Some of these may in fact have been posted in this thread already, but here they are again anyway. I edited one or two things that are
really out of date, but otherwise it's as is.
Let's do this! Commonthroat is read from right to left. Yinrih use their left forepaw to write with. Humans can approximate the shape of the writing claw with a fountain pen with a stub nib.
Dawn of the First Day. 744 hours remain
rDFrlmqrLPq
/chuff, long high strengthening whine, chuff, short low strengthening grunt, huff, chuff, long rising strengthining grunt, huff/
Etymology
rDFr (near) + lmq (speed) + rLPq (light)
Adjective
Quasiluminal, near light speed. A speed regime at which relativistic effects cease to be negligible.
Womb ships are the fastest yinrih spacecraft, able to reach 10% the speed of light.
CDlmqrLPq
/long rising weakening whine, short low strengthening grunt, huff, chuff, long rising strengthining grunt, huff/
Etymology
CD (above) + lmq (speed) + rLPq (light)
Adjective
Superluminal, faster than light
The yinrih use ansibles to communicate instantaneously over arbitrarily large distances. Ansibles transmit information instantly via the Underlay, which is like hyperspace. They've been trying to transmit matter via the Underlay as well, but haven't been successful so far.
Looks like this is supposed to be one post per day, so I split my original post.
Dawn of the Second Day. 688 Hours Remain
qBfrhKg
/huff, late rising strengthening whine, chuff, early rising strong growl/
Etymology
qBf (two) + rhK (wheel)
Noun
Bicycle
To describe a yinrih bicycle I first have to describe what a perch is. A perch is the yinrih equivalent to a seat or chair. The occupant straddles the perch lying on his belly. The perch is broad enough to comfortably support the yinrih's body, but narrow enough to allow the legs and tail to hang freely and move around to manipulate objects below the perch. Picture a raccoon straddling a branch while resting.
We start with the familiar two wheels of a human bicycle, but move the handlebars lower down and the peddles further back. The peddles look like a second set of handlebars and are gripped as such by the yinrih's prehensile rear paws. Replace the seat with a perch as described above, and add a tail rest over the rear wheel to keep the tail out of the way. Any controls such as gear shifters are located behind the rider and are actuated with the tail.
Does this work from an engineering and biomechanics perspective? IDK lol.
Dawn of the Third Day. 665 Hours Remain
sbsPlHGg
/yip, short low weak whine, yip, late falling weakening grunt, long low weakening growl, short low weak growl/
Etymology
sb- (to cover with) + sPl (condensation, dew) + -HG (suffix on verbs forming nouns denoting an event or occurrence of the verb)
Noun
Dewfall
This is the name of the yinrih womb ship that makes First Contact with humanity. The lemma for nouns is the 3rd person indefinite deictic form which ends in <-g>.
Bonus word!
sCbsGHg
/yip, late low weakening whine, yip, long low strengthening growl, short low weak growl/
Etymology
sCb (ship, craft, vehicle) + sGH (womb-nest)
Noun
Womb ship. A small, single-use interstellar spacecraft used by missionaries of the Bright Way in their search for other rational souls dwelling among the stars.
They're called womb ships because the capsules used to keep the missionaries in metabolic suspension are called "amnions", and the arrangement of amnions inside the ship is likened to the womb-nest that yinrih litters hatch from.
Dawn of the Fourth Day. 641 Hours Remain
qGKqg
[huff, long rising strengthening growl, huff, short low weak growl]
Noun
Outer Space.
The yinrih became a space-faring species a mere 5 thousand Earth years after achieving sapience. Having a written language right of the bat helps. By the time of First Contact they're a Kardashev II civilization. I originally used the neolithic revolution on Earth as the time frame for them to achieve K2 status, but it seems Agriculture is much more recent than I thought. The idea is they've finished subduing their entire star system a reeeealy long time ago. Maybe I'll push it back to around the extinction of the Neanderthals or something. The Bright Way has been doing interstellar missions for even longer, not too long after they achieve spaceflight. Their zeal sometimes gets in the way of practicality, and they start out more or less flinging missionaries into the cold interstellar void without a lot of planning or forethought. Obviously they lose a lot of missionaries early on, and these pioneers are honored as martyrs.
