Re: trQal

Incidently, some other ideas I've got to trQal that I want to run by
someone:

I firmly intend to evolve two other languages from trQal at some point
namely, Orcish and the Dark Tongue, spoken by a group of "evil" wizards
who have rejected society and the tiresome contention of the Chaos Mages
against the Order Mages in order to pursue their own ends.  Of course, I'm
also going to have to invent a human speech, since Dark tongue will rely
on that as well.

First, though, I want to get TrQal into some sort of order.  I think what
I've got now is only skeletal.  I like Ed's ideas for eructative vowels,
as well as a couple new sounds.  Let me give you a run down of basic trQal
grammar, and see if anyone has any suggestions.  Remember some of the
examples will probably change, phonetically, before the week's done (my
Beowulf presentation is more or less finished, so I have more time to
screw around).

I.  Nouns

    A.  Gender.

Nouns fall into one of three genders, being:
   1.  The "r gender", which contains all things that inspire fear, awe,
or could be considered dangerous.
   2.  The "m gender", containing all things that are edible.
   3.  The "vowel gender", containing all those things considered
insignificant, or small.

1.  The "r gender".
    These include all nouns considered dangerous, awe-inspiring, or
fearful.  Most natural events and objects -- storms, rivers,
floods, etc. are included whether terrible or not.  R gender nouns end in
either r or l  The paradigm noun is trQal, meaning "a
troll".  Plurality in the r gender is indicated by adding -c, thus trQalc,
"trolls".

2.  The "m gender".
    These include all things that are edible, including almost all
animals, humans, and a few plants.  Our paradigm noun is grm,
meaing "a deer."  Nouns in the m gender indicate plurality by adding -a,
hence grma, "deer".

3.  The "vowel gender."
    Includes all things of no significance, animals too small to eat,
cubs, and inedible plants, as well as small natural objects.  Our
paradigm noun is stlkHe, meaning "tree."  (Here's an example of how
tongue-twisting troll can be to the human who has grown
up speaking a civilized language.  Breaking the word into syllables can
help:  "stlk-He"  It sounds a lot like an English speaker
saying "stalk, huh!".)  Plurality in vowel gender nouns is irregular, and
must be learned for each noun.  The plural of stlkHe is
stlkHu.

Nouns indicate the accusative by adding the suffix -tr.

Genitive relationships are indicated by proximity.  "grm trQal" (the
troll's deer).

These suffixes never take the accent.

Definitness is sometimes -- although rarely compared to most human
languages that indicate it -- indicated with the word gu.
While this could be translated "the", one might come closer to the sense
of the prefix by translating it "that very".  gu never takes
accent.  "gu grm" -- "That very deer. . . "  The plural of gu is gum.

Verbs can be turned into nouns by the edition of the following suffixes,
which take the accent:

One who does the action of a verb -- al, am, u (plural o)
One upon whom the action is done -- tral, tram, tru (plural tro)
Tool with which one performs the action -- ul, um, tu (plural du)

-----------


Verbs decline for number and mood, but not for tense.

Trollish has three moods:  "hungry," "horny," and "satisfied."  (These are
direct translations of the trolls' descriptions of their
verbal moods)  We might say "forceful imperative/subjunctive," "polite
imperative/subjunctive" and "indicative."  The three moods
for each verb are irregular, and must be learned for each word.  The
declension for number, however, is regular through almost
all verbs.  Moods are always listed in word lists as satisfied (hungry,
horny).

Trollish has only two numbers: self and other.

------------------------

III.  Adjectives

Adjectives agree with their nouns in number and gender.  Most adjectives
are regular.

qox -- deliciously bitter

qoxr -- r gender singular        qoxrc -- r gender plural
qoxem -- m gender singular     qoxma -- m gender plural
qox -- vowel gender singular  qoxe -- vowel gender plural

engqox -- more deliciously bitter
toqox -- most deliciously bitter

Trollish doesn't have articles, but commonly uses words similar to "this,
that, that yonder" to indicate spatial relationship.  These
words follow, and are slightly irregular.

qe -- this

qel -- r gender singular    qelc -- r gender plural
qem -- m gender sing.    qema -- m gender pl.
qe -- vowel gen. sing.    qu -- vowel gen. pl.

te -- that

tr -- r gender sing.    telc -- r gender pl.
tem -- m gen. sing.    tema -- m gen. pl.
te -- vowel gen sing.    tu -- vowel gen. pl.

HOk -- that yonder

Hr -- r gen. sing.    Hlc -- r gen. pl.
Hokem -- m gen sing.    Hokma -- m gen. pl.
Hok -- vowel gen. sing.    Hoke -- vowel gen. pl.

IV.  Adverbs

Adverbs agree with verbs in mood only.  Some adverbs are irregular, and
when so, are listed in the same manner as verbs.
Adverbs can be made by adding the vowel -a to the vowel gender singular
form of the adjective.

drka, "coldly" (from adjective drk, meaning " deeply cold.")  -- satisfied
mood
drkam -- hungry mood
drkl -- horny mood

Adverbs in Trollish cannot modify adjectives, unlike English and most
other human languages.

The adverb "not" is irregular.  It is guX (gr, egu).

V.  Postpositions, conjunctions, and particles.

Trollish indicates dative and instrumental relations by using a very small
number of postpositions and relying on context.  An
almost full list of postpositions follow:

to, toward                                Ca
in, into                                      qatl
of, from, far, out of                    eng
with, beside, near, next to          zr
around                                      Homl
toward quickly                          koz
by means of                              du
like, in the manner of                meCo
indirect object marker                ho

Trollish is a language relatively rich in conjunctions.  In fact, the
conjunction used often indicates the structure of a sentence.
Almost every sentence in Trollish in introduced by one of several
conjunctions.  A partial list:

Used for individual words:
o. . . o . . . (both. . .  and. . . )
ge. . . ge. . . (neither. . . nor. . . )
ke . . . se. . . (surely . . . but not . . .)

Used for clauses, sentences:

o (and)
teHa (then)
ge (but)
ong (previously)
trX (while)
meha (however, on the other hand)
ku (therefore, so that)
emHa. . . emHa (when. . . then)
ze (because)

To introduce an interrogative:  "Qu- -ha"  (hence, Qupekatha (what place,
where))