# Midêkʰ This is one of several conlanguages [][@:Rinna] is working on for an eventual Dark Dungeons X (BECMI D&D retroclone) setting. (fae welcomes input.) rinna uses the token "TKTK" to mark places where more stuff is needed later. a minimal map of the world in question is below for a bit of context. it is also necessary to know that all or most sentient creatures in the setting are anthropomorphic animals, but that the corresponding ordinary animals also exist but are considered non-sentient. ![map of an as-yet unnamed world, with three contents and a few islands](https://lyssa-rpg-docs.neocities.org/media/blorb-world-map-minimal.png){width=600} Rinna has the following goals for Midêkʰ: * it will serve as a proto-language for a number of languages spoken along the west coast and within the temperate interior (mostly the 30°-45° zone) of the southeastern continent, possibly plus some further-flung offshoots. * fae wants to build it around a system of biliteral or triliteral consonantal roots (as in Afro-Asiatic languages such as Tamazight, Egyptian, Amharic, Hebrew, Akkadian, etc.) * fae is inclined to include few vowel qualities, but with some additional complication such as pitch accent, vowel length, or extensive use of diphthongs that may develop into a more extensive vowel system in daughter languages. * it should not be too difficult to pronounce for the native US English and Rioplatense Spanish speakers likely to play in the setting, particularly since the most likely places for faese games to start out will have this language prominent. but some such difficulties can be resolved in daughter languages via sound change. * the proto-language and descendant languages will mostly but perhaps not exclusively be used for names (of people/places/texts/etc.) ## Phonology To help with approachability for English/Spanish speakers, [][@:Rinna] opted to draw inspiration from [Wikipedia's account of Proto-Indo-European phonology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-European_phonology#Vowels){title="Wikipedia on reconstructed PIE phonology"}. Consonant table: | | labial | coronal | p.velar | velar | l.velar | glottal | |-----------|:------:|:-------:|:-------:|:-----:|:-------:|:-------:| | nasal | m | n | | ŋ | | | | voiceless | p | t | kʲ | k | kʷ | | | voiced | b | d | gʲ | g | gʷ | | | aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | kʲʰ | kʰ | kʷʰ | | | fricative | f | s | | | | h | | liquid | | r l | | | | | The language featured three series of stops: voiceless, voiced, and aspirated (voicing was not phonemic in aspirated consonants). Each of these series included a labial stop, a coronal (dental or alveolar) stop, and three variants of a velar stop: a plain variant, a palatalized variant, and a labialized variant. There were three fricatives: a (bi)labial fricative, a coronal fricative, and a glottal fricative. There were three nasal stops: labial, coronal, and velar. There were two coronal approximants: rhotic and lateral. Both the nasals and the approximants could be used as syllable nuclei. There were three vowels: `*e` (mid front), `*o` (mid back), and `*i` (close front). Each vowel could be pronounced long or short, which was phonemic. Long vowels are transcribed with a macron. One syllable in each multisyllabic word was emphasized, likely with a raised pitch (marked with an acute accent on the vowel). Long vowels of accented syllables are marked with a circumflex for ease of processing. A syllable begins with a consonant followed by either a vowel, a nasal, or an approximant as a nucleus. A syllable with a short vowel can additionally have a final consonant. ## Morphology Most content words are derived from a "root" (TKTK) consisting of two to four (but usually three) consonants, which are combined with a particular template (TKTK) of surrounding and intervening sounds (mostly vowels) to form a particular word. Roots will be represented with their consonants separated by hyphens, for example: `m-d-kʰ` (which is the root for language). Templates can include any vowel but only certain consonants: nasal stops (n m ŋ), the coronal and glottal fricatives (s h), and the voiceless coronal stop (t). ### Adjectives Unlike nouns and verbs, adjective are not derived from using a combination of root and template, with the exception of the active and passive participles of verbs. Some adjectives are fixed words, but most are the result of affixation of other words. Adjectives are marked for number, gender, and case to match the noun modified. ### Nouns Nouns are marked for number (singular and plural) and case using a prefix for case and a suffix for number. Each noun also has a gender: either masculine, feminine, or neuter. The cases present in the language were: * Nominative: used for the subject of the