Durygan language

The Durygan language (Durygan: lẽba durygana, Nillonan: lemba durygana) is a language spoken in the southern region of the continent of Nodaima.

One thing many have noticed about Durygan is that sound changes have drastically altered the words and phonology of the language to a greater extent even than what would be expected for a Nodaimese Romance language. An often used example to show the magnitude of the divergent sound changes is the numeral for "four" (Durygan: šatir, Nillonan: patro, Umirian: quaitter; cf. Latin quattuor); in this example, the fact that Durygan is a P-Romance language is obscured by the /pʲ/ → /ɕ/ sound change (original /kʷ/ became /p/, and stressed /a/ caused palatalisation). Another example is /stʲ/ → /çs/ (as seen in jsela; cf. Nillonan ťella, Umirian stiella, ultimately deriving from Latin stella).

Nouns
Nouns have four cases, two numbers, and three genders.

Durygan has the following cases (Durygan: času): Some nouns, particularly names, may possess a separate vocative case (Durygan: vučasvu).
 * The nominative case (Durygan: numnjasvu) indicates the subject of the sentence.
 * The accusative case (Durygan: akyšasvu) indicates the direct object of the sentence. It can also be used as the object of a preposition.
 * The genitive case (Durygan: ženjesvu) indicates the possessor or a modifier of another noun. It can also be used as the object of a preposition, and it now governs many of the prepositions once governed by the ablative case (Durygan: abjasvu).
 * The dative case (Durygan: zasvu) indicates the indirect object of the sentence. It can also be used as the object of a preposition.

First declension:

Second declension:

Second declension neuter:

In the second declension, the genitive singular (and for masculine and feminine nouns, the nominative plural) ending palatalises the stem. If this results in a bare /j/, then the ending is absorbed into the stem.

Third declension:

For third declension masculine and feminine nouns, the nominative singular often uses a separate stem from the rest of the declension.

Third declension neuter:

All neuter nouns have identical nominative and accusative forms.

Personal pronouns
Unlike all nouns and most pronouns, the first and second person pronouns and the reflexive pronoun have a separate instrumental case (Durygan: ẽstrymẽsal). For all other pronouns and for all nouns, the instrumental case is marked using the preposition ku (before a consonant) or kun (before a vowel) in combination with the genitive case.

Possessive pronouns
All possessive pronouns decline like normal adjectives, and agree with the number, gender and case of the possessee. Note that the third person possessive pronouns are not marked for the gender of the possessor. The forms given are the masculine nominative singular, and the masculine/neuter genitive singular.

Relative and interrogative pronouns
Durygan merged the relative and interrogative pronouns. Like the first and second person pronouns, the relative/interrogative pronouns have a separate instrumental form.

Adjectives
In Durygan, all adjectives (with the exception of numerals and comparatives) decline identically.

Declension of bonu: Most adjectives have two adverbial forms. The short form is formed by removing the ending (e.g. malu → mal), while the long form is formed by adding the ending -amẽs (e.g. novu → novamẽs). Note that bonu and malu do not have long forms, and that bonu has an irregular adverbial form (bonu → žen).

Comparatives and superlatives
Most adjectives have comparative and superlative forms. The superlative is formed by adding the suffix -išmu to the palatalised stem, which then declines like a normal adjective. The comparative is declined as follows (note that all forms palatalise the stem; the adverbial form is identical to the neuter nominative/accusative singular): A number of adjectives have irregular comparative and superlative forms. In particular, the comparatives of bonu and malu, which are mejr and šejr respectively, decline irregularly:

Declension of mejr: Declension of šejr:

Numerals
Unlike in Nillonan or Umirian, all cardinal numerals can be declined for case. For all numbers from 4 to 99 (except additive compounds with 1 or 2), the nominative and accusative forms are identical. Only additive compounds with 1, 2 or 3 decline for gender. The hundreds and thousands inflect as if they were normal adjectives. The hundreds from 300 to 900 decline identically to 200 and are listed below: One million is miljonu, one billion is miljardu, and so on (Durygan uses the long scale).

All ordinal numbers inflect as if they were normal adjectives. For all other numerals, the ordinal is formed by adding -mu to the numeral (for multiples of 10) or replacing the ending with -ešmu (for hundreds and thousands and larger numbers). Additive compounds have all numerals in the ordinal form.

Verbs
First conjugation: The above is an example of a stem-invariant regular first conjugation verb.

Irregular verbs
Conjugation of ješer: Conjugation of jsar: Conjugation of ajer: Conjugation of pošer:

Non-finite forms
The infinitive is an indeclinable verbal noun which largely corresponds to the English infinitive. It is largely used as a base to an auxillary verb, but it can be used as a standalone noun (typically as a nominative argument). An example of its use as a noun is the line ješer, o nu ješer ("to be, or not to be"). Verbs of motion (e.g. ir, meaning "to go") can also use a verb in the infinitive to indicate purpose.

Durygan has two participles, both of which can act as adjectives or adverbs. The present participle declines irregularly: Note that the present participle has two stems (although most verbs use identical stems): one is used for the nominative and accusative singular, and may be unique to the present participle, and the other stem is used for the oblique and plural forms, and is based on the gerund. The following is an example of the two stems (using the present participle of pošer): This originates from sound changes affecting /a/ and /o/ being dependent on whether the syllable is stressed. Unstressed /o/ becomes /u/ when in pretonic position (and /i/ when in posttonic position), with stressed /o/ remaining /o/. Stressed /a/ initiates palatalisation of the preceeding consonant for a number of consonants, while unstressed /a/ remains unchanged. Note that some verbs (including all first conjugation verbs) have levelled away this difference.

The past participle declines like a normal adjective. Both participles lack dedicated adverbial forms; instead, an adjectival form is used depending on the auxillary verb used and the arguments of the clause: The gerund is another verbal noun, and it largely corresponds to the English gerund. It is declined as a neuter second declension noun.
 * If the auxillary is ješer or jsar, then the participle agrees with the subject in number and gender. The participle is in the nominative case.
 * If the auxillary is ajer, then the participle agrees with the object in number and gender (if it exists), or uses the neuter singular form (if the object does not exist). The participle is in the accusative case.