Nouns in Vrkhazhian

Vrkhazhian nouns are called maḡimud (singular maḡimu). They are declined for case, gender, and number. Specifically there are five cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, allative, and ablative) and two numbers (singular and plural). Additionally, Vrkhazhian has three grammatical genders: masculine, feminine and neuter. These genders are based on sex and strictly semantic, thus most nouns, such as inanimate objects, fall into the category of neuter.

ʾIpālage ʾAṣrēsu (Noun inflection)

All nouns are declined in one of three cases, which are the nominative, the oblique, and the instrumental.

The nominative case indicates the subject of an intransitive verb and the agent of a transitive verb. The accusative case indicates the object, or patient, of a transitive verb. It also indicates the possessor of a genitive construction as well as the object of a preposition. Lastly, the instrumental case indicates the theme of a ditransitive verb.

māǧde (king, male ruler) Singular Plural Nominative māǧd-e māǧd-e-n Oblique māǧd-i māǧd-i-n Instrumental ta-māǧd-i ta-māǧd-i-n

ʾāya (woman) Singular Plural Nominative ʾāy-a ʾāy-a-n Oblique ʾāy-u ʾāy-u-n Instrumental t-āy-u t-āy-u-n

Noun states

Nouns are also considered to be placed into what are called "states". There are two states: the governed state (???), or status rectus, and the construct state (???), or status constructus. The construct state is used in genitive constructions to mark the head noun (possessed noun), while the oblique case is used to mark the dependent (modifying) noun or adjective. In Vrkhazhian, the head noun and the modifying noun/adjective are called ??? and ???, respectively. Nouns that that are not placed in the construct state are considered to be in the governed state, which is the default state of all nouns.

When a noun is placed in the construct state, it is stripped of its gender-case ending. In addition to this, the last consonant of the noun expresses a polarity in voicing; if the last consonant of the noun is voiceless, it becomes voiced and if the last consonant of the noun is voiced, it becomes voiceless. Furthermore, many nouns possess irregular forms in the construct state, as exemplified below:

sēmśe (boundary, liminal space) Singular Plural Nominative samūl samūl-ē Oblique samūl samūl-ī Instrumental ta-samūl ta-samūl-ī

ʾegra (stook of wheat) Singular Plural Nominative ʾēger ēger-ā Oblique ʾēger ēger-ū Instrumental t-ēger t-ēger-ū

Noun derivation

Vrkhazhian nouns are mostly derived from verbs and there are numerous ways to derive nouns from them:

Dsuri / Dusri Dasrawi Padsuri Dassari

Dsira / Disra Dasraya Madsira Dasrira

dusri/daskar OR dusri/dasyar/desīr disra/duskur OR disra/daswar/dosūr