Tonkgha
| |
| Spoken in | Rowalde |
| Language family | Purely A-Priori out of semantic compounds |
| Language Type | Art-/Englang* |
| Regulated by | discontinued |
| Inception | |
| Continued and Readopted | 4 March 2020 |
Tonkgha, known as Toncllèbhen in Rowalde and also known as Tonkghà or Toncghà, is a constructed language in which words are created by a limited set of semantic compounds. Its word order is free by virtue of using subject-oblique alignment. It is currently only official in the Queendom of Rowalde (which is called Rèven in Tonkgha itself). Tonkgha is pro-drop, meaning pronouns are optional and often context or names are used instead.
Selection of useful words and phrases
| ENG | TKG |
|---|---|
| Hello! (anonymous) | (ka) donc! (informal) pegha donc! (formal) |
| Hello! (using name) | (pe+(own)Name) donc! (informal and formal) |
| Do you speak Tonkgha? | (peghan/pe+Name) donc sonkghà? |
| I (don't) speak Tonkgha. | (gàn) donc sonkghà. |
| to not X/no | gàn |
Phonetics
Phonotactics
The basic phonotactic rule of Tonkgha can be expressed as CV(C). In the so-called "second dialect" - which is an alternative dialect to the standard "first dialect" that uses more consonant realizations -, however, it is closer to (h)CV(Ŋ)(C) as nasalized vowels are expressed using the [ŋ] sound after the vowel in this dialect, and voiceless non-plosives are instead preceded by a [h] and turned voiced. Vowels can be either short or long in both dialects.
The primary stress is always on the first second to last syllable.
Phonology
Consonants
Basics
There are five base consonants in Tonkgha. Dictionaries are sorted by those base letters. The letters themselves are sorted by manner of articulation first then place of articulation, leading to the consonant alphabet to be ordered as {m,p,t,c,r}. Each of these consonant has four mutations, which are called CAT0 through CAT3 mutation, CAT0 being the base consonant itself used grammatically.
Below is a table of all consonants in Tonkgha (second dialect, if applicable, in parenthesis)
| Consonants | Labial | Coronal | Dorsal |
| Nasal | m̥(hm) m | n̥(hn) n | |
| Plosive | p b | t d | k g |
| Fricative | f v | s z | x ɣ |
| Trill | r̥(hr) r | ||
| Lateral | l̥~ɬ(hl) l |
Core meanings
The five initial consonants have an assigned core meaning, that is: their very presence indicates the word fitting into a specific category. The categories are as follows:
- m - physical/non-biological phenomena and objects, numbers
- p - the alive
- t - the social, body parts
- c - abstract concepts
- r - man-made objects/places
There are also three suffixes that can slightly alter the meaning of a word:
- p - -seeming
- t - -looking
- c - -sounding
Mutations
The plosives p,t,c mutate in the same manner: voiceless plosive → voiced plosive → voiceless fricative → voiced fricative.
The nasal mutation order is: voiceless labial nasal → voiced ln → voiceless coronal nasal → voiced cn.
The rhotic-lateral mutation order is: voiceless coronal trill → voiced ct → voiceless coronal lateral → voiced cl.
| Base | 0CAT | 1CAT | 2CAT | 3CAT |
| m | m [m̥] | mm [m] | n [n̥] | nn [n] |
| p | p [p] | b [b] | ph [f] | bh [v] |
| t | t [t] | d [d] | s [s] | z [z] |
| c | c [k] | g [g] | ch [x] | gh [ɣ] |
| r | r [r̥] | rr [r] | l [l̥~ɬ] | ll [l] |
Vowels
In Tonkgha, there are 16 semantic vowels and one "null" vowel that is only inserted in special circumstances and has no meaning of its own, making the total of vowels 17. 8/16 vowels have been assigned meaning the rest, being the long counterparts of the short vowels that are currently semantic, is currently not in use but is officially part of the language. Since the language is not finished they might come into use very soon. All vowels, except the null vowel, can be nasalized by adding the glyph -n.
Below is a table with all vowels in Tonkgha:
| Vowels | Front | Central | Back |
| Close | i iː | u uː | |
| Close-Mid | e eː | o oː | |
| Mid | (ə) | ||
| Open-Mid | ɛ ɛː | ɔ ɔː | |
| Open | a | ɒ |
Core meanings
The following vowels have their own core meaning:
- i - good, simple, soft, easy
- u - up, high, top
- e - moving, turbulent
- o - inside, into, inwards
- è [ɛ] - big, large
- ò [ɔ] - important
- a - this, same, equal
- à [ɒ] - existence, everything, all
Nasalization
Nasalization changes a word into its antonym. So that "ki" (the concept of good, goodness) becomes "kin" (the concept of bad, badness).
Orthography (list)
| ORT | m | mm | n | nn | p | b | ph | bh | t | d | s | z | c | g | ch | gh | r | rr | l | ll |
| IPA | m̥ | m | n̥ | n | p | b | f | v | t | d | s | z | k | g | x | ɣ | r̥ | r | l̥/ɬ | l |
| ORT | i | ie | u | uh | e | ee | o | oh | è | èe | ò | òh | a | aa | à | àh | (ê) |
| IPA | i | iː | u | uː | e | eː | o | oː | ɛ | ɛː | ɔ | ɔː | a | aː | ɒ | ɒː | ə |