Sevvufery

Sevvufery is a language spoken by the Sevvuferýkilý of Sevvuferý, a country at the centre of contemporary maps of the fictional planet Erad. Its inhabitants are similar to humans, apart from differences in intellectual capacity. Though there has been some change in the language, not much has evolved over time, which is why this page's information was taken from a time when the language has lived for about 200 years.

Phonology

Consonants

Sevvufery has 27 consonants. Some of these are represented using two of the same letter, but they are treated as one letter in writing, and would be considered as such to a native speaker. The same applies for "ΔΓ".

	Bilabial	Labio-dental	Dental	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Retroflex	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyngeal
Plosive	p [p] b [b]		t [t] d [d]					k [k] vv [g]
Nasal	m [m]			n[n]		n[ɳ]*		ΔΓ [ŋ]
Trill				r [r]
Affricate					g[t̠ʃ]		yy [dʑ]
Fricative		f [f] v [v]	å [θ] ð [ð]	s [s] x [z]	rr [ʃ] ii [ʒ]				hh [χ]	h [h] ʰ [h]* [ɦ]*
Lateral Fricative				∞ [ɬ]
Approximant		w [ʋ]					j [j]
Lateral Approximant				l [l]

[n] becomes [ɳ] before another consonant.

[h] becomes [ɦ] if it is the last letter of a word. ʰ is pronounced as a weaker version of [h] and cannot appear at the start or end of words.

[ʋ] can sometimes be reduced to [ʷ] if a consonant is either before or after it. For example, the word "ywtar" (/eʷtar/) meaning "weather". Similarly, other consonants, especially in clusters, can be reduced to affecting the previous letter. As another example, the word "silnif" (/silⁿif/) meaning "son".

Letters representing consonant clusters

The cluster [ks] is represented by the letter 'z'

The cluster [zχ] is represented by the "letter" 'zz'

Monopthongs

Sevvufery uses 17 letters to represent vowel/dipthong sounds. Of these, 13 represent monopthongs. Where two sounds are included in the same row, the one on the left represents the unrounded version

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i/ý [i]* u [y]		ö [u]
Near-close	í [ɪ]
Close-mid	y [e]	ä [ɵ]
Mid			õ [o̞]
Open-mid	e [ɛ]		o [ɔ]
Near-open		ú [ɐ]
Open	a [a]		ã [ɑ]

i and ý both make the [i] sound, but ý is pronounced [ĭ], being shorter than 'i'.

Dipthongs

Vowel clusters are banned in Sevvufery, so other letters are used for dipthongs, as are shown below:

• ÿ [ai]
• ø [aɔ]
• ë [ɛi]
• ï [ɪi] (or, less commmonly, [ei])
• ü [ɐi]

Morphology

Sound clusters

Start of a word

Most sound clusters are banned at the start of words, but there are three which are permitted: kr, tr and kw, although the latter is rarely used since it would replace the "q" sound, a sound which is nearly unused in Sevvufery to begin with.

For example, in the word 'krut' (/kryt/) meaning 'synagogue'

Middle

However, in the middle of words, consonant clusters are allowed, if they are no longer than two letters (with one exception : ntr), provided that a vowel both preceeds and proceeds them.

For example, the word 'ysry' (/esre/) meaning 'voice'.

End of a word

There is some more lenience at the end of words, although not much. Again though, the clusters must not be any longer than 2 letters. The following are permitted: ns, nt, nk. And here the effect I mentioned earlier occurs, where the n shifts to being pronounced as [ɳ].

For example, the word 'nunk' (/nyɳk/) meaning 'to notice'.

Uses of ʰ

Vowel lengthening

Now, with the exception of 'i' and 'ý', Sevvufery does not distinguish between long and short vowels with the use of different letters. In order to lengthen another vowel, two of the same vowel are placed on either side of the letter ʰ.

For example: the word "hyliʰi" (/heliː/) meaning 'certain' or 'specific'

Joining vowels in a very weak dipthong

The other use of ʰ is less subtle, and places more importance on its pronunciation. When two vowels occur next to each other whose dipthong is not already covered by one of the letters mentioned earlier, ʰ is used to connect these since it does act as a consonant, just a weakly pronounced one.

