Ancient Kartara

Ancient Kart́ara
Romanization	Ancient Kartara
AIL Name	Ancient Kardara
Region	Kartara

Ancient Kartara (or, more properly, Ancient Kart́ara) is the oldest known ancestor of the human language families on the island of Kartara. It appears to have had some influence on the modern Karalome language, but does not show signs of being influenced in return. Its most direct daughter language is Eastern Kartara. Influence from the nearby Reems helped mold its other main daughter, Western Kartara.

Phonology

Consonant Grid	labial	alveolar	retroflex	velar	glottal
stops	p	t	t́	k	*
fricatives	f	s	ś	h
nasals	m	n	ń
approximants		r
lateral approximants		l	ĺ

Vowel Grid	front	near-front	back
close	i		u
near-close		ï
mid	e		o
open	a

Syllables can be generalized to be a vowel, optionally preceded by a stop or fricative, and optionally ending with any consonant. Only verbs may end in a consonant, and even then it must not be an approximant.

Typical Kartara does not use voiced stops or fricatives. However, stops in the middle of words often take on partial voicing when they are preceded by an approximant. For instance: kart́ara is has been interpreted by continentals to be "kardara".

Stops do not typically have aspiration, but when two stops occur next to each other, the first stop is usually aspirated before moving on to the second. For instance: pat́ka is pronounced [paʈʰka].

Glottal stops are not written, but they always happen between equal vowels (Ex: iipke [iʔipʰke̞]). They often occur between any two vowels if both are unstressed, and after a stressed vowel before an unstressed i.

The sound r can fall under the alveolar or retroflex category, or somewhere in between, depending on the word being used. It is written as one symbol and is thought of as one sound, similar to how English has two ways of presenting it's L sound: clear in 'lake' vs. dark (velarized) in 'cool'. Kartara speakers do not register a difference. (Incidentally, l and ĺ are always 'clear'.)

The sound h does not sound like English h. It is the same as the 'ch' in the Scottish word 'loch' or the German name 'Bach'.

Kartara f sounds similar to English f, but is made only with the lips.

Front vowels are unrounded, while back vowels are rounded. The vowel sound ï is used to form dipthongs, which gives Kartara the following nine vowels: a, e, i, o, u, aï, eï, oï, and uï. In IPA, therefore, the vowels are represented as [a], [e̞], [i], [o], [u], [aɪ̆], [e̞ɪ̆], [oɪ̆], and [uɪ̆]. Each vowel has its own separate glyph.

The next-to-last syllable of the root word receives stress. If the root word has only one syllable, then the stress falls on it. A secondary stress may be added to an important affix to denote importance.

Morphology

Pronoun Table	singular	dual	paucal	plural
1st (inclusive)		aïkuasta	aïkusata	aïkuańa
1st (exclusive)	husa	husasta	husata	huańa
2nd	pepa	pipina	pika	pińa
2nd (formal)	emsua	esasta	esia	hińa
3rd	tahi	tasita	takaśi	taśuńi
3rd (formal)	empi	emori	emiri	erońi
3rd (inanimate)	kafa	kafaki1	kafaru1	kańa

¹ These forms are made with the standard suffixes. Therefore, stress always falls on the syllable ka.

Kartara has four classes of grammatical number. Singular refers to one and dual refers to two. Paucal is relative, generally denoting 3-10, while plural denotes a quantity greater than that.

Part/Whole Distinction

The paucal/plural marking can also be used to denote distinctions between parts of a whole. The plural is used to describe the entirety, while the paucal is used to denote a division of it, even if the division is more than ten or fewer than three. This generally happens when using uncountable nouns (sand, wind, etc) or large groups of people or flocks of animals.

For example, one may spill water (plural), and note that some water (paucal) got on the floor, some (paucal) on the drapes, and some (paucal) remained in the cup. Or, one may refer to the two Senators from Ohio (paucal) as opposed to all Senators in DC (plural).

This latter usage can be seen as more poetic, fanciful, or flamboyant if used for trivial distinctions, if not used to compare and contrast, or when it's just plain overused. Comparison: Sarcasm and irony in the English language.

Writing System

A crude representation of the original nautical flags that predated the writing system.