Alfermann's Law
Alfermann's Law (named after the fictional linguist Juliane Alfermann) is a complex change in the phonology and morphology of the West Hesperic languages. In these languages, non-paradigmatic final *a is lost; this loss affected inanimate a-stem nouns (e.g. *khara > *khar 'stone') and oblique case endings (e.g. *xnarana > *xnaran 'man' (dative).
In animate nouns and verb endings, number inflection was reorganized such that *-a marked the singular, *-u dual and *-i plural in all cases. This involved suffixation of *-a to i-stem and u-stem animate nouns (e.g. *xasi > *xasia 'star'). Also, the objective suffix *-m was now also used in the dual and plural. The nominal paradigm thus changed from the Proto-Hesperic paradigm
| Case | Singular | Dual | Plural |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agentive | *xnara | *xnarax | *xnaras |
| Objective | *xnaram | *xnarax | *xnaras |
| Genitive | *xnarasa | *xnarawsa | *xnarajsa |
| Partitive | *xnarala | *xnarawla | *xnarajla |
| Dative | *xnarana | *xnarawna | *xnarajna |
to this type:
| Case | Singular | Dual | Plural |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agentive | *xnara | *xnaru | *xnari |
| Objective | *xnaram | *xnarum | *xnarim |
| Genitive | *xnaras | *xnarus | *xnaris |
| Partitive | *xnaral | *xnarul | *xnaril |
| Dative | *xnaran | *xnarun | *xnarin |
In all West Hesperic languages except Albic, this paradigm underwent a further change due to the neutralization of final nasals as *-n. This change led to the merger of the old dative and objective case, and the shift of the old partitive case to the meaning of a dative case.
The adverb-forming suffix *-s on adjectives also became *-i, the source of the Old Albic instrumental case.
The East Hesperic languages (Valdiska and Duniscian) did not undergo this change, nor did Viddan.
