Kosi

• Language name: Kosi
• Language author: Trebor Jung
• Started: December 2003
• Abstract: I wanted to make a Uralic-esque language - but not a clone. Important features of Kosi include: (1) Tense is only optional (as in Chinese) and is indicated with temporal adverbs; perfectness takes its place. (2) Some grammatical functions are marked with metathesis and ablaut (as in English and Kebreni), as well as affixation. When /i/ and /e/ are backed, they turn into /M/ and /7/ (written û and ô). (3) Much of the vocabulary is Uralic: iri 'to write', keka 'blue', and öt 'five' come from Hungarian; kaheks 'eight', keli 'to speak', and tuli 'fire' come from Finnish. Some lexical items were borrowed from Romance: mera 'ocean', mil 'one thousand', and un 'one'. (4) The language has numerous irregularities and oddities.

Internal History

Like Latin in Roman times on Earth, Kosi is the auxiliary language of the planet Kosia. It is the scholarly language, and the source of many creole languages spoken by the common people; cf. Vulgar Latin. Kosi's descendants have a distinct, non-Kosian feel slightly horrifying to the scholars. Previous to 1902, speaking one of the creoles in the presence of a scholar was punishable by imprisonment; happily, nowadays such speech is frowned upon by educated people but for speaking such a tongue will only result in laughter.

Kosi has many creoles, the main ones being Hezy /hez@/ and Huzí /huzi/. The most-liked (or rather, least-disliked!) of these creoles on the part of the scholars is one called Kezi /kezi/. On November 10, 2003, the Kosian Supreme Linguistic Assembly (SLA) passed a resolution making Kezi the second official language.

There are three forms of Kosi: Ancient Kosi, Classical Kosi, and Modern Kosi. The grammatical sketch and lexicon in this document is Modern Kosi material.

Ancient Kosi apparently had quite a large phonemic inventory and a complex grammar. Unfortunately, specifics are unavailable at this time because the scholars are still debating.

We know much more about Classical Kosi than Ancient Kosi, as scholars have been able to get an idea of what it might have sounded like. We know that Classical Kosi had a larger phonemic inventory than Modern Kosi; beside the consonants of Modern Kosi, Classical Kosi probably had the following extras: /f, K_d, S, tS, J, K_j, L, J\, q, G\/. The vowel system was quite different, and was probably something like /I, i:, Y, y:, E, e:, 9, 2:, a, a:, {, 7, O:, O, o:, M, U, u:/. Traces of the old phoneme inventory can be found in Modern Kosi: /i/ and /e/ (from /I/ and /E/) still back to /M/ and /7/ respectively, and consonantal length is still used (rare though it is) phonemically: tuli 'fire' vs. tulli 'wind'.

Grammar

Phonology

Consonants

	Labial	Labiodental	Dental	Alveolar	Lateral	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Stops	p, b		t, d			c	k
Nasals	m		n
Fricatives		v	th, dh, s					h
Affricate			ts
Liquids				r	l
Glides					j

Vowels

	Front	Mid	Palatal	Back
	Rounded	Unrounded
High	i, ü			û*, u
Mid	e, ö	y	jo	ô*, o
Low		a	ja

Diphthongs: ae /ai)/, au /au)/

All graphemes are as in X-Sampa, with the following exceptions: th and dh are the dental fricatives /T/ and /D/; t d s ts n l are dental, not alveolar; ü and ö are the rounded counterparts of /i/ and /e/: /y/ and /2/; y is the schwa vowel /@/; ae is the rising diphthong /ai/.

Stress: first syllable of a word

Syllable structure: (C)V(C) (if the addition of a suffix to a root or another suffix would cause an awkward consonant or vowel cluster, the epenthetic vowel /i/ or consonant /j/ is added)

Morphology

Nouns

• Cases
• Case Example (with noun 'house')
• nominative has
• dative hasid
• genitive hase
• instrumental hasin
• illative hasiba
• allative hasikau
• inessive hasab
• superessive hasits
• adessive hasim*
• elative hasilen
• delative hasra
• ablative hascu
• terminative hasini
• commetative hasr
• benefactive hasavae
• formal hasikyn
• *may be used temporally: ötam

• Possession
• (non-nominative forms derived with the suffixes -l (accusative) and -n (dative))
• Person Example (with noun has 'house')
• 1s hasami
• 2s hasta
• 3s hasamin
• 1p hasana
• 2p hastsü
• 3p hasivad

• Plural
• first vowel of a root is changed as follows: i > û, ü > u, e > ô, ö > e, y > i, a > e, o > ö, u > ü

• Demonstratives
• (non-nominative forms derived with the suffixes -t (accusative) and -n (dative))
• Person Example (with noun has 'house')
• 1s hastu
• 2s hasti
• 3s hassa
• 1p hasty
• 2p hastû
• 3p hasse

Verbs

• Person
• See possessive suffixes above; third person singular is marked with a null morpheme -0.

