Conlang Relay 22/Idaltu

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Text in Idaltu

Makaqwarekoluxzaharamanoxza

Wærijaharamanongoharahamnetudxa. Zahejashoqefazafakochafaxahurxurabxa. Atanxanejashoqemorahantubxahurxuraxza.

Esmumarijamakokwanoxaharamanohi. Tukujamakoqecheha. Kajejashokozaso. Quxajashoqehalazabxa. Arawiltengujadbekamoqemakoxzakwanoqudungmekozaxza. Tinujadbestoqetkwanodxaqirupu. Kanustoqeshodiruzfewarulu.

Zahejaharamanoqeqechulufazakudahurxuraqqa. Etsekanujaljushoqeshi. Araqurdunijawareshodxa. Oh! Ækibajujashoqewareqirupu! Kamejashoqewarebajalu. Tunojashohingoware. Laxajaqarto. Shulejakwano. Bau! Bau! Bau! Zeqejashoharamanohi. Belejaharamanongo. Hafajashoqekwano. Xogujakwanongo. Ngukijashongo. Bawajashobuqilu. Iqnebelejamorangowolaluzalu. Iqeloqijasha. Iqezeqejasha. Tanojashaxangohurxura. Tanojaharamanoxawareqe. Kolejasho. Esmuwedajahurxuraqediru. Paxejashiqazefalufa. Herijashingo.

Smooth English

The story of the fall of the merchant

The merchant made ready for a trading journey. He put pots and baskets upon a wagon. He harnessed a mare before the wagon.

Meanwhile a boy walked towards the merchant. The boy seemed hungry. He went into a house. There, he looked for food. But the parents of the boy forbade the dog to enter the house. They ordered for the dog to sit beside the door. They tied it to the door with a rope.

Finally the merchant put the last pot on top of the wagon. He wanted to tie it down. But he had not enough rope. Oh! He found a rope by the door! He pulled the rope towards himself. The knot loosened. The dog was free. Bow! Wow! Wow! It ran towards the merchant. The merchant was afraid. He kicked the dog. The dog was hurt and surprised, barking wildly. This made the mare very afraid too. It started to jump and run. It pulled the wagon along. The merchant was pulled along by the rope. He fell over. At the same time the wagon hit the tree. It broke in many pieces and was destroyed.

Some grammar notes

Idaltu is designed to be a non-recursive language. It has been theorised that recursion is the only feature of language unique to humans (Hauser, M., Chomsky, N. & Fitch, W. T. 2002. The Language Faculty: What is it, who has it, and how did it evolve? Science, 298, 1569-1579.), which I interpret to mean that it was the last major innovation of human speech before we reached the condition we have today, a modern, flexible language with full freedom of expression. Recursion probably is hard-wired in us, because it is a reasonable guess that features that are universal or near universal in human language (or human characteristics in general) are hard-wired. Many of the other universals (or near-universals) that do not depend on recursion are present in Idaltu. However, it does not, by definition, have statements and clauses like normal human language. Instead, I will refer to them as calls. They are more structured than usual animal calls, and the structural elements are similar to the ones of modern language, thus I will mostly use commonplace terminology when referring to them. Each call has this structure:

<aspect>-VERB-<tense>-<mood>-<subject>-<voice>-<object>-<other arguments>, where only the VERB is mandatory.

Which looks pretty commonplace for a polysynthetic language at first glance. In my model of language history the languages were polysynthetic at first when they reached the recursive stage, and have been evolving towards more analytic structures since, though not necessarily in a linear fashion.

In place of a complex syntax, Idaltu has complex semantics. The things we can say just by adjusting the syntax a little, or a lot – in principle there's no limit – Idaltu has to invent new words for. It has been suggested that there is a correlation between the size of a language's phoneme inventory and its geographical distance from the site of the origin of the human species. This indicates that pre-human language had rich phoneme inventories, which is an advantage if you need such a large vocabulary. But the evolution of logical structures like the above probably reduced the need for huge inventories a bit, as before them you had to invent new words for each logical distinction. The phonetic ability of humans probably evolved to its full extent before this logical structure evolved. Then the need for it declined, and modern languages get by with just a small fraction of the sounds that it's actually possible for us to make. For Idaltu, I propose a comparatively rich inventory, which I will represent by the reasonably close Latin letters and digraphs to save me from too much work. I'm not a natural IPA typist.

