Nother/Kirumb
| Kirumb (Kirómbos) | |
|---|---|
| Pronounced: | English: /kəˈrʌm/ Kirumb: [kɪˈruːmβʊs] |
| Timeline and Universe: | Nother |
| Species: | demihumans |
| Spoken: | Southeastern Europe 1st c. BC–500 AD |
| Total speakers: | [no data] |
| Writing system: | Kirumb alphabet |
| Genealogy: | Indo-European Satem Hadwan Kirumb Âdlantki Atlantic |
| Typology | |
| Morphological type: | Fusional |
| Morphosyntactic alignment: | Tripartite |
| Basic word order: | [no data] |
| Credits | |
| Creator: | Muke Tever | ✎ |
| Created: | 2000 |
In Nother, Kirumb (formerly Hadwan and Kaðuhhan) was an Indo-European language spoken by demihumans in Greece and the Balkans in the early centuries AD. The native speakers called the language Kirómbos, which was also the appellation of their own people. In origin the word is an ordinary adjective applied to things of or pertaining to gryphons, and was still occasionally so used in the historical period. Inscriptions found at Corinth attest that ΚΙΡΟΥΜΒΟΣ or ΚΙΡΩΜΒΟΣ was a designation known to at least some human (or at least Grecophone) inhabitants of the city. The modern name used in English is Kirumb.
Phonology
Vowels
The Kirumb vowel system is simplified from the Indo-European, the original mid vowels *e and *o having merged into the high vowels *i and *u.
Kirumb /yː/ has no short counterpart due to continuing a PIE diphthong *au, an unusual change via a Proto-Hadwan sound symbolized as *øː.
| Vowels | ||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Front | Near-front | Central | Near-back | Back | ||||||
| High | ɪ iː | (ʏ) yː | ʊ uː | |||||||
| Mid | (ɛ eː) | (ɔ oː) | ||||||||
| Low | ɑ ɑː | |||||||||
Parentheses denote phonemes found only in borrowed words (chiefly from Greek). The mid back /ɔ oː/ is harder to attest than the other foreign sounds, as it was, until relatively late, frequently spelled with the same letters as /ʊ uː/—and those letters, o and ó, were only the Greek omicron and omega.
| Examples | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| /ɑ/ | mita | /mɪˈtɑ/ | "with" |
| /ɑː/ | giná | /ɡɪˈnɑː/ | "woman" |
| /ɪ/ | biric | /ˈβɪrɪtʃ/ | "he carries" |
| /iː/ | nír | /niːr/ | "man" |
| /ʊ/ | gíotos | /ɡijʊˈtʊs/ | "life" |
| /uː/ | tsamó | /tsɑˈmuː/ | "human being" |
| /ʏ/ | kuríos | /kʏ.rɪˈjʊs/ | "lord" (κύριος) |
| /yː/ | ús | /yːs/ | "ear" |
There are few diphthongs appearing in native Kirumb words, with more appearing in Greek loans.
| Examples | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| /ɑʊ/ | lavjiros | /ˈlɑʊdʒɪrʊs/ | "free" (as in liberty) |
| /ɑɪ/ | kraistór | /krɑɪsˈtuːr/ | "a judge" |
Consonants
| Consonants | ||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bilabial | Labiod. | Dental | Alveolar | Post-alv. | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |||||||||
| Nasal | m | n | ŋ | |||||||||||||
| Plosive | (p) | t | d | k | g | |||||||||||
| Fricative | β | f | s | (z) | ʃ | (x) | h | |||||||||
| Affricate | tʃ | dʒ | ||||||||||||||
| Approximants | w | j | ||||||||||||||
| Trill | r | |||||||||||||||
| Lateral Approximant | l | |||||||||||||||
The system is somewhat asymmetrical.
| Examples | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| /m/ | molbí | /mʊlˈβiː/ | "an evil" |
| /n/ | nava | /nɑˈwɑ/ | "nine" |
| /ŋ/ | ŋiošóm | /ˈŋjʊ.ʃu:m/ | "I allow/entrust" |
| /p/ | psalmos | /psɑlˈmʊs/ | "a psalm" (ψαλμός) |
| /β/ | boró | /βʊˈruː/ | "a rami" |
| /t/ | tó | /tuː/ | "you" |
| /d/ | dviflís | /dwɪˈfliːs/ | "double" |
| /k/ | kraima | /ˈkrɑɪ.mɑ/ | "a judgment" |
| /ɡ/ | gniió | /ɡniˈjuː/ | "a dragon" |
| /f/ | foktos | /fʊkˈtʊs/ | "wounded" |
| /s/ | só | /suː/ | "a dog" |
| /ʃ/ | šoŋ | /ʃʊŋ/ | "I" |
| /z/ | zéta | /ˈzeːta/ | "zeta" (ζῆτα) |
| /x/ | xé | /ˈxeː/ | "chi" (χεῖ) |
| /h/ | hilšóm | /ˈhɪl.ʃuːm/ | "I throw out" |
| /tʃ/ | coraŋc | /tʃʊˈrɑŋtʃ/ | "in your presence" |
| /dʒ/ | jaios | /dʒɑˈjʊs/ | "a god" |
| /w/ | vai | /ˈwɑɪ/ | "we" |
| /j/ | iohmót | /jʊhˈmuːt/ | "because" |
| /r/ | ravdóm | /ˈrɑʊduːm/ | "I cry out" |
| /l/ | lakkos | /lɑkˈkʊs/ | "pool" |
Stress and accent
Kirumb has a stress accent, whose placement in a word is determined by its part of speech. Stress in verbs and stress in non-verb words are determined by two separate sets of rules.
Verbs
In general, verbs are accented on the initial syllable. However, derivative verbs, statives and futures are usually stressed on the derivational suffix.
For example in the verb biróm 'I am carrying', the forms biróm, birir 'you are carrying', biric 'he is carrying', etc. are stressed on the initial syllable. The stative of this verb, which is built on the extended stem borsko-/borski-, is accented on the sko-/ski- syllable that forms it: borskóm 'I carry', borskir 'you carry', borskic 'he carries' all bear stress on the second syllable.
Non-verbs
Nonverbal parts of speech were, in the parent language, regularly stressed within the first three syllables, on the farthest-right, heaviest syllable. (In SPC notation, 123/123/123L.)
The weight of the syllable is determined by the length of the vowel or by whether it has a coda consonant. Kirumb grammarians asserted that sonant codas (l, m, n, ŋ, r) do not count for syllable weight; if this was the case, this rule did not carry down to the daughter languages, which reflect a state of affairs where all coda consonants have the same weight.
The protosystem is mainly inherited in Kirumb; however, the loss of an initial i sometimes leaves the accent sooner than the early rules dictate, hence exceptions like navanos /nɑˈwɑnʊs/ 'ninth' and lavjiros /ˈlɑʊdʒɪrʊs/ 'free'—instead of the expected */nɑwɑˈnʊs/, */lɑʊdʒɪˈrʊs/—from earlier *inavanos and *ilavjiros.
Vocabulary
- Main article: Kirumb lexicon
External links
- Old website: http://frath.net/kirumb
