Archive:Thuun

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Thuun
Tuum
Thuun flag.PNG
Pronunciation[tʉ:m]
RegionNorthern Mahavia
Native speakers~ 300 000  (2015)
Language family
Writing systemKuoggvi / Achiyitqan
Official status
Official language inUvanga
CWS codeUO1

Background

Thuun (Tuum /tʉ:m/) is the primary language of Uvanga, and is distantly related to Mahavic and Elipo-Sucaelian.


Phonology

Consonants

Bilabial Alveolar Dorsal
Nasal m n
Plosive p t k
Fricative s
Approximant l j

Vowels

Front Back
Unrounded Rounded Unrounded Rounded
Close i i: y y: ʉ ʉ:
Mid e e: ø ø: ɤ ɤ: o o:
Open æ æ: ɑ ɑ:

These vowels can combine to form up to almost 80 phonemic polyphthongs, including length distinctions. Overlong vowels are also possible, but quite uncommon.

Phonotactics

(C)V(C) syllable structure, /j/ cannot appear in coda, and /p/, /k/, and /l/ generally cannot be word-final.


Thuun has a system of vowel harmony. A word cannot contain both front and back vowels, so affixes automatically adapt to the same backness as the stem. The only neutral vowel is /i/, which can occur in words of either backness.

Orthography (romanisation)

a
/ɑ/
ä
/æ/
e
/ɤ/
ë
/e/
i
/i/
j
/j/
k
/k/
l
/l/
m
/m/
n
/n/
o
/o/
ö
/ø/
p
/p/
s
/s/
t
/t/
u
/ʉ/
y
/y/

Long and overlong vowels are written doubled or tripled, eg. <ää> /æ:/, äää /æ::/
Diphthongs are written with their components side by side, eg. <ië> /ie̯:/, <iië> /ie̯::/

Orthography (conscript)

Thuun has two official scripts: Achiyitqan (abugida), and Kuoggvi (alphabet), a modified version of the Mahavic script. Standard Mahavic is also commonly used.


Grammar

Morphology

Thuun is highly synthetic and exclusively suffixing. The morphology is overall agglutinative, but there are some fusional elements as well. The suffixing process also often results in phonological modifications to the stem or other attached suffixes.

Nouns decline for at least 30 cases and 2 numbers, with number and case being fused into one suffix. Nouns also take suffixes for pronominal possession and locational modifiers.

Verbs conjugate for 10 different categories: subject agreement (10), tense (2), polarity (2), voice (3), mood (10+), interrogative (2), and 4 aspect slots (9).

Syntax

The word order is fairly unrestrictive, but tends to be SVO or SOV.