Introduction

Nordsippisk is a Germanic-flavored constructed language built around predictable grammar, transparent spelling, and words that remain easy to construct and deconstruct.

The name is itself transparent:

• nord — north
• sipp — family / kin group
• -isk — category, origin, affiliation, or association

The rough sense is of the northern kin.

Nordsippisk draws vocabulary from Proto-Germanic and Germanic descendant languages, but it is not intended to reconstruct or simulate a historically plausible descendant language. Borrowed historical material is regularized to fit Nordsippisk.

The formal language favors a small set of productive rules:

• strict subject–verb–object clause order;
• no grammatical gender;
• no noun declension classes;
• no person or number agreement on verbs;
• regular noun and verb morphology;
• predictable vowel length and stress;
• roots that remain visibly intact under affixation;
• productive compounding instead of unnecessary special grammar.

A literal English gloss may sound unusual. That is not an error: Nordsippisk is not English grammar with altered vocabulary.

Quick Start

This page gives the minimum needed to begin reading and writing simple Nordsippisk.

Basic clause order

Nordsippisk uses strict subject → verb → object order.

ik timb hus
I build a house.

han zin husen
He sees the house.

Nouns

Nouns use regular suffixes:

The order is:

ROOT → NUMBER → DEFINITENESS → POSSESSION

Verbs

The bare root is the ordinary present form for every subject.

ik werk — I work
han werk — he works
de werk — they work

Past tense always uses -de:

ik werkde — I worked

The present perfect uses hav + VERB-de:

ik hav skrivde — I have written

Future uses skal + VERB:

ik skal werk — I will work

The copula is ett:

ik ett trett — I am tired

Negation

ne negates a clause.

ik ne werk — I do not work

Questions

Questions retain ordinary word order and end with ka.

du werk ka? — do you work?

du mak vat ka? — what do you do?

Infinitives

Ordinary verb chains use bare verbs:

ik vil far — I want to go

Use at + VERB only when an explicit infinitive phrase is needed:

At liv ett at sterf. — To live is to die.

Adjectives

Adjectives precede nouns and never agree with them.

redd hus — a red house
redd husar — red houses

Comparatives are transparent compounds:

mergod — better, literally more-good
mersmal — smaller, literally more-small
ferrhard — less difficult

A short example

Mornen ett kald. Ik wak erl og far til werk-stedd. Eft werk ik far hem, giv mat til iks kattar, og rest med de.

The morning is cold. I wake early and go to the workplace. After work I go home, give food to my cats, and rest with them.

Orthography

Nordsippisk uses the Latin alphabet with þ and ð, but does not use the native letters:

c q x y

The vowel letters are:

a e i o u

Canonical spelling is intended to expose pronunciation and morphology rather than preserve historical spelling accidents.

General rules:

• written consonants are pronounced;
• no native consonant is silent;
• fixed digraphs represent defined consonant units;
• broad Germanic consonant clusters are allowed;
• vowel length is predictable from spelling;
• stress is predictable;
• affixes do not rewrite roots;
• diphthongs are absent unless deliberately introduced later.

ASCII fallback

Canonical Nordsippisk uses þ and ð. Plain-ASCII writing may use:

• th for þ
• dh for ð

These are practical fallbacks rather than alternate canonical spellings.

Vowels and Vowel Length

Nordsippisk has five vowel letters, each with one short and one long value.

Length rules

Vowel length is determined inside the morpheme containing the vowel.

1. vowel + one consonant unit → long;
2. vowel + doubled consonant → short;
3. vowel + consonant cluster → short;
4. single vowel in an open syllable → short;
5. doubled vowel in an open syllable → long;
6. neighboring affixes do not change the root’s vowel length.

Examples:

• hus — long u
• mann — short a
• timb — short i because mb is a cluster
• ka — short a
• kaa — long a
• tvaa — long final a
• þrii — long final i
• frii — long final i
• tuu — long final u

Doubled vowels

Vowel doubling is used only to mark a long vowel in an open syllable.

mer is already long by the one-consonant rule, so meer is invalid.

Doubled consonants

A doubled consonant marks the preceding vowel as short. It is not pronounced as a geminate consonant.

