Meftla

Meftla is a language with a priori vocabulary being created by Renato Montes from 2011 onward. Its phonological inventory was intended to resemble a SAE language, and the rest is inspired by features found in Romance languages, Standard Arabic and Chinese. This article is intended to give a Wikipedia-style quick overview of the language's phonology and grammar, though far more on this language exists in the author's computer...

Meftla
Genealogical classification:	Melha family Proto-Melha Meftla
Basic word order:	VSO, head-initial
Morphological type:	agglutinating ~ fusional
Morphosyntactic alignment:	accusative
Created by:
Renato Montes	2011-

Phonology

Consonants

	Labial	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Velar	Glottal
Nasals	m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Stops: unvoiced	p	t		k	ʔ
Stops: voiced	b	d		g
Affricates: unvoiced		ts	tʃ
Affricates: voiced		dz	dʒ
Fricatives: unvoiced	f	s	ʃ	x
Fricatives: voiced		z	ʒ
Laterals		l
Trills		r~ɾ
Semivowels	w		j		h

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i:, i		u:, u
Mid-close	e		o:, o
Mid-open	ɛ:, ɛ		ɔ:, ɔ
Open		a:, a

Stress

Stress generally falls on the last syllable of the root. Clitics never affect its location, though certain suffixes (inflectional or derivational) can attract the stress towards them.

Word linking and the initial /ʔ/

Word-initial words can be linked to the syllable of the last word in a similar way to English and Spanish, e.g. interested in it [ɪˈnɪt̚]. Note that, unlike English, the language distinguishes words with an initial glottal stop /ʔ/ and words with an initial vowel: ʔosa [ˈʔosa] 'skirt', osa [ˈosa] 'star'.

Orthography

Consonants, vowels and stress

The consonants are written with the exact same glyphs as the IPA symbols used above, with the exception of /r~ɾ/ which is written r at all times, and the semivowels /w/ and /j/ written u and i respectively.

The different vowel qualities are written with IPA symbols, except that length is marked with macrons instead of a following colon.

Stress is not usually marked. If a speaker feels some disambiguation is necessary, they can mark it by adding an acute accent on top of the respective vowel. Stress is normally marked in didactic and reference materials on every word as well, including this article.

Punctuation

The usage of periods and commas differs significantly from that of English. In an argumentative or expository text, sentences are usually thought of representing one whole idea or point of view, and it's normal to have various main clauses linked simply by juxtaposition with a comma. Such texts in Meftla would strike many English speakers as having long chains of "comma splices".

In general terms, a sentence ends once the speaker is going to start a contradiction with what has just been said, or perhaps an exploration on a very small part of it. In narrative texts, a sentence would end once the next one introduces a sort of surprise, such as a character coming in into the events.

In the same way, paragraphs aren't divided as much as it's normally done in English. Paragraphs can normally be expected to contain much introductory information with details, lists and different points of view all the way to a conclusion. Narrative texts can go on pages and pages without a paragraph break in a whole scene. A paragraph break in general represents a significant change in topic or environment, such as a new in-depth treatment of a topic in a research article or a change of location in a narration.

The style of quotation marks used is ‘‘...‘...’...’’, and unlike various English quotations styles, punctuation is never introduced if not part of what the person actually said, nor is a new paragraph started with every new quotation. Dialogue uses quotation marks as well.

Questions and exclamations use a single ? and ! at the end. Ellipses have either two or six periods: .. or ......, the latter representing a greater pause or voice drag.

Morphology

Morphology, whether inflectional or derivational, balances between agglutinating and fusional.

Inflection of nouns

Nouns are inflected for case and number, across four declensions.

-a declension

This declension is mostly comprised by nouns ending in -a and long vowels except for ɛ̄. The great majority are of feminine gender.

	Singular	Plural	Supraplural
Nominative	alea	aleai	aleaiām
Accusative	alear	aleɔr	aleɔiɔ̄r
Oblique	aleas	aleɔs	aleɔiɔ̄s

-ɔ declension

This noun class is comprised solely by feminine nouns ending in -ɔ. If a borrowing is created with final -ɔ and it's masculine, it's absorbed into the -i- declension.

