Kosi
Welcome to the Kosi reference grammar and lexicon. It is being constantly revised.
1. Phonology
- 1.1. Phonemic Inventory
- Kosi's phonemic inventory consists of fifteen consonants and seven vowels, making a total of twenty two phonemes, described below.
- 1.1.1. Consonants
- Kosi has fifteen consonants:
| Grapheme | Description |
|---|---|
| P p | voiceless bilabial stop |
| B b | voiced bilabial stop |
| M m | voiced bilabial nasal |
| V v | voiced bilabial fricative (in some dialects, a voiced labiodental fricative) |
| Ð ð | voiced interdental fricative (in some dialects, it has merged with d) |
| T t | voiceless dental stop |
| D d | voiced dental stop |
| N n | voiced dental nasal |
| S s | voiceless dental fricative (voiced intervocalically, unless written geminate; a voiceless postalveolar fricative before i) |
| C c | voiceless lamino-alveolar affricate (a voiceless lamino-postalveolar affricate when it precedes i) |
| L l | voiced alveolar lateral |
| R r | voiced alveolar trill |
| J j | voiced palatal glide |
| K k | voiceless velar stop (a voiceless velar fricative intervocalically) |
| H h | voiceless glottal fricative |
- 1.1.2. Vowels
- Kosi has seven vowels:
| Grapheme | Description |
|---|---|
| I i | close front unrounded monophthong |
| Ü ü | close front rounded monophthong |
| E e | open-mid front unrounded monophthong |
| Ö ö | open-mid front rounded monophthong |
| U u | close back rounded monophthong |
| O o | close-mid back rounded monophthong |
| A a | open back unrounded monophthong |
Note that vowels in Kosi are backed or fronted in certain environments for certain grammatical purposes; when the vowels i and e are backed, they become Ï/ï and Ë/ë (the unrounded counterparts of u and o respectively), but these vowels are never found in lexical roots.
- 1.1.3. Diphthongs
- Kosi has four diphthongs:
| Grapheme | Description |
|---|---|
| JA ja | palatalized open back unrounded monophthong |
| JO jo | palatalized close-mid back rounded monophthong |
| AE ae | open back-close front unrounded diphthong |
| AU au | open back-close back rounded diphthong |
All other vowel combinations are pronounced disyllabically, e.g. heis 'incorrect' = he.is, except geminate vowels, which are pronounced geminate, e.g. dunja 'world (nominative)' + -a = dunjaa 'person (accusative)'.
- 1.2. Stress
- Primary stress falls on the first syllable of a word, secondary stress on the third syllable, and tertiary stress on the fifth syllable.
- 1.3. Syllable Structure
- Kosi's syllable formula is (C)V(C). Most clusters of two consonants are allowed, except consonant+liquid clusters like [bl] and [tr].
- 1.4. Svarabhakti Vowel
- If the addition of an affix to a root or another affix would cause an awkward consonant cluster or if a foreign name contains a difficult consonant cluster, a svarabhakti (epenthetic) vowel i is added in speech only (the name remains the same as in the source language in writing), e.g. Blake is pronounced as if spelled Bileik, Tristan as if spelled Tiristn.
2. Morphology
2.1. Nominal and Adjectival Morphology
- 2.1.1. Argument Roles
- There are three argument roles: agent (subject), patient (direct object), and focus (indirect object). Their corresponding cases:
| Case | Suffix | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | -0 (i.e., a null morpheme) | has |
| Accusative | -a | hassa |
| Dative | -e | hasse |
In equational sentences, both arguments are in the nominative (and thus any modifiers): ih anak 'I am a child'.
