Nankôre

Background

Nankôre, from the words nan ("man, human") and kôre ("speech"), is spoken by the Nanhoshka people of Kôya Island. There are two main dialects, the Konishmak, located in the Northeastern Coastal Mountains, and the Sapshira, encompassing the western and southern parts of the country. The dialects differ chiefly in pronunciation and differences in certain lexical items, but are otherwise mutually intelligible.

The origins of the language and its people remain clouded in mystery. Physically, the Nanhoshka people look distinct from the Northwest Pacific Native Americans just 862 kilometers from the eastern shore, but their physical features bear a strikingly close resemblance to the Minhast people of the Republic of Minhay, who live much further away on the other side of the Pacific Ocean close to Japan and Ainushir. Because of these physical resemblences, both anthropologists and linguists have been exploring a possible relationship between the two peoples. Although recent genetic research has uncovered that both the Nanhoshka and Minhast belong to the haplogroup C-M212, suggesting a common ancestry, linguists have been much less successful in establishing a relationship. Some linguists have compiled Swadesh lists that suggest some lexical items may have a common origin, but so far researchers have failed to demonstrate reliable sound correspondences between the two languages. Therefore, both Nankôre and Minhast remain classified as language isolates.

Phonology

Consonants

Nankôre has a small inventory of consonants, only fourteen in number. Noteworthy is the paucity of voiced consonants which contributes to the limited number of consonants in the Nankôre language. The following table contains the entire consonantal inventory:

	Bilabial	Dental	Alveolar	Apical	Post-alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m		n
Stop	p	t					k	ʔ
Affricate					͡tʃ
Fricative			s	s̻	ʃ			h
Approximant	w				j
Flap			r

Orthography

The Nankôre orthography is based on the Allen-Mills system, derived from the Latin alphabet:

Grapheme	IPA
'	ʔ
a	ɑ
e	e
i	ɪ, i
o	o
u	u
c	tʃ
s	s, s̺, ʃ
sh	ʃ
h	h
k	k
r	r
m	m
n	n
p	p
t	t
w	w

Note that the grapeme <s> is pronounced /ʃ/ or /s̺/ when followed by [i] (e.g. sinkokah "orca"), or in coda position (Nanhoska "the Nanhoshka people"). A few decades after the Allen-Mills transcription system was developed, a sound shift in the northwestern Hoyampe dialect, whereby /s/ shifted to the voiceless apico-alveolar fricative /s̺/ when followed by /i/ or in coda position. A similar sound shift occurred at around the same time in the northeastern Konismak dialect (possibly the result of the Hoyampe sound shift), but it was the voiceless palato-alveolar fricative /ʃ/ that appeared. It was this sound shift that spread out through the rest of the country. The original Allen-Mills digraph <sh> was retained for all other cases.

Grammar

Morphology

Nouns

The Nominal Heirarchy

Nankôre nouns, at first glance, appears very simple. They are not inflected for case, gender, nor do adpositions indicate their directional or positional relationships. Number is distinguished only in pronouns. Nevertheless, the nominal system has a complex heirarchy of animacy, which although unmarked, is a semantic feature of the noun and pronoun. Where a given NP falls within the animacy heirarchy must be memorized in order to use the verbal inverse prefix tā(h)- correctly (see section on Verbs regarding inverse marking).

The Nankôre nominal heirarchy has been traditionally classified along two axes, the first marking category, and the second marking levels of heirarchy within a given category. Animacy along categories decrease as one traverses from Supernatural/Phenomonological onwards towards the Ephemeral. Animacy decreases as one goes down the Level axis. The heirarchy is arranged according to the following table:

Table of Nominal Animacy Heirarchy

Level	Supernatural & Phenomonological	Human	Animals		Weather	Lower Animals	Plants	Geophysical	Material	Ephemeral
			Mammals	Birds
1	Gods	Adults >> Children	predator >> prey		Sleet	Reptiles (excluding snakes)	Forests	Rushing rivers	Water	Magic
2	Demons	Older >> Younger	wild >> domesticated		Rain	Snakes	Large Trees	Slow-moving rivers	Food	Emotions
3	Human & Animal Spirits	Male >> Female	Pet (usually carnivorous) >> Non-Pet (usually raised for food)		Snow	Amphibians	Small Trees	Streams, brooks, springs	Fabrics, fibers, skins, clothing	Actions
4	Destructive Forces of Nature	Strong >> Weak	Large >> Small		Wind	Fish	Fruit/Nut Trees	Lakes	Wood	Thoughts
5	Lightning	Large >> Small	Strong >> Weak		Breeze	Crustaceans	Bushes/Shrubs	Glaciers	Buildings	Disease
6	Ocean	Quick >> Slow	Quick >> Slow		Water	Insects	Prairie grass	Mountains	Metals	States
7	Thunderstorms	Intelligent >> Unintelligent	Carnivore >> Herbivore >> Carrion Eater		Air	Worms	Leafy plants	Cliffs, jagged outcroppings, tumuli, boulders	Jewels and gemstones	Abstractions
8	Fire	Fertile >> Infertile	Stud >> Gelded	Flight >> Flightless	Muggy weather	Mollusks	Mushrooms/Fungi/Mosses	Flat land or gently rolling landscape	Stones, rocks, pebbles	Death

Pronouns

The first group of pronouns are the simple independent pronouns. The animacy of each pronoun is arranged in the following heirarchy:

Pronominal Heirarchy
1st >> 2nd >> 3rd

Plurality generally does not affect the animacy level across persons. However, if two 3rd person arguments have the same animacy and one of the arguments is plural, then the plural argument is assigned a higher animacy level.