• Aspects
• Aspect Example (with verb keli 'to speak', adjective keka 'blue', or vila 'having reflected/illuminated light')
• perfect kel
• imperfect (add the person endings and substitute the root vowel with the ending -i and -i with the root vowel) kile
• habitual kelim
• inceptive keltö
• inchoative kekatö
• causative kelmit
• cessative kelse
• pausative kelda
• resumptive kelsu
• protractive kelke
• iterative kelha
• random kelvo
• frequentative keltü
• experiential kellau
• volitional (change the height of the first vowel: i > e, ü > ö, e > i, ö > ü, y > a, a > y, o > u, u > o) hiky
• intensive vilcö
• moderative vilkae
• attenuative veltsa
• crescendo vilnu
• decrescendo viladh

• Moods
• imperative (see "Imperfect Aspect" above) kile!
• subjunctive keltae
• obligative kelsen
• abilitative kelkan
• interrogative Kelkanko?

• Valency
• suffix -yth converts intransitive verb to its transitive form, or vice versa

• Voices
• active kel
• passive kelen
• reflexive keljo
• reciprocal kelum

Adjectives

• must agree in case and number with the nouns they modify; the same operations and suffixes are used for declension of adjectives and nouns; use of quantifiers does not affect the number: öt 'five' + has 'house' = öt has 'five houses'--not *öt hes
• Form Example (with adjective nadhi 'big')
• comparative nadhica
• superlative nadhire
• no comparative conjunction: lit. 'X more-big X' or 'X most-big X'

• Derivation
• deverbal noun lek 'book' (< leki 'to read'), hesti 'goodness' (< hasti 'good')
• gerund lykkae 'an act of reading' (< leki 'to read'), mysinkae 'an act of singing' (< mysinae 'to sing')
• verb tulinae 'to burn' (< tuli 'fire'), mysinae 'to sing' (< mysi 'music')
• adjective myside 'musical' (< mysi 'music'), kelide 'linguistic' (< kel 'language')
• perfect active participle leki
• perfect passive participle lekin
• imperfect (substitute the root vowel with the ending -i and -i with the root vowel) active participle like
• imperfect (substitute the root vowel with the ending -i and -i with the root vowel) passive participle liken
• personal participle (substitute the root vowel with the ending -i and -i with the root vowel, then raise or lower the second vowel, according to the pattern i > e, ü > ö, e > i, ö > ü, y > a, a > y, o > u, u > o) liki

Syntax

• Basic word order: SOV
• Relative clause: kile man 'the man who spoke/the spoken man', inemi en 'the food I want to eat/the I-want-eat food'

Lexicon

• ami (< French aimer): to like
• böki (origin unknown): to eat to one's heart's content
• e (< Finnish ei): no
• ema (< Hungarian ember): person
• en (see eni): food; meal
• eni (< Hungarian enni): to eat
• evi (< Hungarian év): year
• hali (< Hungarian hallani): to listen; to hear; to perceive audibly
• has (< Hungarian ház): house
• hasti (< Estonian hästi): good; well
• hul (< Welsh hwyl): mood, atmosphere, emotion
• huth (< Welsh chwith): left (as opposed to right)
• hold (< Hungarian hold): moon; month
• iri (< Hungarian írni): to write
• ja (< German/Estonian ja): yes
• kaheks (< Finnish kaheksa): eight
• karom (< Hungarian három and Finnish karom): four
• keka (< Hungarian kék): blue
• keksö (< Hungarian kettõ and Finnish keksi): two
• kel (< Estonian keel): speech; language
• keli (see kel): to speak
• kinjo (< Welsh cinio): lunch; midday meal
• lec (< Spanish leche): milk
• leki (< Estonian lekuda): to read
• loti (< Estonian lotama): to hope
• luha (< Swedish lugga): to pull someone's hair
• luk (see leki): book
• lunki (< Quechua llunk'uy): to clean the plate and lick the fingers
• mera (< French mer): ocean; sea
• mil (< French mille): one thousand
• mysi (< French musique): music; song
• naran (< Hungarian narancs): orange (colour)
• naran rut: orange (fruit)
• nati (< Finnish): to see; to perceive visually
• neri (< Estonian neri): four
• naeru (< Rokbeigalmki ngiirau): awe and respect for something dangerous
• ör (< Estonian öör): evening; night
• öt (< Hungarian öt): five
• piru (< Hungarian piros): red
• sabu (see soba): friend
• savi (< French savoir): to be familiar with
• so (< Hungarian szó): word; morpheme
• soba (< Estonian sõber): loyal
• sola (< French soleil): sun; day
• talva (< French table): table
• taua (< English tower): tower
• to (< Hungarian tó): lake
• toja (< Hungarian tojás): egg
• torta (< Hungarian torta): cake
• tudi (< Hungarian tudni): to know (a fact)
• tuli (< Finnish tuli): fire
• tulinae (see tuli): to burn
• tulli (< Finnish tulli): wind
• tullinae (see tulli): to blow
• ulits (< Polish julic): street
• un (< Spanish uno): one
• vaco (< Hungarian vacsora): dinner; supper
• vede (< Spanish verde): green
• veni (< French venir): to come
• vesa (< Finnish vesi and Hungarian víz): water
• vila (origin unknown): having reflected/illuminated light