Ingrian language
Ingrian ("ižoran keeli" or "inkeroin keeli" ), also called Izhorian, is a nearly extinct Finnic language spoken by the (mainly Orthodox) Izhorians of Ingria. It has approximately 120 native speakers left, all of whom are elderly. The Ingrian language should be distinguished from the Ingrian dialect of the Finnish language, which became the majority language of Ingria in the 17th century with the influx of Lutheran Finnish immigrants; their descendants, the Ingrian Finns, are often referred to as Ingrians. The immigration of Lutheran Finns was promoted by Swedish authorities, who gained the area in 1617 from Russia, as the  local population was (and remained) Orthodox. Classification. Ingrian is classified, together with Finnish, Karelian (including Livvi), Ludic and Veps, in the Northern Finnic branch of the Uralic languages. History. In 1932–1937, a Latin-based orthography for the Ingrian language existed, taught in schools of the Soikino Peninsula and the area around the mouth of the Luga River. Several textbooks were published, including in 1936 a grammar of the language. However, in 1937 the Izhorian written language was abolished and mass repressions of the peasantry began. Alphabet (1936). The order of the 1936 alphabet is similar to the Russian Cyrillic alphabet . Alphabet (2005–present). The order of the current alphabet matches the Finnish alphabet. Dialects. Four dialects groups of Ingrian have been attested, two of which are probably extinct by now: A fifth dialect may have once been spoken on the Karelian Isthmus in northernmost Ingria, and may have been a substrate of local dialects of southwestern Finnish. Grammar. Like other Uralic languages, Ingrian is a highly agglutinative language. There is some controversy between the grammars as described by different scholars. For example, Chernyavskij (2005) provides the form "on" ("he/she is") as the only possible third-person singular indicative of  the verb "olla" ("to be"), while the native speaker Junus (1936) as well as Konkova (2014) describe also the form "ono". Nouns. Ingrian nouns have two numbers: "yksikkö" (singular) and "monikko" (plural). Both numbers can be inflected in eleven grammatical cases: Ingrian doesn't have a separate accusative case. This case corresponds with the genitive (in the singular) and the nominative (in the plural). Ingrian also has a high amount of compound words. In these words, the last word of the compound is inflected: Like other Finnic languages, Ingrian nouns don't have gender. However, Ingrian does have a few  gender-specific suffixes: Adjectives. Adjectives don't differ from nouns morphologically, that is to say that they are inflected the same as nouns. Adjectives are always attributed to a noun, either directly or with the verb "olla" (to be). Comparatives are formed by adding the suffix "-mp" to the Genitive stem. It is then inflected as usual: The object of the comparison will be set in the "partitiva": Superlatives are formed by adding the "partitiva" of the pronoun "kaik": Verbs. Infinitives. The Ingrian verbs have two infinitives, both of which can be inflected (much like the nouns) depending on the  situation of usage. The first infinitive comes in the "partitiva" or "inessiva". The "partitiva" of the first infinitive is used after the verbs "kyssyyä" (to ask), "pyytää" (to ask), "alkaa" (to start), "tahtoa" (to want), "suvata" (to love), "vässyyä" (to tire) and "pittää" (to have to): The "inessiva" of the first infinitive acts as a present participle. It denotes an action that happens simultaneously with the acting verb: The second infinitive comes in the "illativa", "inessiva", "elativa" and "abessiva". The "illativa" of the second infinitive is used to denote a reported act (e.g. after the verb "nähhä", to see), to  denote a purpose or following the verbs "männä" (to go), "lähtiä" (to go) or "noissa" (to come to pass): The "inessiva" of the second infinitive acts as a continuous clause, introduced by the verb "olla" (to be). It denotes an action that is happening at the present moment: The "elativa" of the second infinitive denotes either the completion of the action or a distancing from its location: The "abessiva" of the second infinitive acts as a participle of an incomplete action: Voice and mood. Ingrian verbs come in three voices: Active, passive and reflexive: Both the active and passive voices  can be portrayed by the indicative mood (both present and imperfect) and conditional mood, while the imperative can only be set in the active voice: Negation. Like in most other Uralic languages, Ingrian negation is formed by adding the inflected form of the verb "ei" (not) to the connegative of the desired verb: The connegative differs depending on the tense and mood of the main verb. The conjugation of the negative verb follows: Pronouns. The personal pronouns set in "nominatiivi" are listed in the following table: The demonstrative pronouns set in "nominativa" are listed in the following table: The proximal  demonstrative pronouns tämä and nämät can be contracted to tää and näät respectively. Furthermore, the "genetiva" singular form tämän can be contracted to tään. Other inflections cannot be contracted. Phonology. Vowels. Monophthongs. The Ingrian language has 8 vowels: Each vowel may occur short or long. Long vowels are doubled in writing (e.g. ⟨aa⟩ being ). To split two vowels, the grapheme ⟨'⟩ is used (e.g. ⟨a'a⟩ being ). The vowel <ь> () exists in some Russian loanwords, but is often replaced by . Diphthongs. Ingrian has at least 24 diphthongs: Additionally, the diphthong "iä" () occurs in the personal pronouns. The diphthongs can , too, be long. This is shown by duplicating the second vowel (e.g. ⟨aii⟩ [ɑːi̯]). Consonants. The Ingrian language has 22 consonant sounds: The Soikkola dialect has a three-way distinction of consonant length (, , ). Both the long and halflong geminates are shown double in writing (⟨tt⟩). Other dialects only differentiate between long () and short () consonants. The long variant of ⟨ts⟩ is written as ⟨tts⟩ (). Stress. Primary stress in Ingrian by rule comes on the first syllable, while the secondary stresses come on every further uneven syllable. In some late borrowings, the primary stress may shift to another syllable: Morphophonology. The Ingrian  language has several morphophonological processes. Vowel harmony is the process that the affixes attached to a lemma may change depending on the stressed vowel of the word. This means that if the word is stressed on a back vowel, the affix would contain a back vowel as well, while if the word's stress lies on a front vowel, the affix would naturally contain a front vowel. Thus, if the stress of a word lies on an "a", "o" or "u", the possible affix vowels would be "a", "o" or "u", while if the stress of a word lies on  an "ä", "ö" or "y", the possible affix vowels to this word would then be "ä", "ö" or "y": The vowels "e" and "i" are neutral, that is to say that they can be used together with both types of vowels.