Rodnús [was Re: Vowelless Sentences]

Dirk Elzinga gov ra:

> Joe:
>
>  Is there more to be seen on your project? I like the sound of
>  the vowelless sentence you posted earlier.
>
>  Dirk
The language (whose poor name has gone from rodyath to rodeys to rodn~as to
rodnús) has been in development for about 4 months.    It features a two part
preposition system, where movement and distance are prefixed and relative
position are suffixed, e.g.

sor ne-tenzl~-o-dí  zomb sr~
I  into-house-behind walked (MOV)
I entered the house from behind

  verbs take varying class markers to indicate the type of action a verb
represents.  in the previous example, "sr~" is the marker for actions of
motion. verbs also make a distinction between volitional actions (which take
the infinitive ending -ex) and non-volitional actions (which take -ax).  The
root "somb-" means both "to walk" and "to dream", but when class markers and
verb endings are added, "sombex sr~" means "to walk" and "sombax xa" means
"to dream", where xa is the class marker for mental actions.  verbs can take
varying class markers idiomatically, so "sombax san", where san is the class
marker for emotional actions, means "to wish for, dream of".  The most
idiomatic use of class marking is to actually use an unambiguous verb stem,
usually profanely.  the stem "kín-" means "to fuck", and therefore is to
obscene to be ambiguous with any more reputable word.  the idiomatic class
marker "kín makes anything obscene or lecherous, and can imply almost
anything, for example:

tam  sr~-tenzl~ zey zomb kín
he    to-house   her  went  (FUCK)
he went to her house (presumably to have sex with her)

tam sr~tenzl~ zey zomb xud
he   to-house  her  went  (BREAK THE LAW)
he went to her house, presumably to rob it.

phrases such as these add the element of assumption: the class markers don't
reflect facts.  the factual versions of the previous sentences are as follows:

tam sr~tenzl~ zey zomb kín-wam        sey sr~
he   to-house   her went   fuck-(PHYS) her (MOV)
he went to her house, intending to have sex with her.

tam sr~-tenzl~ zey zomb  xud-wam              sr~
he   to-house   her  went   break-law-(PHYS) (MOV)
he went to her house, intending to break the law in some way.

because of this flexibility, the 700-or-so words in the dictionary I've
collected can be stretched to cover huge territory lexically.

There's also a good deal of consonant voicing and devoicing in almost all
parts of speech to indicate the genitive case, aspect, tense, etc.

The language has 8 genders and a fair number of inflections that would in
other languages be adjectives and adverbs.

Once i got it into a stable state, I started writing epigrams about fictional
characters in it.  these form the basis of the culture for the language.  the
characters are simply embodiments of complex things that can be referred to
in a sentence.  one of the earliest characters, "Lerem Rambamb" (which means
"boss Rambamb") represents the concept of "see no evil, hear no evil, speak
no evil:

Lerem Rambamb kolza pazr~
nr~ sevr~ kond-es ye sentr~


Lerem Rambamb kolza    pazr~
Boss   Rambamb seems happy
nr~  sev-r~     kond-es        ye  sentr~
but  time-this see-(SENSE) not bad

which means:

Boss Rambamb seems happy,
this is due to the fact that he refuses to look at bad things

The sense of the epigram comes from the fact that "kond-es ye" is a
volitional statement.

These characters are slowly being added to the literature of my language in
order to build up a culture called senr~zevrú.  The culture consists of me
and some friends, but unlike a micronation, we are a culture without a
homeland, and it is the power of our great cultural heritage that keeps us
together.  The other day, my friend Redzm~ Rov (well, his real name is Dave)
by unanimous decree became the first embodiment of Lerem Rambamb.  His duty
is to frequently reassure everyone that "everything is fine", or, in rodnús,
"bab sagoy!"  I'm not sure whether the senr~zevrú deal is going to last very
long, but it's a good time.