Venian

Consonants
Venian has 25 discrete phonemes and 27 consonants. A note regarding p and b: the Venian phonemes use a lateral release of the mandibles, and as such are not reproducible by species without mandibles. The closest approximations are the aspirate counterparts of these sounds.

Vowels
Venian has 6 vowels. Note that while Venian's native vowel shape is unrounded due to the inflexibility of turians' facial features, other species speaking Venian frequently round the vowels considerably more than would be native, particularly in the case of "o" and "u". Also important is the fact that Venian's vowels are monophthongs, unlike English, and native English speakers should take care not to turn "e" and "o" into diphthongs.

Stress
Venian words typically place the primary emphasis on either the penultimate (second-last) or pre-penultimate (third-last) syllable.

Nouns
Venian nouns have no particular rules. Most nouns pluralize by adding the suffix -rre, but there are exceptions (ex. oqulo, "eye", where the plural is oquli).


 * friend: æminoš; friends: æminošrre

Adjectives
Venian adjectives must end in a vowel.

To create a comparative adjective (as if adding -er to an English adjective), add the suffix -si. To create a superlative adjective (as if adding -est), add the suffix -tao.


 * happy: elixa
 * happier: elixasi
 * happiest: elixatao

Articles
Unlike English, where definite and indefinite articles are their own words, Venian functions similar to Icelandic, where the articles are suffixes.


 * Indefinite singular article (a): -la
 * Indefinite plural article (some): -le
 * Definite singular article (the): -lo
 * Definite plural article (the): -li

Example:


 * sword: væcir
 * a sword: væcirla
 * some swords: væcirle
 * the sword: væcirlo
 * the swords: væcirli

Pronouns, case, and person
Venian has a straightforward case system, including nominative/accusative, dative, and possessive/genitive cases. All pronouns in all cases may be used as suffixes in verb conjugation and noun declension; the nominative/accusative and possessive pronouns also function as words in their own right.

Also, Venian includes a delineation in the third person singular and plural between persons (beings of sapience) and objects. For the sake of efficiency, the person case examples here use only he/she pronouns - this does not reflect any strict gender binary, as Venian does not distinguish between gender. It is only for ease of reading in translation.

Nominative and accusative pronouns

 * I: ‘a
 * You (singular): na
 * He/she (singular, person): qa
 * It (singular, object): xa
 * We: ‘e
 * You (plural): ne
 * They (persons): qe
 * They (objects): xe

Possessive and genitive pronouns

 * My: ‘at
 * Your (singular): nat
 * His/hers (singular person): qat
 * Its (singular object): xat
 * Our: ‘et
 * Your (plural): net
 * Their (plural person): qet
 * Their (plural object): xet

Dative pronouns

 * First person singular: ‘aš
 * Second person singular: naš
 * Third person singular (person): qaš
 * Third person singular (object): xaš
 * First person plural: ‘eš
 * Second person plural: neš
 * Third person plural (persons): qeš
 * Third person plural (objects): xeš

Other particles
Venian includes a selection of particles which are added as suffixes when a word must decline into a particular case or usage, but a pronoun does not apply.


 * Accusative particle: -i
 * Genitive particle: -nus
 * Dative particle: -š *
 * Reflexive particle: -te
 * Ordinal particle: -č

A note regarding the dative particle: it is relatively common for the dative particle to be absorbed by another suffix in the word, frequently becoming -č.

Verbs
Venian regular verbs end in a consonant. The infinitive and present tenses are represented by only the verb stem; the infinitive stands alone, where the present will then be conjugated with a pronoun as per the above tables.

Tenses

 * Present: verb stem only
 * Past: -t after unvoiced consonant, -d after voiced consonant
 * Future: -l
 * Conditional: -ç
 * Cond. past: -çt
 * Cond. future: -çl
 * Immediate (occurring in the immediate present, or occurring continuously): -k
 * Imperative: -ł
 * Participle (act of verb, -ing): -ais

Other particles

 * Affector/doer (one who...): -ix
 * Adverbs (-ly): -vz

Syntax
Venian has a basic syntax as follows:


 * verb [+nominative pronoun] > object [+pronoun] > indirect-object [+pronoun]

Adjectives are placed after the noun to which they refer; adverbs are placed after the verb to which they refer.