Dawn of the Fifth Day. 616 Hours Remain
rKGrg
[chuff, long falling weakening growl, chuff, short low weak growl]
Noun
1. Surface, especially of a planet or moon
2. the rind of a fruit
This word is used in contrast with <qGKqg> (outer space), especially when discussing people who live aboard orbital colonies ("spacers") with people who live on a planet's surface. The yinrih are practically built for microgravity, having five prehensile extremities (four paws and a tail), but must walk on all fours when planetside.
Dawn of the Sixth Day. 592 Hours Remain
HrBqMqmg
[long low strong growl, chuff, long low weak whine, huff, long low strong grunt, huff, short low strong grunt, short low weak growl]
Etymology
HrBg (nerd) + qMqmg (human).
HrBg is in turn a compound of:
H (no, none, -less) + rBg (ink)
qMqmg is an onomatopoeia of the English word "human".
Noun
A yinrih who is obsessed with human culture
The commonthroat word has a neutral to positive connotation, but it's often translated into English as "terraboo" (a blend of "terra" and "weeaboo") with same negative connotations as "weeaboo".
The word for "nerd" literally means "inkless". The idea is that nerds write a lot, and are thus constantly running out of their own ink. Since yinrih ink is a bodily fluid, it takes time to regenerate. The ink sac stores about as much ink as a fountain pen cartridge.
Dawn of the Seventh Day. 570 Hours Remain
Print
Braille
⠏⠟
Romanization
GJ
Pronunciation
[long rising weak growl]
Verb
1. (intransitive) To work
2. (transitive) To make something, to create something
Derivatives
GJmg
A creator, a worker,
The Creator
I always thought it would be interesting to use the same word for "to work" and "to make", like how the English "wrought" is a fossilized past participle of "work".
Dawn of the Eighth Day. 545 Hours Remain
rLrg
[chuff, long low quiet grunt, chuff, short low weak growl]
Noun
space
vicinity
area around something
neighborhood
Phoning it in this time, since I'm in a hurry to get to work. This word is used in as-yet-unrealized compounds for things like "personal space". Yinrih are very particular about their personal space. Do not confuse with the word above which specifically refers to the space between planets and stars.
Dawn of the Ninth Day. 519 Hours Remain
I've got a few today, so I'll run through them and give an example sentence.
-K
[long high strong growl]
Verbal suffix denoting the
dogmatic mood. It's used when the speaker wishes to emphasize the truth of the statement. Can be translated using the emphatic
do in English, as in "I
do wash my hands after using the bathroom." It can also be translated as "I swear that..." as in a promise or threat. Also used, as the name implies, when making truth claims that must be assented to in order to be considered part of a group (which is how I personally use the word "dogma"). If I get around to translating the first article of the universal declaration of human rights, the verbs ("are born", "are endowed" etc) will be in the dogmatic mood, although "human beings" must necessarily change to something like "sophonts" to include our little visitors. In this case I consider the declaration dogmatic because it's an axiom that I must agree to to be considered a reasonable human being in a modern liberal democracy. If I denied the claim made in the declaration I would be rightfully shunned.
Anyway, on to some less political stuff...
Lmq
[late low strengthening grunt, huff]
Verb
to repair, to fix.
Also used in the imminent aspect construction. Inspired by my own English dialect, which uses "fixing to..." in the same way.
fCq
[early falling strong whine, huff]
Verb
To lose
Putting this altogether, we get the following example sentence (Commonthroat is read right to left):
Code: Select all
qMqmqn Lmqk fCqK png qbf KC B rkH cdqml
qMqm-qn Lmq-K fCq-K pn-g qbf K-C B rkH cdq-m-l
human-2 fix-DOG lose-DOG digit-3.INDEF if time-another try rub ask-CUSTOMARY-1
I swear you're fixin' to lose a finger if you try and pet me again.
