Daniel Millington, Conlanger

To explain, the first word is a perfective participle of the verb 'to eat' (intransitive) with a conditional suffix, and the second word uses an ablative noun construction ('away from this place') as a verb root plus a necessitative (must/should) suffix and suffixes for aspect, tense and person

Zaouanaw is synthetic and mostly agglutinative

For instance, here's an example of a conditional sentence comprising just two words:

gesuθuqag uls’ammozuas’
ges-uθ-q-ag ul-s’(e)-am-moz-u-a-s’
eat(intran)-PTCP.PFV-3s.POSS-COND place-this-ABL-NEC-CONT-PRS-1p.SUBJ
‘If he has eaten, we should leave’

After God-only-knows how long, I think I've finished Zaouanaw's reference grammar

It's over 12,000 words long

I still need to make some tweaks to some older dictionary entries, but this conlang – my first proper conlanging project – finally feels almost complete

If I had to give a literal translation of this, it would be something like 'The women have seen the dog-chased-man-out-of-it house' or 'The women have seen the house, the dog chased the man out of it'

Relative clauses, anyone?

č'esaš ojok wupuθ wenam turjeluθ k’jok beopatot
č’es-aš-Ø oj-k wup-θ we-n-am turjel-uθ k’jo-k be-o-p-a-t-ot
woman-PL-NOM man-ACC dog-GEN it-INE-ABL chase-PTCP.PFV house-ACC see-IND-PFV-PRS-3SG.OBJ-3PL.SUBJ
‘The women have seen the house that the dog chased the man out of’

The full gloss is as follows:

wasamak ojoθ mjawaqo seguθuk gnwataf
was-m-k oj-θ mjaw-q-o seg-uθ-k gn(e)-w-a-t-f
fish(collective)-1SG.POSS-ACC man-GEN cat-3SG.POSS-DAT give-PTCP.PRF-ACC know-IND-PRS-3SG.OBJ-1SG.SUBJ
‘I know that the man gave my fish to his cat’

In this edition of 'Unexpected Results from Other Grammatical Rules', Zaouanaw has ended up with OSV word order in subordinate clauses, e.g.:

wasamak ojoθ mjawaqo seguθuk gnwataf
‘I know that the man gave my fish to his cat’ (lit. My fish the man to his cat gave I know it')

dac mjawak gjalpso mjawak romh’wataš’ nuš?
dac mjaw-k gjal-pso mjaw-k rom-h’-w-a-t-š’ nuš?
black cat-ACC white-or cat-ACC wantTo-have-IND.CONT-PRS-3SG.OBJ-2SG.SUBJ AnotA
‘Do you.SG want a black cat or a white cat?’ (polar question with non-exclusive or)

7/7

dac mjawak gjalhuš mjawak qwek romh’wataš’?
dac mjaw-k gjal-huš mjaw-k qw(e)-k rom-h’-w-a-t-š’
black cat-ACC white-xor cat-ACC what-ACC wantTo-have-IND.CONT-PRS-3SG.OBJ-2SG.SUBJ
‘Do you.SG want a black cat or a white cat?’ (alternative question with exclusive or)

6/

For a conlanger, this opens up several possibilities

For instance, my main conlang, Zaouanaw, uses both of the systems described above

As such, the example question provided has two different translations depending on which interpretation is intended, namely...

5/

...other languages use other methods, e.g. Finnish has two translations of English 'or': one non-exclusive and one exclusive

Alternatively, a language may use a particle(s) that specifically marks a question as polar (as opposed to alternative or open), e.g. Mandarin uses such A-not-A particles

4/

A way of unambiguously going for the first interpretation would be to ask "Do you want EITHER a black cat or a white cat?", with 'either' acting as an exclusivity marker of sorts (in prescriptive grammars, you can only use 'either' when there are precisely two options)

However...

3/

...as a polar question

The first interpretation uses an exclusive or, forcing the addressee to choose either a black cat or a white cat

The second interpretation allows the addressee to respond with 'yes' (they want a cat of some kind) or 'no' (they don't want either option)

2/

Some thoughts on non-exclusive vs. exclusive or, and alternative vs. polar (yes/no) questions:

Consider this example:

"Do you want a black cat or a white cat?"

In English, this question can be interpreted in one of two ways: as an alternative question with two exclusive options, or...

1/

I've been formalising how Zaouanaw handles different types of question

Open questions are fairly straightforward, but alternative questions and polar questions behave...rather strangely

Time to put my syntax hat on!