Adjacent vowels

Diphthongs are not part of the default system. A doubled vowel under the open-syllable rule represents one long vowel. Other adjacent vowels are separate syllables unless a future rule states otherwise.

Consonants and Clusters

Defined values

z, w, and r retain ordinary recognizable values.

The fixed digraphs tj, dj, sh, and ng count as one consonant unit for vowel-length rules.

Clusters

Broadly Germanic consonant clusters are permitted and are pronounced literally.

• timb — both m and b are pronounced;
• hvem — both h and v are pronounced;
• stark — the cluster is pronounced as written.

Affixation may produce awkward boundaries. Formal Nordsippisk does not insert repair vowels, delete consonants, or mutate roots to smooth them.

Stress, Boundaries, and Spoken Reduction

Stress

Stress falls on the first syllable of the root. Affixes do not move it.

Morpheme boundaries

Optional hyphens may be inserted at genuine morpheme boundaries.

Hyphenated and unhyphenated forms are equivalent in meaning, pronunciation, stress, and grammatical status.

Examples:

• efttag = eft-tag
• timbde = timb-de
• mannarens = mann-ar-en-s
• tvaatigg = tvaa-tigg

A hyphen may not split a morpheme internally.

Natural speech

Canonical spelling remains morphologically explicit, but ordinary speech may smooth difficult boundaries or assimilate neighboring sounds when the intended structure remains clear.

This does not create a spelling exception or a new formal rule. The language name Nordsippisk, for example, may naturally smooth at speed without changing its canonical spelling or morphological analysis.

Names and Loanwords

Native Nordsippisk vocabulary follows native orthography. Foreign material is allowed more latitude when preserving its identity is useful.

Proper names

Proper and foreign names may preserve their original spelling even when that spelling contains letters or sequences outside native Nordsippisk orthography.

Naturalized spellings are also allowed when useful.

For example, Luci may remain Luci, or be adapted as Lusi.

Preserving an original proper-name spelling does not expand the native alphabet.

Loanwords

Loanwords are handled by judgment rather than a mandatory mechanical conversion rule.

Two broad treatments are available:

• naturalize the word into legal Nordsippisk spelling and pronunciation;
• retain recognizable source-like spelling or pronunciation when doing so is useful and does not make the word needlessly awkward.

A naturalized loan behaves like native vocabulary. A visibly foreign loan may preserve foreign-looking material without changing the rules for native roots.

When naturalizing, prefer minimal change: alter what conflicts with Nordsippisk spelling or pronunciation while preserving useful recognizability.

For example, English crucifix could be naturalized as krusifiks.

Loans take ordinary Nordsippisk morphology where practical:

• krusifiksar — crucifixes
• krusifiksen — the crucifix
• krusifikss — the crucifix’s

A final root s does not trigger a special possessive allomorph; possessive -s simply stacks.

A loan may be used provisionally to fill a lexical gap without automatically becoming a permanent glossary entry. Adoption into the core lexicon remains a separate decision.

Clause Structure

The basic clause order is strict:

SUBJECT → VERB → OBJECT

ik timb husen
I build the house.

mannen timb husen
The man builds the house.

kwennen zin mannen
The woman sees the man.

Subject and object roles are carried primarily by word order. Nouns and pronouns therefore do not need nominative and accusative case forms.

Prepositional phrases and time expressions may be added around the core clause without changing the internal SVO order.

eft werk ik far hem
After work I go home.

Nouns and Possession

Nouns have no grammatical gender and no declension classes.

Number and definiteness

Example:

Possession

-s marks the possessor. No apostrophe is used.

The full noun morphology order is:

ROOT → NUMBER → DEFINITENESS → POSSESSION

Examples:

• manns hus — a man’s house
• mannens hus — the man’s house
• mannars hus — men’s house
• mannarens hus — the men’s house
• livs end — life’s end

A possessed noun does not normally receive -en merely because the possessor identifies it. Redundant definiteness is avoided when context already does the work.

Numerals and noun number

enn takes a singular noun. zero and every cardinal number greater than one take a plural noun.

