Royal/Grammar

Basic Properties

Royal is a subject–object–verb language. Adjectives typically follow the noun they modify, though there are a small number that normally precede them, that may have different meanings when following them. Royal has postpositions rather than prepositions, and in addition, it only has two. Reduplication, both of the initial syllable and entire words, is frequently used in Royal to perform a number of functions. Royal is an isolating language; nouns and verbs, reduplication exempt, never change form.

Nouns

Nouns in Royal, as mentioned previously, do not inflect. There are also no articles. As such, a noun in isolation such as cicir "dog" can actually mean "a dog", "the dog", "dogs", or "the dogs" depending on the context. Nouns, as mentioned previously, can be reduplicated. For nouns that are more than one syllable, either the first syllable alone or the entire noun can be reduplicated. A reduplicated noun typically implies a multitude of something, so that ci-cicir can be translated as "several dogs" or even "a pack of dogs". This is typically only used when the plurality is being emphasized, however.

Possessive nouns are formed with the postpostion te, and generally follow what they possess. For example, cicir tar te "the man's dog".

Compound nouns typically follow the opposite order as in English; the head of the compound is the final component. As an example, the parts of the word hurhwa "rain cloud" are literally "cloud-rain".

Pronouns

In the 2nd singular, there is a formality distinction. The plural of the 1st and 2nd is formed with the elsewhere-unseen suffix -yën, but the 3rd has an irregular plural form. The third person singular can also be used for any gender, as well as for inanimate and animate objects. There is also the reflexive pronoun min.

Person	Singular	Plural
1st	ko	koyën
2nd (informal)	no	noyën
2nd (formal)	mula
3rd	tal	këlun
Reflexive	min

The possessives are all formed regularly with the possessive postposition te.

There are three demonstrative pronouns in Royal. It is a three-way distinction between i "this/these"–a object close to the speaker, ban "that/those", an object close to the listener but not the speaker, and yai "yonder", an object far from both listener and speaker. These demonstratives can act as standalone pronouns as well, in addition to modifying nouns.

Adjectives

Adjectives behave strangely in Royal. Most adjectives, as well as numerals and determiners follow the noun they modify.

However, there is a set of ten adjectives (which form five pairs of antonyms) that usually precede what they modify, though they can have a different connotation when they follow:

muzu "good"	gil "bad"
bok "large"	bëse "small"
det "true"	was "false"
izë "new"	dëzo "old"
bwi "bright"	os "dark"