- 2.1.2. Oblique Cases
- There are thirty five oblique cases:
| Preposition(s) or Phrase(s) | Affix | Example |
|---|---|---|
| above, over | -ab | hassab |
| after, behind | -ive | hassive, ötive |
| alongside, beside, next to | -ari | hassari |
| around, surrounding | -ja | hasja, ötja |
| as, like, similar to | -ken | hasken |
| before, in front of, prior to | -öm | hassöm, ötöm |
| between, among | -ki | haski-uliski, ötki-sabki |
| by means of, via | -i | hassi |
| compared to, than, pertaining to | -ra | hasra |
| composed of | -öl | hassöl |
| down to | -era | hassera |
| during, in the middle of | -oc | hassoc, ötoc |
| far from | -aci | hassaci |
| for, in order to benefit | -aed | hassaed |
| from, out of, away from, derived from | -il | hassil |
| in, inside, at | -ahe | hasahe, ötahe |
| into, towards | -tah | hastah |
| in exchange for, instead of | -inde | hassinde |
| left of the listener | -oli | hassoli |
| left of the speaker | -eli | hasseli |
| near to | -jah | hasjah |
| of, associated with | -ü | hassü |
| on (top of) | -on | hasson |
| onto | -tan | hastan |
| outside of | -ahi | hassahi |
| part of, some, any | -o | hasso |
| per, for every | -alah | hassalah |
| right of the listener | -oðe | hassoðe |
| right of the speaker | -ene | hassene |
| through, across, beyond, past | -eð | hasseð, öteð |
| under, below, beneath | -jal | hasjal |
| until, as far as | -jok | hasjok, ötjok |
| up towards | -üla | hassüla |
| with, accompanying | -um | hassum |
| without, lacking | -ak | hassak |
- 2.1.3. Possession
- Kosi has seven possible possessors:
| Possessor | Meaning | Ending | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| First person singular | 'my' | -im | hassim |
| Second person singular | 'your' | -at | hassat |
| Third person singular | 'his/her/its' | -u | hassu |
| First person plural exclusive | 'our (but excluding you)' | -öd | hassöd |
| First person plural inclusive | 'our (and including you)' | -ic | hassic |
| Second person plural | 'you guys' ' | -üt | hassüt |
| Third person plural | 'their' | -ed | hassed |
These endings may be nominalized by standing alone: anakat imü 'that child is mine'. When this is the case, they can take case endings; their accusative and dative forms are irregular, ending in -l and -n respectively (rather than the expected -a and -e). Kosi also has no genetive; instead, the nouns are joined together and the property is put into the third-person possessive declension: man hassu 'a man's house', man hessu 'a man's houses', men hassu 'the men's house', men hessu 'the men's houses'. Kosi has no verb meaning 'to have', either; instead, Kosi uses periphrasis: hassim neb 'I have a house/my house exists'.
- 2.1.4. Plural
- The first vowel of the root is backed if front (i, ü, e, ö) or fronted if back (o, u, a):
| Ablaut change | Example |
|---|---|
| i > ï | sim 'eye(ball)' > sïm |
| ü > u | tüs 'fire' > tus |
| e > ë | me 'ocean/sea' > më |
| ö > o | köpek 'dog' > kopek |
| o > ö | hojo 'river' > höjo |
| u > ü | buk 'book' > bük |
| a > e | ha 'tree' > he |
- 2.1.5. Demonstratives
- Kosi has three basic demonstrative-adjectival suffixes that can be attached to nouns:
| Demonstrative | Suffix | Example |
|---|---|---|
| 'this' | -ut | hassut |
| 'that' | -at | hassat |
| 'yon' | -öt | hassöt |
These endings may be nominalized by standing alone: amihe atl 'I don't like that'. When this is the case, they can take case endings; their accusative and dative forms are irregular, ending in -l and -n respectively (rather than the expected -a and -e).
- 2.1.6. Concordance Rules
- Adjectives must agree in case and number with the nouns they modify.
Declension of adjectives and nouns is identical. Nouns used with quantifiers require the partitive case: öt 'five' + has 'house' = öt hasso 'five houses'.
- 2.1.7. Comparison
- Kosi has five degrees of comparison:
| Type | Meaning | Prefix | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Comparative of inferiority | 'less' | ja- | janae |
| Comparative of superiority | 'more' | si- | sinae |
| Superlative of inferiority | 'least' | hae- | hanae |
| Superlative of superiority | 'most' | ru- | runae |
| Equative | 'as...as' | kö- | könae |
More coming soon...