verb. * Accusative: used for the object of transitive verbs. * Vocative: used for a party directly addressed by the speaker. * Dative: used for the recipient or beneficiary of an action. * Prepositional: used for the complement of most prepositions, although some prepositions require or allow other cases. ### Verbs Verbs are inflected for tense, aspect, mood, person, and number. Person is first, second, and third. Number is either singular or plural. There are two tenses, which reflect the time at which the action occurred: * Non-past: used for events happening now, in the future, in the immediate past, or at an uncertain time. * Past: used for events that started in the past, but not the immediate past. There are three aspects, although the continuous and habitual are only distinguished in the indicative mood: * Continuous: used to describe an ongoing process. * Habitual: used to describe a recurring or cyclical activity. * Perfective: used to describe an action as a single unit. There are three moods: * Indicative: used for statements of facts. * Optative: used for wishes and hopes, conditional events, and some commands. * Subjunctive: used for hypothetical events, future events, and more polite commands. Issues such as questions and the active or passive voice are marked elsewhere in a sentence. There are three special forms of each verb: * The verbal noun, which functions as a noun and can represent the act of the verb occuring or a object related to the activity described by the verb. The gender of a verbal noun is determined by the verb's conjugation group, but they receive affixes for number and case normally. * The active participle, which functions as an adjective or adverb and indicates that the modified word is related to the subject of the verb. * The passive participle, which functions as an adjective or adverb and indicates that the modified word is related to the verb's object. Both participles receive the normal affixes for number, gender, and case agreement. ## Derivational morphology The derivational morphology of Midêkʰ is based around the combination of a root with a template to form a stem (TKTK). These stems are further modified by infection to arrive at final word forms. This section and the following one on inflectional morphology will represent roots using their consonants separated by hyphens: e.g. m-d-kʰ, p-ŋ-r, h-s-t. Groups of roots sharing only certain components will be represented with a question mark `?` for any unspecified consonants: p-?-r would include p-ŋ-r, p-k-r, p-s-r, etc. Templates will be written with their surrounding and intervening sounds and with the position of each root consonant represented by a plus sign, for example: `+i+ē+`. Groups of templates sharing certain components will be represented using a question mark for any unspecified template positions: for example, `?+i+?+?` represents all noun templates (which all place a short /i/ between the first two consonants). This section and the following will primarily use the root `m-d-kʰ` as an example to express how roots are combined with templates to form stems or words. ### Derivation of noun stems All noun templates place /i/ between the first two consonants of the root, other than the verbal noun patterns which place /ī/ there, a long vowel, instead. These are summarized below, with more details below: | pattern | description | m-d-kʰ | gender | english gloss | |---------|--------------|----------|--------|--------------------------| | +i++é | abstraction | midkʰé | f | linguistics/all language | | +i+ê+ | prototype | midêkʰ | varies | the Midêkʰ language | | so+í+i+ | place | somídikʰ | n | TKTK | | mi+í++o | instrument | mimídkʰo | n | pen, stylus | | +i+és+e | emphasis | midéskʰe | m/f | conversation/command | | hê+i+o+ | personal | hêmidokʰ | m/f | orator, author, sage | | hi+i++í | diminutive | himidkʰí | f | word | | ŋô+i++o | derogative | ŋômidkʰo | m | nonsense, pleading | * The noun of abstraction represents the abstract category of the root, both the set of all of the things (or at least a particular type of thing) encompassed by the root, the idealized concept of the root, and sometimes the academic, artistic, or other sort of field related to the root. The noun of abstraction is not normally used in the plural, but this may have occasionally happened in poetic language to refer to many or all things belonging to the category. * The prototype noun represents the prototypical object related to a root. For some roots, the prototype refers to a specific thing (as "Midêkʰ" for the language) as a proper noun, in which case it cannot be used in the plural and it has feminine gender. In other cases, it refers to a typical type of object related to the root (e.g. p-s-ŋ 'liquid' has the prototype pisêŋ 'water'), in which case the noun may