Ruykkarra(ber)

[Arayaz]

This is gonna be a thread formatted kinda like lessons, just to provide an overview of the language. Ruykkarraber is my most recent project; its placeholder name, Besque (from Basque-esque), is no longer quite true to its state, but some Basque-like features remain, mostly in its phonoaesthetic.

[Arayaz]

Ruykkarraber Phonology and Romanization

Ruykkarraber has a relatively simple phonemic inventory. Its consonants are /b t d k g s m n ɾ r j/, and its vowels are /a e i u/, as well as the diphthongs /aj ej uj aw ew iw/. Of course, on the phonetic level, it gets more complicated:

• The voiced stops /b d g/ often lenite to [β ð ɣ]; geminates never lenite.
• Standard nasal assimilation also exists, with all consonants except liquids. This is one of the only ways [m] ever occurs; it is actually Ruykkarraber's rarest phoneme.
• Voicing assimilation occurs as well, but only with /s/ + /b, d, g/, in that order. Most dialects have it more prolifically, but this is all that they all agree on.

It's all romanized just as you'd expect, so nothing of much interest there.

Syllables are CCVC; the onset must be obstruent + sonorant (not r), nasal + liquid (not r), or sibilant + consonant.

Stress is always on the penultimate syllable, except when a prefix is added to a monosyllabic word without suffixes.