Hello, everyone! I'm developing a completely new constructed language, which includes:

• 31 unique letters
• 4 diacritic marks
• 10 numbers
• 20 punctuation marks

I want to create a custom font for this language and design a virtual keyboard for easy typing.

💡 Currently, I need help with:
1️⃣ Font design (including bold, italic, and bold-italic styles).

• Bold: I would like it to be in Gothic style.
• Italic: I would like it to be in cursive style.
• Bold-Italic: I haven't decided yet, but I'm thinking of a fusion of Gothic and cursive styles.
• The font should also be adapted for a virtual keyboard.

2️⃣ Linguistic development, including word formation (morphology) and sentence structure (syntax).

3️⃣ Website development (including a dictionary and translation system).

• The dictionary should allow users to suggest new words and have a text-to-speech function.
• The translation feature is optional and may or may not be included.

If you're interested in conlanging, font design, or worldbuilding, feel free to comment or DM me! Let's collaborate on this project! 😃✨

THX!!!!

I've been interested in developing a conlang featuring extensive vowel harmony. One idea I found intriguing was having word harmony extend across word boundaries, so that even in compound words, both components have to have matching word harmony.

For example:

• páléchá [pælexæ] 'king' + cónse [tsonsɛ] 'real' = páléccénse [pæletːsensɛ] 'kingdom' (ó→é).
• talóe [tɑlwɛ] 'home' + álétá [æletæ] 'animal' = talóalóta [tɑlwɑlotɑ] 'pet, domesticated animal' (á→a, é→ó)

This creates for some very interesting variations.

That said, I'm not aware of any natural language that this occurs in, where vowel harmony crosses word boundaries in compound words. It's been difficult to find information online.

While certainly uncommon, how plausible is this type of system really? What would cause this to occur or not occur? What are the advantages and/or disadvantages of this sort of system?

Would love to hear y'all's perspective.

hi guys! ive been conlanging for over half a decade now, so i want to showcase some features from my oldest and favorite conlang, atsurian: the language of the fictional atsurian empire, 700 BC - 1452 CE.

Grammar:

atsurian word order is generally OVS and head final (no, it was not inspired by klingon). instead of utilizing cases, atsurian relies on word order and particles to indicate a words function in a sentence. however, some particles have evolved into affixes that effectively create cases, such as tal(a)- (the instrumental) and -(a)l (the genitive/possessive).

interestingly, the copula is treated as a particle instead of as a verb. in classical atsurian, it was m /m̩/, which would follow the subject. this evolved into the suffix -(a)m, however its past and future forms, ram and kha, are particles and relatively unchanged from classical atsurian.

ex. Śadana gadal dammam. (Śadana me-GEN name-COP) - My name is Shadana.

atsurian verbs are highly agglutinative and take a variety of endings and inflections. there are 4 major verb groups in atsurian, somewhat inspired by japanese: -r verbs (the most common), -śi verbs (typically formed from a noun stem), -nar verbs (relate to movement or motion), and -asen verbs (relate to submission). despite these different classes, theyre all inflected basically the same, making atsurian verbs relatively easy.

there are many grammatical quirks in atsurian that came about from my lack of understanding linguistics resulting in creativity. for example, the past and future copulas ram and kha change to ram/iram and kha/ukha if another independent clause is added to a sentence.

ex. riyal ram, kor nisa iram. (man was, and woman was-2) - there was a man, and there was a woman.

Worldbuilding Influence:

much of atsurians vocabulary is influenced by atsurian culture, and especially the religion of atsuri: Shama. shama is a dualistic religion that claims that we exist within the dreamscape of the creator god, shamurianar, who is in an eternal coma after battling a rabid demon named enksira. shamurianar and enksira are embodied on earth as the sun and moon, and therefore much of the religion revolves around the worship of sun and fire and the revile of night and the moon.

the most obvious example of this influence are the prefixes śa/śma- and en-, which can be found all throughout the language. typically, words beginning with śa/śma- have a positive connotation and words beginning with en- have a negative one. often times in speech, atsurians will use these prefixes on nouns as stand ins for the adjectives good and bad.

ex. endam tsakhba śabur deśude zhyaranim ye. (bad-name have-3PS this peaceful people-group-COP emphasis) - such a vulgar name for a seemingly peaceful ilk, indeed.

there is much more to say about atsurian, but im writing on mobile and i dont want to push the limits of how bad the formatting can get on here. the following is a personal letter written by a famous atsurian ksa'ama (empress), Uhari Kesid II, to her wife and closest advisor, Nadia.

dearest nadia,

i wish you to know i long for you each day as i perform my duties, and the nights without your presence grow longer. i know that i can entrust you with the most important duties, and you can even direct the other ksa'amalidas (advisors) with the voice of a leader. i truly admire you, and view you as my equal. i presume you have been made aware of a rising religious group in south ajada'arya (an atsurian territory) who our subordinates have referred to as "enksiricts". such a vulgar name for a seemingly peaceful ilk, indeed. i implore that you send shekjyakes (officers) to observe them from a distance; peacefully, mind you. i want no bloodshed on atsuris sacred sands, and i believe maintaining peace will be in the best interests of shamurianar. together, we will speak of this over a banquet with the ksa'amalidas 5 days from now. of course, i will save your spot next to mine.

