Meckelnish language

Meckelnish
Meckelnburghish
Mächeleböörchsch
Pronunciation	[ˈmæxəl(ə)ˌbøːɹ̈xʃ]
Native to	Meckelnburgh Alexandretta Siegrwangria The Clanlands Branniboria
Region	Northern Apollonia Tallandor Bay Crowsilver Sea Esthar
Ethnicity	Meckelners
Native speakers	approx. [unknown]
Language family	Pancontinental Prætaic–Arminic Crando–Batavian Apollo–Batavian Meckelnish
Early forms	Proto–Crando–Batavian Old Low Maas Old Meckelnish Early Modern Meckelnish
Standard form	Victoria University Standard
Dialects	Insular (Branniboria)
Writing system	Audente script (Meckelnish alphabet)
Official status
Official language in	United Kingdom of Meckelnburgh  Meckelnburgh  Branniboria
Regulated by	Royal Academy of Letters
Language codes
MOS-9 codes	mk

Phonology

Meckelnish shares a phonological system with the broader Crando–Batavian languages, including a complex syllable structure extending to (C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C)—a syllable may include a single vowel core preceded by up to three-sound consonant clusters and followed by four-sound clusters. However, there are a few notable exceptions unique to the Apollo–Batavian branch. Meckelnish retains productive dental fricative phonemes (/θ/ and /ð/) from Proto–Crando–Batavian. The system of palatalization, leading to sound change, has also expanded through a generalization of the weak realization in Batavian (where the sequence ⟨sj⟩ creates /ʃ/, as in Meckelnish).

Historic monophthongs

	Front				Back
	unrounded		rounded
	long	short	long	short	long	short
Close	iː	i	yː	y	uː	u
Mid	eː	eː	øː	ø	oː	o
Open	æː	æ			ɑː	ɑ

The Meckelnish language is stress-initial in native roots, and stress does not serve to distinguish native words. Secondary stress is placed in compound words on the second word. Where a prefix is used, such as /gə-/ in some past-tense verbs, the stress remains on the first syllable of the root. Outside of morphological contexts, unstressed /ə/ is heavily subject to deletion causing the loss of syllables.

The vowel system of Meckelnish is subject to different interpretations. There are 15 vowels which may serve in a phonemic role, but only seven to eight vowel spaces—where other short or reduced vowels are derivative of the cardinal stressed vowels. In Old Meckelnish, sounds such as /ɛ/ were formally the short counterparts of the cardinal vowels, in this instance /e/ (see table). Only long vowels, such as /eː/, have retained their original quality while the short vowels have laxed. By laxing, /ø/ since merged into /ʏ/ by the end of Old Low Maas.

Sound inventory

Cardinal vowels in Meckelnish.

		Labial		Dental		Alveolar		Post-alveolar		Palatal		Velar		Glottal
Nasal		m				n				(ɲ)		(ŋ)
Plosive/Affricate		p	b			t	d	t͡ʃ	d͡ʒ	(c͡ç)	(ɟ͡ʝ)	k	g
Fricative		f	v	θ	ð	s	z	ʃ	ʒ	(ç)	(ʝ)	x		h	(ɦ)
Approx.	Central									j		ɹ̈
	Lateral					l				(ʎ)		(ɫ)
	Labial									(ɥ)		w

Monophthongs

	Front				Central	Back
	unrounded		rounded
	long	short	long	short		long	short
Close	i	ɪ	y	ʏ	(ə)	u	ʊ
Mid	eː	ɛ	øː	(œ)		oː	ɔ
Open	(ɛː)	æ			äː		ɑ

Di- and triphthongs

	Front			Back
	unrounded		rounded
	fronting	backing		fronting	backing
Close		iə̯u̯		ui̯
Mid	ɛi̯	eːu̯	øːy̯	ɔi̯	oːu̯
Open				ɑi̯

Orthography

Comparison of forms of ⟨ij⟩ in italics.