Dawn of the Tenth Day, 491 Hours Remain
sJK
[yip long high strengthening growl]
Verb
choose, vote for
sJKrnq Literally means
paw-choose and means the same as the phrase
Vote with one's feet. Freedom of movement and residence is considered an inalienable right in most schools of yinrih political philosophy. In fact, it's considered more fundamental than actual voting. You can find any and all political systems throughout Focus. Hearthside has popular nominations for most political positions, but the ruling clerics have the final say, and they do use that power regularly. The Allied Worlds alone has absolute monarchies, representative democracies, even direct democracies on very small lunar and orbital colonies.
The yinrih take the phrase "If you don't like it, move somewhere else" literally, to the point that countries are expected to help finance both immigrant and emigrant expenses. The idea is that, if you
want to live under an absolute monarchy, you're more than welcome to move to one that already exists rather than try to overthrow the government you currently live under. The system of immigrant exchange assistance makes that reachable for even the lower rungs of the socioeconomic ladder.
One of the reasons that the Partisans are considered evil is that they deny this right.
Dawn of the Eleventh Day. 462 Hours Remain
OK, so it's not morning, but that's not going to stop me from using the Majora's Mask reference.
sDsGKqmg
[yip, long high weak whine, yip, long rising strengthening growl, huff, short low strong grunt, short low weak growl]
Etymology
sDsGKq (to follow a path) + m (customary verb suffix, akin to -isto in Esperanto)
sDsGKq is in turn derived from
sD (to go) + sGKq (way, path)
Noun
1. A Pilgrim
2. A Follower of the Bright Way, A Wayfarer
rDsGKqmg
[chuff, long high weak whine, yip, long rising strengthening growl, huff, short low strong grunt, short low weak growl]
Etymology
rDsGKq (to wander from the road, get lost)
rD means to wander or err. sGKq is as above.
Noun
1. A wanderer
2. A lapsus, an apostate
fCqfCqg
[early falling strong whine, huff, early falling strong whine, huff, short low weak growl]
Etymology
from fCq (to lose)
Noun
1. Something or someone that is lost
2. A heathen, a pagan, a nonbeliever
Some religious vocab today. Don't think that fits the theme but I needed to make these for future lexemes down the road. I think this is what's called "noun incorporation" where you attach a noun to a verb to narrow the verb's meaning. So even though the noun comes after the verb (as Commonthroat is strongly head-initial) the customary suffix -m seems to be attached to the noun. Not sure if that makes any sense...
<rDsGKqmg> is intended to sound less harsh than "apostate" would suggest, hence why I translate it as "wanderer" when worldbuilding. Think Dante in Canto I of
Inferno lost in the dark wood before finding Virgil.
I'm starting to second-guess my use of reduplicating verbs to form a patient noun. I don't even have a solid grasp of what Commonthroat's morphosyntactic alignment is yet, and I feel like that's going to effect verbal derived forms.
Dawn of the Twelfth Day. 443 Hours Remain
sMp
[yip, late rising strong grunt]
Verb
To step, tread. Can be said of any of the four paws
Code: Select all
bc slPqMr qN sMpb
bc slPq-Mr qN ∅ sMp-b
on tail-3.PROX your I step-NAUTH
I stepped on your tail (accidentally)
When the subject is in the first person and the verb is inflected in the nonauthoritative mood, it indicates the speaker did something by accident or unintentionally.
Code: Select all
bc slPqMr qN sMp
bc slPq-Mr qN ∅ sMp-∅
on tail-3.PROX your I step-AUTH
I stepped on your tail (deliberately)
If the subject is in first person and the verb is inflected in the authoritative mood, it indicates the action was deliberate.
Dawn of the Thirteenth Day. 423 Hours Remain
sCDrg
[yip, long rising weakening whine, chuff, short low weak growl]
Noun
taste, flavor
I'm finally following this week's theme.
Yinrih have a weaker sense of taste than humans. This is a tradeoff for having a stupidly strong sense of smell. From an evolutionary perspective this makes sense. You've already determined whether something is edible by smell, so the info you gain from tasting it is largely redundant. This has lead more epicurean yinrih to find other ways of enhancing the flavor of foods. The use of menthol and capsaicin (or analogous compounds) is nearly ubiquitous.