• enn hund — one dog
• zero hundar — zero dogs
• tvaa hundar — two dogs

Collective folk

folk means a people considered as a cultural, national, or social collective.

mannar means multiple individual persons.

folkar therefore means multiple distinct peoples.

Pronouns and Demonstratives

Personal pronouns

Pronouns are invariant for subject and object roles.

han zin ik — he sees me
ik zin han — I see him

Nouns have no grammatical gender. Gender distinctions exist only semantically in han, hun, and det.

Possessive pronouns

Pronouns take the ordinary possessive -s.

Demonstratives

þis means this / these.
þat means that / those.

They are invariant for number and may stand alone.

þis hus — this house
þis husar — these houses
ik vil þis — I want this

Location words:

hir — here
þar — there

Adjectives and Comparison

Adjectives precede nouns and are invariant.

They do not change for number, definiteness, possession, gender, or syntactic position.

redd hus — a red house
redd husar — red houses
redd husen — the red house

Predicative adjectives

The same adjective form is used after the copula.

husen ett redd
The house is red.

Multiple adjectives

Multiple adjectives may appear together. The adjective closest to the noun is understood as the most tightly associated quality. Nordsippisk does not require an English-style adjective-order hierarchy.

Degree

tuu means too / excessively.

zer means very / highly.

tuu kald — too cold
zer god — very good

Comparatives

Comparatives are formed through ordinary qualifier + root compounds rather than comparative inflection.

mer increases the degree of a quality; ferr decreases it.

• mergod — better; more-good
• merstor — bigger; more-big
• mersmal — smaller; more-small
• merhard — harder / more difficult
• ferrgod — less good
• ferrhard — less difficult

Because these are compounds, spacing may distinguish scope:

mergod mat — better food
mer god mat — more good food

Superlatives are not yet specified.

Verbs

Verbs do not conjugate for person or number.

Present

The bare root is the ordinary present form.

ik timb — I build
han timb — he builds
de timb — they build

The bare root also follows governing verbs directly:

ik vil far — I want to go
han kan timb hus — he can build a house

Past

-de is the universal past-tense suffix.

• timbde — built
• farde — went
• zinde — saw
• komde — came
• sterfde — died / ceased functioning

There are no irregular past forms and no spelling-repair rules at the suffix boundary.

Present perfect

The present perfect uses:

hav + VERB-de

-de still marks the completed or past event. hav supplies the present connection.

ik hav skrivde — I have written
han hav komde — he has come
mashin hav sterfde — the machine has died / stopped functioning

This does not create a new participle form: the same regular -de form is used.

Future

skal + VERB marks the future.

ik skal timb hus — I will build a house

Copula

ett is the regular copula to be.

han ett timber — he is a builder
han ettde timber — he was a builder
han skal ett timber — he will be a builder

Explicit infinitive

at + VERB forms an explicit infinitive phrase when the verb itself is being treated abstractly or occupies a noun-like syntactic position.

at liv — to live
at sterf — to die

At liv ett at sterf.
To live is to die.

The marker is not inserted into ordinary verb chains and is not a general noun modifier.

ik liv — I live
ik vil far — I want to go

English noun + to-verb constructions are preferably expressed through native compounding when possible: makþingar rather than þingar at mak.

Verb chaining

A governed verb remains bare.

han skal kan timb hus
He will be able to build a house.

Literal English awkwardness is acceptable when the Nordsippisk structure is clear.

Negation and Questions

Clause negation

ne is the invariant clause-negation particle.

ik ne timb — I do not build
ik ne timbde husen — I did not build the house
ik skal ne timb husen — I will not build the house

Lexical un- is different: it forms an opposite, reversal, or absence.

un-timb — dismantle / reverse building

Yes and no

ja — yes
nin — no

nin is a standalone response. It does not replace clause negation ne.

Question particle

Questions retain normal clause order and end with ka.

han timb husen ka?
Does he build the house?

The written question mark is punctuation; ka is the grammatical question marker.

Interrogatives

Interrogatives remain in the ordinary syntactic position of the missing information.

du timb vat ka? — what do you build?
han skal kom hir nar ka? — when will he come here?

