Editing Trokh

[[File: Aslan.jpg|right]]
[[Trokh]] is a [[language]] that is primarily used by the [[Aslan]]. 
* It is a supercentral language.
* Please see the [[:Category:Trokh dictionary|Aslan Dictionary]] for more information.

== Description (Specifications) ==
The [[Aslan]] language is known as '''Trokh''' and is spoken by nearly all Aslan.
* Although the '''Trokh''' language is spoken by nearly all [[Aslan]], few non-Aslan can claim to have mastered it. Difficult to pronounce, split into gender-specific dialects, and weighty with formalisms, it causes foreign speakers to open themselves to embarrassing blunders in conversation.
* Trokh is three languages at once: a base language of shared, neutral gender terms, along with two separate languages for males and females, each having different emphases of vocabulary. While a typical male will understand many words of the female dialect, it would be a grave dishonor for him to utter one, and vice versa.

== History & Background ([[Dossier]]) ==
The ''Trokh'' language can be traced back to {{WorldS|Kusyu|Dark Nebula|1226}}, where it developed into its present form about 4,000 years ago. Since then, ''Trokh'' has changed little. In fact, some scholars insist it has decreased in the number of words it contains and is more formalized. 

=== Trokh in 1900 ===
After the Wave, ''Trokh'' splintered, but before Imperial year 1400 the language was tightly controlled by the ''[[Tlaukhu]]'', and remained almost entirely free of offshoots, local dialects, or corruptions. In 1900, the [[Republic of Regina]] is host to an Aslan population who speak a variant that is recognizably ''Trokh'', though separated from the original by 700 years. As a ritual language today, it serves as an Aslan interlingua.

== Structure ==
''Trokh'' is a polysynthetic verb-based language. This means that the ''Trokh'' verb has a number of classes of prefixes and suffixes (nineteen classes, to be specific) which modify the verb stem in a way that can fully express a wide variety of concepts, often without the need for supporting noun phrases. ''Trokh'' also has separate grammars based on the gender-role of the speaker: martial-male and economic-female.

By necessity this overview is only a brief sketch. In addition, many elements of the ''Trokh'' verb – a highly daunting construct – have not yet been recorded, or are only indicated but not translated or itemized here. The documenting of ''Trokh'' is a continuing work.  

The extant example from Alien Module 1 is a fragment, a noun phrase:

=== Example #1 ===
 Hlyueawifiy Ahroay'ifiy Wahtoi Layeauiwahfeakteli hlalikhtyeiteyahahtateisiyu 

 Unmarried first son of the third son of the grandfather of the head of the pride which holds the valley in the fork of the Iwahfea River part of clan Wahtoi which is a vassal of clan Aroaye'i itself a vassal of clan Hlyueawi.

Pulling out patterns, this format emerges:

 Hlyueawi-fiy + Ahroay'i-fiy + Wahtoi + Lay-eau-iwahfea-kteli + hlali-khtyei-teya-hahta-teisi-yu 

 [clan] Hlyueawi-over + [clan] Aroaye'i-over + [clan] Wahtoi + [pride] river-valley-Iwahfea-fork + head-grandfather-third son-first son-unmarried

=== Morphology ===
Morphology is the study of the internal structure of words (morpheme, inflection, paradigm, declension, derivation, compound, etc).

Characteristics:
# affixally polysynthetic language
# ergative language both in nominal and verbal morphology. It has obligatory polyagreement on all verbs with subject and object but not with the theme of a ditransitive verb.
# nonconcatenative morphology
# triliteral roots with heavy fusion of internal affixes

=== Phonology === 
Phonology, the study of the sound systems of a language (phoneme, allophone, segment, mora, syllable, foot, stress, tone, etc).

Trokh sound inventory:
  Vowels: A AE AO E EA I O U YA YE IY YO YU
  Consonants: F FT H HF HK HL HR HT HW K KH KHT L LR R RL S ST T TL TR W ‘ 
  Note: the ‘ is a glottal stop.

Characteristics:
# Distinct phonotactics
# Pseudo-mora-timed language
# Limited dialecture

The complexities of ''Trokh'' pronunciation hamper foreign speakers. One human "expert" wrote: 

''"The tongue spoken by the Aslan is both attractive and repellent to the Anglic ear, combining sonorous and melodic vowel sounds with throaty snarls and animal growls, all accompanied by a fair amount of spitting when spoken at any volume."''

