Halfling

Natively known as: Hà̂phphlinɡ /ˈafflinɡ/

...and he stood holding his hat and turned his wet face to the wind... ddàːll rhèi ffèpa dẁth rhèi iyuc ddàːll am rhèi ddàr ddaph by ɡŵɡ Pronunciation: /ðaːɬ r̥ɛi ˈfɛpaː dʊθ r̥ɛi dʒəuk ðaːɬ am r̥ɛi ðar ðaːf bə ɡuːɡ/ Halfling word order: and he stood holding his hat and turned his wet face to the wind

Spelling & Phonology

Consonant inventory: /b d f h j k l m m̥ n n̥ p r r̥ s t v w x ð ŋ ŋ̊ ɡ ɬ ʃ ʒ θ/

↓Manner/Place→	Bilabial	Labiodental	Dental	Alveolar	Palato-alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Glottal
Nasal	m̥ m			n̥ n			ŋ̊ ŋ
Stop	p b			t d			k ɡ
Fricative		f v	θ ð	s	ʃ ʒ		x	h
Approximant						j
Trill				r̥ r
Lateral fricative				ɬ
Lateral approximant				l

Co-articulated phonemes

↓Manner/Place→	Labial-velar
Approximant	w

Vowel inventory: /a ai au aː eː iː oː uː ɔ ɔi ə əu ɛ ɛi ɛu ɨ ɨː ɪ ɪu ʊ ʊi/
Diphthongs: ai, au, ɔi, əu, ɛi, ɛu, ɪu, ʊi

	Front	Central	Back
High	iː	ɨ ɨː	uː
Near-high	ɪ		ʊ
High-mid	eː		oː
Mid		ə
Low-mid	ɛ		ɔ
Low	a aː

Syllable structure: Custom defined Stress pattern: Penultimate — stress is on the second last syllable Word initial consonants: b, d, dʒ, f, h, j, k, l, m, m̥, n, n̥, p, r, r̥, s, t, tʃ, v, w, x, ð, ŋ, ŋ̊, ɡ, ɬ, ʃ, ʒ, θ Mid-word consonants: b, d, f, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, r̥, s, t, v, w, x, ð, ŋ, ŋ̊, ɡ, ɬ, ʒ, θ Word final consonants: b, d, dʒ, f, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, tʃ, v, x, ð, ŋ, ɡ, ɬ, ʃ, θ
Phonological changes (in order of application):

• b → u / _C
• {n,l} → [+palatal] / _C
• θ → ʃ / C_
• p → f / V_
• h → Ø / _#
• n → ɲ / _E
• t → s / _V
• ja → aː / C_
• j → ɡ / #_
• N → h / _S
• p → f / _{t,k}
• s → t / _#

Spelling rules:

Pronunciation	Spelling
a:	a|â
a	a|à
ai	ai|au|ae|áu
au	aw
dʒ	j|di
e:	e|ê
f	ff|ph
iː	î
j	i
k	c
m̥	mh
n̥	nh
oː	ô|o
r̥	rh
tʃ	ts|tsi
uː	ŵ
v	f
x	ch
ð	dd
ŋ	ng
ŋ̊	ngh
ɔ	ò
ɔi	oi|oe
ə	y
əu	yw
ɛ	è
ɛi	ei|eu
ɛu	ew
ɨ	u
ɨː	û|ŷ
ɪ	i
ɪu	iw|uw|yw
ɬ	ll
ʃ	si|sh
ʊ	ẁ
ʊi	wy|ŵy
ʒ	zs
θ	th

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Grammar

Main word order: Subject-Verb-Object-Oblique. "Mary opened the door with a key" turns into Mary opened the door with a key. Adjective order: Adjectives are positioned before the noun. Adposition: prepositions

Nouns

	Singular	Plural
Definite	If ends with vowel: Suffix -m Else: Suffix -ɪum llŵfium /ˈɬɨːvɪum/ the doɡ	If ends with vowel: Suffix -ɬ Else: Suffix -auɬ llŵfawll /ˈɬɨːvauɬ/ the doɡs
Indefinite	Suffix -ɛi llŵfèi /ˈɬɨːvɛi/ a doɡ	Suffix -ʊ llŵfẁ /ˈɬɨːvʊ/ some doɡs

Articles

Halfling encodes definite article ‘the’, and indefinite article ‘a’ in noun affixes. See Noun section.

Pronouns

1st singular	dŵ /duː/ I, me, mine
2nd singular	sa /sa/ you, yours
3rd singular masc	rhèi /r̥ɛi/ he, him, his, it, its
3rd singular fem	dde /ðeː/ she, her, hers, it, its
1st plural	ddab /ðaːb/ we, us, ours
2nd plural	ty /tə/ you all, yours (pl)
3rd plural	lim /lɪm/ they, them, theirs

Possessive determiners

1st singular	dŵ /duː/ my
2nd singular	sa /sa/ your
3rd singular masc	rhèi /r̥ɛi/ his
3rd singular fem	ddê /ðeː/ her
1st plural	ddàːb /ðaːb/ our
2nd plural	ty /tə/ your (pl)
3rd plural	lim /lɪm/ their

Verbs

Present	No affix têddo /ˈteːðoː/ learn
Past	Suffix -ɨː têddoŵ /teːˈðoːɨː/ learned
Remote past	If ends with vowel: Suffix -p Else: Suffix -ɔp teddôp /ˈteːðoːp/ learned (lonɡ aɡo)
Future	Suffix -ɛr têddôèr /teːˈðoːɛr/ will learn

Imperfective aspect

The ‘imperfective’ aspect refers to ongoing actions, such as I am learning and habitual actions, such as I learn (something new every day).
Halfling uses a standalone particle word for imperfective:

Imperfective

Particle before the verb: r̥ɪu - rhiu teddô /r̥ɪu ˈteːðoː/ learns/is learninɡ

Numbers

Halfling has a base-20 number system:
1 - dôch 2 - nha 3 - ng̊it 4 - foch 5 - lur 6 - dî 7 - siâp 8 - llŵt 9 - hèu 10 - iiu 11 - bèdd 12 - llomŵp 13 - bèthâ 14 - caffu 15 - lipyudŵ 16 - wawphi 17 - têthyunè 18 - ddàːlà 19 - ling̊i 20 - hèup 21 - hèupdôch “twenty-one” 400 - doch lè “one fourhundred” 401 - doch lè ddàːll dôch “one fourhundred and one” 800 - nha lè “two fourhundred” 8000 - doch ddàːnytsh “one eightthousand”

Derivational morphology

Adjective → adverb = If ends with vowel: Suffix -ɬ Else: Suffix -auɬ Adjective → noun (the quality of being [adj]) = If ends with vowel: Suffix -ɬ Else: Suffix -uːɬ Adjective → verb (to make something [adj]) = If ends with vowel: Suffix -f Else: Suffix -auf Noun → adjective (having the quality of [noun]) = Suffix -aɡ Noun → adjective relating to noun (e.g. economy → economic) = Suffix -ɪb Noun → verb (to create [noun]) = Suffix -ɛub Verb → adjective (result of doing [verb]) = Suffix -ad Verb → adjective (likely to do [verb]) = Suffix -ɪum Verb → noun (the act of [verb]) = If ends with vowel: Suffix -l Else: Suffix -oːl Verb → noun that verb physically produces (e.g. build → building) = Suffix -ʊk One who [verb]s (e.g. paint → painter) = If ends with vowel: Suffix -ʃ Else: Suffix -aʃ Place of (e.g. wine → winery) = Suffix -uː Diminutive = Suffix -af Augmentative = Suffix -ɨːŋ

Dictionary

4406 Words.