Ardaenic

The diverse language of the equally-colourful Ardaenian folk of the south is known for its interesting phrases and complicated grammar system, almost incomprehensible to even the nation's neighbours...and to the people themselves, in many cases.

— A Survey of Renathian Languages by Geran Portanik

While Geran was likely exaggerating the "incomprehensible" part, Ardaenic is well-known for its complicated syntax systems and incredibly specific grammar constructions. One linguist once joked that the Ardaenians have a word for everything and then some, and the depth of the language doesn't appear to disappoint on that front. The fact that a simplified version of this language is used for the Power Script used by the Temple of the Powers is a firm basis for the belief that Ardaenic might be one of the most important Renathian language.

Structure

Ardaenic uses a VSO word order, meaning that the verb precedes the subject which precedes the rest of the sentence. This is different from a rather large number of Renathian languages, but the differences definitely don't end there.
In addition, nouns in Ardaenic can be in one of six cases (nominative, accusative, dative, genitive, locative or ablative), one of two genders (masculine or feminine) or two numbers (singular or plural). If the sheer number of options weren't enough to dissuade a would-be learner, the case and number affixes appear to be completely random, some being prefixes and others suffixes.
Ardaenic also has a very large number of affixes that are added for a variety of reasons, creating a very dense vocabulary using a much smaller number of basic words. To illustrate, one well-known linguist took the word chüm (light) and found nearly two dozen words that were based on just that one word alone. This is helped by having a large variety of vowel sounds, counting thirteen in total, as well as twenty-two consonants, so there is a diverse set of sounds to choose from.

Peculiarities

Many people like to find the particularly unique parts of Ardaenic in order to help bridge the gap between their mother tongue and this language. These often include:

• Comparative and superlative nouns (see sidebar
• An inclusive "we" and an exclusive "we" (that is, a "we" that can include the other people in the conversation or not and
• A past tense for happenings so long in the past that none of the people in the conversation were alive when the events took place, as well as for more recent events.

Dictionary

14 Words.

Spoken by

• Ardaenian

Common Phrases and Idioms

varanda

hello

bapil

goodbye

sëchenob shür

in their element (lit. "on their own battlefield")

lüf chümof

on one hand, on the other (lit. "on dark, on light")

Example Grammar: Comparative and Superlative Nouns

Most languages have a comparative and superlative form for adjectives, such as good becoming better, then best, or far becoming further or farther, then furthest and farthest. Ardaenic appears to be unique among the languages of the multiverse for the existence, rare though they may be, of so-called hiranyamith, or comparative/superlative nouns. The word itself is an example: hira is a noun, so a hiranyam is "the noun of nouns" or "the better/best noun." The -ayam or -yam ending is how this appears for masculine nouns, with -iyom or -yom being the feminine equivalent.