be used in the plural and has neuter gender if it refers to a mindless animal and masculine gender otherwise. * Nouns of place refer to a place associated with the root. * Nouns of instrument refer to a tool used in performing actions associated with the root. * Nouns of emphasis refer to a repetition or intense form of an action related to the root. They are usually masculine, but in some cases a root gives rise to two nouns of emphasis with identical form but with one masculine and one feminine. When this occurs, typically the feminine noun relates to intense action and the masculine noun relates to repeated action. * The personal noun refers to a type of person associated with the root's meaning. The noun is gendered according to the individual being referred to. When not referring to a particular individual of known gender, the word is typically masculine except when the meaning of the word was strongly associated with women. * Diminutives refer to something small or dear related to the root. * Derogative nouns refer to something disapproved of related to the root. * There are also several "common noun" patterns which can give rise to various nouns associated with the root without specific semantic implications from the pattern. Each root only is used with a subset of the common noun patterns. Some patterns for common nouns (with the resulting noun's gender in brackets) include "+í+o+" (f), "to+i+í+" (n), "te+i++ó" (m), "no+i+é+" (f), "si+í+e+" (m). * Finally there are verbal noun patterns that are treated below. ### Derivation of verb stems Verbs are similarly formed by combining a semantic root with one of several patterns. Unlike nouns, the patterns for verbs are grouped into several "forms", each form consisting of several patterns for different uses of a verb. The application of the patterns of a form to a given root are considered different variations of the same verb. Verb forms will be distinguished using a number (e.g. 1st form, 2nd form). Each form has patterns for the non-past tense stem, the past tense stem, the verbal noun, the active participle, and the passive participle. The verb stems must then be inflected for aspect, mood, aspect, number, and person to be used. The patterns for each verb form are indicated in the following table, with information about typical semantics and other properties of the forms described after the table. | Form | non-past | past | verbal noun | active part. | passive part. | |------|----------|----------|-------------|--------------|---------------| | 1st | +é++i | +e+í+ | +ī++é | +ó++o | +o+ó+ | | 2nd | +én+i+ | +e++ín | +î++en | +ó++on | +o+nó+ | | 3rd | hō+e++ó | hō+é+o+o | he+ī+é+ | +ó+ohi+ | he+o++ó | | 4th | +é++it | te+é+i+ | +ī++ís | +ó+si+o | +o+is+ó | | 5th | fe+é+e+ | fí+e+ē+ | fi+ī++í | fo+ó++o | fo+o+ó+ | | 6th | +ém+e+ | +em+ē+é | +ī+mó+ | mo+o+ó+ | mo+ó++o | * The 1st form refers to the action seen as most directly connected with the meaning of the root. They may be either transitive or intransitive depending on the meaning of the verb, although ditransitive 1st form verbs are rare. The verbal noun is of neuter gender. * The 2nd form typically has a meaning related to some action with a lasting effect or impact, although in some cases it is instead an emphatic or more intense version of the root's 1st-form verb. They may be either transitive or intransitive. The verbal noun is of neuter gender. * The 3rd form often functions as a causative, representing a ditransitive form of a transitive 1st or 2nd form verb, or a transitive form of an intransitive 1st or 2nd form verb. When the 3rd form is a causative, it usually serves as causative for both the 1st and 2nd form, not just one of them. Even when not causative in meaning, the 3rd form is always transitive or ditransitive. The verbal noun is of masculine gender. The active participle of ditransitive 3rd form verbs often relates to either or both of the agent and patient of the action, with the passive participle relating solely to the recipient or benefactor. * The 4th form often refers to a reciprocal or repeated action related to the root. 4th form verbs interact atypically with the case system: when they have reciprocal meaning, all parties typically take the nominative case, although for emphasis a single participant can be treated as the subject while a preposition is used to identify other participants; if the verb can ever have reciprocal meaning, it never takes an accusative object; even when the particular verb cannot have reciprocal meaning, any patient of the described action must be marked for the dative case. The verbal noun is of feminine gender. The active and passive participles are generally used to refer to different aspects of the subject(s), often but not always using the active participle for a more agentive aspect of the action. * The 5th form often has a meaning related to either capability of performing some action or the acquisition or possession of a non-physical quality (capability of action perhaps being considered a non-physical quality); in some cases the verb may be used for both meanings. 