	Singular	Plural	Supraplural
Nominative	zullɔ	zullɔi	zullɔiɔ̄m
Accusative	zullɔr	zullɔir	zullɔiɔ̄r
Oblique	zullɔs	zullɔis	zullɔiɔ̄s

-ɛ declension

The majority of nouns here belong to the masculine gender, and all end in -ɛ.

	Singular	Plural	Supraplural
Nominative	reitɛ	reitɛi	reitɛiɛ̄m
Accusative	reitɛr	reitɛil	reitɛiɛ̄r
Oblique	reitɛs	reitɛis	reitɛiɛ̄s

-i- declension

Also known as "the consonant declension", the nouns comprising this declension are mostly masculine. The singular nominative can end in everything possible. Various of the inflections can be analyzed as essentially ending in a consonant, though inserting an /i/ if a cluster that is not allowed is produced. Borrowings, unless they're acquired with a final /a, ɔ, ɛ/ sound, are taken into this declension.

	Singular	Plural	Supraplural
Nominative	—	-i	-iɛ̄m
Accusative	-(i)r	-(i)l	-iɛ̄r
Oblique	-(i)s	-i	-iɛ̄s

	Singular	Plural	Supraplural
Nominative	fant	fanti	fantiɛ̄m
Accusative	fantir	fantil	fantiɛ̄r
Oblique	fants	fanti	fantiɛ̄s

Inflection of adjectives

Adjectives inflect in the same manner that nouns do, agreeing in gender, case and number.

There are three declensions for adjectives:

• Those that inflect like -a nouns in the feminine and -ɛ nouns in the masculine.
• Those that inflect like -a nouns in the feminine and -i- nouns in the masculine.
• A small, closed class of adjectives relating to mostly female phenomena (such as menstruation or pregnancy) ending in -ɔ and inflecting like such nouns. In the event of these adjectives agreeing with a male noun (such as pregnant seahorses), they still inflect like -ɔ nouns.

The Definite Clitic

The definite infixing clitic -un- is inserted right before the inflectional ending of a noun: fugi 'rain' (nom.), fuguni 'the rain' (nom.); kardir 'a book' (acc.), kardunir 'the book' (acc.).

The main argument for considering it a clitic and not an inflection or an extremely productive derivational suffix is that it doesn't really have allomorphs (besides the -u- being a part of diphthong or not, best considered as part of the regular morphophonology of affixes beginning with /i/ and /u/), and that if it were a derivational suffix it'd be the only that never changes the noun's declension.

Personal Independent Pronouns

	Singular				Plural
	1st person	2nd person	3rd person		1st person	2nd person	3rd person
Nom Feminine	ʔɔ̄	lī	kɔ̄		ʔauāh	lāi	nāi
Nom Masculine	ʔɛ̄	lɛ̄	kī		ʔū	lɛ̄i	nɛ̄i
Acc/Obl Feminine	ʔɔr	lir	kɔr		ʔar	lair	nair
Acc/Obl Masculine	ʔɛr	lɛr	kir		ʔur	lɛir	nɛir

Personal Possessive Determiners

Although most other determiners either don't inflect at all or inflect with one of the four regular declensions, possessive determiners have an inflection of their own. They're nearly identical to their independent nominative counterparts, except that have their long vowels shortened.

Singular

Plural

1st person

2nd person

3rd person

1st person

2nd person

3rd person

ʔɔ=

li=

kɔ=

ʔa=

lai=

nai=

ʔɛ=

lɛ=

ki=

ʔu=

lɛi=

nɛi=

Correlative pronouns

	Question	Rel. pron.	This	That	-ever	Every-	Some-	No-
Person	ref	miref	hi	mi	rɛnsau	bɛlrɛn	rɛnoia	rɛnzɛ
Thing	sef	tisef	rō	tō	sɛtsau	bɛlsɛt	setoia	sɛtsɛ
Place	ialef	tīasef	hou	togou	niasau	bɛlnia	nialoia	niazɛ
Manner	karef	tikardef	unrokar	untokar	karsau	bɛlkar	karoia	karzɛ
Time	gaɔnef	tigaɔnef	darofīlɔis	(see below)	gaɔsau	bɛlgaɔ	gaɔnoia	gaɔzɛ
Reason	ʒulnief	tiʒulnief	kauroʒulni	kautoʒulni	ʒulnisau	bɛlʒulni	ʒulnioia	ʒulnizɛ

The correlative of time for "that" depends on whether the time is present or past: for the past (from the point of view of the speech) it's datofīlɔis; for the future, kantofīlɔis.

