# Japanese

*A reference grammar*

Verb-final and consistently head-final, with postpositions, prenominal relative clauses and a topic particle doing work that English gives to word order.  
Generated 25 October 2026.

## What this is

This describes **a human language**, carried in **vocal** form and heard rather than read. Its smallest contrastive unit is called a *sound* throughout.

This is a language in the full sense: every one of Hockett's design features is present.

| Design feature | Present? |
|---|---|
| Duality of patterning | yes |
| Displacement | yes |
| Productivity | yes |
| Arbitrariness | yes |
| Cultural transmission | yes |
| Discreteness | yes |

## At a glance

SOV word order, postpositions, adjectives before nouns, agglutinative, nominative–accusative, no number marking, no articles, a passive, pro-drop.

Written left to right in a logographic script, with 21 distinct sounds and 27 words so far.

## 1. Phonology

### Consonants (16)

| IPA | Written | Sound |
|---|---|---|
| p | p | voiceless bilabial plosive |
| t | t | voiceless alveolar plosive |
| k | k | voiceless velar plosive |
| b | b | voiced bilabial plosive |
| d | d | voiced alveolar plosive |
| ɡ | g | voiced velar plosive |
| m | m | voiced bilabial nasal |
| n | n | voiced alveolar nasal |
| ŋ | ng | voiced velar nasal |
| s | s | voiceless alveolar fricative |
| z | z | voiced alveolar fricative |
| h | h | voiceless glottal fricative |
| ʃ | sh | voiceless postalveolar fricative |
| r | r | voiced alveolar trill |
| j | y | voiced palatal approximant |
| w | w | voiced labial-velar approximant |

### Vowels (5)

| IPA | Written | Sound |
|---|---|---|
| i | i | close front unrounded vowel |
| u | u | close back rounded vowel |
| e | e | close-mid front unrounded vowel |
| o | o | close-mid back rounded vowel |
| a | a | open front unrounded vowel |

### Word shape

Syllables are `(C)V(N)` — `C` a consonant, `V` a vowel, parentheses an optional slot.

A word runs from 1 to 6 syllables.

Stress is not fixed by rule.

### Stress, tone and length

| | |
|---|---|
| Does vowel length change a word's meaning | Yes — long and short are different vowels |
| Does consonant length change a word's meaning | Yes — geminates are distinct |
| Does pitch on a syllable change a word's meaning | No tone |
| Where does stress fall | No stress at all |

### The sounds themselves

| | |
|---|---|
| Are there nasal vowels distinct from oral ones | Yes — French, Portuguese, Hindi |
| How do stops contrast | Voiced against voiceless — /b/ against /p/. English, French |
| Are there ejective or implosive consonants | No |
| Are there retroflex consonants | No |
| Are there uvular consonants | No |
| Are there clicks | No |

### What happens when sounds meet

| | |
|---|---|
| Do the vowels in a word have to match | No |
| What happens to a voiced consonant at the end of a word | Nothing — it stays voiced |
| Does the language repeat part of a word to change its meaning | No |
| What makes a syllable heavy | Either a long vowel or a closing consonant |

### Syllable and word shape

| | |
|---|---|
| How many consonants may start a syllable | One only — Japanese, Hawaiian |
| How may a syllable end | One consonant |
| Can a consonant be a syllable on its own | Yes |
| Is there a minimum size a word must reach | Yes — a word must be at least two syllables or one heavy one |
| Does syllable weight matter | Yes — a long vowel makes a syllable heavy |
| How long is a typical word | Two or three |
| May a word begin with a vowel | Yes |

### Rhythm and timing

| | |
|---|---|
| What is the rhythm of the language | Mora-timed — the unit is smaller than the syllable. Japanese by some accounts |
| Do unstressed vowels weaken | Yes — they centralise or drop |
| Do long words carry a secondary stress | No |

### Intonation

| | |
|---|---|
| What does the pitch do at the end of a statement | Falls |
| What does the pitch do in a yes/no question | Rises |

### The shape of the inventory

| | |
|---|---|
| How large is the sound inventory meant to be | Average — around 25 to 35 |
| How many vowels | Five — the world's commonest system |

### Sounds changing in context

| | |
|---|---|
| Do neighbouring consonants become more alike | In place — "in-possible" becomes "impossible" |
| Is a vowel inserted to break up an awkward cluster | Yes |
| Are sounds dropped in fast or casual speech | Yes |
| What happens to a borrowed word with foreign sounds | It is remade in native sounds |
| Does the writing show predictable sound changes | No — spelling keeps the underlying form |

## 2. Writing system

The script is **logographic**: one glyph per word.

- Written left to right.
- Words are run together without spaces.
- A sentence ends with `。`.

*No glyphs have been drawn yet, so the language can only be shown transliterated.*

### Marks on the page

| | |
|---|---|
| Does the script have two cases | No — one set of letters |
| Is vowel length written | Yes |

### Layout and division

| | |
|---|---|
| How are words separated | Not at all — Thai, Chinese, Japanese |
| How much punctuation is there | A full set — stops, commas, quotes, questions |
| Is there a mark for a new section or paragraph | No |
| How closely does spelling follow sound | Loosely — spelling records history rather than sound. English, French, Tibetan |
| Are there conventional abbreviations | Yes |

### Numbers and dates

| | |
|---|---|
| How are numbers written | With digits, positionally |
| Which way do multi-digit numbers run | The same way as the text |

### How the script came to be

| | |
|---|---|
| Where did the script come from | Borrowed from a neighbour and adapted |
| What was it first written on | Paper or parchment — free-flowing |
| Do letters join or merge when adjacent | No |
| Do letters change shape by position in the word | No |
| Does the direction alternate line by line | No — every line runs the same way |
| Has the spelling been reformed | Once |
| Is there a calligraphic tradition | Yes — writing is an art form in its own right |
| Is there a shorthand or cursive for fast writing | No |
| What is the script called | kanji with kana |

## 3. Transliteration

Phonemic: written as heard, which means the spelling cannot be read back to a unique original. Sounds with no Latin letter are written with the nearest letter there is, losing the distinction.