Alphabet

Majuscule	A	Ä	B	Ƀ	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N	O	Ö	P	R	S	T	U	Ü	W	IJ	Z	Þ	Ð
Minuscule	a	ä	b	ƀ	c	d	e	f	g	h	i	j	k	l	m	n	o	ö	p	r	s	t	u	ü	w	ij	z	þ	ð
Name	aas	äes	beer	ƀee	see	doo	een	äf	ga	ha	ijs	jod	ka	äl	äm	än	oos	öös	pee	är	äs	tee	uuw	üüw	ween	ijg	zod	þorn	äð

The Meckelnish language's writing system has retained many of the features seen only in Proto–Crando–Batavian with numerous inventions, with most of the orthography stabilized in the Old Low Maas period. Meckelnish has retained the dental fricatives ⟨þ⟩ and ⟨ð⟩ while using umlauts to indicate fronting. The letter ⟨j⟩ has broad use in indicating the system of palatalization after many consonants, where it becomes a multigraph. The letter ⟨c⟩ has lost all associated sounds, and is only used in multigraphs. The rare letter ⟨ƀ⟩ for Micran languages developed from former ⟨b⟩ where the sound /β/ existed, dividing into /v/, /w/ and /b/ in various contexts. More usual, sound length is usually indicated by doubling the letter (e.g. ⟨a⟩ for /ɑ/ becoming ⟨aa⟩ for /äː/).

Spelling (and orthography) in Meckelnish has been standardized since the Early Meckelnish Era in metropolitan Meckelnburgh on the Genevelond Peninsula through multiple community efforts and later the University of Victoria via the Royal Academy of Letters, known as Victoria University Standard. The Insular Dialect found on Esthar in the constituent country of Branniboria, diverged from over a century of limited contact, adopted similar spelling, albeit for different pronunciations, starting around 1720 AN.

Meckelnish letter names solidified by the Old Meckelnish era. While many letters were based on nouns that applied their sounds, these names have fossilized so that their meanings (or even accompanying words) have not changed in parallel.

Grammar

Meckelnish follows the common Crando–Batavian system of grammar, with past and present tenses, three genders (masculine, neuter, feminine), and two numbers (singular and plural). The dual number was lost in the Old Low Maas era. However, Meckelnish retains many features lost elsewhere in Crando–Batavian languages, including the subjunctive mood, the genitive case and incomplete deletion of stem-final dental consonants (i.e. not /d/ > /ð/ > /∅/) in morphology. Meckelnish has also not undergone /θ/ > /d/ hardening in determinatives. For adjectives, Meckelnish has the lost the distinction between definite and indefinite forms, and instead decline according to the noun being modified, except in the predicate. Meckelnish also uses stressed forms of some reference terms by adding final ⟨-e⟩, so that words like "þat " ("that") and "dijch" ("you") become "þatte" and "dijche" (e.g. "Not him, but you.").

Determinatives (showing case and gender)

		Articles					Demonstr.
		definite		indefinite		neg.
		nom.	gen.	nom.	gen.		prox.	distal
Sing.	masc.	þe	þes	ene	eens	geine	þeze	þee
	neut.	het		e ('n)		gee	þit	þat
	fem.	þe	þer	een	ener	gein	þees	þij
Plural				—

Meckelnish has a complex system of umlaut where certain back vowels (see table) are shifted to the front in morphology, such as in the subjunctive mood, diminutive nouns and some plurals of nouns. Umlauting words have a root stem with a back or central vowel or diphthong (e.g. ⟨a⟩, ⟨au⟩, ⟨oo⟩) while umlautless words do not (e.g. ⟨ä⟩, ⟨ei⟩, ⟨ö⟩). Morphology in many words has also undergone T-deletion, where the ⟨-t⟩ suffix is lost in stems, except those ending in approximants (⟨j⟩, ⟨l⟩, ⟨r⟩, ⟨w⟩) and nasals (⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, ⟨ng⟩). A common change in forms is that bare final ⟨e⟩ is almost always followed by ⟨n⟩ before ⟨t⟩, ⟨d⟩, ⟨þ⟩, ⟨ð⟩, a vowel or ⟨h⟩ in the following word—notably not in verb suffixes.

