Triparic Accent

Accent Rules

In order of precedence:

1. The marking rule. If a syllable is marked acute or grave, it gets the accent.
2. The disyllable rule. If a word has two syllables, the first syllable (the penultimate) is accented.
   • Therefore, any 2-syllable word accented on the final syllable must get a grave on it.
3. The source rule. For words of more than two syllables, it depends on the origin. If a word is of Germanic origin, it follows the Germanic accent rules; if it is of Romance origin, it follows the Romance accent rules.

Germanic Rules

1. First syllable. The first syllable of the root is accented.

Romance Rules

1. If the penultimate syllable is heavy, it gets the accent.
2. Otherwise, the antepenultimate (third-from-last) syllable gets the accent.

Heaviness: A syllable is heavy if it contains a diphthong (ä, æ, ŏ, ø) or ends with a consonant.

Examples

machisto has a heavy penultimate syllable and no explicit mark; therefore, the accent is ma-CHIS-to.

könig is two-syllable, so it is accented on the penultimate (even though the penultimate, kö-, is light).

ãncivilan has no heavy syllables, so it is accented on the antepenult: ãn-CI-vi-lan.

Accent votes for exemplar polysyllables

Word	Carrie	Shawn	Alan
ascheten	1, maybe 2	2, maybe 1
civilan	3	1, mmmmaybe 3
chocolad	3	3, maybe 1
diziren	2	2	2
febessen	2	2	2
kübernen	1	1 or 2
machisto	2	2	2
ŏssagen	1?	2	1?
passenstanz	1	1
vidoncor	3 I guess	2