For example, in the word 'yʰale' (/ehalɛ/) meaning 'phase'.

Grammar

Nouns and Adjectives

Nouns in Sevvufery employ a highly inflectional structure, where each case, apart from the nominative singular, is marked with a suffix. Adjectives precede the noun they describe, and must agree with it in number, but not in case (so, for example, an adjective in the dative plural does not need to be followed by a noun in the dative plural, but the noun must still be in the plural form, and not the singular). This will be explained further in the section 'Articles' burden'. All nouns and adjectives decline differently depending on whether they end in a consonant, or a vowel.

Regular nouns

Nouns in Sevvufery can have eight cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, possessive*, dative, ablative, locative, resultant, which serve the following purposes:

The Nominative acts as the subject of the sentence. Some prepositions, such as "nas" meaning "against", are followed by the nominative, but those are rare exceptions.

The Accusative acts as the object of a sentence.

The Genitive indicates possession, as does the Possessive, but the latter can be combined with any case, to achieve meanings such as 'of my' or 'to his' etc.

The Dative can be used in either a locative sense, or to indicate the recipient of an action.

The Ablative can be used in four different ways:

1. By itself, without an article. In this case, it means 'in' or 'on'
2. By itself, with an article. Either the article is in the ablative, or the noun is, but it is the presence In this case, it indicates an instrumental sense (i.e 'by [insert noun]')
3. With the word 'ibajo', without an article. In this case, it means 'from' or 'out of'
4. With the word 'ibajo', with an article, in this case, it means 'with' (in the sense of companionship)

The Locative indicates a locational sense where the observer is 'at' their destination. So, indeed, it means 'at [insert noun]'

The Resultant has two uses:

1. Following comparatives, to achieve the meaning 'than [insert noun]'
2. Indirect statements, to achieve the meaning 'that [insert noun]'

	Consonant		Vowel
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nominative	-	-ý	-	-jý
Accusative	-en	-ýjen	-mon	-kýmon
Genitive	-ime	-ölig	-jetöd	-zze
Possessive	-tel
Dative	-aiiu	-ajahh	-fodyl	-kömë
Ablative	-ymal	-ýmal	-byn	-býn
Locative	-gúd	-mød	-úd	-ød
Resultant	-ymuvv	-imuvv	-bylø	-belø

Adjectives

Adjectives decline in the exact same way as regular nouns, so that will not be covered in this section.

Table of Contractions

Letter	e-contraction	i-contraction	ú-contraction
a	y	ÿ	ø
ä	ä	ú	o
e	e	i	í
ö	õ	u	ö

ë, ï and ü have not been included here, since they would just be reduced to e + j, í + j, and ú + j respectively, after which they follow the consonant endings.

Rules of formation

Although adjectives may end in any consonant, they cannot end in any vowel. Only the following are permitted, due to the way this plays into comparatives, superlatives and absolutives, having mentioned the table of contractions in the previous section: a, ä, e, ë, ï, ö, ü.

Comparative

This is the mode adjectives take in order to, well, compare nouns to others, as is the case for many natural languages. Comparatives decline like regular adjectives. They are formed by adding -egan to consonant endings, and adding the e-contracted version of the last vowel of the adjective + gan if the adjective ends in a vowel. Refer to the Table of Contractions. Comparatives are followed by the resultant case to achieve the meaning 'than [insert object]'

For example, "dögegan TËIRymuvv mo."

I am better than him.

Superlative

This is the mode adjectives take only to indicate a substantial amount of the adjective's quality, not per se to indicate the highest possible amount of it. The latter function is taken up by the absolutive.

The Sevvuferyn superlative is formed by adding either '-ivvino' to adjectives ending in consonants, or the adjective's last vowel's i-contracted version + -vvino to adjectives ending in vowels.

Take this sentence, for example:

Oheå sytejýn dögivvino soran.
Oheå	sytejýn	dögivvino	soran
This	bread	good.SUPER	be.IND.ACT.3rd.SING

This bread is very good.