In addition, there is an entire clade of small creatures filling rodent-like niches that have evolved the ability to store an electric charge in capacitor-like organs below their eyes. They can discharge these organs into any would-be predator attempting to eat them. These critters are called <sdFrdFg>, which (very loosely) translates to "zap rats". Zap rats have even developed aposematic coloration, bearing mostly bright yellow fur with white, black, red, or blue accents being present in varying degrees depending on species. Unfortunately for the zap rats, the yinrih LOVE the mild shock they get from eating them. It's like sticking a 9-volt battery on your tongue. They're either eaten live or, if you don't want to risk them going off in your gut instead of your mouth, you can quickly kill them by holding the animal between your inner and outer thumb and puncturing their dorsal nerve cord with your writing claw.
There are frequent population booms, necessitating regular cullings, with hunting being the preferred method. The zap rats' bright yellow fur makes them trivial to spot.
Dawn of the Fourteenth Day. 401 Hours Remain
spmg
[yip, short falling strong grunt, short low weak growl]
Noun
1. an odor
2. an emotion, a feeling
Yinrih have a prodigious sense of smell, and they produce a wide variety of pheromones that indicate emotional state. Much of the information humans convey through facial expressions is indicated via odors by the yinrih. In fact, the same word is used for "to smell like" and "to feel an emotion", <rMP>. And just like humans, smells just as often trigger emotions as they indicate them. The word <qMqnq> literally means "an odor that evokes nostalgia".
Yinrih are just as empathic with humans as they are with each other, although they have to learn what all our emotions smell like first.
Dawn of the Fifteenth Day. 370 Hours Remain
Got a couple today, some emotions to go with yesterday's entry.
rpMr-GH-g
happyness
rfCr-GH-g
sadness
rkHr-GH-g
anger
rfBr-GH-g
fear
Etymology
rpMr = happy
rfCr = sad
rkHr = angry
rfBr = afraid
-GH = a suffix that turns adjectives into nouns meaning the quality of... (-ness). Also used to turn verbs into nouns meaning the concept of the verb.
When describing how you feel in Commonthroat, you use the verb <rMP> which literally means "to smell" as in "to smell good". Yinrih associate emotions with the odors of their equivalent pheromones.
For example
Code: Select all
rMP rpMr qgKql fCq qMqmg dB qMqmg rMP qJKq.
0 rMP-0 rpMr qgKq-l fCq qMqm-g dB qMqm-g rMP qJKq
I smell_like-AUTH happy yinrih-1 find human-3.INDEF although human-3.INDEF smell_like bad
I
feel happy we found humans even though humans
smell bad.
Human odor is initially off-putting to most yinrih but they're usually at least able to get used to it, and some even start enjoying it. From the human point of view, individual yinrih may have a musky odor to them, and of course their ink has that famously strong rainy smell which most humans love. Enclosed spaces such as the interiors of interstellar womb ships, as well as spaces where many yinrih come together, such as orbital colonies, have a distinct "dog odor" about them. It is for this reason that the first orbital colony visited by humans is nicknamed "The Kennel".
Dawn of the Sixteenth Day. 350 Hours Remain
rC
[chuff, long low strong whine]
Verb
To flick (something or someone) with the tail
jHr
[ early rising strengthening growl, chuff]
Verb
to thump the ground with the tail
kHr
[early falling strong grunt, chuff]
Verb
To strike with the tail
All these words are verbs describe actions performed with the tail. Much like the words "punch" and "kick", they imply the use of a specific body part. <rC> is an action similar to a horse flicking away a fly. When performed on oneself, it can mean "don't bother me", or "Don't concern yourself with that" depending on context. The word <rC-HG-g>, literally "an act of flicking with the tail", can also mean something like "handwave" in the sense of brushing off someone's concern. Flicking
someone else is a very offensive gesture that implies the flickee is a nuisance but is easily "dealt with".
<jHr> describes the act of repeatedly thumping the tail on the ground. It's a gesture that can indicate a threat if directed at someone, but it can also be similar to a human drumming the fingers on a table or tapping the foot in frustration or impatience.
<kHr> is just what it sounds like, slapping or striking something/someone with the tail. Yinrih tails are pretty long and made of pure muscle, like an elephant's trunk. They're strong enough to support the weight of the rest of the body. A well-aimed tail slap can easily break a nose. The word is also used when wielding a melee weapon in the tail.