How the language is written back in Latin letters. Each sound's own spelling is in the phonology tables above.

- Morphemes run together, with no hyphens.
- Nothing is capitalised.

### Names and borrowings

| | |
|---|---|
| How are foreign names written | Respelt in the native system |
| Are romanised proper nouns marked | No |

### Where systems differ

| | |
|---|---|
| May diacritics be dropped when typing | Yes — the bare letters are acceptable |
| Is there more than one accepted romanisation | Several, by country or era |

## 4. Grammatical categories

What the language distinguishes. How each is expressed is in the next section.

| Category | Distinguished? |
|---|---|
| Number | no |
| Definiteness | no |
| Case | nominative against accusative |
| Tense | past against non-past |
| Aspect | progressive against simple |
| Agreement | no |
| Copula | "be" is a verb |
| Voice | active, passive ("-rare", agent by "ni") |
| Pro-drop | pronoun subjects and objects may both be dropped |

### Number beyond singular and plural

| | |
|---|---|
| What number distinctions are there | No number marking at all |
| Does "we" distinguish whether the hearer is included | No — one word for both |
| How many cases does the language distinguish | Ten or more — Finnish, Hungarian, and much of the Caucasus |
| Is there a way to say "X and those with X" | Yes, with a marker of its own |
| How do the subject and object cases differ in form | Both are marked, and neither is built from the other |

### Gender and noun class

| | |
|---|---|
| Does the language sort nouns into classes | No |

### Mood and modality

| | |
|---|---|
| Which moods does the verb distinguish | Statement and command |
| What aspects does the verb distinguish | Ongoing against not |
| Does the verb change according to who is being addressed | Yes |
| Does negating a sentence change anything else about the verb | Yes — tense, aspect or agreement is marked differently under negation |
| Does a command use a special form of the verb | Yes — a form used only for commands |
| Is there a form for "may it be so" — a wish | No |

### Evidence and certainty

| | |
|---|---|
| Must a speaker say how they know | No — it is optional or absent |

### Voice and valency

| | |
|---|---|
| Is there a way to say "make someone do it" on the verb | Yes — a causative form |
| Can the verb promote an oblique to object | No |
| Where is the relationship between words marked — on the head or on the dependent | On the dependent — case on the noun, as Latin and Russian do |

### Time, more finely

| | |
|---|---|
| Does the past distinguish how long ago | No — one past |
| Is the future a tense, or a mood | A tense — grouped with past and present |
| Is there a perfect — a past with present relevance | No |
| Does the verb say whether the next clause has the same subject | No |
| Does the verb agree with the object as well as the subject | No |
| Is plural marking optional | Yes — used only when it matters |
| Can part of a sentence be negated on its own | No — negation is always the whole clause |
| Does negation take two parts | No — one marker |
| Who can be commanded | The hearer only |

### Definiteness and specificity

| | |
|---|---|
| What does the article system track | There is no article |
| Do possessed nouns change form | No |
| What kind of classifier does counting need | A numeral classifier — "three FLAT rice-paper". Mandarin, Thai, Japanese |

## 5. Morphology

The language is **agglutinative**: affixes stack up, each carrying one meaning.

| Category | Form | Attached as | Glossed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nominative | `ga` | separate word | NOM |
| Accusative | `o` | separate word | ACC |
| Past | `--ta` | suffix | PST |
| Progressive | `--te iru` | suffix | PROG |
| Negation | `--nai` | suffix | NEG |
| Question | `ka` | separate word | Q |

### How large that makes the paradigm

Your verb paradigm has at least 2 tense x 2 aspect x 2 voice x 2 polarity = 16 cells. 38% of the 146 languages in UniMorph have a verb paradigm no larger. At the rate real languages reuse forms — 0.881 distinct forms per cell — about 14 distinct forms would carry those 16 cells, with 2 filled by a form already doing another job. English "walked" is past and participle at once. At least, because this multiplies only the categories the app models: sentence markers you invented yourself, and any agreement richer than the app's yes/no, add cells this count cannot see.

### Pronouns

| | |
|---|---|
| Do third-person pronouns distinguish gender | No — one word for he, she and it |
| Is there more than one word for "you" | Several levels — Javanese, Thai |
| Where does a possessive marker attach | Nowhere — a possessor is a separate word only |
| Do adpositions change form for their object | No — the adposition is invariant |
| How is "someone" or "something" formed | From the question word — "who" doubles as "someone" |
| Is "this" the same word standing alone as it is before a noun | Different words entirely |
| Is the third-person pronoun related to a demonstrative | Related to the demonstratives generally |
| How does a pronoun become plural | A plural marker used only on pronouns |

### Demonstratives and deixis

| | |
|---|---|
| How many degrees of distance do demonstratives have | Three — here, there, yonder. Spanish, Japanese, Latin |
| Do demonstratives mark elevation or direction | No |

