Plitnakya

Plitnakya
Spoken in:	Scotland (Skotlanda)
Conworld:	League of Lost Languages
Total speakers:	~2,000
Genealogical classification:	Atlantic Scotic NW Scotic Plitnakya
Basic word order:	VSO
Morphological type:	Polysynthetic
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Accusative, Hierarchical
Writing system:
Created by:
Taylor Selseth	2010 C.E.

Plitnakya [pʰliʦ̺nakja] is a highly endangered language isolate spoken by about 2,000 people in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. It has a complex, polysythetic morphology that is very unusual for Europe and is likely a relic of the first people to populate Britain after the Pleistocene Glaciation.

Phonology

Plitnakya is unusual in that it contrasts between Laminal-Dental and Aplical-Alveolar points of articulation and has no rhotic. It has a root structure of (F)(C)(F|L)V(F|L)(C) where C is any consonant, F is a fricative, and L is a liquid or nasal.

IPA

	Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Stops, plain	p	t̻	t̺	ʧ	k
Stops, aspirated	pʰ	t̻ʰ	t̺ʰ	ʧʰ	kʰ
Fricatives	f	θ	s	ʃ	x
Nasals	m	n
Liquids	w	l	j

Plain stops and fricatives are voiced when between two voiced phonemes. /l/ is velarized when it follows a back vowel and is [ɾ] between vowels. /t̻ʰ t̺ʰ/ are realized as [tθ ʦ] between vowels and before nasals.

	Front	Center	Back
High	i iː		u uː
Mid	e eː		o oː
Low	aj	a aː	aw

Orthography

	Labial	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar
Stops, plain	b	dh	d	j	g
Stops, aspirated	p	th	t	c	k
Fricatives	f	z	s	sh	h
Nasals	m	n
Liquids	w	l	y

	Front	Center	Back
High	i ii		u uu
Mid	e ee		o oo
Low	ai	a aa	au

Nouns

Nouns fall into an Animancy Hierarchy of 2nd Person > 1st Person > people and animate collectives > non-person animates > natural forces > other inanimates and collectives. There is a rich case system. Noun morphological structure is:

1. Number
2. Possessive Prefix
3. Noun Stem
4. Case-Definiteness suffix

Number

Nominal number is marked by a prefix on the noun. There are 3 numbers: Singular, Dual, and Plural. Mass nouns do not inflect for number but are instead required to be compounded with a measure word. Singular is unmarked

	C-Stem	V-Stem
Dual	thaa-	th-
Plural	he-	sh-

Case-Definiteness

Syntactic Cases

	Nominative	Accusative	Ergative	Genitive	Dative	Comitative
Indefinite	-Ø	-(y)ai	-(f)o	-(a)p	-(e)z	-(w)uu
Definite	-(e)l	-lii	-zo	-lep	-le	-luu

Locative Cases

	Locative	Allative	Ablative	Illative	Ellative	Perlative	Subessive	Superessive
Indefinite	-(h)e	-(u)ksah	-(a)yeh	-(a)dhau	-(a)dhot	-(o)waah	-(i)ke	-(i)kla
Definite	-(h)el	-(u)ksat	-(a)yet	-(a)dhol	-(o)waat	-(i)kel	-(i)klal

Verbs

Verbs are the most complex part of the language by far. As in many polysynthetic languages a single word can mean a whole English sentence. The morphological structure is thus:

Pronominal Prefixes
Direct-Inverse Prefix
Incorporated Intransitive Subject
Comitative Prefix
Adverbals
Locative-Spatial Prefixes
Habitual Prefix
Inhcoative Prefix
Continuative Prefix
Cessative Prefix
Defective Prefix
Evidential Prefixes
Benifactive Prefix
Desirative (2st & 3rd person wanting)/Optative (1st person wanting) Prefix
Instrumental Prefix
Necessitative Prefix
Frequentative Prefix
Perfect Aspect
Mood
Tense
Voice
Intensive Prefix
Verb Stem
Incorporated Direct Object
Negation
Question Suffix
Indirect Object Pronominal Suffix

The verb stem can be made out of a single root or 2 or more compounded roots.

Pronominal Inflection

The person and number Subject and Direct Object are marked on the verb in the Direct-Inverse format, each person form has a set spot, starting with 2nd Person and going in order down the animacy hierarchy If the subject has a lower animacy than the direct object the inverse morpheme -maa- must be used.

Yaanishpuz. "You know me."
yaa-ni-shpuz
2SG-1SG-know

Yaanimaashpuz. "I know you."
yaa-ni-maa-shpuz
2SG-1SG-INVERSE-know

The inflections are thus:

Agentive-Transitive	1st Person In.	1st Person Ex.	2nd Person	3rd person	4th Person	Indefinite
Singular		ni-	yaa-	go-	sai-	lu-
Plural	nin-	zan-	yan-	gon-	sen-	lun-

Patientive	1st Person In.	1st Person Ex.	2nd Person	3rd person	4th Person	Indefinite
Singular		no-	yai-	gii-	su-	lok-
Plural	non-	zen-	yen-	gin-	sun-	lonk-

when there are two "3rd Persons" in the sentence the less topical one is marked as 4th person.

Gosaiglaufe. "she has helped him."
go-sai-glaufe
3SG-4SG-feed

The Impersonal is used for processes that are perceived as agentless, as well as for general statements. The Impersonal when used without any other marking also functions as an infinitive. Infinitive stative verbs are used as adjectives.

Luzguu "It snows"
lu-zguu
IMPERS-snow

Indirect objects are marked on the verb as suffixes.

Zangotheyaa "We gave it to you"
zan-go-the-yaa
1PL.EX-3SG-give-2SG

There are no adjectives, stative verbs are used instead.

Noblitesh "I am British"
no-blitesh
1SG-British

Tense

There are 4 tenses, Present, Near Past (Past 1), Far Past (Past 2), and Future. Use of the near or far past is determined whether the verb occurs within the last day. The Near Past prefix is -ka, Far Past is -fe, Future is -wo.

Nikahyoslyai "I ate ham (today)"
ni-ka-hyo-slyai
1SG-PST1-eat-ham

Nifehyoslyai "I ate ham (before today)"
ni-fe-hyo-slyai
1SG-PST2-eat-ham

Niwohyoslyai "I will eat ham"
ni-wo-hyo-slyai
1SG-FUT-eat-ham

Aspect

There are 8 aspect prefixes: The Perfect Prefix -nc-, The Habitual Prefix -nla-, the Inhcoative Prefix -haa-, the Continuative Prefix -pzu-, the Cessative Prefix -jaul-, the Defective Prefix -mo-, The Desideritive Prefix -hne-, the Optative Prefix -f- and the Frequentative Prefix -z-.

The Perfect is used to show completed action. Note that it is Perfect, NOT Perfective; Plitnakya does not have a true Perfective-Imperfective distinction

Niksaanchyoslyai "I have eaten ham before"
ni-ksaa-nc-hyo-slyai
1SG-previously-PRF-eat-ham

The habitual aspect signifies actions that are habitual and usual.

Nidhunlahyoslyai Notlig "I (usually) eat ham on Christmas"
ni-dhu-nla-hyo-slyai
1SG-LOC-HAB-eat-ham Christmas