Absolutive

As mentioned previously, adjectives take this mode to indicate the highest possible amount of an adjective's quality. They are formed either by adding 'úme' to adjectives ending in consonants, or by adding the adjective's last vowel's ú-contracted version + -me to adjectives ending in vowels.

For example:

Soran et nagríme Sevvuferÿl* ediga.
Soran	et	nagríme	Sevvuferÿl	ediga
be.IND.ACT.3rd.SING	the.NOM.SING	big.ABS	Sevvuferý.ABL.SING	bridge.NOM.SING

It is the biggest bridge in Sevvuferý.

*you may notice that the ablative of 'Sevvuferý' is not what you would expect. This irregularity is covered in the section "Irregular Terminations of 'Sevvuferý' and 'Sevvufery'"

Numbers

Number System

The way Sevvufery deals with numbers is... more mathematical than most languages can be bothered to include. But to begin, the numbers 0-10 are just direct translations (and the ordinals are also shown here):

English	Sevvufery	Sevvuferyn ordinal
zero	nihilil	nihilal
one	oiienzzi	oiienal
two	dojeni	dojenal
three	trezeni	trezenal
four	ereja	erejal
five	kwinkwa	kwinkwal
six	xis	xisal
seven	pente	pentejal
eight	ohhoj	ohhojal
nine	xande	xandejal
ten	zortýn	zortyjal

However, for numbers greater than 10, Sevvufery actually just says the digits, in base 10, of the number, starting with the biggest. However, it does not use these forms of said numbers. It uses the shortened stems instead. The other stems which are shown here will be explained afterwards, but here is a list of said stems:

Number	Shortened stem(s)	Root
nihilil	níh,* ní,* íh,* í*	n/a
oiienzzi	oii	o
dojeni	doj	id
trezeni	trez	ter
ereja	erej	er
kwinkwa	kwin	ki
xis	xit	i
pente	pen	e
ohhoj	ohh	y
xande	xan	ax
zortýn	n/a	zo

Those for 0 will vary based on the phonetics of the numbers before and after it. For example, 204 is dojíhereja, but 505 is peníkwinkwa. Granted, the "n" here was already part of the shortened stem for the number 5, but the stem is still different in that it does not have the "h" that the stem in dojíhereja had.

Another useful thing to note is that this does not apply to multiples of ten. For these, we simply add -anos to the shortened stems (and -anal for the ordinal form).

For multiples of 100, we add -oðe to the shortened stems, with the exception of 100 itself, which has the name 'xendato' (ordinal: xendatal)

And for greater numbers, we use this formula:

S + R + -mil

Where S is the shortened stem and R is the root, or combination of roots. ʰ will sometimes be necessary in said combination.

For example, the current estimate for the number of atoms in the universe, in Sevvufery, is 'xendatidimil' (/zɛndatidimil/) which can be broken down into 'xendat' + 'id' 'i' + mil i.e 100 x 10^3(20 + 6) or 10^78 x 10^2, which equals 10^80

Cases

Although numbers have an almost completely different declination system to regular nouns, they also do not decline for the accusative singular and plural. This can lead to some ambiguity, as, for example, the sentence "trezeni ivvuta" can mean either "three [people/beings] understand" or "they understand three [people/beings]". Granted, this can be avoided in most cases by switching the word order for the second example, and leaving the first to be understood from context.

	Vowel		Consonant
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nominative	-	-mý	-	-emý
Accusative	-	-mý	-	-emý
Genitive	-jÿ	-mlÿ	-ÿ	-emÿ
Dative	-lo	-lmo	-ilo	-emo
Ablative	-byn	-býn	-ymal	-ýmal
Locative	-ú	-ö	-ú	-ö
Resultant	-eΔΓ	-eΔΓý	-eΔΓ	-eΔΓý

Note that for the locative and resultant, vowel and consonant endings are the same. This is because, if the number ends in a vowel, said vowel is lost in place of the ending: for example, "ereja" becomes "erejú" in the locative singular.

Combining Cases with the Possessive

Remember how there are two ways to express possession in Sevvufery? Well, the possessive can, as stated earlier, be combined with other cases. It declines like any regular noun that ends in a consonant, but the stem now has "-tel" added to it.