### Numerals and counting

| | |
|---|---|
| What does the counting system group by | Tens |
| Where do numerals sit relative to what they count | Before — three dogs |
| Are there separate ordinal numbers | Yes — first, second, third |
| Is there a way to say "two each" | Yes, by saying the numeral twice |

### Making new words

| | |
|---|---|
| How are new words most often made | By affix — happy, unhappiness |
| How is "one who does X" formed | -sha |
| How is a diminutive formed | -ko |
| How is an abstract noun formed from an adjective | -sa |
| Are there infixes — pieces inserted inside a word | No |
| Are the commonest words irregular in a way no rule explains | Yes — go/went, good/better |
| Does a verb change shape for how many are doing it | No |

### Clitics

| | |
|---|---|
| Where do clitics attach | To a particular kind of word |

### Mood and modality on the verb

| | |
|---|---|
| The form for ability or circumstance | dekiru |
| The form for possibility | kamoshirenai |
| The form for obligation | nakereba naranai |

## 6. Syntax

### The clause

Basic order is **SOV**. Adpositions come after their noun, and adpositional phrases sit on the same side of the verb as the object does.

A manner adverb comes before the verb.

### Inside the noun phrase

| Modifier | Position |
|---|---|
| Adjective | Before the noun |
| Numeral | Before the noun |
| Article, demonstrative | Before the noun |
| Possessor | Before the possessed |

Where several modifiers fall on the same side, they mirror outward: the adjective sits nearest the noun, then the numeral, then the article.

### Negation

Negation is a suffix on the verb.

### Questions

A yes/no question takes a particle at the end of the sentence.

### Clauses inside clauses

A relative clause goes **before** the noun it modifies. Nothing marks the position the clause is missing: the gap is simply left open.

Relativisation reaches down to **obliques** on the accessibility hierarchy, so the following can be relativised:

- yes — subjects — "the man **who saw me**"
- yes — direct objects — "the book **that she read**"
- yes — indirect objects — "the child **I gave it to**"
- yes — obliques — "the house **I live in**"
- **no** — possessors — "the man **whose dog barked**"

*Keenan and Comrie (1977): every language relativises an unbroken run from the top of this list, and none skips a position.*

A clause serving as an object is introduced by a complementiser **to**, at the end of its clause.

A circumstance clause carries its link on the verb, as a converb, rather than being introduced by a word.

The nominaliser is **koto**, attached to the subordinate verb.

A subordinate verb is **balanced**: it carries the same marking a main verb does.

### Joining things together

| | |
|---|---|
| Can unlike things be joined — a noun and a clause | No — only like with like |
| Can a repeated verb be left out of the second half | Yes — "I ate rice and she, bread" |
| Do multiple negatives reinforce rather than cancel | Yes — "I didn't see nobody" means I saw nobody |
| How is a negative command formed | A dedicated prohibitive form — Latin "noli", Greek "mē" |
| Is the word joining two nouns the same as the one joining two clauses | No — joining nouns takes a different word |
| Is the word for "and" also the word for "all" | No — separate words |

### Comparison

| | |
|---|---|
| How is a comparison made | With a case or adposition — "big from the dog". Arabic, Turkish |
| How is a superlative made | A separate marker — "the biggest" |
| How is "as big as" expressed | A dedicated equative marker |
| What is the superlative marker | ichiban |
| What is the equative marker | onaji |
| Where does a degree word like "very" go | Before the adjective — very big |
| Can an adjective stand without its noun — "the big one" | Yes, with nothing added |

### Having and belonging

| | |
|---|---|
| How is "I have a book" expressed | "As for me, a book exists" — Japanese, Mandarin |
| Are body parts and kin possessed differently from objects | No — one construction for everything |
| Is a temporary possession marked differently from a lasting one | No — one construction for both |
| Is a possession that has ended marked differently from a current one | No — the tense of the clause does it |
| How is "there is a cat" expressed | A dedicated existential verb |
| How does the language say "the house is big" | Some adjectives take a copula and others behave as verbs |
| Is "she is a doctor" built the same way as "she is in the house" | Different — a location takes another verb or none |
| Are there nouns that must always be possessed | No — any noun can stand alone |

### Emphasis and topic

| | |
|---|---|
| How is one part of a sentence emphasised | By a focus particle |
| What is the focus marker | ga |
| Is there a dedicated position for the topic | Yes — the topic comes first, whatever its role |

### Reflexives and reciprocals

| | |
|---|---|
| Is the emphatic "herself" the same word as the reflexive one | Yes — one word does both |

## 7. Semantics

| | |
|---|---|
| Colour terms | the full set: black, white, red, green, yellow, blue and beyond |
| Counting | base ten |
| Kinship | Eskimo type |
| Motion | verb-framed: the path is in the verb ("exit running") |
| Possession | possession is marked one way for everything |
| Classifiers | counting a noun requires one |

### Ideophones and expressive words

| | |
|---|---|
| Are there ideophones — words that depict rather than describe | A large open class covering sound, movement, texture and feeling |
| How do ideophones fit into a sentence | Like adverbs |
| Do ideophones break the ordinary sound rules | Yes — they use sounds and shapes no other word may |
| Are nouns and verbs clearly different classes | Yes |
| Are adjectives their own word class | Yes, but a small closed set — Igbo has about eight |

### Space and motion

| | |
|---|---|
| How is location described | Relative to the speaker — left, right, in front |