Dawn of the Seventeenth Day. 325 Hours Remain
spm-rGk
[yip, short falling strong grunt, chuff, late rising strengthening growl]
Etymology
spm (odor, emotion) + rGk (plain, unremarkable, bland)
Noun
1. a plain odor
2. a stoic person
3. an emotionless person
4. someone good at concealing their feelings
Dawn of the Eighteenth Day. 305 Hours Remain
mp
[short rising strong grunt]
Particle
Indicates yes/no questions
Code: Select all
mp qLPq sFq.
mp 0 qLPq sFq?
QUESTION [you] hear tidings
Did you hear the news?
rnL qLPqK. sFqBD?
rnL qLPq-K. sFq-BD?
not hear-DOG. tidings-INTERROGATIVE?
No I haven't heard. What news?
rHqPp fCqsfsf C cdqmg!
h rHqP-g fCq-sfsf C h cdq-m-g!
PL missionary-3.DIST find-MIR other PL ask-CUSTOMARY-3.INDEF
some missionaries have found other sophonts!
Dawn of the Nineteenth Day. 281 Hours Remain
Bdq-qgKq-sCF
from Bdq (valley, dale) + qgKq (yinrih) + sFC (new)
Proper Noun
Newman's Dale, the tropical river basin that the yinrih originate from. It is considered the holiest place in the Bright Way, and its former seat of power before the ouster of the clergy from power and exile to Hearthside. "Newman" hear refers to newly sapient yinrih.
Externally, a calque of German "Neandertal", with "Neander" being the name of a Calvinist hymn writer, itself an ancient Greek calque of the German surname "Neumann" or "newman".
Dawn of the Twentieth Day. 248 Hours Remain
sHJqg
[yip, long rising weakening growl, huff, short low weak growl]
Noun
1. A melee weapon in the form of a spiked ring or tube held in or slipped over the tail
2. A
thagomizer
Dawn of the Twenty First Day. 225 Hours Remain
Ln
[late rising weak grunt]
Particle
Indicates the hortative mood. Takes the nonauthoritative verb suffix. Used to encourage or suggest. May be translated as "Let's..."
Can also form imperatives with the added meaning that the listener will gain some intrinsic benefit from performing the action.
rgj
[chuff, short rising weak growl]
Verb
Grow, become
Code: Select all
Ln sFsFqn rpMrb hgq h MNqMr rgj rmn.
Ln sFsF-qn rpMr-b hgq h MNq-Mr rgj-0 rmn
HORT friend-2 happy-NAUTH because PL day-3.PROX become long
Take heart, friend, for the days grow longer
This is the seasonal greeting during the feast of the winter solstice. The phrase has strong religious associations within yinrih society. It's best not to say "happy holidays" to a wayfarer (follower of the Bright Way) unless you want a lecture about cultural relativism. They'll accept "merry Christmas" or "happy [insert specific holiday here]", though. They may not know what those holidays even are, but they know they mean something to you, and they'd rather the expression mean
something to
someone. Having said that,
Take heart, friend, for the days grow longer is pretty neutral to a human ear, so you could say it to anyone, which ironically makes it sound more like
happy holidays when said between humans.
Externally, the expression is inspired by my own seasonal affective disorder :(. The good news is that the days are in fact getting longer from here on out. Yay!
Dawn of the Twenty Second Day. 201 Hours Remain
rmr=today
sjr=tomorrow
spr=yesterday
BD = What is? interrogative copula*
Code: Select all
BD rmr-g sjr-p b spr-p
what_is today-3.INDEF tomorrow-3.DIST of yesterday-3.DIST
What is today but yesterday's tomorrow
A little lazy today. The gloss is an obvious Spongebob reference. I just needed to come up with some time adverbs so I could start incorporating tense into Commonthroat. Turning the adverbs into nouns by adding noun suffixes may or may not be a thing.
<BD> may not even end up as an official thing in Commonthroat. I've been trying to avoid the use of copulas, but the idea of using a copula for interrogatives is interesting. This construction differs from the interrogative noun suffix in that you're asking for a sense rather than a referent. so <pLg> = a cloud. <pLBD> = What cloud? <BD pLg> = What is a cloud?