None of the above inflects for case, gender or number except for the question and relative person and thing pronouns, which inflect like -i- nouns. Note that the language doesn't quite have clear means to differentiate "what" and "which", leaving it to context. On the other hand, it distinguishes interrogative determiner-pronouns from relative pronouns.

Inflection of verbs

Verbs inflect for the gender of their subject, aspect, and two moods (indicative and imperative). The imperative essentially the same, but with the vowel of the inflection made long and stress moved to it, except for the pluperfect. There's also a single non-finite form, functioning as a sort of infinitive or gerund.

The following shows the inflection of regular verbs:

	Indicative		Imperative
	Feminine	Masculine	Feminine	Masculine
Perfective	kizila	kizili	kizilā	kizilī
Pluperfect	kizilad	kizilɛd	miŋkizilād	miŋkizilɛ̄d
Experiential	kizilat	kizilɛt
Inchoative	kizilɔ	kizilɛ	kizilɔ̄	kizilɛ̄
Imperfective	kizilɔn	kizilɛn	kizilɔ̄n	kizilɛ̄n
Habitual	kizilɔs	kizilis	kizilɔ̄s	kizilīs
Gerund	kizilai

Although we could think of an experiential imperative (do this and gain experience!, or perhaps, you must have had the experience of doing this!), the other imperatives or alternative constructions like with these English examples are used instead.

Verbal Clitics

Verbs can take up to three infixing clitics, always unstressed: direct object pronouns, indirect object pronouns, and a further clitic used when the verb is in the main clause of certain adverbial clauses.

These clitics have inflections of their own: the pronouns agree in person, gender and number with their antecedents, the adverbial clitic varies depending on the type of adverbial clause it's used with.

	Singular				Plural
	1st person	2nd person	3rd person		1st person	2nd person	3rd person
Direct Feminine	-ɔh-	-ɔl-	-ɔk-		-ai-	-ail-	-ain-
Direct Masculine	-ɛh-	-ɛl-	-ɛk-		-ūh-	-ɛil-	-ɛin-
Indirect	-ah-	-ik-	-ik-		-āh-	-īn-	-īn-

Derivations

Word derivations are mostly accomplished by adding suffixes, although a very small number of prefixes exist. Suffixes may be added to a root or to a root that already has other suffixes.

Compounding roots directly, as done with Latin and Greek roots in scientific contexts (e.g. lamino-alveolar), isn't common. Adpositions and possessive constructions are preferred to modify nouns with other nouns instead, and affixes exist to derive adjectives from verbs. There are no affixes that express prepositional notions such as English post- ('after (sth)'), however, and such things always have to expressed with the corresponding preposition.

Syntax

Basic Word order

The most basic word order is verb-subject-object (VSO). However, topicalization can move either an object or the subject before the verb. A topic can also be any of the other arguments, or even an argument unrelated to the verb.

The language is strongly head-initial, with nouns being followed by adjectives, relative clauses or adverbial clauses, adjectives by adverbs, prepositions by their objects, verbs by their objects.

Case, Gender and Number

Various distinctions may be found in nouns and agreeing adjectives, some adverbs, and verbs: cases, genders, numbers, aspects and moods. This section shows how the first three are used —aspect and moods are dealt with below.

Case

Nominative Case

• Subjects
• Subject topics
• Adpositions
• Vocatives
• Cited words

Accusative Case

• Direct objects
• Direct object topics
• Objects of some prepositions
• Time period adverbs and adverbials

Oblique Case

• Indirect objects
• Possessors in possessive constructions
• Modifiers of nouns and adjectives
• Topics of any of the above
• Objects of some prepositions
• Time point adverbs and adverbials

Gender

There are two genders: masculine and feminine. Adjectives agree in gender with their nouns, and verbs agree in gender with their subjects.

Gender is not completely natural:all common and abstract nouns get an assigned gender depending mostly on their final phoneme. Humans get their natural gender assigned, though animals vary depending if they're pets or if it's especially relevant to the context (many animals have certain genders already assigned, such as eagles which are generally treated as if they were males).

If the natural gender isn't known in a context where it's necessary, adjectives take their feminine forms. Mixed groups also take the feminine plural or supraplural.