### Time

| | |
|---|---|
| Is the future ahead and the past behind | No — the past is ahead, because it can be seen |
| Is a repeated time said differently from a single one | No — the same construction, and context does the rest |
| How is time divided | Hours and minutes |

### What the language has words for

| | |
|---|---|
| How is the body divided into named parts | Finely — separate words for hand and arm, foot and leg |
| Is there one verb for eating and drinking, or two | Two |
| How are siblings named | By both |
| Are maternal and paternal grandparents named differently | No |
| Are left and right named after anything | They are simply words |
| How many basic colour terms are there | Eleven or more |
| Is blue distinguished from green | Yes |
| How rich is the vocabulary for smell | Poor — smells are described by their source |
| Are red and yellow separate colours | Separate words |

### Borrowing

| | |
|---|---|
| How does the language take in foreign words | Freely, adapted to its own sounds |
| Which languages does it borrow from, and for what | Chinese, then English |

### People, places and things

| | |
|---|---|
| Is "with a friend" the same word as "with a knife" | No — company and instrument take different words |

## 8. Pragmatics

| | |
|---|---|
| Politeness | full speech levels; the verb itself changes |
| Evidentiality | not marked |
| Topic | a particle |
| Focus | a particle |
| Pronoun omission | subject and object may both be dropped |

Markers: topic `wa`.

A separate register exists for addressing particular people; small particles manage the flow of conversation.

### Addressing people

| | |
|---|---|
| How are people addressed | By title and role — teacher, elder brother |
| Are some names or words forbidden in some company | No |

### Doing things with words

| | |
|---|---|
| What does a greeting ask about | The time of day |
| How is a request usually made | As a question — "could you" |
| Do listeners signal attention while someone else speaks | Yes, frequently — Japanese aizuchi |
| What does silence mean in conversation | Respect or consideration |
| Does "yes" agree with the question or with the fact | With the question |
| Do speakers use clicks outside words | No |

### Registers and styles

| | |
|---|---|
| How many distinct registers are there | Several — Javanese has three or more, with different vocabulary |
| Is there a separate language or register for ritual | Yes |
| Do speakers use different forms depending on who they are | Yes |
| Is there a distinct way of speaking to children | Both |
| Is reported speech marked as such | Yes — a quotative particle or verb |
| How is turn-taking managed | One speaker finishes, then the next begins |

## 9. Typology

In one line: **SOV, agglutinative, postpositional, nominative-accusative, classifier-using, pro-drop**.

