Drakona language

Standard Drakona (; ; ) is the official standard of the Drakona language in the Adborthos Republic and the United Provinces of Edazora. The Drakona language is a tongue spoken by a little over 21 million people, and written in Drakona script. In some places, it is accompanied by (; literally, romanization), a romanization system not unlike the Japanese rōmaji. In the unrecognized Luenas territory, where Standard Drakona is often spoken alongside the native Lyoonos language, the system is the norm, and the established method of writing. In the Lyoonos wilderness, a mixture of and the traditional script can be observed.
While there are differences between Edazoran, Adborthos, Luenas, and Lyoonos Drakona, these differences are generally minor except in instances of pronunciation; this means that although understanding speech may be difficult, the written word is largely unambiguous, and thus few exceptions need be made to the listed rules herein. Nonetheless, there are a number of differences which will be noted below, as they may cause anywhere from small to great deals of trouble to the unknowing learner.
This article outlines the writing system, phonology and phonotactics, syntax, and basic grammar of Standard Drakona. Drakona script is indicated by , while romanization is indicated with . In instances where this is not practical or more confusing, such as in quoting texts, the Standard Drakona text will typically be italicized or bolded, and the romanization or translation left in regular font. Pronunciation is indicated by the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), and all IPA examples are click-through and lead to the Help:IPA for Edazoran and Adborthos page. Some of these have a speaker next to them, and clicking that will take you to a pronunciation example.
==Grammar==
===Negation===
Drakona negation is one of the most ambiguous features of the language, even in Standard Drakona. Drakona has several ways of negating words, verbs, phrases, and even entire sentences, and in some cases multiple negations can exist in a single sentence without necessarily cancelling each other out. This is a source of significant confusion even among Drakona; it is particularly burdensome to children and later learners of the language, who often find the rules to be exceedingly and needlessly complicated. Nonetheless, no effort has been made to reform negation.
====Ne and ny====
The simplest, and most basic form of negation occurs with the words () and (). Both words mean the same thing, and are used in the same way;There is a reason for this curious split. Although traditionally the Adborthos convention of spelling has won out in standardization, ne/ny was considered to be unambiguous enough that no preference was levied during the reforms that established Standard Drakona. Thus, neither of the two is considered to be incorrect. however, there is a great preference for in the Adborthos Republic, Lyoonos, and Luenas, and an equally great preference for in Edazora and among the Standard Drakona community of the Drakonsiluundes. For the sake of convenience, the standard of will be used henceforth; but should you desire to not appear as a foreigner (or perhaps a person with an unusual accent), it is a worthwhile endeavor to accustom yourself with the preferred negating word.
In any case, is used to negate nouns and verbs, with essentially no exceptions to the rule. "" () for example consists of "" () meaning "I am," which is then negated by the . The is applied before the verb or noun, not after, as is the case in some other Equo-Kryfonic languages. Similar constructions to this example are "I did not" () and "They have not" (), among others. This works similarly with nouns: "no plains, no mountains, and no rivers" is "" (), for example. As noted above however, is only used with nouns and verbs, and learners should take care to avoid using with adjectives. A common mistake is to use one in the place of the other which, while still intelligible, sounds clunky and awkward to native speakers.
::
::
::They did not ask [about them], but if they do, tell them we have no planes to spare!
=====Ne a/Ny a=====
 (; sometimes ) is used with negative questions, generally speaking. Loosely speaking, could be translated as "don't", although strictly it does not correspond to any particular English word or phrase and simply acts to negate the question being asked. Compare for example "do you know?" () to "don't you know?" (). 
::
::
::You know how to get there, don’t you?
=====Ne nes/Ny nys=====
=====Ne ik/Ny ik=====
====Sny====
There is a singular catch to the use of , which is that in the constructs should not, could not, and would not, () is used in its place. The use of is unusual, it must be said. For one thing, in contrast to , always comes after what it negates. Secondly, should not, which is ordinarily () is often contracted down to just ; the other two, () and () respectively, do not have the same occur. This is a staple of Standard Drakona speakers, and may at first throw an otherwise observant listener through a loop. Fortunately, these three phrases are the only instances where is used, and beyond this contracting there are no unusual properties of . The oft-taught example of the three is "" (), which literally means "She would not do it, and could not; so you should not do it!"
::
::
::You could not have known about that.
====S-====
Literally, the prefix () is used to negate or reverse the meaning of a word; see the section on noteworthy prefixes for the latter aspect of the prefix's use. This prefix is one of the oldest with recognizable impact on words and the language itself; in fact it is so old that in a number of older words, the prefix has become a part of the word (as is the case with ). In theory, the prefix can be appended to any Drakona word; however, in practice it is not applied to nouns or verbs, nor with the aforementioned constructs of should not, could not, and would not.One note to be made here is that across borders, there is a propensity among young speakers of Drakona to append it to all words as part of a slang. A number of non-standard dialects also use it in place of ne/ny and sne/sny. Both are infrequent at best however, and it is unlikely that most travelers or casual learners of Drakona will encounter someone who makes use of s-
 in all positions.
The prefix comes in a variety of forms, of which the bare form is the most common, naturally. The variant forms () and () occur less frequently, but can be seen in words such as () and (). The use of these three prefixes is not strictly the same, and is governed by the first letter of the words they are appended to, as noted below. The prefix and its variant forms are functionally equivalent to the English prefixes of un-, in-, de-, dis-, and similar prefixes.
=====Prefix s-=====
Bare is appended in instances where the first letter of the word being modified is any vowel besides . In some older words like () "wrong", () "unloved", () "after", and others, what previously was the bare is now considered to be a part of the word rather than a prefix.Worth mentioning is that such words, which were codified before the standardization of Drakona, are not considered to be exceptions to the rules noted above. In any case, can on paper be appended to any adjective, adverb, or other word class; however, if it is ever used it is typically applied to the former two.
Use of with adverbs is controversial, it must be said. While technically it is allowed under the rules of Standard Drakona, it is a very regional thing. In many dialects, it would be considered unusual to append to an adverb; words that in Kataboriyos or Ratinethos would be seen as normal like () are essentially unheard of elsewhere, and to a majority of all Drakona speakers would probably seem indicative of ignorance or an unusual dialect. It is advisable therefore to stick to using with adjectives only.
::
::
::Disunity today is indefensible.
=====Prefix se-=====
=====Prefix sy-=====
==Notes==
==References==