Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: Nyenya'a

From:Elliott Lash <al260@...>
Date:Thursday, October 18, 2001, 22:07
In a message dated Thu, 18 Oct 2001 5:04:44 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Frank
George Valoczy <valoczy@...> writes:

> Well here is a little bit of rather premilinary information on Nyenya'a, > my newest language, based mostly on Tundra Nenets and Japanese. > > Phonology > > Vowels > > a E i o u > > [u] after a palatalised consonant or [S] becomes [y] > [i] after a vowel becomes [I], though it stays more or less a separate > vowel. Technically there are no diphthongs, but in practice (especially in > rapid speech), they do exist. > > Consonants > > p t k ? > b d > w s S > j ts x > m n N > l > r > > p b m t d n l r x can be palatalised > [?] becomes [q] before a consonant. > > Syllable structure is CV. The only consonant that can be syllable-final is > [?] > > Nyenya'a is written in a modified form of Hiragana. > > Miscellaneous Bits of Morphology > > Nyenya'a has classifiers, like Japanese: > > animals: [xiki] > books, etc: [satsu] > paiks: [soku] > buildings: [kE?] > levels, floors, etc: [kaI] > times, occasions: [soNu] > people: [ni?] > flat objects: [maI] > cylindrical objects: [lapi] > bizarrely shaped objects: [ma?E] > spirits, gods: [kamE] > > Particles or Cases: > > Whether these are particles or in fact cases is not yet clear: > > Topic: wa > Subject: Na > Accusative: ?o > Genitive: no > Dative: ni > Locative: na > Allative: e > Ablative: da > Comitative: sa > Instrumental: jE > Interrogative: ko
Are these all derived from Japanese case particles or are some derived from Nenets cases?
> Verbs > > This is a lot like Japanese: > > to go to be > Present: -dEma minadEma oma > Present negative: -nai minanai onai > Past: -dEmata minadEmata odEmata > Passive: -rE- minarEdEma orEdEma > Causative: -sE- minasEdEma osEdEma > Imperative: -ka minaka oka > Desiderative: -taI minataI otaI > Conditional: -rEba minarEba orEba > Continuative: -mEba minamEba omEba > Frequentative: -rENa minarENa orENa > Habitual: -SEti minaSEti oSEti > Momentanteous: -xali minaxali oxali > Diminutive: -jEtE? minajEtE? ojEtE? > Inchoative: -la? minala? ola? > Reflexive: -wa?a minawa?a owa?a > Infinitive: -ru minaru oru > Nominaliser: -koto minakoto okoto
I like the basic idea, but how do you combine them? Is it going to be like Japanese where interesting pre-forms show up alot? that is: minanai "go-neg" ikanai (japanese) ikanakatta "go-neg-past" Where the "preform" for -nai is "naki" Also, where do most of the suffixes come from?
> Numerals: > > 1 Nopo > 2 sid^ja > 3 n^jaxa > 4 t^jEtu > 5 samaNa > 6 ma?a > 7 si?iwa > 8 sidE > 9 xasuju? > 10 ju? > > Personal Pronouns: > > Informal Formal > 1psg orE mana > 2 omaI pida > 3 ke? xaru > 1ppl orEta? manata? > 2 omaIta? pidata > 3 keqta? xaruta?
It seems like the informal varieties are based on japanese while most of the formal categories are based on Nenets. Is this true? If so, where does "xaru" come from.
> And An Example: > > mana-Na n^jEn^ja?a-no-xilE-?o jarinaI > I-SUBJECT Nyenya'a-GEN-language-ACC speak-PRES NEG > I don't speak [the] Nyenya'a language. > > ----ferko
Very interesting, I like what I see so far! :) Elliott

Reply

Frank George Valoczy <valoczy@...>