/r/conlangs Chat Network Relay Game - 1st Improv Relay (July 2015)

#4Pɨkwɨc (Apɨkuwɨc) by Yatalac
Pɨkwɨc (Apɨkuwɨc)English

səysəɲɲam qaɲɨw ŋandlɨwkəmbə ɨtnɨl ansal ŋamplɨʔkənɢɨʔ.

Make understand the end of the sound that is turned on, that awakened y’all’s lives.

sə-yisə-məɲa-m qə-anə-yɨwa ŋa-la-ndɨ-wɨ-kənap ɨttən-ɨla ɨ-anə-salɨ ŋa-plɨ-nɨ-ka-ʔəqanɨ-ʔə

  • ɨttən “sound, noise” (class II) (stress on first syllable)
  • kənap “to awaken, to be figured out, to make sense” (stress on first syllable)
  • məɲa “to sound, to be on (of a machine)” (stress on second syllable)
  • ʔəqanɨ “to understand” (stress on third syllable)
  • salɨ “to end” (stress on first syllable)
  • yɨwa “to live” (stress on second syllable)

Nominal morphology:

  • qə- 2pl possessive
  • ɨ- class II possessive (steals stress)
  • -ɨla marks the head of a relative clause

Verbal morphology:

  • ka- imperative marker (triggers post-fixed reduplication of initial syllable)
  • la- class II singular transitive subject marker
  • ndɨ- class I plural object marker
  • nɨ- class I singular object marker
  • ŋa- causative (steals stress)
  • plɨ- 2pl transitive subject marker
  • sə- class II singular intransitive subject marker
  • wɨ- past tense (steals stress)
  • yɨsə- inchoative marker (second syllable steals stress, triggers post-fixed reduplication of initial syllable)
  • anə- nominalizer (class I)

Rules:

Stress is a powerful force in Pɨkwɨs, as you can tell by the name as it is pronounced and the underlying name. The stress has such an effect that the vowel in the syllable before, the vowel in the syllable after, and every second syllable syllable after that one get reduced.

You’ll notice some affixes steal stress from the root - if there are multiple of these in a word, the stress that is kept is the leftmost one. If two vowels bump up against each other, the lower one is left and the resultant vowel steals stress.

This creates a lot of consonant clusters - same-mannered clusters can assimilate to the place of the last member of the cluster, or they can remain distinct. A “y” or “w” can bring the previous consonant to its articulation. With different-mannered clusters, nasals like jumping before plosives, laterals like jumping after them. A plosive after a nasal gets voiced, and forms a prenasalized stop, which cannot end a word, so an epenthetic schwa is put in after them.

Verbal affix ordering is causative-subject-object-tense-aspect/mood-root. The language is strongly head-marking.