The vocabulary of Meckelnish also descends from Proto–Crando–Batavian, along with its morphology. As a consequence, not all forms of verbs and other words "group recognizably" in their phonology, such as descendants in Class IIIa and IIIb verbs (i.e. /ɪ/ versus /æ/ Grade 1 stems). Many forms of especially verbs have also simplified so that a greater number of verbs are weak as compared to other Crando–Batavian languages.

Nouns and adjectives

Personal pronouns

			Subject	Object	Possessive			Reflexive
					masc.	neut.	fem./plur.
Sing.	1st		ijch	mijch	mijne	mij	mijn	mijch
	2nd		dijch	dijch	dijne	dij	dijn	dijch
	3rd	masc.	heer	hem	zijne	zij	zijn	zijch
		neut.	het	het
		fem.	zij	hür	höre	höör	höör
Plur.	1st		ƀeer	üsch	üzje	üüsch		üsch
	2nd		geer	üüch	öre	öör		üüch
	3rd		zij	hün	hünne	hün		zijch

Noun morphology

		Singular		Plural
		nom.	gen.	nom.	gen.
Stem	fem.	-∅	-er	-e	-er
	masc.		-(e)s
	neut.			-er
Um.	fem.		um.-e	um.	um.-e
	m./n.		um.-es
S-nouns			-(e)s	-(e)s	-(n)e
Diminutive		-ke	-kes	-kes	-kene

Adjective morphology

		Nom.	Gen.	Comp.	Super.
Sing.	masc.	-e	-s	-(d)ere	-ste
	neut.	long V, -∅, t, p, k	long V, -s	-(d)er
	fem.	-∅	-er
Plural

Verbs

Like most Prætaic–Arminic languages, Meckelnish is a verb-second (V2) language, following a subject-verb-object (SVO) word order in the main clause with only one verb (e.g. "I visit the store."). Subsequent verbs are placed in the SOV form (e.g. "I want the store to visit."), while the VSO form arises when the front of a main clause is made a modifying word instead of the subject (e.g. "Today visit I the store."). These combine such that a fronted subordinate clause is SOV while the main clause is VSO (e.g. "When I the store visit, want I carrots to buy."). Unlike most Crando–Batavian languages, the supine is not formed by circumlocution, but by its own morphological form ⟨-enterre⟩, such as that "I visit the store in order groceries to buy," becomes "I visit the store groceries buy-(in order to) [-enterre]," in the V2 syntax. Meckelnish also has double negation, with general "not" (⟨neet⟩) combined with pre-verbal ⟨än⟩ (e.g. "I not [än] visit the store not [neet].").

"reize" to travel (weak)

infinitive		reize
supine		reizenterre
auxiliary		hübbe
		pres.	past/subj.			imp.
sing.	1st	reis	reisde			reis
	2nd	reis	reisdes
	3rd	reis	reisde
plur.	1st	reize	reisde
	2nd	reis	reisdet
	3rd	reize	reisde
		pres.	past
participle		reizend	gereis

"wune" to live (weak umlaut)

infinitive		wune
supine		wunenterre
auxiliary		hübbe
		pres.	past	subj.	imp.
sing.	1st	wuun	wuunde	wüünde	wuun
	2nd	wüüns	wuundes	wüündes
	3rd	wüünt	wuunde	wüünde
plur.	1st	wune	wuunde	wüünde	wuunt
	2nd	wuunt	wuundet	wüündet
	3rd	wune	wuunde	wüünde
		pres.	past
participle		wunend	gewune

"ete" to eat (strong class 5)

infinitive		ete
supine		etenterre
auxiliary		hübbe
		pres.	past	subj.	imp.
sing.	1st	eet	aat	äet	eet
	2nd	its	aats	äets
	3rd	it	aat	äet
plur.	1st	ete	ate	äte
	2nd	eet	aat	äet
	3rd	ete	ate	äte
		pres.	past
participle		etend	gëete

"zeen" to be (irregular)

infinitive		zeen
supine		zeenterre
auxiliary		zeen
		pres.	past	subj.	imp.
sing.	1st	bin	woor	weer	bis
	2nd	bis	woors	weers
	3rd	is	woor	weer
plur.	1st	zeen	wore	were	zeet
	2nd	zeet	woort	weert
	3rd	zeen	wore	were
		pres.	past
participle		zeend	gewees