Sungor (also Assangorior, Assangor, Assangori, Songor, Asongor) is an Eastern Sudanic language of eastern Chad and western Sudan and a member of the Taman branch. It is closely related to Tama with some researchers speaking of a Tama-Assangori continuum.
Sungor is spoken in an area located to the south of Biltine and to the north of Adré (Ouaddaï) in Chad, as well as in Darfur in Sudan. It is spoken by the Sungor people, of which a majority are Muslim. The number of speakers was estimated at 23,500 according to the 1993 census of Chad.
So far, Sungor phonology is not well attested in literature and research.
Sungor is most likely a tonal language with a high and low tone, e.g. 'worm' dút and 'big' dùt. It has seven vowels and height assimilations. Examples for height assimilation include plural suffixes -u,-uk, and -uò which trigger the root vowel /a/ to be raised to /ÃÂ/ as in 'raven' gárá changing into 'ravens' gÃÂrú . Another example are suffixes -i and -ià  which trigger the root vowel /a/ to be raised to /ÃÂ/ as in 'house' wál changing into 'houses' wá¼Âlï.
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<sup><small>Apart from some examples listed in the phonology tab, all words are spelled according to Lukas/Nachtigal with some limitations caused by a lack of certain characters on Wikipedia. Due to historical reasons, spelling roughly follows German spelling rules.</small></sup>
Sungor, like Tama, follows a noun class system. Similarly to other Sudanese languages that also use noun classes, Sungor distinguishes meaning through the use of suffixes. However, there is little overlap between the suffixes used.
Plurals are mostly formed by suffixion. Suffixes change depending on class and number. Lukas lists 31 different suffix pairs which do not necessarily constitute separate noun classes. There are six ways of forming plurals in Sungor:
<small><sup>1. 3rd person Plural also exists as áià Âko</sup></small>
<sup><small>2. from ésià Âko which corresponds to áià Âko</small></sup>
Possessive pronouns in Sungor stand in postposition, e.g. 'his brother' bet an. If a possessive follows a plural, it is pluralised by adding -uà Â, e.g. 'our hearts' omulu uà Âunuà Â.
Sungor Demonstratives are quite underresearched. Examples are 'this' translating to ià Â, plural ià Âkà  and 'that translating to á»Âà Â, plural á»Âà Âgo.
Interrogatives lack research as well. 'Who' translates to nấrÃÂ, 'which' to nấnÃÂ, and 'what' to nÃÂmmà Ârë or nim as an alternative expression.
The word for 'human' at is used to express 'someone'. The plural is árë. To differentiate whether 'someone' refers to a man or woman, the respective terms follow. 'Man' is at ma, 'woman' is at ë. Following this same pattern, 'everyone' translates to at kÃÂro, literally 'every human' with kÃÂro being the term for 'every'. Other indefinite pronouns are 'some' kà Âra, 'everything' hÃÂnià Â, or 'nobody' là Â. Plurals can be formed by adding the suffix -guà Â.
Ordinals are derived from the cardinal numbers by adding suffixes -na or -no.
<sup><small>1. "The first" (male) also has the special form kémerik</small></sup>
To indicate how often something happens/has happened, Sungor uses mar and the corresponding ordinal number, e.g. 'the first time' mar korena.
Sungor has locative adverbs, temporal adverbs, and adverbs of manner. Adverbs in Sungor are not well attested for. Some examples of locative adverbs are 'here' ÃÂndi, 'there' á¸Âà ÂdÃÂ, 'between' rÃÂnik, 'above' óroyÃÂ. Temporal adverbs are, for example, 'daily' abad hḯnik, 'today' dấdo, 'always' dëman, 'yesterday' á»ÂrÃÂ, 'now' hása, 'tomorrow' súsekÃÂ. Examples for adverbs of manner are 'maybe' tấsei, 'impossible' tấsoto. 'Maybe' tấsei might not be an adjective in itself since it can be divided into tấ-sei 'it will be'.
Numbers become adverbial when they follow the arabic loanword mar, e.g. 'once' mar kor.
In Sungor, adjectives follow and agree with the noun, for example 'white clay' à Âsu aek and 'red clay' à Âsu arak. Adjectives form plurals by adding a suffix, e.g. 'small, young' elit | elià Âa (Sg. -t, Pl. -à Âa), 'ripe, mature' naÃÂed | naÃÂedo (Pl. -o), 'older brother' jà  dud | já¹Âàdútà «.
Verbs inflect by addition of affixes to a word root. For example, 'I birth' ná¸Âne has the root ÃÂn. Verb roots are usually monosyllabic or disyllabic. Prefixes mark the person, whereas suffixes mark time and mood.
The verbs can be put into three groups depending on the plural-affix they take. While verbs in Group I & II follow a regular patter, group III consists of irregular affixation.
In the following tables, 'R' marks the verb-root, 'V' signals a vowel, sounds in brackets '()' only sometimes occur, sounds in squared brackets '[]' only rarely occur, and '/' signals different realizations according to the context of an utterance, '-' is used to signal affixes.
<sup><small>1. Also occurs as eke/[inye]</small></sup>
<sup><small>2. Nasals are followed by -ge, plosives or /s/ are followed by -eke</small></sup>
In the present tense, verbs can be further divided up into those that have suffix -i (Group I) or -e (Group II).
Present tense conditionals take one of three suffixes: -(V)à Âne, -kne, or -(V)ne. The plural is formed by adding a conditional suffix to a plural suffix, e.g. 'if I count' notoïyanà| 'if we count' notoïnyane (from no÷toïy÷ny÷ane).
Negation happens by adding a suffix. A positive form with the suffix -e takes -ato if the verb root contains front vowels (a, e, i) or -oto if the verb root contains back vowels (o, u). If the positive form takes the suffix -i, the negative form takes the suffix -to or -(V)kto (sometimes -kÃÂto) with some exceptions. In the plural form -kto becomes -kÃÂto/-kà Âto, while -ato/-oto remains the same.
<sup><small>1. Also n-(V)RV-aà Âa</small></sup>
Preterite tense suffixes can sometimes be added onto the present tense suffixes -i and -e.
Preterite conditionals are formed by replacing the -ne | -nÃÂ. These conditionals have a future meaning, e.g. 'I counted' notá»Âyià Âa (preterite I) and 'if I will count' notoïyià Âne, 'I requested' niseká¸Âà Âià Âa and 'if I will request' niseká¸Âà Âià Âne.
Both negatives of preterite I & II are derived from the positive by adding the suffix -to, e.g. 'I played' nagarnáà Âa | 'I did not play' nagarnáà Âto (preterite I) and nagarnáà Âià Âa | nagarnáà Âià Âto (preterite II).
<sup><small>1. Group II plural marker saie can also be replaced by seke</small></sup>
Lukas suspects the future marker -sa to be an auxiliary verb in the present tens.
Future tense conditionals are formed by adding suffix -à ÂnÃÂ, e.g. 'to know' njel and 'if I will know' ninjilisáià ÂnÃÂ.
Imperatives in Sungor differ based on the present tense verb group a word falls into. The positive singular imperative for verbs that end in -i is the verb root, although there are some exceptions. Verbs that end in -e take suffixes -a, -o, -e, and in some cases -i. For plurals, the prefix k-(V)- and suffixes -a or -o are needed. Negative imperatives are follow the either the schemata VR-aito or VR-ÃÂto.
Some auxiliaries exist in Sungor. However, due to a lack in research, auxiliaries are not well documented.