-lovingly, uhari

Nadia kannat,

aldar da, tsitari da, aka li endukhbunrime akat deruturika, kor niyori tsusu abada akal madari tsakhbanazhya śiranam. dukzhekkala akat intulurime uturi, kor kisama li talabaśara kisamalidat inlakhadi. daśo aka zhekari, kor aka sa gad khualam. orazhadariya de, ośa śezhya li enśirazhyal dam tsakhbazhya śmazhyaranisaq akat uturika. endam tsakhba śabur deśude zhyaranim ye. taladeśude, ośa nakalat san tsun śezhyat akhatadika. se atsuril śmanai de zhyamuba khan, kor śamanaral tsori li deśude ukha. ut olbin dar san da, nigadinaya de farkisamalida śabur li tasugul. daśo gad kataś kibadul.

-ośa uhari akuzhin

This is a game of borrowing and loaning words! To give our conlangs a more naturalistic flair, this game can help us get realistic loans into our language by giving us an artificial-ish "world" to pull words from!

The Telephone Game will be posted every Monday and Friday, hopefully.

Rules

1. Post a word in your language, with IPA and a definition.

Note: try to show your word inflected, as it would appear in a typical sentence. This can be the source of many interesting borrowings in natlangs (like how so many Arabic words were borrowed with the definite article fossilized onto it! algebra, alcohol, etc.)

2. Respond to a post by adapting the word to your language's phonology, and consider shifting the meaning of the word a bit!

3. Sometimes, you may see an interesting phrase or construction in a language. Instead of adopting the word as a loan word, you are welcome to calque the phrase -- for example, taking skyscraper by using your language's native words for sky and scraper. If you do this, please label the post at the start as Calque so people don't get confused about your path of adopting/loaning.

Last Time...

ņosiațo by /u/FreeRandomScribble

muçkrusikamak - [mʉʂ.^(k)ʀ̥ʉ.si.qɑ.mɑq]
n. Lit: War of/for Horses

Comes from: mucuku-țu-krusikamak • war-GEN-horse

An antiquity-esqu board game I’m working on; on a 4x8 grid with four out of 6 pieces in play at any time, objective is to steal your opponent’s horses through 4 successful thefts, getting all your pieces to their side, or eliminating them.

Take care of yourselves!

Peace, Love, & Conlanging ❤️

Say in the proto language, you marked case with prepositions, so “to” would evolve into the accusative case and “with” evolves into the instrumental case. Say articles began being used after the prepositions but before the preposition fused with anything. That means nouns back then were formed with article+preposition+noun, so saying cow in the accusative case would be “ko te peda” (the to cow). Say now the case marker gets suffixed to the article, making it “kote peda”. The last vowel of the article gets lost, making “kot peda”. Now, say the article fused with the noun to become “kotpeda”. Maybe the “p” is lost, making “koteda” a definite cow in the accusative case. Say in the instrumental case it evolved from “ko ki peda” to “koki peda” to “kok peda” to “kokpeda” to “kokeda”. Now the two ways of saying it are “koteda” and “kopeda”, would this be considered infixing if the unmarked was “ko’eda”?

Credit: Concleror

Teleon is a collaborative worldbuilding project set in a realistic world in a modern-day setting. Despite this, there are significant differences from Earth—in geopolitics, history, culture, and language. There is room for all types of niches, from conlanging to religionbuilding to history. You don't necessarily need to own a nation to join—we have collaborative projects where people can collaborate on different aspects of a multi-country region.

Regarding conlanging, we are looking for a posteriori and a priori conlangers. Some collaborative concept ideas that have floated around include

• An entire language family of Hittite-descended languages similar to the Romance languages
• A Sumerian-descendant as a traditional language of a Jewish-like religious group
• A maritime civilization based on the Dene-Yeniseian connection

Of course, everything is a work in progress, and nothing is set in stone. We welcome completely novel conlangs and concultures. We need new ideas more than ever; if you want to shape the central ideas and narratives of this world, now is your chance.

Much of our activity occurs on our Discord server.

Why am I doing this to myself this was just supposed to be a naming language.

Kaliki is a polysynthetic language, with composite words constructed from a set of component words consisting of a consonant followed by a vowel or a mandibular consonant followed by a consonant and vowel. (MCV words typically relate to word with the same CV but this is not required). The rules for construction of composite words in order to establish meaning uses both word order and tonal structure of component monosyllabic component words. The tones have no inherent effect on the meaning of a word. Na (high), Na (low), Na (rising) are all the same word.

Kaliki recognizes 5 tones: High, low, middle, rising and falling. And 4 types of agreement: Agreement, Disagreement, non-agreement and Lack-of-agreement.

The tonal agreement structure is:

High and low are in disagreement, as are Rising and falling.

Component words in Middle tone is always considered to be in lack of agreement with all other component words.

Component words in any other tone are considered to be in agreement with other component words in the same tone.

High/low are in lack-of-agree agreement with rising/falling unless non-agreement is established.

Non-agreement is established by following tone parings: Rising->Low, Falling->High, High->Rising, Low->Falling, non-agreement persists into new other composite words until an lack of agreement between the pair is reestablished by the reverse pairing.

I.E. A composite word with a component word in Rising followed immediately by a component word in Low would establish non-agreement between all Rising and Low component words until Low->Rising is used then Rising and Low and returned to lack of agreement.

Rules for non-agreement establishment:

Non-agreement is only established between the specific pair of tones (Rising->Low only effect the relationship between Rising and Low, not Rising and High or any other pairing).

The non-agreement acts establish non-agreement between the tones, not the component words. Most assume non-agreement to exist in the construction of the composite word that establishes the non-agreement relationship if this would change the meaning of the composite word.