Relations, Direction, and Time

Spatial and relational words

ov is not a general possessive of. Possession is expressed with -s.

bok ov krig — a book about war
livs end — life’s end

Cardinal directions

nord — north
sudd — south
ost — east
vest — west

Relative directions

upp — up
ned — down
fram — forward / front
bak — back / behind
venst — left
rett — right

Temporal relations

Examples:

vor krigen — before the war
eft krigen — after the war
medan krigen — during the war

Time roots and transparent constructions

nu — now
tid — time
tag — day
natt — night
morn — morning
kveld — evening
wek — week
monþ — month
jar — year
mid — middle / midpoint / center

Useful transparent compounds include:

nutag — today
vortag — yesterday
efttag — tomorrow
midtag — midday / noon
midnatt — midnight

The general adjectives erl and latt mean early and late.

No formal 12-hour vm / em notation is part of the language specification.

Conjunctions

The following conjunctions are in current use, but the set has not yet been formally bound as final canon:

They do not alter normal clause order.

om han timb husen, þan ik un-timb det
If he builds the house, then I dismantle it.

This page is intentionally the only place in the reference that exposes their provisional status; the dev book remains the authoritative place for design discussion around them.

Numbers and Quantity

Nordsippisk currently specifies cardinal numbers through 99.

Zero through ten

Eleven through nineteen

tin is the productive ten-plus / -teen element.

Tens

-tigg forms multiples of ten.

For other values, the tens form comes first and the ones numeral follows as a separate word.

tvaatigg enn — 21
þriitigg seks — 36
niitigg nii — 99

Optional hyphens may expose numeral morpheme boundaries: tvaa-tigg, enn-tin.

Noun number after numerals

enn takes a singular noun. zero and every number greater than one take a plural noun.

enn katt — one cat
tvaa kattar — two cats
zero kattar — zero cats

Age

Age is expressed with the copula, a number, and plural jarar.

Ik ett þriitigg seks jarar.
I am thirty-six years old.

gammal remains the ordinary adjective old and is not required in age expressions.

Quantifiers

zero is the numeral 0; null is absence of quantity.

Degree

tuu — too / excessively
zer — very / highly

tuu mang hundar — too many dogs
zer god — very good

Hundreds, larger place values, ordinals, fractions, decimals, and an ordinary word for enough are not yet specified.

Derivational Affixes

Productive affixes have narrow, stable functions and do not mutate the root.

Examples:

timb-er — builder
timb-ing — building / construction
wulf-lik — wolf-like
wulf-isk — pertaining to wolves
stark-nes — strength
hard-vis — with difficulty
un-timb — dismantle / reverse building

un- is lexical. Clause negation uses ne.

Affixes may stack when the resulting meaning remains interpretable. Root spelling and pronunciation remain unchanged across affix boundaries.

Compounding

Compounding is productive and deliberately permissive.

A compound should remain mechanically decomposable from known material. Nordsippisk does not require every useful compound to become a dedicated glossary entry.

Examples:

• farþing — travel-thing; vehicle / conveyance
• farmashin — travel-machine; mechanical conveyance
• werk-stedd — workplace
• nutag — now-day; today
• midnatt — middle-night; midnight

Hyphens are optional at genuine morpheme boundaries.

The head carries ordinary inflection

The final head of a compound normally carries number, definiteness, and other inflection that applies to the compound as a whole.

krigbund — war group / war league
krigbunden — the war group / the war league

A preceding component does not need possessive -s merely because English might use of or a possessive-looking paraphrase. Use -s only when possession itself is intended.

folks krigbunden — the people’s war league

Thus compounding and possession remain separate mechanisms.

Morphology inside compounds

A compound element may carry ordinary morphology when that morphology contributes meaning.

skrivbund — a coherent collection of writing
skrivarbund — a collection foregrounding multiple distinct writings

Likewise:

sangbund — an album-like coherent song collection
sangarbund — a playlist-like collection of separate songs

This is a semantic tendency, not a special compound grammar.

Verb roots as modifiers

Verb roots may modify noun roots when the intended relation is clear.

makþing — a doing/making thing; something to do
makþingar — things to do

Ik hav mergod makþingar.
I have better things to do.

This is preferred over importing English noun + to-infinitive syntax. at remains the explicit infinitive marker and does not become a general noun-modifying particle.

