Alpic

Alpic Elbettusa
Spoken in:	Switzerland (Swestazjoka)
Conworld:	League of Lost Languages
Total speakers:	~300,000
Genealogical classification:	Danubian SW Danubian Alpine Alpic
Basic word order:	SVO
Morphological type:	Synthetic/Fusional
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Fluid-S Active-Stative
Writing system:
Created by:
Taylor Selseth	2010 C.E.

Alpic /ˈælpik/, natively Elbettusa /ˈɛlbɛˌtːusa/, spoken in southeastern Switzerland, with most speakers living along the Inn River and near Davos. It is the sole surviving language of the Danubian language family which was once spoken throughout the Danube River basin. The Danubian languages are part of the of the Europic Macrofamily, which consists of Indo-European, Hesperic, and Rhaeto-Etruscan. Europic itself maybe a part of an even larger language phylum called Mitian, Eurasiatic, or Core Nostratic, which also includes Uralic, Chukchi-Kamchatkan, Eskimo-Aleut, Altaic, and Kartvelian.

Phonology

The syllable structure of Alpic is (C)(F|l|m|r|w|j)V(C), where F is any fricative. CF, Cl, Cm, and Cr can only occur at the beginning of a word. Stress is moderately light and is always on the initial syllable of a word. Prosody is syllable-timed and Trochaic in rhythm. Intonation patterns are typical for a Western European language, with a rising intonation in questions.

Consonants

IPA

	Labial	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Palatal	Velar
Stops, unvoiced	p	t	ʧ		k
Stops, voiced	b	d	ʤ		g
Fricatives, unvoiced	f	s	ʃ		x
Fricatives, voiced	v	z	ʒ
Nasals	m	n		ɲ
Laterals		l		ʎ
Trills		r
Semivowels	w			j

Orthographical

	Labial	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Palatal	Velar
Plosives, unvoiced	p	t	tj		k
Plosives, voiced	b	d	dj		g
Fricatives, unvoiced	f	s	sj		h/ch
Fricatives, voiced	v	z	zj
Nasals	m	n		nj
Laterals		l		lj
Trills		r
Semivowels	w			j

/r/ is realized as the flap /ɾ/ in between vowels. /n/ assimilates to the point of articulation of the following consonant. /x/ is realized as /h/ in the syllable onset, it is represented as H in the orthography in the onset and as CH in the coda. /s/ and /z/ are [ʃ] and [ʒ] when before a plosive. /k/ and /g/ are [c] and [ɟ] when followed by /j/ or /i/.

Vowels

Alpic has a simple Spanish-style /a e i o u/ vowel system, with the vowels realized as [ɐ ɜ ɪ ɔ ʊ] in closed syllables and are pronounced shorter than in open syllables to maintain syllable-timed prosody.

Morphology and Morphosyntax

Alpic is a synthetic and fusional language with rich morphology in nouns, adjectives and verbs.

Nouns and Adjectives

Nouns inflect for Possession, Case, and Number. Adjectives and the Definite and Indefinite Articles agree with their host nouns in Case and Number. The order of suffixes are:

1. Nominal Stem
2. Possessive Suffix
3. Case-Number Suffix

Possessive suffixes

Possessive Suffixes function like the Possessive Adjectives in other European languages, marking who possesses the marked noun

	1st Person	2nd Person	3rd Animate	3rd Inanimate	Impersonal
Singular	-mi-	-di-	-ye-	-si-	-pa-
Plural	-vi-	-wa-	-tje-	-sja-

Attami
atta-mi
"My father"

Case and Number

Case and Number marking is fusional. There are two numbers: singular and plural. There are 4 cases: Direct, Genitive, Dative, and Instrumental. The Direct Case is the unmarked case for the Agent or Patient of the sentence. The Genitive marks that the noun possesses or has a relation of some kind to another noun. The Dative marks the Direct Object of the sentence. The Instrumental marks by which means a verb is done as well as the demoted agent of a passive voice sentence.

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular	-Ø	-s	-m	-t
Plural	-t	-sja	-n	-tta

Note that there are alternations of the vowels before morphemes starting with a nasal. /a/ becomes /o/, /e/ becomes /i/, and /o/ becomes /u/. This alternation occurs with all inflectional and derivational morphemes in all parts of speech, not just nouns.

Articles

Alpic has 3 articles, the Definite Article, the Indefinite Article, and the Partitive Article. All agree with their nouns in, case and number. The Definite Article also agrees with it's noun in Noun Class. All are regularly declined, though the Partitive has no plural form. The article precedes the noun.

Definite

The Definite Article indicates that its noun is a particular thing identifiable to the listener. It may be the same thing that the speaker has already mentioned, or it may be something uniquely specified. A noun marked with a possessive suffix always has the Definite Article.

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular Animate	ta	tas	tom	tat
Plural Animate	tat	tasja	ton	tatta
Singular Inanimate	to	tos	tum	tot
Plural Inanimate	tot	tosja	tun	totta
Collective	tje	tjes	tjim	tjet

Indefinite

The Indefinite Article indicates that its noun is not yet a particular thing identifiable to the listener. It may be something that the speaker is mentioning for the first time, or its precise identity may be irrelevant or hypothetical, or the speaker may be making a general statement about a particular thing.

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular	zo	zos	zum	zot
Plural	zot	zosja	zun	zotta

Partitive

The Partitive article indicates a non-specific quantity of a mass noun. It is not unlike the English determiner "some", but acts grammatically like an article since it agrees with it's noun in case.

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular	ni	nis	nim	nit

Demonstratives

Alpic has a 2-way Proximal-Distal demonstrative system, like English's "This-These" and "That-Those. It also has locative demonstratives like English's "Here-There"

Proximal

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular	su	sus	sum	sut
Plural	sut	susja	sun	sutta

Distal

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Singular	da	das	dom	dat
Plural	dat	dasja	don	datta

Locative

	Direct	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
Proximal	swa	swas	swom	swat
Distal	ga	gas	gom	gat

Pronouns

Alpic pronouns are thus:

	Agent	Patient	Genitive	Dative	Instrumental
1SG	mu	mi	mwe	mim	mit
2SG	du	di	dwe	dim	dit
3SG Animate	ai	e	es	im	et
3SG Inanimate	sau	si	sis	sim	sit
1PL	vu	vi	ve	vin	vit
2PL	dju	dje	wa	won	wat
3PL	ge	gi	gis	gin	git
Relative	zju	zji	zjis	zjim	zjit
Interrogative	ko	ki	kis	kim	kit
Impersonal	pa	pa	pas	pom	pat