Kepepow language

The Kepepow language was spoken by the Kepepow people in (location TBD) around (timeline TBD, likely beginning of bronze/iron age/'classical', lasting around 2000 years). It is descended from Proto-Kepepow, the only of the Proto-Kepepow descendents to survive long enough to be written down.

The name 'Kepepow' literally means 'of sand', referring to the coastal lands and beaches they inhabited, in contrast to the Proto-Kepepow tribes who lived further inland. The people called themselves the Êntronr Ké-pèpöhw /ˈɛ̂ɳʈəɳ ˈkɛ́ˌpɛ̀pœːw/ (People of Sand). The language was usually referred to simply as Ngèm Vòevhwö /ˈŋɛ̀m ˈβœ̀wwœ/ (Our Language), but could also be termed Ngèm Êntronr-òhw Ké-pèpöhw (Language of the People of Sand) /ˈŋɛ̀m ˈɛ̂ɳʈəˌɳɔ̀ːw ˈkɛ́ˌpɛ̀pœːw/

Kepepow is a VSO head-first language, though some established phrases are head-last as this was a trait of Proto-Kepepow.

History
The Kepepow language can be broadly broken down into 3 periods:


 * Early Kepepow (0-600) - first stage of differentiation from Proto-Kepepow, just as the people were migrating to the coast.
 * Middle Kepepow (600-1400) - development of Kepepow culture settled in the new coastal environment
 * Late Kepepow (1400-2000) - final stage of Kepepow. The details of the language described below mostly pertain to this era, as this was when Kepepow writing became more widespread and the the (Trade Speech) koiné was developed.

Phonology and Orthography
Alveolar-retroflex always resolve to retroflex, thus retroflex sequences are transcribed with only one final modifying r - e.g. /ɳʈ/ written

/β/ and /ʐ/ weaken when syllable-final into [w] and [ɻ]. /β/ merges in pronunciation with /w/ in this position and is transcribed . [ɻ] is simply written  - it can only come after a vowel, and thus there is no potential to confuse it for a modifying r.

The  in  and  is not written before another velar consonant, as alveolar /n/ and /l/ become velar in that position. The same applies to , which is always /ɫw/. Vowel orthography is somewhat more complicated and will be addressed in its own section.

The letter  is used after a vowel to denote nasalisation.

Every stressed vowel carries one of four tones - high, low, falling or rising. Most vowels only allow a subset of those tones due to tone evolution. All vowels can additionally be unstressed, and there is an additional /ə/ which can also appear in unstressed position.

Note the difference between the vowel value in low vs rising close vowels.

Vowel harmony
Vowel harmony was an important process in early stages of Kepepow, although by Late Kepepow this had evolved into inflection classes instead, as sound changes masked the original process. Kepepow has 4 inflection classes which correspond to what used to be vowel harmony classes - ATR- front (F), ATR- back (B), ATR+ (+) and ATR++ (++).

Vowel levelling was also productive and extensive in early stages of Kepepow. Late Kepepow retained one productive instance of vowel levelling: pre-stress vowels are tied to the stressed vowel, thus any changes to the stressed vowel will also change the pre-stress vowel - e.g. sasrâ /saʂâ/ + -zru fronts to *sasrêzru, which levels to sesrêzru /seʂêʐu/.

Nouns
Nouns undergo inflection for number and case.

Number
Most nouns have 2 numbers (singular and plural), while some retain the paucal number for a specific use, generally referring to a commonly used small set (pair, handful, bunch, etc). Note that some nouns have shifted number despite the underlying form deriving from a different number-inflected form - most commonly, a former paucal form replaced the singular as the new singular form - thus there are several 'paradigms' for number inflection despite deriving from only 2 affixes.


 * No inflection. These may derive from any former number, e.g. kwás  ' sky.SN' > 'sky', montrôumpu 'ice.PAUC' > 'ice', ké-pèpe 'sand.PL' > 'sand'
 * Singular-Plural (most common)
 * Paucal-shifted: old paucal is now singular. The old paucal has a suffix which needs to be stripped before adding the reduplicated component for plural.
 * vôlvu 'day', vôvo 'days'. The old singular form vô is now used to mean 'sun'
 * Paucal-dropped: old paucal is dropped
 * óew 'mountain' - óelvöw 'mountains'.
 * Plural-dropped: old plural is dropped, and old paucal is used as plural
 * pâk 'wall' - pâklvu 'walls'. The old plural form pâppak is now used to mean 'enclosure, fence'
 * Singular-Paucal-Plural (traditional)
 * ngwùhnsr 'single blade of grass' - ngwùhnzrmu 'bit of/clump of grass' - ngwùhnzrngwunsr 'large amount of/field of grass'

Case
The cases themselves haven't changed significantly from Proto-Kepepow. The inflections can be slightly irregular due to sound changes. Case inflections are either stressed after an unstressed syllable, or unstressed after a stressed syllable. Only unstressed suffixes need to change depending on the stem noun's inflection class, stressed suffixes maintain their own vowel value independently.

Case endings can induce fronting or rounding in the stem vowel, as well as nasal consonant assimilation. Unstressed vowels change depending on stem noun harmony (i.e. inflection class). Note that in many nouns that would otherwise trigger fronting and/or rounding, the paucal suffix is used as to 'regularise' the noun.