Number

How many number distinctions there are varies with the part-of-speech: nouns and adjectives distinguish three: singular, plural and supraplural; while pronouns distinguish only two: singular and plural. There's also an adverb that inflects for number: dɛil (pl.), dɛliɛ̄s (spl.) 'all'.

The singular is used for individualized, countable nouns. The plural is used for groups of these individualized nouns or for mass nouns. The supraplural is used when there's some focus on the great number of individualized nouns or the great amount of a mass noun, expressing a notion such as "a huge number of" or simply "many". Pronouns use their plural with supraplural antecedents too.

Adposition and possession

Both adpositions and possessive construction put two (or more) nouns next to each other, with the following ones modifying the first.

Adpositions give a title, an explanation, or a nickname to the preceding noun, and are always in the nominative case regardless of what case this noun they modify is in.

Possessors instead are always in the oblique.

This possessive construction is also used for many other sorts of noun modification such as the content of containers, the measured noun of a measure, and certain descriptions as of purpose, material and others often expressed in English as noun+noun compounds or with the preposition of.

Personal Independent Pronouns

The personal independent pronouns come in two cases: nominative and accusative-oblique.

The nominative pronouns are used when a subject is not explicitly mentioned, and may or may not be stressed. If a verb doesn't have an explicit subject, it's interpreted as passive (see more below).

The accusative-oblique pronouns exist to be the objects of prepositions, and to stress direct or indirect objects already marked in the verb.

Pak belɛis ʃiɔi rāgi ʒulnief lī niɔ​kir​?

from all guys go.to.bed-PRF why you with=him?

Out of all guys, why did you sleep with him?

Adjectives

Adjectives generally follow their pronoun:

rūiɔ māna'

woman tall

'a tall woman'.

They can go before the noun too, though they gain a certain nuance of pomposity:

Iaualaŋnɛ ūɲɛ!'

magnificient house!

'A magnificient house!'

Relative clauses

Relative pronouns always start relative clauses (there are not instances they can be dropped such as in English the man [that] I saw) with relative pronouns.

These pronouns agree with their antecedent in case, number and gender; unlike English who~whom~whose, which decline according to what the noun would be inside the clause. If a noun has a function other than the subject, the antecedent is repeated inside the relative clause with an anaphoric pronoun.

Ranun miref gianɛka ʔɛ̄ haidan.

the.man that see-him-PRF I yesterday

The man I saw [him] yesterday.

Ranun miref gianɔhi haidan.

the.man that see-me-PRF yesterday

The man that saw me yesterday.

Sīɔn ʔɔ̄ tarāruna mirefa gianɛki haidan.

be I the.policewoman that see-him-PRF yesterday

I'm the policewoman that saw him yesterday.

Sīɔn ʔɔ̄ tarāruna mirefa gianɔhi ʔɛ̄ haidan.

be I the.policewoman that see-me-PRF he yesterday

I'm the policewoman that he saw [me] yesterday.

Sīɔn kī ʃiɔunir miref ʃasʃasi ʔɛ̄ kɔkardir.

be he the.guy that burn-PRF I his=book

He's the guy whose book I burned. (Lit., 'that I burned his book'.)

Questions

There's three type of questions: yes/no questions, asking about the truth of a statement to which a "yes" or a "no" answer can be expected; content questions such as what, how, when, etc.; and echo questions, when asking the other person to repeat something last said using that same sentence or part of it.

Yes/No questions

Yes/No questions are built by simply putting tāl after the verb.

Sīɛn tāl hikalamɔk odɔnɛr kakl?

is yes/no this=article long enough?

'Is this article long enough?'

This also goes for indirect yes/no questions, where the subordinate the verb is followed by tāl.

Mɔnɛn ʔɔ̄ sīɛn tāl hikalamɔk odɔnɛr kakl.

want I is yes/no this=article long enough

'I want to know if the article is long enough.'

Content questions

The question correlative pronouns are used here.

Person and Thing question pronouns are always topicalized to the beginning of the question.

Refir siakali lī!?

Whom kill-PRF you!?

'Who did you kill!?'

All other kinds of questions are normally used after the verb.

Siakalɛki ʒulnief lī?

kill-him-PRF why you?

'Why did you kill him?'