Establishment of Non-agreement only happens within a composite word (a composite ending in (rising) followed by a new composite starting in (low) would not establish non-agreement).

Non-agreement can also be considered 'cleared' by context. Generally moving to a new subject is considered to clear all non-agreement.

The definite article Ke is an exception to this structure, with initial agreement between Ke and the following component word establishing the tone of Ke as meaning the composite phrase until 'cleared'

For Example: If a phrase that would be translated as "The devise I have been working on today" was spoken with Ke(high) followed by (high) then Ke(high) would be understood to meaning that particular devise.

Adding the Hard Rattle mandibular consonant before a Ke with an established tonal tag is considered to 'clear' that meaning. To follow the last example (HR)Ke(high) would indicated that Ke(high) no longer indicated that particular devise.

While technically non-grammatical, it is common practice to use the addition of a Hard-Rattle mandibular consonant before a different component word without a mandibular consonant is considered to 'clear' all non-agreement established with that tone. The Hard-rattles are extremely rare in modern Kaliki, so component word would be understood to only consists of the consonant and vowel.

While this practice is common, doing so this twice in a row to 'clear' all non-agreement is considered to be poor speaking, and the use of the hard-rattle before a word with a mandibular consonant to indicated full clearing is considered very crude.

An example of Tonal agreement in constructing.

"Ke(CH)rinekine" could be a single composite word consisting of the component words: Ke=the, (FB)Ri=present/now, Ne=work/act, Ki=good.

But this word would have be very unclear without tonal structure. It could mean "the present good work" "the good time for work" or "do it now"

If presented with the following tonal structure: Ke(high)(FB)Ri(rising)Ne(mid)ki(low)ne(low)

It would mean "the present good work", or something similar. However, if the Ke(high) had been tagged as in the example, and non-agreement established between Rising and low this would unambiguously mean:

I have just finished fixing the devise that I have been working on.

(edited to be consistent in using the notation of mandibular consonants and trying to apply the half finished rules properly.)

1. Onsets

/

2. Rimes (P: Bilabials, T: Dentals, S: Sibilants, K: Velars, Ø: Laryngeals)

2.1. Vowel-final rimes(Qieyun)

/

2.1. Rimes ending in a palatal glide

/

2.2. Rimes ending in a labial glide

/

2.3. Rimes with coda m

/

2.4. Rimes with coda n

/

2.5. Rimes with coda ŋ

/

2.6. Rimes with coda p

/

2.7. Rimes with coda t

/

2.8. Rimes with coda k

/

3. Tones

/

4. Examples

4.1. Numbers
Number - Chinese character - Middle Chinese - Mandarin Chinese - Han-o-eum - Wa-go-on

0 - 零 - leng - líng - 령 [ɾjʌŋ˨] - らゃん [ɾjàɴ]

1 - 一 - ʔjit - yī - ·일 [il˦] - いっ [íʔ]

2 - 二 - nyijH - èr - :이 [i˨˦] - にー [ɲí]

3 - 三 - sam - sān - 삼 [sʰam] - さん [sàɴ]

4 - 四 - sijH - sì - :스 [sʰɯ˨˦] - しー [ɕí]

5 - 五 - nguX - wǔ - :오 [o˨˦] - ごー [gó]

6 - 六 - ljuwk - liù - ·륙 [ɾjuk̚˦] - りっ [ɾíʔ]

7 - 七 - tshit - qī - ·칠 [tɕʰil˦] - ちっ [tɕíʔ]

8 - 八 - peat - bā - ·팔 [pʰal˦] - ぺっ [péʔ]

9 - 九 - kjuwX - jiǔ - :구 [ku˨˦] - くー [kú]

10 - 十 - dzyip - shí - ·씹 [ɕ͈ip̚˦] - じっ [ʑíʔ]

100 - 百 - paek - bǎi - ·벡 [pek̚˦] - ぴゃっ [pjáʔ]

1,000 - 千 - tshen - qiān - 쳔 [tɕʰjʌn˨] - つぇん [tseɴ]

10,000 - 萬 - mjonH - wàn - :만 [man˨˦] - もんー [móɴ]

100,000,000 - 億 - 'ik - yì - ·억 [ʌk̚˦] - よっ [jóʔ]

1,000,000,000,000 - 兆 - drjewX - zhào - :뚀 [t͈jo˨˦] - でぅー [déw]

/
4.2. Poem - Bring in the Wine, by Li bai 將進酒, 李白 ( 쟝 :진 :쥬 :리 ·뻭 [tɕjaŋ˨ tɕin˨˦ tɕju˨˦ ɾi˨˦ p͈ek̚˦], ちゃんちんーちゅー りーびゃっ [tɕaɴ tɕín tɕú ɾí bjáʔ])

君不見，黃河之水天上來，奔流到海不復回。

군 ·불 :견, 황 하 지 :슈 텬 :썅 레, 분 류 :도 :헤 ·불 ·뽁 회.

[kun˨ pul˦ kjʌn˨˦ hwaŋ˨ ha˨ tɕi˨ ɕʰu˨˦ tʰjʌn˨ ɕ͈aŋ˨˦ ɾe˨ pun˨ ɾju˨ to˨˦ he˨˦ pul˦ p͈ok̚˦ h(ø ~we) ]

くんぷっけんー、ふゎんはちすゐーてんじゃんーらぃ、 ぽんるたぅーはぃーぷっぶっふゎぃ。

/kùɴ púʔ kéɴ ɸàɴ hà tɕì swí tèɴ ʑáɴ ràj pòɴ ɾù táw háj púʔ búʔ ɸàj/

Have you not seen - that the waters of the Yellow River come from upon Heaven, surging into the ocean, never to return again;

君不見，高堂明鏡悲白髮，朝如青絲暮成雪。

군 ·불 :견, 고 땅 명 :경 비 ·뻭 ·벌, 됴 여 쳥 스 :모 쎵 ·셜.