The following table lists the forms of the simple independent pronouns:

Simple Independent Pronouns

	Singular	Plural
1S	ak	akôs
2S	kā	kakôs
3S	tā	takôs

If used as a core argument, they appear in intransitive clauses only, and just before the clause-final particle itá,e.g. Nitori ka itá! (You are a fool). They may also be used to emphasize a noun, in which case the pronoun precedes the noun linked with the connective si=, as in tā si=naho (She/Her, the mother).

Portmanteau Pronouns

Singular				Plural
	1S	2S	3S	1P	2P	3P
1S	--	akak	akat	--	akakos	akatos
2S	akak	--	kat	akoska	--	katakos
3S	akat	kat	tat	akosta	kakosta	takosta
Plural x Plural
1P				--	akoskos	akostos
2P				akoskos	--	kakostos
3P				akostos	kakostos	takostos

As earlier stated, nouns in Nankôre are not inflected, nor are case clitics attached to them to indicate case relations. Transitive verbs take two NPs as core arguments. The case relations of the two arguments are determined by the position of the noun in the animacy heirarchy; the core argument that is higher in the animacy heirarchy is assigned the Agent role, and the other argument is assigned the Patient role. However, an inverse affix tā-/tāh- is prefixed to the verb or its auxiliary to alter the argument structure by marking the lower-animacy argument as Agent.

Oblique arguments on the other hand are treated as adjuncts, and are thus bound to their clause with the connective clitic si= or =si. Context alone determines the semantic role of the oblique. Because obliques are considered adjuncts, they may not come between the core arguments and the verb, and therefore must appear either before or after the clause nucleus. To illustrate, the sentence Maska=si ohipna koykare ekán itá (anthill=CONN twig boy twist PST), i.e. "The boy inserted the twig into the anthill", the noun maska (anthill) is the oblique argument and is marked with the clitic si= to join it to the rest of the sentence. Oblique arguments use the form =si preceding the clause nucleus, or si= following the clause nucleus, e.g. Ohipna koykare ekán itá si=maska.

Verbs

Tense	Form	Header text
Mythological Past	man	Example
Distal Past	suphi	Example
Past	itá	Example
Recent Morning Past	ho	Example
Present	sipá	NB: This particle is optional and usually left out.
Future	pa	Example

Verbs in Nankôre, as in many other languages, can perform valence operations to alter the argument structure of a clause. Agents and Patients may be demoted from their core status, Patients may be promoted to a derived Subject, and Obliques may be promoted to a derived Patient role. Nankôre has a several auxiliary verbs that perform passivation, antipassivation, and applicativization. In a language that has virtually no adpositions or case markings on the NPs, valence operations conducted by these auxiliary verbs, particularly the applicative auxiliaries, are exploited to encode spatial or directional information that case affixes or adpositions perform in other languages. The animacy system interacts with these auxiliary verbs, called valence auxiliaries in the linguistic literature of Nankôre.

As an example, the auxiliary kohán passivizes the clause, resulting in a one-argument clause containing only the logical Patient. Since there is only one core argument, the need for inverse marking no longer exists, and in fact the presence of both the passive auxiliary kohán and the inverse marker tā-/tāh-' in the same sentence is ungrammatical. The same is true for the antipassive auxilliary norhe/norhâ, that is the logical Patient is deleted leaving only the agent, and so once again, the presence of the inverse tā-/tāh- is ungrammatical. When either the Agent or the Patient has been deleted by the passive or antipassive auxiliaries, one thing that must be noted is that the demoted arguments are fully deleted. In other languages that have passives and/or antipassives, demoted core arguments need not be deleted, in fact in many languages the demoted argument may still be retained in the sentence, but this time as an oblique argument. Such is not the case in Nankôre; the former core argument cannot appear in the sentence.