And I've got an exclusive 'or', because why not?

mjawak wupukhuš beopohotof
mjaw-k wup-k-huš be-o-p-h-t-f
cat-ACC dog-ACC-or(exclusive) see-IND-PFV-PST-3SG.OBJ-1SG.SUBJ
‘I saw either the cat or the dog’

3/3

If an element of the list comprises multiple words, then the clitic is suffixed onto the first word of the element, e.g.:

se mjaw bajpso mjaw
se mjaw-Ø baj-pso mjaw-Ø
little cat-NOM big-or cat-NOM
‘A little cat or a big cat’

2/

Zaouanaw coordinators occur as clitics suffixed onto all but the first element of a given list, e.g.:

oj wupugge misjak turjelopohotot
oj-Ø wup-q-Ø-ge misja-k tur-jel-o-p-h-t-ot
man-NOM dog-3SG.POSS-NOM-and fly-ACC quickly-follow-IND-PFV-PST-3SG.OBJ-3PL.SUBJ
‘The man and his dog chased the fly’

1/

It's amazing what I can do if I just sit down and conlang for a bit

Just tonight, I've written a whole section about coordinators ('and', 'or', 'but', etc.) into Zaouanaw's reference grammar, and I've corrected a bunch of discrepancies regarding the use of the perfective aspect in example sentences

oθigmozuas’
o(k)-θ'ig-moz-u-a-s'
ANTIP-win(trans)-NEC-CONT-PRS-1PL.SUBJ
‘We have to win’

okamlawuaš'
o(k)-am-law-u-a-š’
ANTIP-send-PERM-CONT-PRS-2SG.SUBJ
‘You.SG are allowed to send something’ (lit. You.SG are allowed to send)

3/3

What's more, this prefix triggers a phonological change: following plosives and affricates become aspirated, following fricatives become plain, and an epenthetic k is added if a vowel follows

nu opep’uaf
nu o(k)-be-p'-u-a-f
NEG ANTIP-see(trans)-POT-CONT-PRS-1SG.SUBJ
‘I can’t see’

2/

Zaouanaw is highly restrictive when it comes to verb transitivity

As such, if you want to use a transitive verb without stating a direct object, then you'll need an antipassive marker to reduce the verb's valency

Unusually for Zaouanaw, which is generally suffixing, this marker is a prefix

1/

The above literally says 'The little one crying-ly ate the root fruits'

The moral of the story is: eat your damn root fruits!

A fruit (or vegetable?) of late-night conlanging with Zaouanaw:

sja t’rahaθsubašak griθante c’uopat’at
s(e)-ja-Ø t’rah-θ-sub-aš-k griθ-an-te c’u-o-p-t’-t
little-SGV-NOM roots-GEN-fruit-PL-ACC cry-PTCP.IMP-ADV eat(trans)-IND-PRF-3PL.OBJ-3SG.SUBJ
‘The child, crying, ate the vegetables’

I think I'm close to the point of 'I'm bored with this conlang; let's make a new one!'

However, Zaouanaw's descriptive grammar is nearly done, so I'll be able to focus on its lexicon + new projects soon

Oh and there's that other conlang, Gee For, that I started ages ago – we'll see about that one

I've been "busy" playing video games as of late, but I've been thinking about conlanging all the while

In particular, playing The Witcher 3 has given me more ideas for a conlang idea I've been cooking up in the back of my mind – think Celtic-presenting but totally different under the bonnet

And for the IPA enthusiasts:

/ˈkθa.ra.makʰ ˈsʼum.pʰa.o ˈka.t͡su.θuqʰ.fekʰ ˈtre.pʼo.pʰa.tʰaf/

To list some features, we've got:

1. Possessive suffixes
2. Complex lative cases that can only be used on inanimate nouns (hence 'into my body' instead of 'into me')
3. A perfective participle
4. The instrumental case acting as a causative
5. Vowel epenthesis to resolve illegal consonant clusters

I feel this example encapsulates a lot about Zaouanaw:

gθaramak s’umpao gazuθuqfek drep’opataf
gθar-m-k s’u-m-pa-o gaz-uθ-q-fek drep’-o-p-a-t-f
book-1SG.POSS-ACC body-1SG.POSS-SUPE-DAT run-PTCP.PRF-3SG.POSS-INSTR drop-IND-PRF-PRS-3SG.OBJ-1SG.SUBJ
‘I dropped my book because he ran into me’

And since it's been a while, have some IPA as well:

/ˈke.san ˈo.jokʰ ˈpe.wa.tʰotʰ/