[kun˨ pul˦ kjʌn˨˦ ko˨ t͈aŋ˨ mjʌŋ˨ kjʌŋ˨˦ pi˨ p͈ek̚˦ pʌl˦ tjo˨ jʌ˨ ʨʰjʌŋ˨ sʰɯ˨ mo˨˦ ɕ͈ʌŋ˨ ɕʰʌl˦]

くんぷっけんー、かぅだんみゃんきゃんーぴびゃっぽっ、てぅにょちゃんしもーじゃんせっ。

/kùɴ púʔ kéɴ kàw dàɴ mjàɴ kjáɴ pì bjáʔ póʔ tèw ɲò ʨàɴ ɕì mó ʑàɴ séʔ/

Have you not seen - in great halls' bright mirrors, they grieve over white hair, at dawn like black threads, by evening becoming snow.

人生得意須盡歡，莫使金樽空對月。

인 셍 ·득 :의 슈 찐 환, ·막 :스 금 존 콩 :되 ·월.

[in˨ sʰeŋ˨ tɯk̚˦ (ɰi ~ e)˨˦ ɕʰu˨ ʨ͈in˨ hwan˨ mak̚˦ sʰɯ˨˦ kɯm˨ ʨon˨ kʰoŋ˨ t(ø ~we)˨˦ wʌl˦ ]

にんしゃんとっいーすぢんふゎん、まっしーこんつぉんこんたぃーぐゑっ。

/ɲìɴ ɕàɴ tóʔ í sù (d)ʑìɴ ɸàɴ máʔ ɕí kòɴ tsòɴ kòɴ táj gwéʔ/
In human life, accomplishment must bring total joy, do not allow an empty goblet to face the moon.

天生我材必有用，千金散盡還復來。
텬 셍 :아 쩨 ·빌 :우 :용, 쳔 금 :산 찐 환 ·뽁 레.

[tʰjʌn˨ sʰeŋ˨ a˨˦ ʨ͈e˨ pil˦ u˨˦ joŋ˨˦ ʨʰjʌn˨ kɯm˨ sʰan˨˦ ʨ͈in˨ hwan˨ p͈ok̚˦ ɾe˨]

てんしゃんがーづぁぃぴっうーよんー、 つぇんこんさんーぢんふゑんぶっらぃ。

/tèɴ ɕàɴ gá (d)zàj píʔ ú jóɴ tsèɴ kòɴ sáɴ (d)ʑìɴ ɸèɴ búʔ ɾàj/

Heaven made me - my abilities must have a purpose; I spend a thousand gold pieces completely, but they'll come back again.

烹羊宰牛且爲樂，會須一飲三百杯。

펭 양 :제 우 :챠 위 ·락, :회 슈 ·일 :음 삼 ·벡 베.

[pʰeŋ˨ jaŋ˨ ʨe˨˦ u˨ ʨʰja˨˦ (y ~ wi)˨ ɾak̚˦ h(ø ~we)˨˦ ɕʰu˨ il˦ ɯm˨˦ sʰam˨ pek̚˦ pe˨]

ぴゃんやんつぁぃーぐちゃーゐらっ、ふゎぃーすいっおんーさんぴゃっぱぃ。

/pjàɴ jàɴ tsáj gù ʨá wì ɾáʔ ɸáj sù íʔ óɴ sàɴ pjáʔ pàj/
Boil a lamb, butcher an ox - now we shall be joyous; we must drink three hundred cups all at once!

岑夫子，丹丘生，將進酒，杯莫停。

찜 부 :즈, 단 쿠 셍, 쟝 :진 :쥬, 베 ·막 뎡.

[ʨ͈im˨ pu˨ ʨɯ˨˦ tan˨ kʰu˨ sʰeŋ˨ ʨjaŋ˨ ʨin˨˦ ʨju˨˦ pe˨ mak̚˦ tjʌŋ˨]

ぢんぷちー、たんくしゃん、ちゃんちんーちゅー、ぱぃまっでゃん。

/(d)ʑìɴ pù ʨí tàɴ kù ɕàɴ ʨàɴ ʨíɴ ʨú pàj máʔ djàɴ/
Master Cen, Dan Qiusheng, bring in the wine! - the cups must not stop!

與君歌一曲，請君爲我傾耳聽。

:여 군 가 ·일 ·콕, :쳥 군 위 :아 켱 :이 텽.

[jʌ˨˦ kun˨ ka˨ il˦ kʰok̚˦ ʨʰjʌŋ˨˦ kun˨ (y ~ wi)˨ a˨˦ kʰjʌŋ˨ i˨˦ tʰjʌŋ˨]

よーくんかいっきょっ、 ちゃんーくんゐがーくゐゃんにーてゃん。

/jó kùɴ kà íʔ kjóʔ ʨáɴ kùɴ wì gá kwiàɴ ɲí tjàɴ/
I'll sing you a song - I ask that you lend me your ears.

鐘鼓饌玉不足貴，但願長醉不復醒。

죵 :고 :쫜 ·옥 ·불 ·죡 :귀, :딴 :원 땽 :쥐 ·불 ·뽁 :셩.

