Virassian grammar

Work in progress This article is currently still being written. The author(s) apologise for the inconvenience.

This article contains Virassian (Armenian) text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters

This article details the grammar of the Virassian language.

Vocabulary

Having evolved away from the synthetic structure typical of Upcylmu-Amleian languages, like that of Amulni or [Mordrasi language|Mordrasi]], the remnants of its collapsed morpheme structure are littered throughout the language's wordstock resulting in a large vocabulary, with various sound changes obscuring the once orderly system of vowel change and harmony. The language also exhibits a degree of influence from Ewigic languages, and features many Visser loanwords and morphemes.

Suffixes

Virassian employs suffixes to achieve various grammatical functions, namely implying aspect, clusivity, tense, as adpositions, and as augmentatives or diminutives. When multiple suffixes are used, they are traditionally used in the following order in central Virassian, with some dialects employing different arrangements.

Adpositions

Virassian adpositions are added after verbs. Directional

• թոռավ (torav) - Towards
• ավւեի (avwei) - Away from
• նեցավ (nejav) - Near
• հասդոռ (hasdor) - Into
• ըթիվսթ (ātivst) - Against
• ընթե (ānte) - Onto
• ովեռ (over) - Over
• էկռս (ēkrs) - Across
• պաշ (path) - Past, beyond
• նիեշ (nieth) - Underneath
• էնռօթ (ēnrut) - Along, by way of
• փեի (fei) - From

Interacting

• ւիթ (wit) - With
• ւիթաժ (witaȥ) - Without
• ավ (av) - Of

Aspect and Tense

Virassian verb aspect and tense is very similar to Atraelish verb aspects, with the exception of an additional habitual tense.

Virassian	Simple	Perfect	Progressive	Perfect progressive
Present	weid/weides	wiedenhis/wiedenhid	wiedinihm/wiedines/wiedineis	his/hiv ben wiedin
Past	wode	wodenhid	wiedinwaz/wiedinwer	hid ben wiedin
Future	wel wied	wel wiedenhid	wel sen wiedin	wel sen wiedin
Habitual	weidsen	wiedensen	wiedensen	sen ben wiedin

Atraelish equivalent	Simple	Perfect	Progressive	Perfect progressive
Present	write/writes	has/have written	am/is/are writing	has/have been writing
Past	wrote	had written	was/were writing	had been writing
Future	will write	will have written	will be writing	will have been writing

Clusivity

• mei - Including just the speaker (similar to "my")
• as - Including the speaker and those they consider with them, and specifically excluding the addressee(s) (similar to exclusive form of "we")
• olas - Including the speaker and those that are and may be listening (similar to inclusive form of "we")
• ue - Including all who may be listening to the speaker, but not the speaker themselves (similar to "you")
• thēi - Includes a group beyond the listener(s) and speaker, who may or may not be listening (similar to "they")

Augmentatives and diminutives

In addition to determining size and/or numerical quantity, Virassian augmentatives and diminutives also preserve aspects of noun gender that were more prevalent in the older Upcymlu-Amleian languages.

• Nis - none
• Doshka - tiny
• Laub - some, a little
• Lintl - little, small, feminine
• Larber - medium-sized, average size, neuter
• Ches - most, a lot
• Chēz - large, big, masculine
• Habrd - very large, huge

Articles

Articles are added before the words they refer to as unbound morphemes.

• Դան (Dan) - Definite article (the)
• Դի (Di) - Indefinite article (a)

Conjunctions

Conjunctions, are used, like articles, as independent morphemes. Their arrangement differs depending on emphasis and the type of conjunction used, however their use is generally equivalent to how they are used in Atraelish.

Coordinating conjunctions

• Frd - for,
• Իհ (Ih) - and
• Nēr - nor
• Ut - but
• Ār - or
• Jet - yet
• Sār - so

Subordinating conjunctions

Some examples of subordinating conjunctions.

• Abvrer - after
• Oltakh - although
• Aȥ - as
• Aȥ ēf - as if
• Aȥ limber aȥ - as long as
• Aȥ mrs aȥ - as much as
• Aȥ suna aȥ - as soon as
• Aȥ thorn - as though
• Bāon kaus - because
• Bāon forde - before
• Bie dan feiten - by the time
• Avneb ēf - even if
• Avneb thorn - even though
• Ēf - if
• Ig alzett that - in order that
• Ig kampeg - in case
• lest
• once
• only if
• provided that
• since
• so that
• than
• That - that
• though
• till
• unless
• until
• when
• whenever
• where
• wherever
• while

Pronouns

	Subject Pronoun	Object Pronoun	Possessive Adjective (Determiner)	Possessive Pronoun	Reflexive or Intensive Pronoun
1st person singular	Ie (I)	Mie (Me)	Mei (My)	Mien (Mine)	Mieslev (Myself)
2nd person singular	Jue (You)	Jae (You)	Jaer (Your)	Yas (Yours)	Yaslev (Yourself)
3rd person singular, male	Hie (He)	Hem (Him)	Hes (His)	Hes (His)	Hemslev (Himself)
3rd person singular, female	Sie (She)	Hā (Her)	Hās (Her)	Hās (Hers)	Hāslev (Herself)
3rd person singular, neutral	Ie (It)	Ie (It)	Ies (Its)	Ies (Its)	Ieslev (Itself)
1st person plural	Wie (We)	Ijas (Us)	Ijau (Our)	Ijaus (Ours)	Ijauslevs (Ourselves)
2nd person plural	Jue (You)	Jae (You)	Jaer (Your)	Yas (Yours)	Yaslevs (Yourselves)
3rd person plural	Thei (They)	Them (Them)	Thier (Their)	Theirs (Theirs)	Themslevs (Themselves)

Demonstratives

Demonstratives are used similarly to nouns in regards to their placement within sentences and ability to be modified by suffixes.

• (ths, thies [plural]) - Refers to object close to the speaker (e.g. "this")
• (that, thos [plural]) - Refers to an object next to the listener(s), or away from both the speaker and listener(s) (similar to "that")

Adjectives and adverbs

Virassian adjectives are added after the words they describe, with many adjectives having homophones with similar or even completely different meanings, all of which is normally supplied by context. Due to Virassian's large and versatile wordstock, describers are typically rare, and are normally used to direct especially nuanced meaning.

Phonology

Timing

Virassian is a stressed-timed language. Like Atraelish, there are frequent, though not rigid, patterns regarding which sounds are stressed in verbal communication. Petro Evangeline, an influential Atraelish-Virassian linguist, wrote of the stress patterns in his The Upcylmu-Amleian Language:

• As a general rule, words have their first vowel or diphthong stressed, unless:
  • If a word starts with a vowel, its second vowel is instead stressed. If the starting vowel is the only vowel, then it is stressed normally.
  • If for a word with two syllables, if the second syllable contains a long vowel or a diphthong, then it is stressed.
  • If morphemes added at the end of a word stem contain a diphthong, the first occurring diphthong is stressed.
• When the letters R or Ȥ are between two consonants in a word, they are treated as vowels and are stressed accordingly.

Sentence structure

Virassian expressions are typically ordered as subject-verb-object (SVO), however subject-object-verb (SOV) constructions are often used to emphasise the object in question. The language is littered with a vestigial case structure that implies older forms of Virassian were more inflected, something notable in other languages of the Zemlyumir language family.