Proper pronunciation of vowels has often proven the most difficult aspect of the language for humans, as some are pronounced while inhaling rather than exhaling. A ''Trokh'' speaker can talk faster than a human; he doesn't need to pause for breath in the midst of his speech. Instead, the language itself paces the speaker's breathing, necessitating rapid movement of the diaphragm to change the direction of breath. Indeed, the word ''trokh'' means "belly," referring to the motion of the Aslan stomach when speaking.

''Trokh'' phonetics further divides the sounds of the language into "flat" and "round", depending on whether the lips are used. For example, the vowel diphthong ''ea'' and the initial consonant ''kh'' would be flat; the vowel ''u'' and the final consonant ''w'' would be round. There is an Aslan expression, ''Firuah ftasour wui'', "Singing a song with flat sounds". The point is that when all the sounds are flat ''(wui')'', the lips can be held back, baring the teeth in a challenging grimace.

=== Grammar ===
Grammar is the structure of a language.
* tense, aspect, mood and modality, grammatical number, grammatical gender, case, etc.

Characteristics:
# Extensive aspect particle usage
# Many cases 
# Extreme verb perfective and imperfective distinction
# "person"-enclitics

==== Verbs ====
''Trokh'' verbs have sets of modifying prefixes and suffixes, ordered by type. For example, the initial, mandatory prefix modifies the tense, aspect, or mood of the verb. Most classes have a few affixes in them, most common of which are aspect, pronoun, and tense. Some are singletons, with only one affix.  A few classes have a dozen or more affixes. (This type of construction is called a templatic verb structure.)

There is one affix which can show up anywhere in the verb: the Negativizer affix I’. It negates the sense of the element after it. Think of it as the English word “not”. For example, I’ at the front of the entire verb essentially sticks a “not” in front of its meaning.

While ''Trokh'' vocabulary is often gender-neutral, the verb template itself is gender-specific, resulting in two completely different verbal constructions for the exact same meaning. 

''Trokh'' verb morphology has a rich set of productions that lets people create new verbs within its own grammar rules.

A verb stem can be turned into a noun.

   Suffix	Meaning			        Examples	
   -le	        Gerund, -“ing”			ftierle, a gathering
   -leao 	Quality, nature, culture, -ness	ftierleao, Aslan culture; ftaeileao, strength
   -khto. 	Event				ktirkhto, a pouncing
   -tyu	        Land				ktirtyu, pouncing grounds
   -sea	        Land, uncultivated		ktirsea, wilderness pouncing grounds
   -stea. 	Land, conquered		        ktirstea, newly acquired pouncing grounds
   -khau. 	People				ktirkhau, a pouncing people
   -ir, ua	Honorable actor			ktirir or ktirua, honorable pouncer person
   -‘hao. 	Dishonorable actor		ktir’hao, dishonorable pouncer person

==== Adjectives ====
Prefixing ua’ to a verb stem often makes it an adjective. Adjectives (and other nouns) modify nouns in the same manner as English (ice box, house cat, rubber band, broken arrow).

Examples:
   Verb			Adjective		
   Haloia (shine)	Ua’haloia (bright)
   Ktyaea (jump). 	Ua’ktyaea (jump-capable)
   Hwarls’e (split)	Ua’hwarls’e (broken)

==== Nouns ====
Nouns can modify other nouns, in the same manner as English (ice box; house cat; rubber band).

An optional class of prefixes can nuance the meaning of nouns.

   Prefix	Meaning			Example	
   Ahk-	        Honorable 		Akhuaeuhrekhyeh, rite of passage
   Ekh-	        Honorable disagreement
   Akya-  	anti; a threat		Akyafteirleao, a heresy or threat to Aslan culture
   Tah-	        without; lacking	Tahwihteakhau, barbarians lacking civilization
   Khih-  	with

By the strictest rules of ''Trokh'' literary style, a noun can hold only one (or occasionally two) adjectival meanings -- but the other meanings are there just the same. This allows an Aslan speaker to engage in ''firukhteahruear'', or "masked insult". For example, the word ''aulryuiysai'' translates to "desert", and when used adjectivally almost always has the formal meaning of "vast" or "expansive". However, using this word to refer to an Aslan male's landholdings implies that his farms are barren and worthless -- should the male in question choose to acknowledge the unspoken insult. A back and forth conversation in this style gradually escalates both the number and nature of insults, until one of the males offers the phrase ''yedika'!'' ("I challenge you"), or ''khaofiya'!'' ("I submit to your strength"). 

