Plurals

Plurals are mostly formed by suffixion. Suffixes change depending on class and number. Lukas^[3] lists 31 different suffix pairs which do not necessarily constitute separate noun classes.^[3] There are six ways of forming plurals in Sungor:

1. Most plurals are formed by changing the class suffix. Some examples are 'skin' gera | geriŋ (Singular -a, Plural -iŋ), 'love' tárī | tárā (Sg. -ī, Pl. -ā), 'name' iget | igā (Sg. -et, Pl. -ā), or arabic loan 'muslim person' miselem | muselmīn (Pl. -īn).
2. Other plurals only take a suffix. Some arabic loanwords fall into this category. Examples include 'heart' ámel | ámelā (Pl. -ā), 'human' at | árē or árī (Pl. -ē or -ī), 'mouth' kul | kulō (Pl. -ō), 'head' ŋor | ŋūrū (Pl. -ū), 'lip' oróyik | oroyikiŋ (Pl. -iŋ).
3. There are some broken plurals, most of which are arabic loanwords. Examples are 'scholar' fik | fókora, 'robber' afrīt | afārit, 'pet' zāmela | zwāmel, or non-arabic 'grandpa' anat | ónut.
4. Lukas lists one example of pluralisation where the vocal length is changed 'cow' tḛ | tệ^[3].
5. A small number of words form the singular from a collective plural. Examples are 'witch' émet | émē (Sg. -t), 'horse' ferda | fērat (Sg. -da, Pl. -at), 'wild cat' lūlut | lǘlu.
6. Some words are irregular in the way that they form a plural. Some examples are 'woman' ī | īrin, 'dog' wī | wḗā, 'blacksmith' mēat | mīnyak.

Demonstrative

Sungor Demonstratives are quite underresearched. Examples are 'this' translating to iŋ, plural iŋkō and 'that translating to ệŋ, plural ệŋgo.

Interrogative

Interrogatives lack research as well. 'Who' translates to nấrē, 'which' to nấnē, and 'what' to nímmōrī or nim as an alternative expression.^[3]

Indefinite

The word for 'human' at is used to express 'someone'. The plural is árī. To differentiate whether 'someone' refers to a man or woman, the respective terms follow. 'Man' is at ma, 'woman' is at ī. Following this same pattern, 'everyone' translates to at kíro, literally 'every human' with kíro being the term for 'every'. Other indefinite pronouns are 'some' kōra, 'everything' híniŋ, or 'nobody' lō. Plurals can be formed by adding the suffix -guŋ.

Ordinal Numbers

Ordinals are derived from the cardinal numbers by adding suffixes -na or -no.

^{1. "The first" (male) also has the special form kémerik}

To indicate how often something happens/has happened, Sungor uses mar and the corresponding ordinal number, e.g. 'the first time' mar korena.^[3]

Adverbial numbers

Numbers become adverbial when they follow the arabic loanword mar, e.g. 'once' mar kor.^[3]

Present

In the following tables, "—" marks the verb-root, "‿" signals a vowel, sounds in brackets "()" only sometimes occur, sounds in squared brackets "[]" only rarely occur, and "/" signals a sound that may differ in another context.

^{1. Also occurs as eke/[inye]}

^{2. Nasals are followed by -ge, plosives or /s/ are followed by -eke}

In the present tense, verbs can be further divided up into those that have suffix -i (Group I) or -e (Group II).

Present tense conditionals take one of three suffixes: -(‿)ŋne, -kne, or -(‿)ne. The plural is formed by adding a conditional suffix to a plural suffix, e.g. 'if I count' noto̯yanē | 'if we count' noto̯nyane (from no·to̯y·ny·ane).^[3]

Negation happens by adding a suffix. A positive form with the suffix -e takes -ato if the verb root contains front vowels (a, e, i) or -oto if the verb root contains back vowels (o, u). If the positive form takes the suffix -i, the negative form takes the suffix -to or -(‿)kto (sometimes -kāto) with some exceptions. In the plural form -kto becomes -kāto/-kōto, while -ato/-oto remains the same.^[3]

Past

^{1. Also n(‿)—‿aŋa}

Preterite tense suffixes can sometimes be added onto the present tense suffixes -i and -e.

Preterite conditionals are formed by replacing the -ne | -nē. These conditionals have a future meaning, e.g. 'I counted' notộyiŋa (preterite I) and 'if I will count' noto̯yiŋne, 'I requested' nisekḗŋiŋa and 'if I will request' nisekḗŋiŋne.^[3]

Both negatives of preterite I & II are derived from the positive by adding the suffix -to, e.g. 'I played' nagarnáŋa | 'I did not play' nagarnáŋto (preterite I) and nagarnáŋiŋa | nagarnáŋiŋto (preterite II).^[3]

Future

^{1. Group II plural marker saie can also be replaced by seke}

Lukas suspects the future marker -sa to be an auxiliary verb in the present tens.^[3]

Future tense conditionals are formed by adding suffix -ŋnē, e.g. 'to know' njel and 'if I will know' ninjilisáiŋnē.^[3]

Imperative

Imperatives in Sungor differ based on the present tense verb group a word falls into. The positive singular imperative for verbs that end in -i is the verb root, although there are some exceptions. Verbs that end in -e take suffixes -a, -o, -e, and in some cases -i. For plurals, the prefix k(‿)- and suffixes -a or -o are needed. Negative imperatives are follow the either the schemata ‿—aito or ‿—ēto.^[3]

Auxiliaries

Some auxiliaries exist in Sungor. However, due to a lack in research, auxiliaries are not documented extensively.^[3]

^{Apart from some examples listed in the phonology tab, all words are spelled according to Lukas/Nachtigal with some limitations caused by a lack of certain characters on Wikipedia. Due to historical reasons, spelling roughly follows German spelling rules.[3]}