### Profile

| Feature | This language | Share of real languages | Rarity | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Order of Subject, Object and Verb | SOV | 41% | very common | WALS, 1376 coded |
| Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | Postpositions | 48.7% | very common | WALS, 1184 coded |
| Order of Adjective and Noun | Adjective-Noun | 27.3% | common | WALS, 1367 coded |
| Order of Numeral and Noun | Numeral-Noun | 41.5% | very common | WALS, 1154 coded |
| Order of Genitive and Noun | Genitive-Noun | 54.8% | very common | WALS, 1249 coded |
| Order of Relative Clause and Noun | Relative clause-Noun | 17.1% | uncommon | WALS, 824 coded |
| Prefixing vs. Suffixing in Inflectional Morphology | Weakly suffixing | 12.7% | uncommon | WALS, 969 coded |
| Fusion of Selected Inflectional Formatives | Exclusively concatenative | 75.8% | very common | WALS, 165 coded |
| Alignment of Case Marking of Full Noun Phrases | Nominative - accusative | 24.2% | common | WALS, 190 coded |
| Expression of Pronominal Subjects | Optional pronouns | 8.6% | uncommon | WALS, 711 coded |
| Polar Questions | Question particle | 61.3% | very common | WALS, 955 coded |
| Definite Articles | No article | 31.9% | common | WALS, 620 coded |
| Coding of Nominal Plurality | No plural marking | 9.2% | uncommon | WALS, 1066 coded |
| Numeral Classifiers | Obligatory | 19.5% | uncommon | WALS, 400 coded |
| Negative Morphemes | Negative affix | 34.1% | common | WALS, 1157 coded |
| Position of Tense-Aspect Affixes | Tense-aspect suffixes | 59% | very common | WALS, 1131 coded |
| Position of Case Affixes | Case clitics | 11.9% | uncommon | WALS, 1031 coded |
| Zero Copula for Predicate Nominals | Impossible | 54.7% | very common | WALS, 386 coded |
| Semantic Distinctions of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 43.3% | very common | WALS, 418 coded |
| Numeral Bases | Decimal | 63.8% | very common | WALS, 196 coded |
| Coding of Evidentiality | No grammatical evidentials | 43.3% | very common | WALS, 418 coded |
| Politeness Distinctions in Pronouns | Multiple politeness distinctions | 7.2% | rare | WALS, 207 coded |
| Is there a decimal numeral system? | Decimal counting | 70.8% | very common | Grambank, 1743 coded |
| Is the adnominal possessive construction different for alienable and inalienable nouns? | One possessive construction | 52.7% | very common | Grambank, 2031 coded |
| Are there numeral classifiers? | Numeral classifiers | 23.9% | common | Grambank, 2175 coded |
| Is there grammatical marking of indirect evidence (hearsay, inference, etc.)? | Indirect evidence not marked | 70% | very common | Grambank, 1429 coded |
| Is there grammatical marking of direct evidence (perceived with the senses)? | Direct evidence not marked | 84.6% | very common | Grambank, 1423 coded |
| Is there a politeness distinction in 2nd person forms? | Politeness distinction in 2nd person | 13.9% | uncommon | Grambank, 1739 coded |
| Is there productive morphological plural marking on nouns? | No productive plural marking | 44.3% | very common | Grambank, 2302 coded |
| Is there any ergative alignment of flagging? | No ergative flagging | 78% | very common | Grambank, 1769 coded |
| Are there morphological cases for non-pronominal core arguments (i.e. S/A/P)? | Morphological case on core arguments | 34.4% | common | Grambank, 2262 coded |
| What is the order of numeral and noun in the NP? | Numeral before noun | 40.1% | very common | Grambank, 2199 coded |
| What is the order of adnominal demonstrative and noun? | Demonstrative before noun | 40.8% | very common | Grambank, 2259 coded |
| What is the pragmatically unmarked order of adnominal possessor noun and possessed noun? | Possessor before noun | 44.8% | very common | Grambank, 2322 coded |
| What is the order of adnominal property word and noun? | Property word before noun | 24.3% | common | Grambank, 2117 coded |
| Are there prepositions? | No prepositions | 45.1% | very common | Grambank, 2268 coded |
| Are there postpositions? | Postpositions | 49% | very common | Grambank, 2152 coded |
| Are there definite or specific articles? | No definite articles | 62.5% | very common | Grambank, 2198 coded |
| Do indefinite nominals commonly have indefinite articles? | No indefinite articles | 86.4% | very common | Grambank, 2221 coded |
| Is there a gender/noun class system where sex is a factor in class assignment? | Sex is not a factor in class assignment | 81.4% | very common | Grambank, 2206 coded |
| Is there a gender/noun class system where shape is a factor in class assignment? | Shape is not a factor in class assignment | 93% | very common | Grambank, 2228 coded |
| Do verbs have prefixes/proclitics, other than those that only mark A, S or P (do include portmanteau: A & S + TAM)? | No verb prefixes | 32.4% | common | Grambank, 2173 coded |
| Do verbs have suffixes/enclitics, other than those that only mark A, S or P (do include portmanteau: A & S + TAM)? | Verb suffixes or enclitics | 83.6% | very common | Grambank, 2265 coded |
| Is there overt morphological marking of present tense on verbs? | No dedicated present marking | 65.8% | very common | Grambank, 2253 coded |
| Is there overt morphological marking on the verb dedicated to past tense? | Past marked on the verb | 52.4% | very common | Grambank, 2269 coded |
| Is there overt morphological marking on the verb dedicated to future tense? | No dedicated future marking | 54.7% | very common | Grambank, 2273 coded |
| Can the S argument be indexed by a suffix/enclitic on the verb in the simple main clause? | Subject not indexed by a suffix | 59.6% | very common | Grambank, 2315 coded |
| Can the S argument be indexed by a prefix/proclitic on the verb in the simple main clause? | Subject not indexed by a prefix | 58.2% | very common | Grambank, 2324 coded |
| Can standard negation be marked by an affix, clitic or modification of the verb? | Negation marked on the verb | 46.8% | very common | Grambank, 2301 coded |
| What is the pragmatically unmarked order of S and V in intransitive clauses? | Subject before verb | 78.8% | very common | Grambank, 2320 coded |
| Can polar interrogation be indicated by a special word order? | Polar questions not by word order | 97% | very common | Grambank, 1758 coded |
| Is there a clause-initial polar interrogative particle? | No clause-initial question particle | 85.2% | very common | Grambank, 1776 coded |
| Is there a clause-final polar interrogative particle? | Clause-final question particle | 39.7% | common | Grambank, 1765 coded |
| 'Want' Complement Subjects | Desiderative verbal affix | 15.9% | uncommon | WALS, 283 coded |
| Purpose Clauses | Deranked | 60% | very common | WALS, 170 coded |
| Reason Clauses | Balanced | 53.3% | very common | WALS, 169 coded |
| Case Syncretism | No syncretism | 17.7% | uncommon | WALS, 198 coded |