Comparative compounds

mer and ferr may form qualifier + root compounds:

mergod — better
mersmal — smaller
ferrhard — less difficult

These are ordinary compounds rather than a separate comparative inflection class.

Large transparent constructions

Ordinary morphology and compounding may stack freely when the result remains readable.

Frii Nordsippisk Folks Krigbunden

can be decomposed as:

frii nordsippisk folk-s krig-bund-en

roughly: the Free Nordsippisk People’s War League / War Union.

Roots

This glossary lists committed lexical roots. Productive compounds are generally omitted unless they are especially useful reference forms.

folk is collective: folkar means multiple distinct peoples, not merely several individual persons.

frii currently means freedom or lack of binding; the no-cost sense of English free is not specified.

Function Words

Pronouns

ik — I / me
du — you
vi — we / us
han — he / him
hun — she / her
det — it
de — they / them

Demonstratives and location

þis — this / these
þat — that / those
hir — here
þar — there

Grammar particles and auxiliaries

ett — be / copula
skal — future auxiliary
at — explicit infinitive marker
ne — clause negation
ka — clause-final question marker

Responses

ja — yes
nin — no

Quantity and degree

null — none / no quantity
zumm — some
faa — few / little
mang — many / much
all — all
mer — more
ferr — less / fewer
tuu — too / excessively
zer — very / highly

Addition and sequencing

ogsaa — also / too / as well
furst — first / firstly
nest — next
þan — then
sist — last / finally

Interrogatives

hvem — who
vat — what
hvar — where
nar — when
hvi — why
hur — how
vilk — which

Relations

in — in / inside
pa — on / upon
ned — under / below; down
upp — over / above; up
med — with
unmed — without
fra — from
til — to / toward; until
for — for / intended for
mellom — between
þur — through
mot — against / toward opposition
bak — behind; back
fram — in front of; forward
ov — about / concerning / regarding
vor — before
eft — after
medan — during / while
sid — since

Numeral-building elements

tin — ten-plus / -teen element
-tigg — tens element

Example Sentences

Basic clauses

ik timb hus.
I build a house.

ik timbde husen.
I built the house.

han skal timb hus.
He will build a house.

ik ett trett nu.
I am tired now.

ik vil rest.
I want to rest.

Completed events and present relevance

ik hav skrivde.
I have written.

han hav komde hem.
He has come home.

The -de form marks the completed event; hav gives it present relevance.

Infinitives and verb chains

At liv ett at sterf.
To live is to die.

At skriv ett god.
To write is good.

ik liv.
I live.

han skal kan timb hus.
He will be able to build a house.

Possession and definiteness

Dodd ett livs end.
Death is life’s end.

mannens hus
the man’s house

iks frend
my friend

Everyday use

ik mog þis werk.
I like this work.

ik sprek nordsippisk.
I speak Nordsippisk.

nordsippisk ett sprak.
Nordsippisk is a language.

mashin sterfde.
The machine died / stopped functioning.

Bind þat ord.
Commit that word.

Questions

du timb vat ka?
What do you build?

hvem timb husen ka?
Who builds the house?

han skal kom hir nar ka?
When will he come here?

Numbers and quantity

enn katt — one cat
tvaa kattar — two cats
enntin kattar — eleven cats
þriitigg seks jarar — thirty-six years

Ik ett þriitigg seks jarar.
I am thirty-six years old.

tuu mang hundar — too many dogs
zer god — very good

Comparison and compounding

mergod mat — better food
merhard werk — harder work
ferrhard werk — less difficult work

Ik hav mergod makþingar.
I have better things to do.

krigbund — war group / war league
krigbunden — the war group / the war league

Time and direction

nutag — today
vortag — yesterday
efttag — tomorrow
midtag — midday / noon
midnatt — midnight

venst, venst, venst rett venst
left, left, left-right-left

Short passage

Mornen ett kald, men wedren ett god. Ik wak erl og far til werk-stedd. Eft werk ik far hem, giv mat til iks kattar, og rest med de.

The morning is cold, but the weather is good. I wake early and go to the workplace. After work I go home, give food to my cats, and rest with them.