Dwemer Language

Based on the work done at UESP.

Phonology

I hypothesize that any so-called "Dwemer" words containing o actually contain another vowel, likely u (cf. Akkadian or Etruscan). o itself occurs extremely infrequently, even in toponyms. Thus I give Dwemer a vowel inventory of /i e a u/. I place ch as velar as pronounciation-wise this seems more tenable. Outside digraphs, I feel h is /h/ before vowels and devoices the following consonant otherwise. This gives Dwemer an inventory of 18 consonants and 4 vowels.

WALS considers the consonant inventory moderately small, the vowel inventory small, and the consonant-to-vowel ratio as moderately high.

Grammar

• Dwemer appears to be agglutinative.
• Possessives are prefixed to the nouns they modify.
• There does not appear to be any significant declension.
• There seems to be an absence of articles, much like Classical Latin.
• Due to the above, it is doubtful Dwemer possesses noun classes.
• The word order seems to be universally SVO.
• Adjectives are possibly suffixes to the nouns they modify, but the corpus is too small to know for sure.

Vocab

Forms with * are hypothesized to exist but are unattested

abak

only

abazun

partake

ahvardn

protection

cf. vvarden 'strong shield'

ahrk

break, perish?

cf. ahrkanch 'had perished'

*(a)left

town? place?

Extremely common in toponyms.

amakai

survive

amz

many

anum

earth

*arkng

affection?, give?

cf. umarkng 'grace'

bcharn

machine

ie. animunculus

btham

power

bthar

allied, bind, bond

*btharng

plea? cry? sound?

bthun

believe, know

*-ch

[Instrumental]?

chal

ask, desire, request

che

for (ie. because)

chend

passage, path

chun

which

*-d

[Passive Perfect]?

*-dn

Likely an adposition similar to en. in

du(um)

we

Probably, duum could refer to the dwemer people and du to just a few. Possibly an example of declension or clusivity.

du-

our

*[d/th]umz

town? place?

Extremely common in toponyms.

eftar

set

cf. eftardn 'set in'

eftardn

set in

cf. eftar 'set'

fahl

not

fahl-

un-

fahlz

not (Prohibitive mood?)

fell

city

*-ingth

new

Present in two compounds involving 'new' and included in many toponyms.

irknd

cloud (verb)

cf. irkngth 'darkness'

irkngth

darkness

cf. irknd 'cloud (verb)'

kagr

tone

cf. kagren 'music'

kagren

music

cf. kagr 'tone'

kanthaln

send

melz

hear

cf. kemelmzulchond 'under the roaring'

mer

people, race

*mk

life

mzan

begin

mzin

against

mzual

mercy

nchard

stone

cf. nchardch 'bone'

nchardch

bone

cf. nchard 'stone'

nchuan

radiance

nchul

fruit (ie. effect)

nchur

symbol

nchuth

vision

ngalft

gratitude

cf. ngark 'thank'

ngark

thank

cf. ngalft 'gratitude'

-raldch

final

cf. ralz 'before'. Perhaps indicative of a stem *ral- meaning 'ahead'.

ralz

before

cf. -raldch 'final'. Perhaps indicative of a stem *ral- meaning 'ahead'.

stur

enemy

th

and

thu

you

thua-

your

thand

steam garden

thumz

culture

thunch

fear

umarkng

grace

cf. arkng 'give'

vanchn

eternity?

volen

hammer

vvarden

strong shield

cf. ahvardn 'protection'

ur

so?

Translated as 'in it' and 'as', but I feel the core meaning is closer to the latter and the former is merely an anglicism.

zel

city, under(ground)?