| Exponence of Selected Inflectional Formatives | Monoexponential case | 43.8% | very common | WALS, 162 coded |
| Inflectional Synthesis of the Verb | 4-5 categories per word (4 marked) | 35.9% | common | WALS, 145 coded |
| Locus of Marking in Possessive Noun Phrases | Dependent marking | 41.5% | very common | WALS, 236 coded |
| Locus of Marking in the Clause | Dependent marking | 26.7% | common | WALS, 236 coded |
| Locus of Marking: Whole-language Typology | Clause dependent, phrase dependent marking | 19.5% | uncommon | WALS, 236 coded |
| Reduplication | No productive reduplication | 14.9% | uncommon | WALS, 368 coded |
| Syncretism in Verbal Person/Number Marking | No subject person/number marking | 28.8% | common | WALS, 198 coded |
| Comitatives and Instrumentals | Differentiation | 66.1% | very common | WALS, 322 coded |
| Distance Contrasts in Demonstratives | Three-way contrast | 37.6% | common | WALS, 234 coded |
| Gender Distinctions in Independent Personal Pronouns | No gender distinctions | 67.2% | very common | WALS, 378 coded |
| Inclusive/Exclusive Distinction in Independent Pronouns | No inclusive/exclusive | 60% | very common | WALS, 200 coded |
| Indefinite Articles | No definite or indefinite article | 37.1% | common | WALS, 534 coded |
| Indefinite Pronouns | Interrogative-based | 59.5% | very common | WALS, 326 coded |
| Number of Genders | None | 56.4% | very common | WALS, 257 coded |
| Occurrence of Nominal Plurality | All nouns, always optional | 18.9% | uncommon | WALS, 291 coded |
| Person Marking on Adpositions | No person marking | 55.3% | very common | WALS, 378 coded |
| Position of Pronominal Possessive Affixes | No possessive affixes | 28.8% | common | WALS, 902 coded |
| Sex-based and Non-sex-based Gender Systems | No gender | 56.4% | very common | WALS, 257 coded |
| Action Nominal Constructions | Double-Possessive | 4.2% | rare | WALS, 168 coded |
| Genitives, Adjectives and Relative Clauses | Gen before, Adj before, Rel before | 10.9% | uncommon | WALS, 138 coded |
| Nominal and Verbal Conjunction | Differentiation | 41.5% | very common | WALS, 301 coded |
| Noun Phrase Conjunction | 'And' different from 'with' | 56% | very common | WALS, 234 coded |
| Absence of Common Consonants | All present | 88.7% | very common | WALS, 567 coded |
| Consonant Inventories | Moderately small (16) | 21.7% | common | WALS, 563 coded |
| Consonant-Vowel Ratio | Average (3.2) | 41.5% | very common | WALS, 564 coded |
| Fixed Stress Locations | No fixed stress | 43.8% | very common | WALS, 502 coded |
| Front Rounded Vowels | None | 93.4% | very common | WALS, 562 coded |
| Glottalized Consonants | No glottalized consonants | 72.1% | very common | WALS, 567 coded |
| Lateral Consonants | No laterals | 16.8% | uncommon | WALS, 567 coded |
| Rhythm Types | Undetermined | 11.5% | uncommon | WALS, 323 coded |
| Syllable Structure | Simple | 12.6% | uncommon | WALS, 486 coded |
| The Velar Nasal | No initial velar nasal | 18.6% | uncommon | WALS, 469 coded |
| Tone | No tones | 58.3% | very common | WALS, 527 coded |
| Uvular Consonants | None | 82.9% | very common | WALS, 567 coded |
| Voicing and Gaps in Plosive Systems | None missing in /p t k b d g/ | 45% | very common | WALS, 567 coded |
| Voicing in Plosives and Fricatives | In both plosives and fricatives | 27.9% | common | WALS, 567 coded |
| Vowel Nasalization | Contrast present | 26.2% | common | WALS, 244 coded |
| Vowel Quality Inventories | Average (5-6) (5) | 50.9% | very common | WALS, 564 coded |
| Weight-Sensitive Stress | Combined | 1.6% | very rare | WALS, 500 coded |
| Alignment of Verbal Person Marking | Neutral | 22.1% | common | WALS, 380 coded |
| Antipassive Constructions | No antipassive | 75.3% | very common | WALS, 194 coded |
| Applicative Constructions | No applicative construction | 4.9% | rare | WALS, 183 coded |
| Comparative Constructions | Locational | 46.7% | very common | WALS, 167 coded |
| Ditransitive Constructions: The Verb 'Give' | Indirect-object construction | 50% | very common | WALS, 378 coded |
| Negative Indefinite Pronouns and Predicate Negation | Predicate negation also present | 82.5% | very common | WALS, 206 coded |
| Nominal and Locational Predication | Different | 69.7% | very common | WALS, 386 coded |
| Nonperiphrastic Causative Constructions | Morphological but no compound | 81.9% | very common | WALS, 310 coded |
| Order of Person Markers on the Verb | A and P do not both occur on the verb | 49.3% | very common | WALS, 379 coded |
| Passive Constructions | Present | 43.4% | very common | WALS, 373 coded |
| Periphrastic Causative Constructions | Sequential but no purposive | 29.7% | common | WALS, 118 coded |
| Predicative Adjectives | Mixed | 26.7% | common | WALS, 386 coded |
| Predicative Possession | Topic | 20% | common | WALS, 240 coded |
| Reciprocal Constructions | Distinct from reflexive | 56.6% | very common | WALS, 175 coded |
| Symmetric and Asymmetric Standard Negation | Asymmetric | 17.8% | uncommon | WALS, 297 coded |
| Third Person Zero of Verbal Person Marking | No person marking | 25.3% | common | WALS, 380 coded |
| Verbal Person Marking | No person marking | 21.7% | common | WALS, 378 coded |
| Imperative-Hortative Systems | Minimal system | 5.3% | rare | WALS, 375 coded |
| Perfective/Imperfective Aspect | Grammatical marking | 45.5% | very common | WALS, 222 coded |
| Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect | Tense and aspect | 12.4% | uncommon | WALS, 193 coded |
| The Future Tense | No inflectional future | 50.5% | very common | WALS, 222 coded |
| The Past Tense | Present, no remoteness distinctions | 42.3% | very common | WALS, 222 coded |
| The Perfect | No perfect | 51.4% | very common | WALS, 222 coded |
| The Prohibitive | Normal imperative + special negative | 36.7% | common | WALS, 496 coded |
| Order of Degree Word and Adjective | Degree word-Adjective | 47.2% | very common | WALS, 481 coded |
| Order of Demonstrative and Noun | Demonstrative-Noun | 44.2% | very common | WALS, 1225 coded |
| Order of Object and Verb | OV | 46.9% | very common | WALS, 1518 coded |
| Order of Object, Oblique, and Verb | XOV | 9.6% | uncommon | WALS, 500 coded |
| Order of Subject and Verb | SV | 79.7% | very common | WALS, 1496 coded |
| Position of Interrogative Phrases in Content Questions | Not initial interrogative phrase | 68.2% | very common | WALS, 902 coded |
| Position of Polar Question Particles | Final | 35.5% | common | WALS, 884 coded |
| Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adjective and Noun | OV and AdjN | 16.4% | uncommon | WALS, 1316 coded |
| Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Adposition and Noun Phrase | OV and Postpositions | 41.3% | very common | WALS, 1142 coded |
| Relationship between the Order of Object and Verb and the Order of Relative Clause and Noun | OV and RelN | 15% | uncommon | WALS, 879 coded |