5th form verbs are only transitive when used to indicate capability. The verbal noun is of masculine gender. The passive participle of 5th form verbs is usually used as a sort of negative: it indicates that something does not have the quality or cannot perform the action. * The 6th form often has a meaning related to either resulting from an action or having or gaining some physical quality, such as colour or shape. As with the 5th form, many of these verbs may be used for both meanings. 6th form verbs are never transitive. The verbal noun is of neuter gender. The active participle of 6th form verbs, similar to the passive participle of 5th form verbs, usually serves as a negative: it indicates that something does not result from the action or does not have the quality. ### Derivation of adjectives As noted above, adjectives are not derived via the combination of a root and pattern (other than the participles of verbs). Instead most of them arise from affixation of existing words. Some of these derivational affixes are listed below: * The prefix "lo-" forms the "relational" adjective from a noun, which indicates that the modified noun is in some fashion related to the noun. * The prefix "tr-" negates an adjective. * The suffixes "-kor" and "-kel" produce comparative forms of an adjective, with "-kor" indicating more and "-kel" less. TKTK ## Inflectional morphology ### Noun and adjective inflection Nouns receive a prefix for case and a suffix for number. Each gender uses a separate set of case prefixes. Adjectives use the same set of number suffixes, and they use the same case markers as neuter nouns when modifying a neuter noun. Adjectives modifying masculine or feminine nouns use slightly different case markers from those used by the noun. Here are the case prefixes: | case | m.noun | m.adj. | f.noun | f.adj. | neuter | |---------------|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------| | nominative | - | - | gr- | gi- | pl- | | accusative | de- | de- | ge- | ke- | po- | | vocative | tʰo- | to- | kʰo- | ko- | pl- | | dative | te- | ti- | gn- | go- | bo- | | prepositional | dē- | dē- | kī- | kī- | pō- | And the number suffixes, which differ depending on whether the stem ends in a vowel or a consonant: | number | after vowel | after consonant | |----------|-------------|-----------------| | singular | -k | - | | plural | -hi | -i | ### Verb inflection Verb stems produced by derivation are inflected for aspect, mood, number, and person. One affix marks aspect and mood, a prefix marks person, and a suffix marks number, with aspect-mood applied before person and number (such that an aspect-mood prefix follows the person prefix and an aspect-mood suffix precedes the number prefix). The verb agrees in person and number with the syntactic subject (the noun or pronoun in the nominative case). The indicative mood uses a prefix for aspect-mood in the continuous aspect, a suffix in the habitual aspect, and the plain stem in the perfective aspect. The indicative habitual suffix is identical to the continuous prefix. In contrast, the optative and subjunctive moods uniformly use suffixes for aspect-mood and do not distinguish the continuous and habitual aspects. All of these aspect-mood aspects are indicated in the table below (with the hyphen marking where the stem is attached): | mood | continuous | habitual | perfective | |-------------|------------|----------|------------| | indicative | bi- | -bi | - | | optative | -r | -r | -n | | subjunctive | -l | -l | -m | The number suffixes for verbs differ depending on whether they follow a vowel or a consonant, and are listed in the table below: | number | after vowel | after consonant | |----------|-------------|-----------------| | singular | -g | - | | plural | -hē | -ē | The person suffixes are invariant and are listed in the table below: | person | prefix | |--------|--------| | 1st | kʰo- | | 2nd | tm- | | 3rd | - | As an example, here are a few inflections of the 2nd-form non-past stem "méndikʰ" (write): * biméndikʰē: they are writing (indicative non-past continuous 3rd-person plural) * tmbiméndikʰ: you(sg.) are writing (indicative non-past continuous 2nd-person singular) * kʰoméndikʰnē: we write (indicative non-past perfective 1st-person plural) ## Syntax As a summary of word order concerns: * Adjectives always follow the noun, but demonstratives and numerals precede it (demonstratives preceding numerals when both are present) * Relative clauses follow the noun. * Prepositions * Typically