Proto-Adzamic language
Old Adzamasi | |
---|---|
Atäsamohtaäk | |
Flag of the Adzamic Empire | |
Pronunciation | ädəzämohtä:k |
Region | Ekuosia |
Ethnicity | Adzamic |
Native speakers | Extinct (470) |
Language family | Ekuo-Lahiri
|
CWS code | – |
Old Adzamasi is the earliest attested form of the Adzamasi language. It was at first a dialect of a larger language called Macro-Adzamic which was spoken across much of the Ekuosian desert. Old Adzamic specifically arose in the Mehyaran area and later became the official language of the Adzamic Empire.
Phonology
Adzamic had a fairly conventional phonology consisting of only oral vowels and pulmonic consonants, with no phonation distinction or secondary articulations at the phonemic level.
Consonants
Phonemic | Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nasal | m | n | |||||
Plosive | p | t | k | q | ʔ | ||
Fricative | ɸ | þ | s | ʃ | x | ħ | h |
Approximant | l | j | ɰ |
Allophones | Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Voiced | b | d | g | ɢ | |||
Glottalized | pˀ | tˀ | kˀ | qˀ | |||
Fricative | β | ð | z | ʒ | ɣ | ʕ | ɦ |
Vowels
Front | Central | Back | |
---|---|---|---|
Close | i | u | |
Mid | e | ə | o |
Open | ä |
Phonotactics
Syllable structure was very loose and all sorts of clusters occurred. Stops and fricatives would voice between vowels, glides, and/or nasals. Uvular~pharyngeal fricatives and glottal sounds became secondary glottalization on preceding consonants, which eventually lead to the development of Adzamasi ejectives.
Orthography
The romanization of Adzamic is as IPA except: f for bilabial fricative; þ for dental fricative; w for velar approximant; and sometimes ä in place of schwa.
Grammar
Morphology
Adzamic was a fairly isolating language.
Nouns mark for animacy and number.
Verbs mark for proximity as the primary deixis (instead of time).
Syntax
Adzamic was a direct-inverse, hierarchical language, organized by a complex animacy system. It was generally head-initial.