=== Syntax ===
Syntax is the study of how words combine to form grammatical sentences (phrase, clause, grammatical function, grammatical voice, etc.)

The structure of the ''Trokh'' sentence is: Verb – Object – Indirect Object, with the subject (and sometimes the applicative object) embedded into the “Person” slot of the verb, or its pronoun.

== Meaning ==
No information yet available.

=== Lexicology ===
A lexicon is the word supply of a language. 
* word, lexeme, lemma, lexicon, vocabulary, terminology, etc.

See [[Trokh/Lexicon|Trokh Dictionary]]

=== Semantics ===
Semantics is the study of the meaning of words (lexical semantics), and how these combine to form the meanings of sentences.
* meaning, sense, entailment, truth condition, compositionality, etc.

* Perhaps easier to grasp than spoken [[Trokh]] are its [[Dictionary:Yoyeaokhtef|written forms]]. Many humans have come into contact with ''[[Yoyeaokhtef|yoyeaokhtef]]'' &ndash;the ornamental designs along the edges of [[Aslan]] ships, buildings, and devices. To the [[Aslan]] eye, these are not random abstracts, but a combination of poetry, drama, and calligraphy, exciting the mind, the eye, and the ear. [[Yoyeaokhtef]] patterns are composed of multiple, blended tao-Trokh ideographs. To Aslan, the result is akin to grand opera in its combination of visual, aural, and dramatic elements.
* For more basic purposes, textbooks or shopping lists, for instance, [[Aslan]] use the ''[[Tleftuawaoirlouheei|tleftuawaoirlouheei]]'', or [[Dictionary:Tleftuawaoirlouheei|"female script"]], which denotes individual sounds with discrete symbols. A typical Aslan tank will have its control panel labeled with ornate, male-oriented yoyeaokhtef. The tank computer's software, however, will have been entered by a female technician with a keyboard configured for the female tleftuawaoirlouheei.

=== Pragmatics ===
Pragmatics is the study of how language is used by its speakers (presupposition, implicature, deixis)

''Trokh'' is a formal language, with highly regulated rules of expression. Novice speakers lack the option of putting together words to create more complex statements. There are so many formalisms in ''Trokh'' that the student must simply learn them all by rote, if he expects to be understood without being challenged.

== [[World]]s & [[Sector]]s ([[Astrography]]) ==
This language is primarily in used in the following areas: <br>
''[[Charted Space]]:''
* [[Aslan Hierate]]
* [[Nonaligned Space]]
* [[Third imperium]]

== References & Contributors ([[Sources]]) ==
{{Intermediate}}
{{Detail}}
{{Sources
|S1= {{Ludography cite|name= Aslan |page=— |version=Classic Traveller}}
|S2= {{Ludography cite|name= Library Data (A-M) |page=—}}
|S3= {{Ludography cite|name= Solomani & Aslan |page=56}} 
|S4= {{Ludography cite|name= The Travellers' Digest 17 |page=— |article: Trokh: Language of the Warriors}}
|S5= {{Ludography cite|name= Referee's Companion |page=}} 
|S6= {{cite ludography|name=Traveller: The New Era|page=70}}
|S7= {{cite ludography|name=GURPS Traveller Core Rules|page=—}}
|S8= {{cite ludography|name= Alien Races 2|page=—}}
|S9= {{Ludography cite|name= Aslan |page=— |version= Mongoose Traveller}}
|S10= [http://www.shoestring-graphics.com/traveller/language/trokh.htm Aslan Dictionary on TML]
|S11= [http://traveller5.net/tools/vilanitools.html Pasuuli's Tools: Trokh Language Generator]
}}
 

[[Category: Trokh]]
{{LE|Aslan|Language}}
[[Category: Guidebook to Afawahisa Sector]]
[[Category: Guidebook to Hlakhoi Sector]]
[[Category: Guidebook to Ealiyasiyw Sector]]