Verse:Irta/Knench
Knench /nɛnt͡ʃ/ (natively /ˈkʰnɔ̃ːnɪð/) is a divergent descendent of Canaanite spoken in Lõis Great Britain. It does not lose Semitic triconsonantal morphology, but it loses older Semitic conjugated verb forms in favor of constructions using the infinitive construct. Knench is the second largest Tdūrzů British minority language after Welsh, in fact its syntax is similar to Colloquial Welsh.
Revamp prosody to a more Welshy one
- dobor [ˈðoːvʌɾ] "a thing"
- doboraz [ðʌˈvoːɾaz] "the thing"
- daberi [ðaˈvɛːɾi] "things" (affection; plural -īm -> -i)
- daberimel [ðavɛˈɾiːmɛl] "the things"
- qhymůr [ˈqʰəmʉɾ] "donkey"
- jůno [ˈjʉːnʌ] "a pigeon"
- jůnozů [jʉˈnoːzʉ] "the pigeon"
- jůnůd [ˈjʉːnʉð] "pigeons" (Hebrew has yōnīm but let's use the f. pl. ending)
- jůnůdil [jʉˈnʉːðil] "the pigeons"
Phonology
Knench phonology is complex, with underlying phonemes resulting in multiple phones depending on the phonetic environment (most importantly, stressed versus unstressed syllables; prevocalic or non-prevocalic for certain laryngeals)
Vowels
Consonants
Phones
Underlying consonants
- |ʔ| x (often lost) from Old Knench /ʔ/
- |v| v from Old Knench /b/
- |ɣ| g from Old Knench /g/
- |ð| d from Old Knench /d/
- |h| ḧ (often lost) from Old Knench /h/
- |w| w from Old Knench /w/
- |z| z from Old Knench /z/ (from PSem *z and ð)
- |qʰ| qh from Old Knench /χ/ (from PSem *x and *ħ)
- |t=| t from Old Knench /tˁ/
- |j| j from Old Knench /j/
- |kʰ| ch from Old Knench /k/
- |l| l from Old Knench /l/
- |m| m from Old Knench /m/
- |n| n from Old Knench /n/
- |s| çh from Old Knench /ts/ (from PSem *s)
- |ʁ̃| ɣ from Old Knench /ʁ̃/ (from PSem *ɣ and *ʕ)
- |f| f from Old Knench /p/
- |p=| p from Latin/Romance /p/
- |ts=| ç from Old Knench /tsˁ/ (from PSem *ṣ, *ṣ́, and *θ̣)
- |k=| c from Old Knench /q/
- |r| r from Old Knench /r/
- |ʂ| s from Old Knench /s̠/ (from PSem *š, *ś, and *θ)
- |tʰ| th from Old Knench /t/
qh is in a process of merging with ch in Modern Knench.
Vocalizables
Vocalizables are underlying consonants that have vocalized forms when reduced or manifest as vowel lengthening or closing elements of diphthongs. These are: |ʔ|, |h|, |r|, |ʁ̃|, |l|, and |w|.
Mutation
Morphology
Verbs
Citation form is the singular imperative (same as the bare infinitive construct)
Knench verbs can be from inherited binyanim (fɣul, iffɣel, itfəɣel, fəɣel, afɣel, istəfɣel) or from noun patterns (Assumes speakers are aware of literal meanings of the syntactic constructions)