Merar

Not to be confused with Meromo.

NOTE ALSO THAT THE SAME PEOPLE CALLING THEMSELVES MERAR LIKELY ENCOMPASSED THE FERN MIGRANTS AND THEREFORE SPOKE AT LEAST ONE FERN LANGUAGE. THESE PEOPLE WOULD HAVE OUTNUMBERED THE TARPABAPS EVEN AFTER MANY FERNS MIGRATED A SECOND TIME.

Merar was the language of Paba's military caste, which consisted mostly of Tarpabaps and other ethnic minorities.

Merar was a nation of people who had immigrated from Paba to Subumpam during the late stages of the Vegetable War after they had pushed the battlefronts westward out of Paba. After the war they stayed in Subumpam and married Subumpamese women. THey set up a new government stating that only military officers were allowed to hold government posts. Some Merari people claimed that they had created the Third Star Empire, named after the dark-skinned Star tribes of the far southwest; however, though the geographical boundaries were similar, the Merar empire was governed from its north, not its south.

In 3041, FILTER took over Subumpam, and therefore the branch of Merar that was spoken in Subumpam went extinct early on. This was an ironic change of fate, since FILTER was originally a Subumpamese language, and Merar had earlier swept out all of the original Subumpamese languages.

Languages

This is a branch of Paleo-Pabappa, not Gold.

This is the indigenous language of Paba, before its people switched to speaking Gold under the influence of Nama and AlphaLeap. Its population was about 90% Pabaps and 5 to 10% Tarpabaps (the same people later called Merar). The Tarpabaps were the military caste of Paba and were much taller and stronger than the Pabaps.

Originally, the Tarpabaps came from the same port of origin as the Pabaps, despite their greatly different body types. They thus spoke the same language. However, even from the very beginning, new migrants were patrolling the coast, and later migrations to Paba brought different tribes of people who joined the Tarpabap caste. These had their own languages, but in order to rise in rank in the military, they had to learn the main language of Paba.

By around 2100 AD, the small-bodies Pabaps could no longer control the Tarpabaps, and left them to use their own languages. Thus the Tarpabaps who had learned the main language no longer had a special avenue to power.

Pre-Patuupʷto (1400) to Proto-Aboa (2668)

This branch of the family is called Aboa because it is the language of the Empire of Aboa, which included Thaoa and some nearby areas. It may also have included parts of Subumpam and Litila. They slowly invaded the pacifist empire of Paba and by 3919 they had become Paba.

Syllables could end in a vowel, or one of /k n h g l/. The high tone could also be considered to be a final consonant, /ʔ/. Each of these five codas could occur after a vowel sequence; therefore, /pouh/ is a valid syllable. Superheavy syllabes such as these are a common trait in related languages.

All closed syllables were toneless, but contrasts like /ak~aak/ still existed.

The consonant inventory in 1400 AD was

Rounded bilabials:    pʷ  mʷ      hʷ  w
Spread bilabials:     p   m   b   f   v
Alveolars:            t   n   r   s   l
Palatals:                             y
Velars:               k   ŋ       h   g 

The vowel inventory was

Short vowels:          a  e  i  o  u  ə
Long vowels:          aa ee ii oo uu 
Falling diphthongs:         ai    au
                            ei    ou
                            əi    əu

1. The voiced stop b shifted to v.
2. After a high tone, the voiceless fricatives hʷ f h shifted to kʷ p k. The /s/ did not shift.
3. After a low tone, the voiceless stops pʷ p t shifted to bʷ b d.
4. After a high tone, the nasals mʷ m n ŋ became the geminates mmʷ mm nn ŋŋ.
5. Tones were eliminated.
6. The sequences mpʷ mp nt shifted to mbʷ mb nd.
7. The clusters kpʷ kp kt kf shifted to ppʷ pp tt pp. Note that there was never a /ks/.
8. Any other final k shifted to h, which adopted previously existing sandhi rules such as /hm/ = [mp].
9. The labialized consonants kʷ pʷ bʷ mʷ shifted to p p b m. Then w shifted to v.
10. The diphthongs ai ei əi all merged as ē. Then au ou əu merged as ō. Then, the double vowel sequences aa ee ii oo uu became ā ē ī ō ū.

Paleo-Pabappa to Raspara

This branch reduces its vowel system due to Gold influence, even though the shift took place more than a thousand years after Gold's. It may even end up with /a i u/ instead of /a i u ə/.