Yeah I don't know about this one, but I made my time words, that's what matters.
Dawn of the Twenty Third day. 182 Hours Remain
DC-sJkrg
from DC (under) + sJkr (to lie down on the belly) literally "that which lies beneath"
The Underlay. A subspace that allows FTL communication and eventually FTL travel via Mass Router
HMLHGp
from H (no, none) + ML (thing) + -HG (an instance of, an event of)
The Void, (Hell)
You know when you wake up at 3 AM, but can't go back to sleep because you start replaying some bad memory in your head? Imagine that, but you can't see, feel, touch, taste, or smell anything. You have no proprioception. You're just a unsensing mind floating in a solipsistic bubble, being gnawed by your own sins and regrets for all eternity.
That is the yinrih's idea of hell. As for how you end up there... I don't know yet.
It's also called HMLHGp rnLqCq (The Blind Void), especially in oaths and profanity.
There's a belief among the particularly superstitious that the Underlay
is The Void, and that the yinrih are routing all their communication through the realm of the damned. This belief is officially rejected by the Bright Way, but it persists nonetheless. Dropped or garbled messages are said to be due to damned shades desperately seeking sensation of any kind. The invention of the mass router births countless urban legends of incursions by lost souls into realspace through the mass router network. Humans absolutely eat this up, given that the "hyperspace is actually hell" concept is pretty widespread in human pop culture (Doom, WH40K, Event Horizon, etc).
Dawn of the Twenty Fourth Day. 157 Hours Remain
rnL-qCq-Cb
from rnL (not) + qCq to see + -Cb (cause something/someone to become) literally "to cause not to see"
Verb
To blind (transitive)
Used in the profane expression <L rLPqp rnLqCqCbb> "Light blind [you/it]!" loosely "[God] damn it!"
A derived expression is:
Code: Select all
L rLPq-p RnL-qCq-Cb-b rjqdB-Mr rpMr
may light-3.DIST not-see-CAUSITIVE 0, memory-3.PROX happy
Happy memories, damn it!
This could be translated loosely (and very ironically) as "fun for the whole family", which is an even loftier promise given that yinrih families consist of up to twelve genetic parents (six male sires and six female dams) and a litter of pups, of equal or greater number than the parents, so around 24 individuals give or take. More broadly the expression means something like "mandatory fun".
Dawn of the Twenty Fifth Day. 127 Hours Remain
snp
[yip, short high strengthening grunt]
Adjective
Holy
derived terms:
snp-g: a saint
sm-snp: unholy, profane
sLg
[yip, long low weak grunt, short low weak growl]
noun
1. heat
2. body heat
3. soul, life force
4. The infrared blackbody radiation produced by a living body
Some more religious vocabulary today, sort of adjacent to the season. I wanted the yinrih to link the soul to something other than the traditional human notion of breath. ("spirit" and "animate" both originally had to do with breathing). Since the yinrih's visual spectrum drops down to the level of infrared radiation, I figure they'd link the soul to the soft glow of body heat. Yinrih actually run a bit hotter than humans, just as dogs do. They also require about 100 extra Calories per day compared to a human, also just like dogs.
Dawn of the Twenty Sixth Day. 101 Hours Remain
-cdr
[short rising weakening whine, chuff]
Suffix
Forms a noun indicating a tool or instrument, usually small enough to be held in the paw or tail.
Plq (to dig), Plq-cdr-g (a shovel)
CDq (to hold), CDq-cdr-g (a holder)
qKq (to split), qKq-cdr-g (an axe)
rgJ (to stab), rgJ-cdr-g (a knoif)
rnq-g (paw), rnq-cdr-g (handle, pedal, [pawdle?])
Bonus Word
rG-rnq-g
from rGg (rope) + rnq (paw)
Noun
Cabling spaced at regular intervals stretched across wide thoroughfares in orbital colonies to allow residents to pull themselves along or to stop people getting stranded in the middle of the hallway out of reach of the sides. (If you've seen
Gravity you know this isn't a trivial thing.) To a human this makes the large pedestrian malls common on yinrih orbital colonies look like a monkey habitat at the zoo, rather apropos for monkey foxes.
