Introduction to the Veda Language
Veda is the language of the inhabitants of the city of Veda, which is the first city that was created to serve as an example of order to all other beings in Athanor (the world of Arena of Valor). The language started out as purely isolating, but its stable stage is a bit advanced from that state. Here’s a brief intro to each facet of the language:
The original consonantal inventory of Veda is as follows:
Stops: p/b, t/d, k/ɡ, q, ʔ
Fricatives: f/v, s/z, x/ɣ
A palatal series was introduced along with vowels other than ǝ, though, which produced the final inventory below (romanized forms in parentheses):
Stops: p/b, t/d, k/ɡ, q, ʔ (=‘)
Affricates: ts/dz, tʃ (=ch)/dʒ (=j)
Fricatives: f/v, s/z, ʃ (=sh)/ʒ (=zh), x (=kh)/ɣ (=gh)
Nasals: m, n, ɲ (=ny), ŋ (=ng)
Approximants: l, ɾ (=r), w, j (=y)
Vowels were mostly assumed at first, colored by the consonants around them, but then there came standards for writing vowels, and things stabilized a bit. The modern inventory is as follows:
The story with the old vowels is basically *ǝ was introduced between two consonants where a rime was wanted. When a following consonants was *j or *w the vowel became modern i and u, respectively. After *ʔ, *x, *ɣ, *j, or *w, the original *ǝ became a. Sequences of *ai and *au became e and o, respectively. Thus a word like *ʔjl became el “tooth”.
Nouns don’t inflect for anything. If a noun is placed before another noun it’s understood to be its possessor, though there are more prolix ways to indicate possession, if precision is required.
Most of the grammar derives from serial verb constructions. Depending on how you look at the language, it’s either SVO (older) or SOV (modern analysis). Here are some illustrative sentences:
Maq jul. “The eagle sleeps.”
Wits jul. “The mouse sleeps.”
Maq kho wits vugh. “The eagle eats a mouse.”
The particle kho is a verb meaning “take”. It now also stands before direct objects of transitive verbs. We can put these guys in the perfective:
Maq jul nǝkh. “The eagle (has) slept.”
Wits jul nǝkh. “The mouse (has) slept.”
Maq kho wits vugh nǝkh. “The eagle ate (has eaten) a mouse.”
The verb nǝkh means “finish”. Next we have these three:
Maq gǝn jul. “The eagle is asleep (is sleeping).”
Wits gǝn jul. “The mouse is asleep (is sleeping).”
Maq kho wits gǝn vugh. “The eagle is eating a mouse.”
Maq gǝn vugh. “The eagle eats (is eating).”
The verb gǝn means “sit”. It comes before the verb resulting in an imperfective or progressive interpretation. With transitive verbs it can be used without a direct object.
Maq yu jul. “The eagle goes to sleep.”
Wits yu jul. “The mouse goes to sleep.”
Maq kho wits yu vugh. “The eagle starts eating a mouse.”
Maq yu chuf. “The eagle becomes (gets) quiet.”
Maq yu vugh (ag wits). “The eagle is eaten (by the mouse).”
Wits yu vugh (ag maq). “The mouse is eaten (by the eagle).”
The verb yu means “go”; the verb ag means “come”. Yu is used with a verb to make reference to its inception or to indicate that a state is growing (no difference between the two). With a transitive verb the interpretation is passive.
With kho it’s also possible to produce causative verbs:
Maq kho wits jul. “The eagle makes the mouse sleep.”
Wits kho maq jul. “The mouse makes the eagle sleep.”
Maq kho wits vugh ghok. “The eagle makes the mouse eat meat.”
Wits kho maq vugh ghok. “The mouse makes the eagle eat meat.”
The verb is used by itself for imperatives, with standard VO word order (kho generally isn’t used with objects in commands unless absolutely necessary).
In negation, the word tso (verb meaning “leave”) is placed before the verb or before the object, as shown below:
Maq tso jul. “The eagle doesn’t sleep.”
Wits tso jul. “The mouse doesn’t sleep.”
Maq tso wits vugh. “The eagle does not eat a mouse.”
There is no copula. For negation, tso appears between the two elements of a copula. For clarity, a demonstrative can stand in between the two elements, e.g.:
Mǝnghok tsuksukh. “The mortal is a spear-thrower.”
Mǝnghok lin tsuksukh. “The mortal is a spear-thrower.”
For standard ditransitive verbs, the post-verbal object slot is used:
Maq kho tsuk shun wits. “The eagle gives a spear to the mouse.”
Wits kho tsuk shun maq. “The mouse gives a spear to the eagle.”
Where it’s less clear, yu (a verb meaning “go”) is used:
Maq kho rǝn qas yu wits. “The eagle says something to the mouse.”
Wits kho rǝn qas yu maq. “The mouse says something to the eagle.”
That’ll take you most of the way. Relative clauses appear before the nouns they modify with a gap (participles, if you can call them that, work the same way).
There are a series of first and second person pronouns in both singular and plural, but not third person:
First Person Singular: kyun “I”
First Person Plural: min “we”
Second Person Singular: da “you (singular)”
Second Person Plural: sa “you (plural), you all”
For the third person the demonstratives are used, though they make no distinction between singular and plural:
Proximal Demonstrative: lin “she, he, it, they, this, these”
Medial Demonstrative: sen “she, he, it, they, that, those (close to the addressee)”
Distal Demonstrative: khon “she, he, it, they, that, those (far from speaker and addressee)”
When modifying a noun, these demonstratives are used postpositively. When used prepositively, they’re understood to be possessors.
Adjectives can be used postpositively or prepositively. They can also serve as predicates, participating in full verbal paradigms. They also can be modified to produce a variety of comparatives which differ in shape depending on whether they’re used postpositively or prepositively. For example:
Plain Adjective: zho “large”
Equative: yu zho (prenominal) / zho yu (postnominal) “as large”
Comparative: dzok zho (prenominal) / zho ghor (postnominal) “larger”
Superlative: dzok zho (prenominal) / zho ghor mem (postnominal) “largest”
Contrastive: ung dzok zho (prenominal) / ung zho ghor (postnominal) “less large”
Sublative: ung dzok zho (prenominal) / ung zho ghor mem (postnominal) “least large”
For some etymologies: ung is “bottom”; mem is “everything”; ghor is “to cross over”; dzok is “top”. When comparing the noun to a standard, the postpositive form is used, and the last word of the postpositive form serves as a preposition (e.g. in the superlative, mem is used as the standard of comparison).
That should give you an idea how this thing works! More will come in a bit.
