Tarmoryan Language

Geopoeia
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Introduction

Tarmoryan or t'tarmorij (لترماورؠج) is the official language of Tarmorya and spoken by around 850,000 people, mostly in Tarmorya but also in Morocco and Algeria. Despite the strong influence of Berber languages and Arabic, Tarmoryan in fact belongs to the Indo-European family. It is the last remnant of Latin spoken in northern Africa at the time of the Roman Empire. The African Romance or African Latin was the language spoken in the Roman province of Africa during the later Roman and earlier Byzantine Empires prior to the annexation of the region by the Umayyad Caliphate in 696. Latin was subsequently supplanted by Arabic in all the province except in the city of Portus Africæ - currently Bourzafrique or Burzafriqe (برزفريقة) - and its surroundings where it remained spoken by peasants and shepherds until present times. The language changed dramatically through the centuries under the influence of Arabic, that was used by the government, the local aristocracy and in the Islamic religious rites. Furthermore, the Berber dialect called Mesoudian or l'mesudi (لمسودي) intensively influenced the phonology, the lexicon and the grammar of Tarmoryan. Recently French also added a new superstratum to the language.

Tarmoryan served as a cultural identity for its people, distinguishing them from others in the Mediterranean coast of Africa and, after the independence, becoming the official language of Tarmorya. The language spoken today is the most divergent of the Romance languages and, for a certain period of time, considered a creole belonging to Afro-Asiatic family of languages.

Classification

       Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Afro-Mediterranean, Tarmoryan (etm)


Phonology

Consonants

  • Stops: /b/, /d/, /t/, /k/, /g/
  • Fricatives: /f/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /ɣ/
  • Uvular: /q/
  • Pharyngeal: /ħ/
  • Nasals: /m/, /n/
  • Lateral and flap: /l/, /r/
  • Semi-vowels: /w/, /j/

Vowels

  • Front: /i/, /e/, /ē/
  • Central: /æ/, /a/, /ə/
  • Back: /o/, /ʊ/, /u/

Writting

Traditionally Tarmoryan is written in Arabic, although some attempts were made in the past to change it into the Latin alphabet and Tiffinagh, the Berber writting, used by the Mesoudian community in the country.

Morphology and Syntax

Article

By influence of Arabic, the single form of the definite article is l' (ل), invariant with respect to gender and number. However, before nouns starting with the so-called sun letters (t, d, r, z, s, j, sh and n) it sounds like these letters, despite keeping the same written form (ل) in Arabic. For the indefinite article, the numeral un (ون) 'one (masc.)' or une (ونة) 'one (fem.)' is used. So, for example:

       l'ghid 'the night                 un ghid 'a night' or 'one night'
       t'temdint 'the city'              une temdint 'a city' or 'one city'

Nouns

Nouns are either masculine or feminine.Typical masculine nouns of Berber origin start with e-. These nouns have the feminine formed with an initial and a final t. So, for example:

       eghlid 'king'                     teghlidt 'queen'
       emksa 'shepherd (m)'              temksat 'shepherd (f)'

Plural of nouns can be of two forms: broken or classic. Classic plural is formed with the addition of -i (masculine) or -ye (feminine). Typically, classic plural is applied to words of Latin origin. Broken plural is formed adding an initial i- and/or a final -n to the root of masculine nouns (which can have vocalic changes). Broken plural of feminine words are typically formed with ti- initial and -in or -t final. There are several irregulaties and exceptions. So, for example:

       tsahrt 'witch'                   tsahrin 'witches'
       adrar 'mountain'                 idurar 'mountains'
       murj 'death'                     murti 'deaths"
       otel 'hotel'                     otili 'hotels'

Adjectives

Adjectives are postponed and agree in gender and number with nouns.

       ketab qeddes 'holy book'      kitaben qiddasen 'holy books'
       shrarb mall 'bad wine'        sharben malli 'bad wines'
       mlyer malle 'bad woman'       mlyere mallye 'bad women'

Pronouns

Personal pronouns vary with respect to gender and number. They can be subjective, objective and possessive. See the list below (two forms correspond to masculine and feminine):

   Subjective        Objective      Possessive
   agh                 me, me         mi, mi
   tu, te              te, te         tus, twe
   ill, ille           s, se          sus, sa
   nus, nust 	       nus, nus       nusr, nusret
   wus, wust 	       wus, wus       wusr, wusret
   illi, illes         illi, illes    ns, nse

The demonstrative pronouns are: hiq 'this' (masc.), heq 'this' (fem.), hiqi 'these' kwil 'that' (masc.), kwel 'that' (fem.), kwilli 'those' (masc.), kwellye 'those' (fem.)

Some interrogative pronouns: kwi 'what', kwis 'who', kwand 'when'. The single relative pronoun is kwi 'that'.

Verbs

Tarmoryan verbs are conjugated according to person, gender, number, tense and mood. Imperative of regular verbs are created with the addition of the suffix -te to the radical for both masculine and feminine forms. Some examples:

      ismmi ast Yessine  'my name is Yessine'
      ebrite heq tezyat sh'shrab d shrubte  'open this bottle of wine and drink it!'
      n'nafi starent gh'muyye 'the boats stayed at the port'
      ill wad br'mesjid, ille nun wade 'he goes to the mosque, she doesn't'

Numerals

The cardinal numbers from 1 to 20 are listed below. When two forms are shown, first is masculine and second is feminine:

  • 1. un, une
  • 2. dwu, dwe
  • 3. ters
  • 4. kattr
  • 5. kunq
  • 6. sis
  • 7. sabt
  • 8. uqt
  • 9. nub
  • 10. deq
  • 11. unjem
  • 12. dwujem
  • 13. trijem
  • 14. ketturjem
  • 15. kunjem
  • 16. sissem
  • 17. sabjem
  • 18. uqjem
  • 19. nubjem
  • 20. wight