subject-verb-object, but it may vary * The question particle begins the sentence * Questions do not alter sentence order * Conditional sentences typically places the condition before the conclusion * Comparisons are of the form adjective-marker-standard (i.e. the adjective being compared, an analogue to "than", then the standard against which the comparison is being made) ## Semantics and Pragmatics TKTK ## Writing System TKTK ## Examples TKTK ## Lexicon Lists here are sorted using roughly the collation order of English. ### Roots * m-d-kʰ: language * p-s-ŋ: liquid/water TKTK ### Word stems Format: stem (root): part of speech. gloss (notes). Parts of speech: **n**oun (**m**asculine, **f**eminine, **n**euter, **v**arying by referent), **v**erb (**t**ransitive, **i**ntransitive, **d**itransitive, **4**th form), **adj**ective. Verbs are listed with the present stem separated from the past stem by a slash, but collated according the present stem. * femédekʰ/fímedēkʰ (m-d-kʰ): vi. to be or become sapient, to be capable of language * fepéseŋ/fípesēŋ (p-s-ŋ): vi. to be variable or flexible, to change * fimīdkʰí (m-d-kʰ): nm. sapience * fipīsŋí (p-s-ŋ): nm. mutability, variability, change * fomódkʰo (m-d-kʰ): adj. sapient, capable of language * fopósŋo (p-s-ŋ): adj. variable, flexible, changing * fomodókʰ (m-d-kʰ): adj. non-sapient, incapable of language, mindless * foposóŋ (p-s-ŋ): adj. static, rigid, unmoving * hemīdékʰ (m-d-kʰ): nm. dictation, decree, declaration * hêmidokʰ (m-d-kʰ): nv. orator, author, sage * hepīséŋ (p-s-ŋ): nm. pouring, a pour, a cupful * hêpisoŋ (p-s-ŋ): nv. cupbearer * himidkʰí (m-d-kʰ): nf. word * hipisŋí (p-s-ŋ): nf. pond, lake * hemodkʰó (m-d-kʰ): adj. being dictated to, subservient, representative of * heposŋó (p-s-ŋ): adj. being poured into, filled * hōmedkʰó/hōmédokʰo (m-d-kʰ): vt/vd. to dictate, to cause to say or write * hōpesŋó/hōpésoŋo (p-s-ŋ): vt/vd. to pour (trans.); to pour onto/into (ditrans.) * médkʰi/medíkʰ (m-d-kʰ): vi/vt. speak, say, utter * médkʰit/temédikʰ (m-d-kʰ): v4. to converse or correspond * mémdekʰ/memdēkʰé (m-d-kʰ): vi. to be noisy, to make noise * méndikʰ/medkʰín (m-d-kʰ): vi/vt. write * midêkʰ (m-d-kʰ): nf.sg. the Midêkʰ language * midéskʰe (m-d-kʰ): nf. command, order * midéskʰe (m-d-kʰ): nm. conversation, dialogue (this can refer to a spoken conversation or a written dialogue) * midkʰé (m-d-kʰ): nf.sg. linguistics, language in general * mīdkʰís (m-d-kʰ): nf. act of conversing or corresponding (in the singular it normally refers to one utterance or letter and its response; in the plural it can refer to an entire conversation or the entire correspondence between two or more people) * mīdmókʰ (m-d-kʰ): nn. noise, sound * mídokʰ (m-d-kʰ): nf. book, scroll * mimídkʰo (m-d-kʰ): nn. pen, stylus, other writing instrument * mipísŋo (p-s-ŋ): nn. canal * mīdkʰé (m-d-kʰ): nn. utterance, speech, act of speaking * mîdkʰen (m-d-kʰ): nn. text, act of writing * módkʰo (m-d-kʰ): adj. speaking, vocal * módkʰon (m-d-kʰ): adj. literate, writing * modiskʰó (m-d-kʰ): adj. comprehending, listening * modnókʰ (m-d-kʰ): adj. written, textual, literary * módohikʰ (m-d-kʰ): adj. dictating, imperious, acting indirectly * modókʰ (m-d-kʰ): adj. spoken, verbal, oral * módsikʰo (m-d-kʰ): adj. communicating, expressive * momódkʰo (m-d-kʰ): adj. noisy, loud * momodókʰ (m-d-kʰ): adj. quiet, noiseless, silent * mopósŋo (p-s-ŋ): adj. melted, liquid, wet * moposóŋ (p-s-ŋ): adj. dry * nomidékʰ (m-d-kʰ): nf. message, letter * ŋômidkʰo (m-d-kʰ): nm. nonsense, pathetic request * nôpisŋo (p-s-ŋ): nm. urine * pémseŋ/pemsēŋé (p-s-ŋ): vi. to become liquid, to melt, to be or become wet * pénsiŋ/pesŋín (p-s-ŋ): vi/vt. pool (intr.); cover in liquid, flood, overflow (trans.) * pésŋi/pesíŋ (p-s-ŋ): vi. flow * pésŋit/tepésiŋ (p-s-ŋ): v4. to rise and fall over time (as tides or water level in a lake or river) * pisêŋ (p-s-ŋ): nm. water * pisésŋe (p-s-ŋ): nm. flood * pīsmóŋ (p-s-ŋ): nn. melting * pisŋé (p-s-ŋ): nf.sg. liquids (the state of matter, and the science of its behavior) * pīsŋé (p-s-ŋ): nn. act of flowing * pîsŋen (p-s-ŋ): nn. pool, puddle, act of pooling * pīsŋís (p-s-ŋ): nf. tide, change in level (especially of a fluid) * pósŋo (p-s-ŋ): adj. flowing, fluid * pósŋon (p-s-ŋ): adj. pooling, overflowing, stagnant * posnóŋ (p-s-ŋ): adj. submerged, flooded, overflowed * pósohiŋ (p-s-ŋ): adj. pouring (the one pouring a fluid), being poured, raining * posóŋ (p-s-ŋ): adj. watered (as e.g. plants, soil), irrigated * simídekʰ (m-d-kʰ): nm. language, script * sipíseŋ (p-s-ŋ): nm. mouthful (esp. of liquids) * somídikʰ (m-d-kʰ): nn. TKTK (some sort of language place) * sopísiŋ (p-s-ŋ): nn. body of water or other liquid, esp. an ocean * tepisŋó (p-s-ŋ): nm. blood * tōmidíkʰ (m-d-kʰ): nn. sentence * tōpisíŋ (p-s-ŋ): nn. cup, waterskin, jug