Haltzeonian

Haltzeonian 
Pronunciation	[hɑldzəniʃen]
Language family	Kardonian
Writing system	Kardonian Interastral Standard Alphabet Latin script
Official status
Spoken in	New Maeksikeo (official)
Speaker
Demonym	Haltzeonian
Technical information
Language code	HTZ

 This page contains Kardonian Interastral characters. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Kardonian Interastral characters.

Haltzeonian (English: [ˌhɑɫtsɪˈjʌwnɪjən]) is a Kardonian language descended from Industrial Kardonian. As the language of one of the core worlds of the Kardonian Empire, it is an important contributor to the standard tongue, Common Kardonian.

Phonology

Main article: Haltzeonian phonology

Consonants

Consonant phonemes

	Labial			Alveolar						Post- alveolar/ palatal			Velar			Uvular
Nasal	m			n						ɲ			ŋ
Stop	pʰ	p	pʼ	tʰ		t		tʼ		t͡ʃʰ	t͡ʃ	t͡ʃʼ	kʰ	k	kʼ	qʰ	q	qʼ
Fricative				s			z									χ
Approximant				ðʷ						j			w			h
Lateral				l						ʎ
Trill				r

Notes

• The non-affricate aspirated stops are variably affricated in Haltzeonian dialects; this is particularly the case for stressed aspirated stops.
• Plain stops are usually slack voiced [b̥ d̥ d̥͡ʒ̊ g̊ ɢ̥], but this is somewhat variable, and the primary way these are distinguished is aspiration (or a lack thereof).
  • The plain uvular stop has other allophones in certain dialects - namely [ʁ̊ ʀ̆].

Vowels

Vowel phonemes

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Close-mid	e	ə	o
Open-mid	ɛ		ɔ
Open		ɐ

Harmony

Haltzeonian, like all Kardonian languages, has highly active vowel harmony based on the backness of the stressed vowel. Vowels must match the backness of the preceding stressed /i e jV u o wV/ in the word. This results in the new phones [y ɯ ø ʌ], when a /u i o ɛ/ switches backness.

Stress

Stress is complex in Kardonian, but generally not phonemic. It relies on "syllable weight", where a syllable which has a stop coda is very heavy. Closed syllables that do not end in a stop are heavy, open syllables with a nasal vowel are light, and open syllables with an oral vowel are very light. Syllables with two onset consonants go up one place on the weight hierarchy unless they already have a coda stop. The first syllable is the only one which can be onsetless, and it goes down one place on the weight hierarchy unless it already is open and oral.

If the word is bisyllabic, then the heaviest syllable is stressed. If both syllables have the same weight, the first syllable receives stress unless its vowel is open-mid oral ae, eo, ao and there is no onset. A geminated stop, such as in the word mekka, is counted as a stop to each syllable.

For trisyllabic words, the first syllable receives primary stress if and only if it is closed and both following syllables are open. If this is not the case, then the stress rules apply to the last two syllables as if they were their own word. For words with more syllables than this, primary stress is determined as if the last three syllables were their own word.

Words with 2 or more syllables before the determined final stress location will receive secondary stress. This is determined the same way as prior, as if the last stressed syllable and all syllables after it were removed. This continues until the beginning of the word is reached. For example, the name Albaqaerqe has penultimate stress, thus the al is also stressed: [ˌɐʟpɐˈqʰɛrqʰe].

Monosyllabic affixes do not change the stress position unless they've been lexicalized. This does mean that, for example, the word for money, lhõnanheon, is pronounced [ˌʎɔ̃nɐˈɲən], even though the identical word for a few lhõnan is pronounced [ʎɔ̃ˈnɐɲən]. This is the only case where stress is phonemic, and even then, these affixes are generally considered a separate morpheme. Under this analysis, the stress within the morpheme lhõnan does not change; it is only once lexicalized into a single morphene lhõnanheon that it changes.

Orthography

Main article: Kardonian Interastral Standard Alphabet

Haltzeonian may be either written using the Latin alphabet or using the Kardonian Interastral Standard Alphabet.

Grammar

Nouns

Noun declinations are generally a single suffix, as follows:

	Singular	Paucal	Plural
Nominative		-(y)eon	-(n)il
Accusative	-cha	-cheon	-nchil
Genitive	-seo	-sheon	-nsil
Possessive	-ma	-meon	-mbil
Dative	-t’an	-t’eon	-nt’il
Lative	-dao	-zaolyeon	-zaonil
Locative	-zẽ	-zenheon	-zẽgil
Ablative	-paet	-paeseon	-paensil

(n) metathesizes with a final non-sonorant.

Lative, locative, and ablative appear to use 2 suffixes. This is because they preserve the previous agglutination.

All endings are listed in standard form, and thereby, will harmonize as needed.

Verbs

Verbs can apply multiple affixes, unlike nouns. Here is the list of affixes:

	Past			Non-Past
Tense	-mik
	Progressive		Habitual		Aorist
Aspect	-taen		-co
	Indicative	Imperative	Optative	Reportative	Inferential/Gnomic	Sensory
Mood	-ka	-ku	-rae	-qeo	-kyen	-lhak

Evidentiality is a mood because it can't be combined with one. In other words, the moods can be translated as "I demand X, I want X, I heard X, I think X, I saw X." In total, the mood suffix goes before the tense suffix, which goes before the aspect suffix.

Indicative verbs are assumed to either be directly experienced or have irrelevant evidentiality.

Adjectives

Adjectives only have four total forms:

	Lone	Adjunct
Positive	-	-taɂ
Negative	-pu	-paoɂ

Adjunct forms are used when chaining multiple adjectives to a word.

Adjectives and adverbs are not distinct in Haltzeonian; the same word can be applied to both nouns and verbs. This is unlike some of its sister languages, where adjectives, although still not entirely distinct, receive the same mood ending.

Word order

Kardonian languages are almost always SOV word order, and Haltzeonian is no different. However, in Haltzeonian, in interrogative sentences, the verb moves to the front of the word, making these sentences VSO.

Declarative: "You threw away the papers."

  

Nel himioncil caelemik.

Interrogative: "Did you throw away the papers?"

  

Caelemik nel himioncil?