*WALS and Grambank are read side by side and never averaged: WALS asks what a language's dominant pattern is, Grambank mostly asks whether a language can do something at all, so a mean of the two would mean neither thing.*

### Combinations

No single answer above can be right or wrong. Combinations can be rare, and these are the ones worth remarking on.

**Word order and adpositions**  
Verb-final languages overwhelmingly use postpositions (Greenberg's Universal 4).  
374 of 1028 languages coded for both share this, among them Abkhaz, Alamblak, Amele, Basque, Burmese, Burushaski.

**Adpositions and possessors**  
Prepositional languages usually put the possessor after the noun; postpositional languages usually put it before.  
442 of 1004 languages coded for both share this, among them Abkhaz, Acoma, Alamblak, Amele, Apurinã, Barasano.

**Word order and relative clauses**  
Relative clauses go before the noun almost only in verb-final languages. Mandarin is the well-known exception.  
113 of 751 languages coded for both share this, among them Abkhaz, Alamblak, Asmat, Basque, Burmese, Burushaski.

**Possessors and relative clauses**  
Both modify a noun, and languages are fairly consistent about which side modifiers go.  
128 of 755 languages coded for both share this, among them Abkhaz, Alamblak, Asmat, Basque, Burmese, Burushaski.

**Word order and adjectives**  
Adjective order correlates only weakly with verb position, so this combination is freer than the others.  
182 of 1182 languages coded for both share this, among them Alamblak, Burushaski, Georgian, Hindi, Japanese, Kannada.

### Nearest real languages

The languages answering the most features the same way. Resemblance here is typological only: it says nothing about relatedness, and two languages can match closely without sharing a word.

| Language | Family | Features shared |
|---|---|---|
| Brokskat | Indo-European | 11 of 11 |
| Momu | Baibai-Fas | 11 of 11 |
| Johari | Sino-Tibetan | 9 of 9 |
| Chaudangsi | Sino-Tibetan | 8 of 8 |
| Dhimal | Sino-Tibetan | 14 of 15 |
| Gurung | Sino-Tibetan | 23 of 25 |
| Kanum (Bädi) | Yam | 8 of 9 |
| Kryz | Nakh-Daghestanian | 8 of 9 |

*WALS Online v2020.5, ed. Matthew S. Dryer & Martin Haspelmath (2013), Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. wals.info, CC BY 4.0.*

## 10. Descent

Nothing to record here: this language is not derived from anything. It is the root of its own family, which is exactly what a proto-language is.

A language gains this chapter by being evolved from another one, borrowed from, or reconstructed — at which point the parent, the sound changes that applied and a set of worked derivations are recorded below.

### How it could change from here

Four mechanisms, and only one of them makes anything new. Nothing below has happened; this is what each would do to the language as it stands.

**Analogy.** Sound change makes a language irregular and nothing in it pushes back. Of your 27 written words, 16 sit in frequency bands that analogy reaches and 11 are common enough to resist it. The frequency effect runs OPPOSITE to sound change here: a common word leads a reductive change and resists an analogical one, which is why English still has "went" and "children" while every rare strong verb has quietly gone weak. Real languages settle at 0.881 distinct forms per paradigm cell, so a fully regular paradigm is not the destination either.

**Reanalysis.** Reanalysis changes nothing you can hear. A listener assigns a different structure to exactly the string the speaker produced, and the language carries both readings with no evidence either way — sometimes for centuries — until somebody says something the old structure could not have generated. That utterance is the first moment anyone, including this app, can tell it happened.

- "I am going to eat" was parsed as a motion verb with a purpose clause: going, in order to eat, and is now parsed as a future auxiliary with its main verb: will eat. Nothing changed on the surface. What gives it away is "I'm going to stay here" — motion and staying cannot both be meant, so the old parse is gone.  
- "a stem ending in the same sound as a common suffix" was parsed as part of the root, and is now parsed as the suffix itself, leaving a shorter root behind. Nothing changed on the surface. What gives it away is the new shorter root turning up with a DIFFERENT suffix, which proves the speaker thinks the boundary moved.  
- "to me it seems good" was parsed as an experiencer in an oblique case, with no subject, and is now parsed as the experiencer AS the subject. Nothing changed on the surface. What gives it away is the verb starting to agree with it, which an oblique never triggers.  

**Borrowing.** Regular contact moves nouns, verbs, adjectives. Everything below that stays put — the hierarchy is an ordering, so a language that has borrowed affixes has certainly borrowed nouns, and one that has borrowed only nouns tells you the contact was shallow. Measured against the Leipzig-Jakarta ranking, the words of yours most likely to survive it are "go", "I", "big", "child". On the sound side, SegBo's most-travelled segments your language lacks are /f/ (146 languages), /d̠ʒ/ (74 languages), /t̠ʃ/ (68 languages).

**Or a shift, which runs the other way.** Did your speakers keep their language and take words in, or did they give up a language of their own and carry its habits into this one? The two produce nearly opposite evidence from the same contact, and only you know which happened.