PS Happy Boxing Day/St Stephen's Day.
Dawn of the Twenty Seventh Day. 77 Hours Remain
sfcPLg
[yip, short falling strong whine, long falling weakening grunt, short low weak growl]
Etymology
from sfc (pup, child) + -PL (suffix forming collective nouns)
1. a litter of yinrih children regardless of age
2. (The Bright Way) a congregation lead by a particular hearthkeeper, used in a similar manner as English "flock".
Code: Select all
pM sbrP-rmK-g snp-g qbf qF rNlr-0 sfc-PL-P H-rLPq-K
OBL custodian-hearth-3.INDEF holy.3.INDEF if merely good.AUTH child-COLLECTIVE-3.DIST none-light.DOG
A hearthkeeper must be a saint. If she is merely decent, her litter shall be godless.
A hearthkeeper (cleric) is forbidden from entering into a childermoot (group of yinrih parents). Her congregation is considered her litter. The traditional explanation is that a cleric must devote all her time to tending the star hearth and performing other sacerdotal duties. Cynics will tell you its because the hierarchy doesn't want to pay a larger salary to account for her having pups to feed.
Dawn of The Twenty Eighth Day. 53 Hours Remain
rgr-rbCq-Cb-g
[chuff, short low weak growl, chuff, chuff early low strengthening whine, huff, late low falling whine, short low weak growl]
Etymology
From rgr (bark of a tree, strip) + rbCq (cold) + -Cb (cause to become) Literally "cooling bark" or "cooling strip"
A small, edible dissolving strip that stimulates cold receptors in the body when consumed. Fills a similar role as chewing gum to the natives of the deserts of the planet Hearthside, although the goal is temporary relief from the heat rather than fresh breath.
This one's a bit of a cheat, as none of the morphemes are new, but the lexeme is :)
Dawn of the Twenty Ninth Day. 31 Hours Remain
rBF
[chuff, long rising strengthening whine]
Verb
1. To cry, to weep
2. (by extension) To mourn
Yinrih don't cry in the same way humans do. Instead of tears, they have a red fluid that is secreted from the mouth. It looks a lot scarier than it actually is. Much like other bodily excretions the yinrih produce, it's highly aromatic. Humans compare it to the smell of sea spray. The strong red color and smell are thought to be social signals indicating very strong emotion. Yinrih cry in the same situations that humans do, when sad, scared, or very happy.
Dawn of The Thirtieth Day. 36 Hours Remain
qCD-g
[huff, long rising weakening whine, short low weak growl]
Noun
male litter mate
brother (when said of humans)
qDB-g
[huff, long falling weak whine, short low weak growl]
Noun
female litter mate
sister (when said of humans)
strictly speaking, this should be closer to "male fraternal twin" and "female fraternal twin" as the relationship implies hatching from the same womb-nest, but twins are a comparatively rare phenomenon among humans whereas yinrih litters scale based on the number of sires and dams who contribute eggs to the womb-nest. The relationship among litter mates is pretty close to that of human siblings, so I think it fits. Time will tell if I'll extend these terms to religious metaphors as well. I kind of wanted to use a different vocabulary besides kinship terms, but I've already committed to using "litter" as one would use "flock" in English, so I suppose that idea is out the window.
I've been using Wolfram Alpha to get the number of hours from now til the end of the month in order to do my titles. I just found out that it's actually interpreting "end of the month" as the beginning of new year's eve, not the beginning of new year's day. I should have been adding 24 hours to the times. Oh well.
Dawn of The Thirty First Day. 18 Hours Remain
rjHr-HG-g
[chuff, early falling strengthening growl, chuff, long low strengthening growl, short low weak growl]
Etymology
rjHr (to howl, to sing, to pray publicly) + -HG (an act or event of)
Noun
1. a song
2. one of the three daily liturgies of The Bright Way
Wayfarers are required to assist at at least one daily liturgy during their 11-day active period. Which day and which liturgy within that day is up to the individual or family, and different communities have different ways to fulfill the obligation.
Like the western breviary/liturgy of the hours, the three liturgies are named for the time of day that they are said.
Yay I did it! 31 days and 31 lexemes (although not necessarily new morphemes)
