Gotski or Modern Gothic

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Shemtov
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Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Shemtov »

Gotski or Modern Gothic is a minority language spoken in the Crimea by C. 2000 people. It is the last surviving descendant of the East Germanic Branch. It has been heavily influenced by Russian, having a palatalized-unpalatalized contrast.

Phonology:
/p pʲ b bʲ t d t͡ʃ d͡ʒ k g kʲ gʲ/
/m mʲ n nʲ/
/f fʲ v vʲ s z ʃ ʒ x xʲ/
/r rʲ/
/l j/

/i u o e a/

Note that the post-alveolars are considered to be the palatalized version of the dentals.
I will be writing this in Russian Cyrillic, with the exception that Ы represents /i/ not proceeded by a palatal or /j/.

Nouns:
Nouns have three genders, Masculine, Feminine and neuter. They have two numbers, singular and plural, and four cases: Nominative Accusative Dative and Genitive:
The a-declension consists of Masculines and Neuters. It comes in two varieties, Nonpalatal and Palatal, the lattar of which shows palatal alternation with the final consonant.
Nonpalatal:
Даг "Day" Masculine
Nom. Sing: Дагс
Nom. Plr. Дагос
Acc. Sing: Даг
Acc. Plr.: Даганс
Dat. Sing.: Дага
Dat. Plr: Дагам
Gen. Sing: Дагыс
Gen Plr: Дагэ

Neuters show fusion between the Nom. and Acc forms, like so:
Ворд "word"
Nom. Sing: Ворд
Nom. Plr. Вордос
Acc. Sing: Борд
Acc. Plr.: Ворданс
Dat. Sing.: Ворда
Dat. Plr: Вордам
Gen. Sing: Вордыс
Gen Plr: Вордэ

Palatal Masculines decline like this:
Хэрджес "One who works with animals"
Nom. Sing: Хэрджес
Nom. Plr. Хэрджос
Acc. Sing: Хэрды
Acc. Plr.: Хэрджанс
Dat. Sing.: Хэрджя
Dat. Plr: Хэрджям
Gen. Sing: Хэрджес
Gen Plr: Хэрдже

Palatal Neuters decline like this:
Куна "Family"
Nom. Sing: Куна
Nom. Plr. Куня
Acc. Sing: Куна
Acc. Plr.: Куня
Dat. Sing.: Куня
Dat. Plr: Куням
Gen. Sing: Кунис
Gen Plr: Куням



Personal pronouns of the first person:
Nom: Ык
Acc Мык
Dat Мыс
Gen Мена

1P PLR
Nom: Вес
Acc Унс
Dat Унс
Gen Унсар

There is a null-copula in present tense, and no articles, so we have sentences like:
Вес куна
"We are a family"

Ык хэрджес
"I work with animals"
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
shimobaatar
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by shimobaatar »

Shemtov wrote:Gotski or Modern Gothic is a minority language spoken in the Crimea by C. 2000 people. It is the last surviving descendant of the East Germanic Branch. It has been heavily influenced by Russian, having a palatalized-unpalatalized contrast.
Nice, I'm always glad to see more Germanic conlangs, particularly East Germanic ones! I assume that it's descended as much as possible from what's attested of Crimean Gothic? Could we see the sound changes you have so far?
Shemtov wrote:Note that the post-alveolars are considered to be the palatalized version of the dentals.
I will be writing this in Russian Cyrillic, with the exception that Ы represents /i/ not proceeded by a palatal or /j/.
Shemtov wrote:Palatal Masculines decline like this:
Хэрджес "One who works with animals"
Nom. Sing: Хэрджес
Nom. Plr. Хэрджос
Acc. Sing: Хэрды
Acc. Plr.: Хэрджанс
Dat. Sing.: Хэрджя
Dat. Plr: Хэрджям
Gen. Sing: Хэрджес
Gen Plr: Хэрдже
Stupid question, probably, but at some point could you go into some more detail regarding the orthography, especially when it comes to representing palatalized consonants? I ask because the ways that some of the forms of "Хэрджес" are spelled aren't what I would have expected.

Anyway, I look forward to more of this language!
Esneirra973
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Esneirra973 »

Could you provide a Latin transcription for the language? I am curious to see how it would look.
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Shemtov
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Shemtov »

Declension of Feminine nouns, which also have a Nonpalatal and palatal subdeclensions:
Non-Palatal: Гыба "Gift"
Nom. Sing: Гыба
Nom. Plr. Гыбо
Acc. Sing: Гыба
Acc. Plr.: Гыбо
Dat. Sing.: Гыбэ
Dat. Plr: Гыбом
Gen. Sing: Гыбос
Gen Plr: Гыбо

Palatal Банды "rope; tieable material"
Nom. Sing: Банды
Nom. Plr. Банджос
Acc. Sing: Банджя
Acc. Plr.: Банджос
Dat. Sing.: Бандже
Dat. Plr: Банджо
Gen. Sing: Банджос
Gen Plr: Банджом



Verbs:
Conjugation of present tense verb Ным "To take"
1P sing. Ныма
1P. Plr Нымам
2p sing. Нымыс
2P Plr: Нымыт
3P sing Нымыт
3P plr: Ныман


Example sentences:
Ык ныма гыба
"I take the gift"

Вес гыбам банджос хэрджя
"We give the ropes to the animal worker"
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
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Shemtov
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Shemtov »

Past tense verbs take the suffix -да if the subject is singular and -джед if it is plural:
Ык нымда гыба
However, for the perfective past, the verb Высан is used an auxiliary, with the main verb in the infinitive:
Past conjugation of Высан:
1P sing. Вас
1P. Plr Весум
2p sing.Васт
2P Plr: Весут
3P sing Вас
3P plr: Весун

Perfective in this case means that the action is completed in full, so in the above sentence, the speaker took the gift, but it was not a complete taking.
Thus:
Ык вас ныман гыба
"I have taken the gift"

This can be used productively like the imperfective/perfective pair for Сок "to search"
Ык сокда банджя
"I searched [unsuccessfully] for rope"

Ык вас сокян банджя
"I searched for rope [and found it}"
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
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Lambuzhao
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Lambuzhao »

[tick] Nice touch using *wysan for PFT: a defs nod to :rus: :ukr: :bel: PLUPs
At first, I was like, what the heck are U doing... Ooooooooooooh! [B)]
[+1] :idea:


One question about Gotski Perfect: why use the INF, where a PST.PTCP might be expected as in Slavic langs, or as in Germanic periphrastic PFT tense (though I do not think there are any attestations of such in :got: :wat: )
:?: :wat:
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Lambuzhao
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Re: Gotski or Modern Gothic

Post by Lambuzhao »

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