[ʨjoŋ˨ ko˨˦ ʨ͈wan˨˦ ok̚˦ pul˦ ʨjok̚˦ k(y ~wi)˨˦ t͈an˨˦ wʌn˨˦ t͈jaŋ˨ ʨ(y ~ wi)˨˦ pul˦ p͈ok̚˦ ɕʰʌŋ˨˦]

ちょんこーづぇんーぎょっぷっちょっくゐー、だんーぐゑんーでゃんつゐーぷっぶっしゃんー。\

/ʨòɴ kó (d)zéɴ gjóʔ púʔ ʨóʔ kwí dáɴ gwéɴ djàɴ tswí púʔ búʔ ɕáɴ/
Bells, drums, delicacies, jade - they are not fine enough; I only wish to be forever drunk and never sober again.

古來聖賢皆寂寞，惟有飲者留其名。

:고 레 :셩 현 개 ·쪅 ·막, 유 :우 :음 :쟈 류 끠 명.

[ko˨˦ ɾe˨ ɕʰʌŋ˨˦ hjʌn˨ k(ɛ ~e)˨ ʨ͈jʌk̚˦ mak̚˦ ju˨ u˨˦ ɯm˨˦ ʨja˦ ɾju˨ k͈(ɰi ~ e)˨ mjʌŋ˨]

こーらぃしゃんーへんけぢゃっまっ、ゐうーおんーちゃーるぎみゃん。

/kó ɾàj ɕáɴ hèɴ kè (d)ʑáʔ máʔ wì ú óɴ ʨá ɾù gì mjàɴ/
Since ancient times, sages have all been solitary; only a drinker can leave his name behind!

陳王昔時宴平樂，斗酒十千恣歡謔。

띤 왕 ·셕 씨 :연 뼝 ·락, :두 :쥬 ·씹 쳔 :즈 환 ·학.

[t͈in˨ waŋ˨ ɕʰʌk̚˦ ɕ͈i˨ jʌn˨˦ p͈jʌŋ˨ ɾak̚˦ tu˨˦ ʨju˨˦ ɕ͈ip̚˦ ʨʰjʌn˨ ʨɯ˨˦ hwan˨ hak̚˦]

でぃんわんしゃっじえんーびゃんらっ、とぅーちゅーじっつぇんちーふゎんひゃっ。

/dìɴ wàɴ ɕáʔ ʑì éɴ pjàɴ ɾáʔ tóː ʨú ʑíʔ tsèɴ ʨí ɸàɴ hjáʔ/
The Prince of Chen, in times past, held feasts at Pingle; ten thousand cups of wine - abandon restraint and be merry!

主人何爲言少錢，徑須沽取對君酌。

:쥬 인 하 :위 언 :쇼 쪈, :경 슈 고 :츄 :되 군 ·작.

[ʨju˨˦ in˨ ha˨ (y ~ wi)˨˦ ʌn˨ ɕʰo˨˦ ʨ͈jʌn˨ kjʌŋ˨˦ ɕʰu˨ ko˨ ʨʰju˨˦ t(ø ~we)˨˦ kun˨ ʨak̚˦]

つーにんはゐーごんせぅーづぇん、きゃんーすこつーたぃーくんちゃっ。

/tsú ɲìɴ hà wí gòɴ séw (d)zèɴ kjáɴ sù kò tsú táj kùɴ ʨáʔ/

Why would a host speak of having little money? - you must go straight and buy it - I'll drink it with you!

五花馬，千金裘，呼兒將出換美酒，與爾同銷萬古愁。

:오 화 :마, 쳔 금 꾸, 호 이 쟝 ·츌 :환 :미 :쥬, :여 :이 똥 쇼 :만 :고 쮸.

[o˨˦ hwa˨ ma˨˦ ʨʰjʌn˨ kɯm˨ k͈u˨ ho˨ i˨ ʨjaŋ˨ ʨʰjul˦ hwan˨˦ mi˨˦ ʨju˨˦ jʌ˨˦ i˨˦ t͈oŋ˨ ɕʰo˨ man˨˦ ko˨˦ ʨ͈ju˨]

ごーふゑめー、つぇんこんぐ、 ほにちゃんちゅっふゎんーみーちゅー、よーにーどんせぅもんーこーぢゅ。

/gó ɸè mé tsèɴ kòɴ gù hò nì ʨàɴ ʨúʔ ɸáɴ mí ʨú jó ɲí dòɴ sèw móɴ kó (d)ʑù/

My lovely horse, my furs worth a thousand gold pieces, call the boy and have him take them to be swapped for fine wine, and together with you I'll wipe out the cares of ten thousand ages.

/

References:

https://oldhangul.kro.kr/dongkukdict/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Japanese_vocabulary

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Xenic_vocabularies

https://eastasiastudent.net/china/classical/li-bai-jiang-jin-jiu/

I know it sounds really weird. It just hit me, so I don't have much development. It'd be a written language, because colors can't be spoken, too. So, you could have one color, say red, that's at the beginning of your sentences (essentially just long and elaborate chains of colors) that immediately means your sentence is set in past tense. "James went to the store" would be red > and then whatever other colors. The shade would determine just how long ago. "James went to the store 5 minutes ago"'s red would look different than "James went to the store 3 days ago"'s red. Nouns and verbs would be determined by a color, and then other colors to specify said noun/verb further so people know what the word is.