The applicative auxiliaries promote an Oblique argument to core status, thereby creating a derived Patient. This results in a transitive sentence, and the inverse marker tā-/tāh- once again can be used to disambiguate the roles of the core arguments if a lower-animacy argument is an Agent. Interestingly, unlike passivation and antipassivation, the demoted core argument, which is always the former Patient, can still appear in the clause as an Oblique argument, marked with the connective si- There are several of these auxiliaries, listed in the following table:

Table of Applicative Auxiliary Verbs

	Auxiliary	Sample Sentence	Translation	Comment
Directional	sanha	Anut America sanha-kor kamuk itá.	Anut supposedly flew to America.	-kor = HEARSAY.EVID, attaches to the auxiliary.
Benefactive	nasko	Nanhoska karen tā-nasko-ro-kor eyna itá.	It is said the (sacred) tree gave (life) for the people.	Note also the inverse marker tā- -ro- = IMPF.
Commitative	yampe	Anut yampe-kor temen itá	Anut walked beside the river with him.	temen = to perform an activity by a river
Instrumental	makôr	Ehok yurasna makôr-nahoyra-kor neat itá.	The adolescent struck (it) repeatedly with a club.	-nahoyra- = Repetitive neat, ne'at = INTENTIVE
Ablative	risa	Shôni Nan Kamun Koryash risa-kor man itá	First Man emerged from (out of) the snow.	Shôni Nan "First Man" Kamun Koryash "All Snow" (the birthplace of First Man) man = particle indicating mythological past.
Locative	neyhi	Yonka asrok tāh-neyhi-kor akun ho itá.	The fly buzzed inside Yonka('s mouth) this morning.	Note inverse marker -tāh asrok = fly, insect ho = earlier this morning.
Vialis	nahke	Pohak tā-nahke-nui shokor-ken ka itá	I saw the river take you through the cave.	pohak = cave shokor = to flow -ken- = CAUS -nui- = VIS.EVID
Superessive	oros	Ayôhe arupenrô oros-kor yaunke ho itá.	The airplane flew over Ayôhe township earlier this morning.	arupenrô = airplane yaunke = to fly
Subessive	yorha	Ekurki saska yorha-ro-kor kahoro itá.	The turtle swam underneath the ice.	ekurki = turtle saska = ice kahoro = to swim
Ablative-Superessive	isuk	(Example)	(Example)
Ablative-Subessive	royna	(Example)	(Example)
Riverine	temen	Kurasno temen-kor rohnas itá.	The girls supposedly were playing by the river.
Montaigne	yayak	(Example)	(Example)

These auxiliaries are often confused for adpositions, or relational nouns, but unlike adpositions and locative nouns, these auxiliaries are full-fledged verbs. If inverse marking is required, the prefix tā/tāh is still prefixed to the auxiliary verb. Likewise, aspect and modality markers are attached to the auxiliary, a process that occurs only with verbs in the language, never with nouns. Moreover, these auxiliaries can stand alone as independent verbs, such as Kosmakis Anut yampe itá "Anut walked with Koshmak" (yampe = to be arm-in-arm; c.f. yanup "elbow").

Numbers

tak orâshim kot "3 Orashim trees" = 3 hundred. An orashim tree is apporximately the length of 100 hand lengths (from heel of wrist to the tip of the longest, i.e. 3rd, finger). An orashim is also 100.

Syntax

The Noun Phrase (NP)

Possession

Possession is indicated by joining the possessor to the possessum with the connective si=, followed either by the verb ras to indicate inalienable possession e.g. Koykare si=naho ras, "The boy's mother", or ocité for alienable possession, e.g. Koykare si=maska ocité. If the possessor is lower in the animacy heirarcy, the inverse marker ta'/tah is prefixed to the verb, as in the improbable Maska si=koykare tah-ocité, "The anthill's boy".

Comparatives and Superlatives

Degrees of comparison are formed by placing the auxiliary verb soyka (to be big, i.e. to be more) or hatka (to be small, i.e. to be less) before a stative verb. Since two arguments are involved, namely the comparer NP and the compared NP, the phrase is structurally equivalent to a transitive clause, requiring an Agent and a Patient, and follows the rules governing the nominal animacy heirarchy. In the sentence Joe Sara soyka inupe tā itá (Joe is stronger than Sarah; lit. "Joe bigs strongs Sara"), soyka precedes the stative verb inupe (to be strong). Joe, being male, is higher in the animacy scale and so is assigned Agent status. If Sara were stronger, the Inverse affix tā-/tāh- surfaces, as in Joe Sara tā-soyka inupe tā itá (Sara is stronger than Joe). Other examples:

1) Joe Sara soyka soyka tā itá (Joe is taller than Sara; lit. "Joe bigs bigs Sara").

2) Joe Sara tā-hatka nahamosh tā itá (Sara is less tan than Joe).

3) Joe Sara hatka hatka tā itá (Joe is smaller than Sara; lit. "Joe small smalls Sara").

4) Natos Suhe soyka makit itá (Natosh [masc.] runs faster than Suhe [fem.]; lit. "Natosh big runs Suhe").

5) Orôyo Paul tā-soyka soyka itá (The volcano is bigger than Paul; note that orôyo is less animate because it is a sessile object, hence the use of the inverse marker tā-).

To express the superlative, the clause must be antipassivized with the auxiliary verb norhe/norhâ e.g. Orôyo norhe soyka soyka itá (This is the largest mountain), or Sikôya orôyo norhe soyka soyka itá (This is the largest mountain in Kôya Island).