Each of the subject, object or other arguments above are nominal items. They are declined for singular, dual and plural number and for a large number of cases, of which I will only bother you (or myself) with the relevant ones below. Pronouns are not in principle different from other nouns and work in the same way. Since the nominal arguments are marked, they can switch places for emphasis. The scheme above is the neutral one. All nouns as well as verbs have theme vowels, and attribute markers can be inserted between them and the roots. The structure of a nominal argument is as follows:

NOUN-<attribute>-<theme>-<number>-<case>, where only the NOUN is mandatory.

There is a large number of verbal aspects, plenty of moods and a number of voices, but only 3 tenses, past, present and future. I will only bother you, or myself for now, with the ones that are relevant for this text.

For the vocabulary below I have used Bengtson's and Ruhlen's 27 Proto-World reconstructions as my main inspiration. Not because I believe they have reached an accurate description of what language was like before it started to diverge, but because I like them and think they are a nice starting point for this experiment. I think however that the freedom of word invention, which amounts to the starting point for divergence, was evolved long before the invention of recursion, so Proto-World belongs to a much earlier stage than Idaltu. But the 27 of B & R have a moderately rich phoneme inventory which is suitable for my purpose. Sergei Starostin's online database has been useful for the rest.

Idaltu is currently very experimental and so far I have done away with all verbal and nominal class distinctions. But I can foresee that something will crystallise out of the theme vowel system if I ever have time to work further on it.

Vocabulary

Roots

akud
(a) last
baja
(n) joy
baju
(v) find
bau
(interj.) dog’s bark
bawa
(v) bark
bele
(v) fear
buqi
(n) wildness, madness
cheha
(n) hunger
diru
(n) tree
efal
(a) many
faxe
(v) break
faza
(n) pot
hafa
(v) kick
hala
(n) food
hamnetu
(n) journey
hantu
(n) front
haqe
(v) see
hara
(v) trade, exchange, switch
harahamnetu
(n) trading journey
haramano
(n) merchant
hawa
(v) will
heri
(v) destroy
hurxura
(n) wagon
kaje
(v) go
kame
(v) grasp
kamo
(n) family, parents
kanu
(v) tie
kocha
(n) basket
kole
(v) fall
kolu
(n) fall
koza
(n) house
kwano
(n) male dog
laxa
(v) loosen
loqi
(v) jump
makaq
(n) word
makaqware
(n) story
mako
(n) boy
mano
(n) man
mari
(v) walk
mora
(n) mare, female horse
nguki
(v) be shocked, surprised
oh
(interj.) surprise
qarto
(n) knot
qazu
(n) piece
qechu
(n) end
qiru
(n) door
qudu
(n) inside
qurduni
(v) be insufficient
quxa
(v) look, look for
sha
(pron) 3s, fem.
shi
(pron) 3s, neut.
sho
(pron) 3s, masc.
shule
(v) liberate, get free
sto
(pron) 3p
tano
(v) pull, draw
tanxane
(v) harness (a draft animal) to something
tinu
(v) sit
tuku
(v) show, display
wiltengu
(v) not will
ware
(n) rope
weda
(v) hit
wola
(n) greatness, bigness, muchness
wæri
(v) make, prepare
xogu
(v) be hurt, feel bad
za
(pron) demonstrative
zahe
(v) put, set
zeqe
(v) run


Formants

(null)
unmarked - present tense, indicative mood, active voice, punctual-stative aspect, singular number, absolutive case
a
(a) progressive - emphasising progress in action
ara
(a) contrary - indicating contrariness to the previous statement
bxa
(c) locative - indicates place
dbe
(m) jussive - indicates an order
dxa
(c) dative - marks indirect object
esmu
(a) simultaneous - indicates simultaneous action
etse
(a) terminative - marks finalising action
hi
(c) allative - indicates movement towards
iqe
(a) inceptive - marks start of action
iqne
(a) inchoative - marks start of state change
jo
(t) past
lju
(m) desiderative - indicates wish
lu
(c) instrumental - means, manner (adverbial) or time
ngme
(c) ablative - movement away
ngo
(v) middle - allows the subject of a transitive action to be marked other than by the ergative, for example to act upon itself.
fa
(n) plural
pu
(c) adessive - marks adjacent location
qe
(c) ergative - marks the subject in a transitive action
qqa
(c) superessive - marks location on top of something
so
(c) illative - movement into
zfe
(c) pertingent - marks something that touches another thing
xa
(c) comitative - marks accompaniment, togetherness
xza
(c) genitive - possession
za
(c) translative - marks turning from one state to another
æki
(a) delimitative - indicates finite extent


Abbreviations

a
aspect, or attribute
c
case
m
mood
n
number
t
tense
v
verb, or voice
Conlang Relay 22
Exolangs Ring General Ring Poetry Ring
Pete Bleackley — iljenatorch
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