Now, I don't think this would be all too practical, mainly because it would look like a mess of colors and nothing more, but also because you'd have so much trouble trying to explain that Cameron ran away from 86 sentient Roombas inside of a Walmart without actual words. But it could be refined a bit. What do you guys think? Feedback's well appreciated.

Hi! I just wanted to ask y'all how you guys handle proper nouns in lexicons. Do you add it in at all? I am debating whether I want some of the character names in there, though for sure I am including the roots that derived these names.

Also, I am a little bit confused about the general stances on dictionaries vs lexicons among more seasoned conlangers. While I seen posts that it's not a good idea to format it like a dictionary (where multiple meaning is given under each word's entry), it's also how I've seen some people organize their lexicons. Frankly, I am unsure if there's any difference between dictionaries and lexicons. Essentially, I am asking how y'all organize your homographs, like bank (money place) vs bank (riverside). Would you write two entries? Or one entry with two meanings separated by a semicolon or something?

Anyways, I'm excited to be here. I am quite new to conlanging, but I do study lingusitics in uni, so I'm aware of some technical terms even though I have zero experience in conlanging. Thanks for the help :D

A small video for an even smaller conlang! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsIvMYO63Bw&t=1s

(Also, tuki tiki is communist.)

So, I guess, to start, I haven't done any language construction in around 3 years. I recently thought about my last project and thought to dust the cobwebs off it. When I went to do that, I found that I'd lost most of the notes for it. I've since recovered a significant portion of those notes. Some of it seems fairly incomplete to me. Some of it has me scratching my head and wondering what I was thinking.

I have notes for phoneme inventory at various eras of the language. I am almost certain that the classical and proto stages of the language were back worked evolutions, because every time I've tried diachrony, I stopped, felt inadequate to the task, or was just frustrated with the process.

Now, I have a couple things going on in my head. One: I would like to work more on this project and make it at least a minimally viable* thing. Two: I'm not sure if I should just pick up where I left off, or use the material I have to try my hand at diachrony again. Three: I kind of want to try my hand at diachrony again, whether it's with this project or another one. Four: I don't necessarily need as much as a minimally viable product out of a classical or early version of the language, but I would like at least sound evolution trail that I can use for snippet examples.

*minimally viable in this case means I could reasonably write out day to day conversation in the language (even if I have to coin a couple new terms to complete said conversation), tell at least two stories with the language, and produce examples of some conculture specific utterances in the language.

So, you know how “the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog” is English's pangram? What's your conlang's pangram? [include sentence written in original script, romanized script, gloss, IPA, and English translation pls]

So my conlang Zhastri has multiple 'possessive' cases/modes (sorry not aware of the correct word). I'm in need of terminology to refer to them for glossing purposes. These are

First is 'perpossessive', marked by the terminal particle -ga. This is used for things not merely possessed by, but mastered and controlled. There's a lot of nuance to how this is used, but in summary, the higher the animacy, the bigger the hubris for using "-ga". In some contexts omitting it is a bigger faux pas; a leader would be cold and detached for not saying "myega bevniki" (my followers, my "boys"), a boisterous youth would be teased by his friends (and perhaps upset his woman) for not saying "myega kocinka" (my girl, my bitch).

"myoga maroni" - our lords - [royal our] loyal vassals

Second is 'plain possessive', marked by "-de". This is widely used for anything that is associated to the subject: held, worn, placed nearby, intended use, owned, inherently possessed etc. Distinctions between things like "the clothes I am wearing" and "the clothes I own" are made by additional context words:

"ta hyade lakani" - now his clothes - what he is now wearing
"hyade ucini lakani" - his home(inessive) clothes - the clothes he owns
"hyade ucide lakani" his home(associated-with) clothes - the clothes he wears when he's home. "myode maroni" - our lords - our betters, the nobility in general

The third, 'humble possessive', is marked by "-no". It is used in reverence about things one is honoured by having the grace to be associated with. It's almost exclusively used of persons like cherished spouses, leaders, and rulers; physical locations like hometowns and countries, and social locations like religions and organisations.

"myeno okyanik" - my esteemed guest
"Karimi'no yudi" - the noble homelands of the Karimi
"myono maron" - our lord - "my lord" (spoken by one servant, using humble 1. person plural)

Poem in töcinna:
me zo mogo.
me viyiyye palla.
pimaye tassa lukun peme.
zallaye kin suna ipilince peme.
töcinseunte, sina ann izenna peme venso.
teppimayente pogayemte ann itelöyente. pemente, ann iay peme.
tiyye la pimaye lun.

Gloss:
1.NOM.SG PASS eat
1.NOM.SG must destroy black.NOM fill LOC.soul
GEN.1.SG nobody.NOM ABIL know ACC.suffering GEN.1.SG
poetry.VOC.PL , 2.NOM.SG COP ACC.friend.SG GEN.1.SG only
ink.NOM.PL DEM.DIST.NOM.PL COP ACC.blood.PL GEN.1.PL, COP NOM.life.SG GEN.1.SG
forever LA black.NOM.SG LOC.COP

Poem in toki pona:

ijo li moku e mi.
mi wile pakala.
pimeja li tawa insa kon mi.
jan ala li ken sona e pilin ike mi.
toki musi o, sina jan pona mi wan taso.
telo pimeja ni li telo loje mi, li ale mi.
tenpo ale la pimeja li lon.
wan taso.

In English:

I am devoured.
I must destroy.
Darkness fills my soul. No one can understand my suffering.
O poetry! My only friend.
This ink is my blood, is my life.
And Darkness shall reign forevermore.