Your speakers gave up a language of their own and carried its habits into this one. **Lexicon.** FEW loanwords — conspicuously few — the shifting speakers are learning the new vocabulary, not contributing theirs. **Phonology.** A foreign accent: the old sound system showing through the new one — phonology is the hardest thing to acquire and the first thing to leak. **Morphology.** Simplification, and categories the old language lacked going missing — imperfect learning drops distinctions the learners had no equivalent for. **Syntax.** Substantial transfer, early — syntactic habits survive a change of vocabulary almost intact. Loanwords are the tell, and they run the wrong way round. Heavy borrowing leaves many; a shift leaves almost none, because nobody was borrowing — they were failing to acquire. A language with a foreign accent, simplified morphology and a native word-stock has been shifted into, not borrowed from.

**Pattern without matter.** A language can be reshaped to the bone by a neighbour and show almost no loanwords, because what travelled was the structure and not the form. Calque: A foreign compound rebuilt word for word out of native parts. German "Fernsehen" for television, from "far" and "see"; English "loanword" itself, a calque of German "Lehnwort". Replicated word order: The neighbour's order adopted while every word stays native. The Balkan languages converging on a postposed article and losing the infinitive, each with its own vocabulary throughout.

*For scale: Glottolog counts 7,674 spoken languages in 421 families. The median one sits 6 branchings below its family's root, and the deepest — in Atlantic-Congo — sits 26. 183 of those families are a single language with no known relative, so a family of one is the commonest shape there is rather than an unfinished one.*

## 11. Examples

```
wagaookiitotemonekoittawaganomidoritotemokusaittanonidequicklytobu-tao-。
TOP FOC big DEG cat-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST green DEG grass-SUPPL =HOST into-INSTR quickly jump-PST-HON
wa ɡa ookii totemo nekoitta wa ɡa no midori totemo kusaitta no nide tobu-tao-
The big cat quickly jumped into the green grass.
```

```
wagawatashiittawaganoieiku-te iruo-。
TOP FOC i-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST home go-PROG-HON
wa ɡa wataʃiitta wa ɡa no ie iku-te iruo-
I am going home.
```

```
wagakanojoittawagakarenofutatsutoriittao-ra-tachi-tsusorezoredai-no-momiru-tao--nai。
TOP FOC she-SUPPL TOP NOM DEM =HOST two bird-SUPPL ACC PL.OPT ASSOC CLF DISTR.RED ORD =HOST NEG.CONC see-PST-HON-NEG
wa ɡa itta wa ɡa kare no toriitta o -ra -tsu sorezore dai- no -mo miru-tao--nai
She did not see the two birds.
```

```
wagatoshiyoritotemoonnaittawaganokodomoittaninohonittaonoageru-tao-ka。
TOP FOC old DEG woman-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST child-SUPPL DAT =HOST book-SUPPL ACC =HOST give-PST-HON Q
wa ɡa toʃijori totemo onnaitta wa ɡa no kodomoitta ni no honitta o no aɡeru-tao- ka
Did the old woman give the child a book?
```

```
-ini iruga aruwagamyaniittawaganonoukaittaonobeo-。
PRED.MIX PRED.LOC POSS.TOP TOP FOC My brother-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST farmer-SUPPL ACC =HOST be-HON
-i ni iru ɡa aru wa ɡa aniitta wa ɡa no noukaitta o no o-
My brother is a farmer.
```

```
wagameittaonomiru-tao-otokoittawaganoderu-tao-。
TOP FOC me-SUPPL ACC =HOST see-PST-HON man-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST leave-PST-HON
wa ɡa itta o no miru-tao- otokoitta wa ɡa no deru-tao-
The man who saw me left.
```

```
wagawatashiittawaganokanojoittagakarenoderu-tao-toshiruo-。
TOP FOC i-SUPPL TOP NOM =HOST she-SUPPL NOM DEM =HOST leave-PST-HON COMP know-HON
wa ɡa wataʃiitta wa ɡa no itta ɡa kare no deru-tao- to ʃiruo-
I know that she left.
```

## 12. Lexicon

27 words.

| Word | IPA | Part of speech | Means |
|---|---|---|---|
| ookii | /ookii/ | adjective | big |
| tori | /tori/ | noun | bird |
| hon | /hon/ | noun | book |
| ani | /ani/ | noun | brother |
| neko | /neko/ | noun | cat |
| kodomo | /kodomo/ | noun | child |
| nouka | /nouka/ | noun | farmer |
| ageru | /aɡeru/ | verb | give |
| iku | /iku/ | verb | go |
| kusa | /kusa/ | noun | grass |
| midori | /midori/ | adjective | green |
| ie | /ie/ | noun | home |
| watashi | /wataʃi/ | pronoun | I |
| de | /de/ | adposition | in |
| ni | /ni/ | adposition | into |
| tobu | /tobu/ | verb | jump |
| shiru | /ʃiru/ | verb | know |
| deru | /deru/ | verb | leave |
| otoko | /otoko/ | noun | man |
| nai | /nai/ | adverb | not |
| toshiyori | /toʃijori/ | adjective | old |
| hayaku | /hajaku/ | adverb | quick |
| miru | /miru/ | verb | see |
| kanojo |  | pronoun | she |
| ni | /ni/ | adposition | to |
| futatsu |  | determiner | two |
| onna | /onna/ | noun | woman |

## Still to do

- 6 grammatical markers have no form yet, so they are not expressed.
- The writing system has no glyphs.