Mɔnɛnzɛ ʔɔ̄ melai siakalɛki lī gaɔnef.

want=not I know kill-him-PRF you when

I don't want to know when you killed him.

Echo questions

Echo questions are always done in-situ. Although the same question pronouns as above can be used, it's also common to suffix them with the definite clitic -un- too.

Xad kī sefunir​?

do-PLU he what?

He had done what?

Verbs: Aspects and Moods

Verbs in Meftla generally distinguish six aspects and two moods. In general terms:

• The perfective is used for completed actions from the point of view of the present or the future.

• For actions completed from the point of view of another past action, the pluperfect is used.

• The experiential is similar to the perfective, except that the fact that such experience has been attained before is what's being primarily communicated. Somebody bragging would use most of their verbs in the experiential.

• The inchoative is used for actions beginning to happen.

• The imperfective is used for ongoing actions without a clear end (because the speaker doesn't or didn't know, or it's simply irrelevant).

• The habitual is used for general truths or things currently being done as a sort of habit, interrupted by continuing after certain pauses.

Five Imperatives

The difference between the imperatives may be especially tricky to acquire, especially between the inchoative and the perfective imperatives. The former puts more emphasis on starting and the latter on finishing. As an example, when hassling a procrastinator, you would use the inchoative imperative to tell them to just start doing their much procrastinated obligations, while you would use the perfective imperative to tell them to both start it and get the hell done with it already.

The imperfective imperative is used to tell somebody to stay doing something.

The pluperfect imperative is used when telling somebody to have completed something by a certain deadline in the future.

The habitual imperative is used to tell somebody to acquire a certain habit. Very common when advising others.

Ŋabīs lɛkiunas kas ŋabɛlis lɛ̄.

love-HAB.IMPER your=neighbour as love-you-HAB you

'Love your neighbour as you love yourself.'

(Although Jesus was speaking to (male) scribe in Mark 12:28-31, and hence the masculine listener (general advice like this usually uses female imperatives, as it's the more unmarked), translators into Meftla take it that Jesus meant the neighbour to be unspecified for gender (that it's masculine in the Koine Greek was just Greek convention, according to them), and hence why the neighbour has feminine gender.

Static Verbs

A few verbs, belonging to a group called "the static verbs", distinguish only four aspects, however. The habitual is replaced by the imperfective, and the experiential is replaced by the perfective. These include gianai 'to see', rauai 'to hear', ŋahŋahai 'to smell';allibai 'to like', mɔnai 'to want', rūŋnai 'to want ~ to wish', sesenai 'to need'; rɔntlɔai 'to die', gigiɲai 'to be born', and by analogy, other verbs derived from them.

Verbs: Infixing Clitics

Three types of verbal infixing clitics exist: direct object pronouns, indirect object pronouns, and an "echo" clitic used when the verb rules certain adverb clauses.

Complement Subordination

Complement clauses are those that express an object of a verb with a clause. Such clauses in Meftla have no explicit subordinator: if the clause is the direct object it's introduced right after, if the clause is an indirect then it follows that preposition.

Gianɔn ʔɔ̄ ʃaxa lī sanɛiti zuiɛis.

see-PRF I buy-PRF you clothes new

I see you bought new clothes.

Ʒōbina ʔɔ̄ pakʃaxa lī sanɛiti zuiɛis.

think-PRF I from=buy-PLU you clothes new

I thought you had bought you new clothes.

The Passive

To express passivization, verbs simply drop the subject argument(s) without changing the cases of the other arguments. This also has the consequence that agents can't be reintroduced into a passive sentence.

Ʃasʃasi pānɛ ʔɛkardir.

burn-PRF brother my=book

My brother burned my book.

Ʃasʃasi Ɂɛkardir.

burn-PRF my=book

My book was burned.

Comparison

Here four types of comparisons are distinguished: comparisons of adjectives (you're more patient than me), comparisons of adverbs (you arrived earlier than them), comparisons of verbs (you procrastinate more than them —i.e. your procrastinating is greater in amount than their procrastinating), and comparisons of noun quantity (she has more books than us).

Across these three types, there's three levels of gradations: inferiority (procrastinate less than them), equality (as early as them, procrastinate as much as them), and superiority (as in the examples in the last paragraph).

Inferiority is always marked as the negative of superiority.