Taribit Language

Alphabet:

• a, b, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, m, n, o, p, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z
• ç
• ḥ
• q
• ɣ
• š

Pronunciation:

• ç: Like Arabic ‘ع’, deep guttural sound
• ḥ: Strong "h" sound, as in arabic "ح"
• q: Deep "k" sound, as in arabic "ق"
• ɣ: Like the French "r" or arabic "غ"
• š: sound as in English "sh" or arabic "ش"
• r: as in arabic "ر"

Grammar:

• Pronouns:

  • Me = ni
  • You (singular) = šo
  • Him/Her = ta/ši
  • We = nou
  • They = to
  • It (neutral) = i
  • Us = ninu
  • Them = tonu

• Articles:

  • The (neutral nouns) = di
  • That = had
  • Which = šmin

• Verbs (Conjugation):

  • Present: qa
  • Future: ɣa
  • Past: ḥa
  • To Eat = ak
  • To Run = ran
  • To Help = asso
  • To Speak = tar
  • To See = tem
  • To Drink = sekk

• Verb Negation:

  • To negate a verb, use ma before the verb.
    Example: ma ran (I don't run)

Sentence Structure:

• Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) is the default sentence structure. Example: Ni ran aman (I drink water)

• To form questions:

  • Add laš for "why" at the beginning of the sentence. Example: Laš šo sekk aman? (Why do I drink water?)
  • Add šmin for "which." Example: Šmin atma? (Which tree?)

• To form negative sentences:

  • Add ma before the verb to negate. Example: Ma sekk aman. (I don't drink water.)

Vocabulary:

• Time:

  • Morning = mori
  • Afternoon = šimo
  • Night = anu
  • Week = asu
  • Month = maḥid
  • Year = san

• Basic Nouns:

  • Mother = yami
  • Brother = sami
  • House = taddart
  • Water = aman
  • Sun = yuk
  • Earth = šatra
  • Sky = iwad
  • Tree = atma
  • City = wadrak
  • Mountain = ammuz
  • Friend = awri
  • Family = akwad

• Pronouns and Possessive Pronouns:

  • I = ni
  • You (singular) = šo
  • He/She = ta/ši
  • We = nou
  • They = to
  • It = i
  • Us = ninu
  • Them = tonu

Prepositions:

• In = fi
• On = çla
• Under = taḥt
• Near = zwi
• Far = baɣ
• To = ɣla
• From = min
• Before = qal
• After = bad
• During = çand
• Until = ḥat
• Without = bala
• Through = amouk
• Inside of = al dokal
• On the side of = ala janib
• As = si
• Like = kama
• Than = min
• For (purpose) = li

Expressing Emotions:

• Happy = ayqi
• Sad = biqa
• Excited = wafid
• Angry = zed

Compound Words:

• yami + awri (mother + friend) = yamiwri (mom's friend)

Tense and Aspect System:

• Present: qa
• Future: ɣa
• Past: ḥa

Word Formation:

• Prefix ta-: To become (e.g., taḥmida = to become big)
• Prefix da-: Agents (e.g., darani = runner, daʕiso = helper)

Example Sentences:

• Ni sakk aman. (I drink water.)
• Šo ḥa sakk aman? (Did you drink water?)
• Ni ma sakk aman. (I don't drink water.)
• Laš ni sakk aman? (Why do I drink water?)
• Šmin aman? (Which water?)

Hello guys! After a break of 2-3 months and I'm slowly coming back to conlang. During my break, I was browsing here for some reference and I came across a post saying their conlang doesn't sound natural [which I've made a post like this here too]. I always thought my conglags didn't sound natural and I found out why.

Someone [can't remember their name] said that the OP's language sounded like a machine gun, always with the same structure, just changing the sounds. I realized I had just one syllable structure: C(C)V

Now I've changed to (C)(C)(V)V(C). This diphtong already existed in form of:

a+e = aye
a+o = ayo

and so on.

My question is: how do I change the previous created words with the old structure? I want to update some old words into the new structure without redoing all over again. Do I have to pick some sounds or shift some letters to it? I'm a little lost

Exclamations are often fun to make. What are some of yours, and what are their origins? I'll go first:

Ladjepcehan

Oyvah (/ˈojvɐχ/) comes from the popular Jewish exclamation "oy vey," but a popular eggcorn has taken hold: ayvah (/ˈæjvɐχ/), because ay- is an adjective meaning "supreme" or "divine." Along with ayvah came the noun vah (/vaχ/), meaning something like "insanity" or "problem."

Another popular exclamation is ayrafja (/ˈʀafʒɐ/), which means something like "ultimate disaster" or "apocalypse." It comes from the previously mentioned ay-, combined with the noun rafja (/ˈʀafʒɐ/), which means "storm" or "disaster."

I have a language, Classical Quthain, that I want to evolve to the next historical era. Thinking about the history and culture of the region, I thought it would make sense and be cool to do a diglossia. My thought is that High Middle Quthain, which would be the written and spoken form of the elites, would hew closer to the Classical language. And then Low Middle Quthain, which would be more widespread as a spoken language but have less written expression, would be more divergent. Does anyone have any experience with conlanging a diglossia? Any advice?

This is a weekly thread for people who have cool things they want to share from their languages, but don't want to make a whole post. It can also function as a resource for future conlangers who are looking for cool things to add!

So, what cool things have you added (or do you plan to add soon)?

I've also written up some brainstorming tips for conlang features if you'd like additional inspiration. Also here’s my article on using conlangs as a cognitive framework (can be useful for embedding your conculture into the language).