For example, the word "nostelymuvv" (/nɔstɛlemyg/), meaning "that the king's".

For plural subjects, the letter 'ý' is added before '-tel' to the stem. Thus, for the plural form of the same word, we have "nosýtelymuvv" (/nɔsitɛlemyg/) meaning "that the kings'".

Articles' burden

This refers to the fact that, in Sevvufery, the definite and indefinite articles do not need to agree with the noun they describe, similar to adjectives, in case. They will need to agree in number, however. Thus, you might as well say that the article "takes the burden" of the case upon itself so that the following noun does not have to.

This also applies to the 2nd and 4th uses of the ablative (see the section Regular Nouns for more information).

For example: Sytejýnen gafus (I eat bread) becomes "eten sytejýn gafus (I eat the bread).

Irregular Terminations of 'Sevvuferý' and 'Sevvufery'

These irregularities are due to the influence of neighbouring languages such as North-East Sevvufery and Cathlushenian, since those humans would more commonly use these words than the Sevvuferýkilý.

	Sevvuferý	Sevvufery	+possessive
Nominative	Sevvuferý	Sevvufery	n/a
Accusative	Sevvuferýj	Sevvuferyj	n/a
Genitive	Sevvuferýn	Sevvuferyn	SevvuferýΔΓ	SevvuferyΔΓ
Possessive	Sevvuferýn	Sevvuferyn	n/a
Dative	Sevvuferým	Sevvuferem	Sevvuferýmní	Sevvuferymne
Ablative	Sevvuferyl	Sevvuferÿl	Sevvuferýle	Sevvuferyle
Locative	Sevvuferu	Sevvuferø	Sevvuferun	Sevvuferøn
Resultant	Sevvuferýd	Sevvuferyd	Sevvuferýnde	Sevvuferynde

Verbs

Sevvuferyn verbs fall into four categories, and these have distinctly different endings. The standard form used for study, and for giving explanations about verbs, is the present infinitive.

Simplest verb

Historically, this was the first word added to Sevvufery, when its first ruler had just arrived and before the language merged with those of its neighbours. It means 'to' but without indicating what the action is. It declines irregularly and its present tense is the source of Sevvuferyn pronouns. 'Yr' (/er/) was originally the present tense infinitive, but over time that has contracted into 'yk' (/ek/). A table of the past and future tenses will be shown below ― since the pronouns are, well, nouns, these will be omitted, being the present tense of 'yk'.

	Past	Future
INFINITIVE	arre	kyzzø
1st person singular	errø	ixo
2nd person singular	rrolú	jilu
3rd person singular	minzze	dizz
1st person plural	ösö	ximar
2nd person plural	rrúntis	kyzzö
3rd person plural	zzøme	ezzi

Since Sevvufery can turn verbs into participles in the present, past and future (as is shown in the section Participles), these will also be shown here.

	Active	Passive
Present	nin	ne*
Past	sa	kaå*
Future	bölyb	böleb*

*The passive forms of these participles are actually used as the participles for the word 'si' (to be), since they technically align in meaning.

Indicative Mood

Nothing unusual to see here. This is just what you would expect, the mood used to indicate a statement or fact.

Active Voice

Present Tenses

Let us begin with something basic, the Simple Present Tense. The four example verbs mean "to appear (in the sense of making an apparition, not as a synonym of "to seem")", "to say", "to go", and "to notice", respectively, and these will also be used as examples for all other tenses. The parts in bold are the endings, whereas the regular parts indicate the stem.

	1st conjugation	2nd conjugation	3rd conjugation	4th conjugation
Infinitive	apar	ysi	nigon	nunk
1st person singular	apa	ys	nigot	nul
2nd person singular	apal	ysora	nigo	nu
3rd person singular	apansí	ysoran	nigotamunt	numan
1st person plural	aparamnes	ysoranos	nigotus	nuta
2nd person plural	aparasí	ysojilo	nigotis	nutys
3rd person plural	aparante	ysorajyn	nigotinen	nuåÿhe

The verb "si", meaning "to be", belongs in the second declension. However, aside from its irregular participles, it can also be used to form compound and continuous tenses through what are called mutations. Below are the present ones, which are used for the following tenses:

Present continuous

Perfect

Near-Future

And these work in a very simple way: first the stem includes a participle of the first part of this tense (think about the imperfect in English, for example: "I was" is part of the ending, and "doing" is part of the stem), such that the present continuous is literally "doing I am", the perfect is "having done I am", and the near-future is "about to do I am", when transliterated.

	mutation
	vowel	consonant
1st person singular	-s*	-ís
2nd person singular	-ra	-a
3rd person singular	-ran	-an
1st person plural	-nos	-os
2nd person plural	-ilo*	-o
3rd person plural	-jyn	-y

  * in the Perfect Tense, the first person singular is actually contracted from "ås" (θs) to "z" (ks), because the former would not be permitted in Sevvufery.
 * -ilo starting with a vowel will cause the verbs formed to have a dipthong. For example, in the word "nösÿlo" (/nusailo/) meaning "you all have noticed"

Past Tenses

Now Sevvufery has two Simple Past tenses – the Past Tense and the Historic Conditional – and five Compound Past tenses – the Imperfect Tense, the Perfect Tense, the Pluperfect Tense, the Future Perfect Tense and the Past Future Tense. The Historic Conditional Tense has its own section, therefore this one will be dedicated to the Past Tense.

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th
INFINITIVE	apavvÿ	yse	nigovõ	nö
1st person singular	apavv	ysele	nigov	nuv
2nd person singular	apavves	yselen	nigova	nöiieb
3rd person singular	apavven	yseres	nigovali	nöΔΓo
1st person plural	apavvemes	ysemas	nigovolis	nönuwös
2nd person plural	apavvejos	ysejil	nigovolon	nödeg
3rd person plural	apavvenÿ	yserelin	nigovalens	nöna

And the mutations, used for the following tenses:

Imperfect (was doing)

Pluperfect (had done)

Near-Future Past (was about to do)

	Mutation
	Vowel	Consonant
1st person singular	-le	-e
2nd person singular	-len	-en
3rd person singular	-res	-es
1st person plural	-mas	-as
2nd person plural	-il
3rd person plural	-lín	-ín

Historic conditional Tense

Now, this tense is NOT to be confused with the regular conditional, used for probable events. This tense is used to describe what would usually happen in the past, if you are speaking from the present. An example in English is "when he was sick, I would visit him in the hospital" or "If we had too much, we would usually give some of them back".

This is the only simple tense to have no infinitive and no participle, and its endings are slightly irregular, especially in the plural forms.

	1st Conjugation	2nd conjugation	3rd conjugation	4th conjugation
1st person singular	apagø	ysyle	nigorro	nüne
2nd person singular	apagøne	ysyla	nigorrimo	nújä
3rd person singular	apagi	ysysyn	nigoðo	nújø
1st person plural	apagolmes	ysemys	nigoðäm	numo
2nd person plural	aparëni	yselyn	nigorri	nunhi
3rd person plural	apahýnÿ	ysinyju	nigomä	niiie

Future tenses

There is one simple future tense, and there are 5 compound future tenses. The simple future conjugations are shown below.

	1st conjugation	2nd conjugation	3rd conjugation	4th conjugation
INFINITIVE	apariiii	ysý	nigopobyn	nÿm
1st person singular	apari	ysýly	nigopot	nÿje
2nd person singular	aparite	ysýlan	nigopolo	nÿmena
3rd person singular	aparimam	ysýlal	nigoponis	nÿkada
1st person plural	aparimamos	ysýnamis	nigopoterem	nÿmos
2nd person plural	aparinat	ysýlol	nigopotitis	nÿlyn
3rd person plural	aparinoj	ysýryjun	nigopoja	nÿsija

Passive Voice

Now, the passive voice is the same as its active counterpart, but this time the subject has the action done to it, rather than it doing the action. This is similar to most languages that have a passive voice.

Present Tenses

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th

Subjunctive Mood

The subjunctive is used to state a possibility, i.e what one 'might' do in a situation. Unlike some languages, Sevvufery distinguishes between the Future Subjunctive Tense and the 'Present Subjunctive Tense, as will be shown later.