Norreyna- YANC part I

For ages I've tried to create a Germanic-based conlang, but I didn't like
any of the ones I came up with. This time I may have struck gold! Norreyna
(for those who have eyes to see it, it is descended from Norrœna- Old Norse)
to me resembles Aidan Grey's Aelya, which happens to be one of my favourite
conlangs. Norreyna is somewhat of a "step-sister" language to Aelya, which
was derived from Old Irish. Enough of the waft, here's the first part of a
quick sketch.

1. Orthography and Pronunciation

1.1 Consonants

b   /b/, aspirated, like English
c   always /k/, also aspirated
ch  /x/
cy  /tS/ (counted as one letter)
d  /d/ dental, aspirated
f   /f/
g  always /g/, aspirated
gy  /dZ/ (counted as one letter)
h   /h/, in some dialects is silent
l  /l/, always clear, never velarised
m  /m/
n  /n/
ng  /N/
p  /p/ aspirated
r  /r/ a trill
s  always /s/
sh  /S/
t  /t/ dental, aspirated
th /T/
w /w/
y  /j/

1.2 Vowels
a  /a/
e  /E/
i  /i/
o  /o/
ö /9/
u  /u/
ü /y/
y  /@/
I'm not entirely happy with the representation of ö and ü- I don't like
tremas. Any suggestions would be more than welcome.
yr  /vocalic r (don't know the SAMPA)/
yl  /vocalic l/
ym  /vocalic m/
yn  /vocalic n/

1.3 Diphthongs
ay /aj/
ey  /ej/
oy  /oj/

2. Nouns
2.1 Nouns do not have gender. I was toying with the idea of collapsing ON
neuter and masculine into one and then having a dual gender system, but the
declensions for both genders turned out the same so analogy came into play
and Norreyna nouns follow natural, not grammatical gender.

2.2 Norreyna nouns distinguish two numbers and two cases- singular and
plural, direct and oblique. There are three declensions- nouns which change
their vowel in the plural make class 1, class 3 nouns are the old r-stems
and all the rest are lumped together in class 2. Below are three examples:
lan "land", nod "poverty" and fadyr "father"

singular
        1               2               3
dir.    lan             nod             fadyr
obl.    lana            noda            fado

plural
dir.    lona            nodyr           fedra
obl.    londo           nodo            fedro

The d in in the oblique plural is an irregularity. ON -nd- normally
becomes -n-, but not before o or u.

2.3 Adjectives and nouns are treated the same and decline the same. An
adjective is in concord with its noun, and generally comes before the noun.

3. Articles
Norreyna has two articles, the definite and the indefinite:

singular
        def.            ind.
dir.    en              an
obl.    eno             ano

plural
dir.    ene             ane
obl.    enna            anna

The articles always come first in a noun-phrase.

4. Pronouns
4.1 Personal Pronouns
        subject         dir. object     ind. obj                possesive
1s      ec              mec             mey             min
2s      thü             thec            they            thin
3sm     say             than            tham            thes
3sf     sü              thay            thar            thara
3sn     tha             tha             thi             thes
3ref    -               sec             sey             sin
1p      wey             os              os              way
2p      ey              id              id              ida
3p      tho             tho             tham            thara

4.2 Interrogative Pronouns
                subj.   dir. obj                ind. obj                poss
animate         cwer    cwenyr          cwam            cwess
inanimate       cwa     cwa             cwam            cwess

Well, that's it for now. Verbs and numbers will follow in the next posting.
Any comments, recommendations, questions and so on are more than welcome.

Dan


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cuebra um deroát a zi sem,
Break a piece of wood and I am there,
                                            cuoca um perro tu me meitera
  Dan Jones                         Lift a rock and you will find me