Often, we come here to this forum to seek advice or inspiration. We ask questions and finally find answers to solve a problem or dilemma in our conlang.

So, how did you choose to solve that problem, then?

Post a link to a recent question of yours, and tell us what you eventually decided to do.

Karbakh is a language isolate spoken in the Central Asian Federal Republic, written in both the Karbakh script as well as a standard romanization system.

https://reddit.com/link/1if0bam/video/q1plfgpi0hge1/player

Gloss, IPA, pluss some other info: https://tinyurl.com/3vjvk6ph

This is a game of borrowing and loaning words! To give our conlangs a more naturalistic flair, this game can help us get realistic loans into our language by giving us an artificial-ish "world" to pull words from!

The Telephone Game will be posted every Monday and Friday, hopefully.

Rules

1. Post a word in your language, with IPA and a definition.

Note: try to show your word inflected, as it would appear in a typical sentence. This can be the source of many interesting borrowings in natlangs (like how so many Arabic words were borrowed with the definite article fossilized onto it! algebra, alcohol, etc.)

2. Respond to a post by adapting the word to your language's phonology, and consider shifting the meaning of the word a bit!

3. Sometimes, you may see an interesting phrase or construction in a language. Instead of adopting the word as a loan word, you are welcome to calque the phrase -- for example, taking skyscraper by using your language's native words for sky and scraper. If you do this, please label the post at the start as Calque so people don't get confused about your path of adopting/loaning.

Last Time...

Mrakwëli Jadi by /u/Runninglikeaturtle

Rupljen - to cry, Rupljë - cries, ruplii - crying.

Tli ruplii gëdë mizki.

[t͡ɬi ruplʲiː ɣəðə mit͡ski]

3.POSS. Cry-NOUN. have-PRS. reason-NOUN

His crying has (a) reason.

Take care of yourselves!

Peace, Love, & Conlanging ❤️

Guys, my conlang - as most of all others aren't in kyrillic script, but latin script.
And im thinking anyways to do an same lvl script, like the serbs do

But that lead me to one question:

Why don't YOU use it? Im just curious about it, i mean it looks nice

https://preview.redd.it/6c8baavxrdge1.png?width=166&format=png&auto=webp&s=b0da79bae7d68cd23a3ae2ce6446caa687f9c4f9

During a few minutes of rest in their time in Narnia, Polly and Diggory thought to teach Frank and Helen a few words in Latin; specifically those related to royalty and war (because really, what else is there to know for Latin?).

Upon Frank and Helen’s coronation, they thought that Latin sounded rather regal to them; coming from lower-class backgrounds, they wouldn’t have been given the privileges of Latin classes. From their perspective then, Latin was a sign of middle/upper class education, so they tried to use it in court as much as possible.

However, some words were misheard or forgotten. Summus, for example (Latin: High) was misheard as Semmus, which turned into Semus, which turned into Tsemuts, which turned into Tsehwemuts.

Some of the Talking Animals in court found it hard to pronounce the trilled ‘R’ and the lateral approximate ‘L’ sound, turning into a ‘w’ instead. This adapted labialization slowly became part of the language itself; most of the consonants are labialized, but still keep the trilled ‘R’. In the same vein, Latin loanwords from Greek that had ‘x’ in them were softened to ‘ts’, which merged with ‘s’ (Hence why it’s Tsehwemuts, and not Sehwemus). The phoneme ‘h’ eventually split into two: ‘h’, and ‘x’.

As the years progressed, these changes and adaptions, along with some influences from English, turned it from a sort of Latin/English creole into a language in of itself.

Phonemes:

High Narnian also has its ‘lower class’ equivalent: Low Narnian. When Frank and Helen’s children married ‘commoners’ to expand the family, High Narnian was passed down second-hand from spouse to children to grandchildren. This created a sort of pidgin, which turned into a High Narnian/English creole, which itself turned into Low Narnian as it is today. There are also some High Narnian loanwords, which emerged after Peter and Edmund started on a project to make High Narnian more widespread- a project that eventually failed upon their disappearance.

To most outsiders, High Narnian sounded like the waves of the sea, while the Pevensie’s thought that Low Narnian sounded more like rocks falling, or in the case of Lucy, like waves crashing against a cliff.

High Narnian kept Latin’s SOV order, and most words are influenced by Latin (with some being influenced by English as well as certain words that were influenced by Greek). Basically, it’s a sort of thought experiment into what would happen if you left Latin and English alone in another world for some-thousand years.

https://preview.redd.it/rcv3zzc8sdge1.png?width=301&format=png&auto=webp&s=15b570dd25aa0d2a99889519f4094f7395d10287

The unfortunate part of this is that the Pevensie’s disappearance the first time heralded the end of both High and Low Narnian. While their children did take their seats at Cair Paravel, some transitions were made to other parts of Narnia that left key scriptures of High Narnian behind at Cair Paravel. By the time Caspian I took over the lands, both languages were already falling out of use, and quickly became endangered under the Telemarine’s regime. When Caspian X was born, only few Low Narnian speakers remained of the populace- High Narnian had already gone extinct. When Miraz banned Low Narnian from being spoken by his subjects, Low Narnian quickly followed become a dead language as well.

https://preview.redd.it/4sbcn6z6sdge1.png?width=393&format=png&auto=webp&s=9255fa5a2cf03f23cdbc430ef43b29b7dca531c8

(Explanation to come in the neography subreddit on the script)

Reposted to fix formatting issues.