Ciètian

Ciètian/Lexicon
Ciètian/Swadesh list
Ciètian/Names

Ciètian
Created by	User:IlL
Setting	Verse:Tricin
Native speakers	100 million L1 speakers (300 million L2 speakers) (fT 1670dd (2676))
Language family	Quihum Talmic Thensaric Old Eevo Ciètian
Language codes
ISO 639-3	qtg

Ciètian (a g:ghâħ h-Anvyru /ə ɣaːħ ˈhanvɨɹu/) is a Talmic language (in the subbranch of Tigolic, which also includes Eevo) somewhat inspired by Irish. On the planet of Tricin (Ciètian: a Smòch /ə smɔːx/), it is an analogue of German in terms of influence and grammar. Ciètian is the official language of Anvyr. Ciètian is the second-largest Talmic language in terms of number of speakers. Like most modern Talmic languages, Ciètian is a descendant of Thensarian. It is spoken on the northwest coast of the continent of Etalocin (called Eħa /ˈɛħə/ in Ciètian) on the planet of Clotricin. Thanks in large part to the printing press, Modern Ciètian rapidly gained prominence over a larger area in Northern Talma and came to serve as a lingua franca for northern mainland Talma. Today, Ciètian still enjoys status as a "cultured" language and is one of the most widely taught foreign languages.

This language began as Tíogall, which was a thought experiment posing the question "What would Irish look like with umlaut instead of palatalization?". For a while it developed as an Irish-German hybrid. At one point I decided to remove all "giblangs" from modern Tricin, or languages with the aesthetics of one natlang (unless the premise was funny, like Bhadhagha or Clofabosin). Since Tíogall was basically an Irish with German characteristics, it was abandoned. I still decided that Talmic languages needed somewhat more internal diversity (in particular, a "German" analogue to Eevo's "English"), so I decided to revive this project. Since I don't want a German analogue to be so obviously Hiberno-German, this time I'm eschewing obviously German features in the aesthetic such as front rounded vowels, and I'm trying a somewhat Old English and West Slavic (particularly Czech and Sorbian) aesthetic. Also grammar-wise, while keeping a somewhat Celtic grammar (e.g. mutations, head-initial syntax), I'm playing with decidedly non-Celtic grammatical features such as split-ergativity (which was in my original Tíogall), and a singulative-collective-plurative system, and an imperfective-perfective aspectual distinction.

Todo

• Should have had more dh's
• Single vs. double negatives: use both, do something weird
• Vdh > lowered vowels - a source of /ɛ: ɔ:/ in addition to Old Eevo ae ao

Notes

Symbols

• ⁱ - i-umlaut
• ^L - lenition/aspiration
• ^N - eclipsis

Phonology

The following describes Ciètian as spoken in Râthanar.

Stress

In native words, primary stress usually falls on the first syllable, except for some inflected prepositions. In loans, stress may not be initial; in that case, vowels before the stressed syllable are not reduced.

Consonants

Ciètian has a relatively large consonant inventory.

Ciètian consonants

		Labial	Dental/Alveolar	Postalv.	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Pharyngeal	Glottal
Nasal		m /m/	n /n/		ṅ /ɲ/	ŋ /ŋ/
Stop	fortis	p /p/	t /t/			c /k/
	lenis	b /b/	d /d/			g /g/
Affricate	fortis		ts /ts/	ċ /tʃ/	tx /tɕ/
	lenis		dz /dz/	ġ /dʒ/	dx /dʑ/
Spirant	unvoiced	f /f/				ch /x/		ħ /ħ/
	voiced	v /v/				gh /ɣ/
Sibilant			s /s/	ṡ /ʂ/	x /ɕ/				h /h/
Liquid			r /ɹ/	ṙ /r̝/
Approximant		ł /w/			j, l /j/

Notes

• An initial /ʔ/ can be added to null initials (but is not mandatory).
• Voiceless stops are aspirated syllable-initially; voiced stops devoice after voiceless sounds.
• Ciètian has a form of Auslautverhärtung: voicing is neutralized for word-final stops but not word-final fricatives.
• /n, t, d/ are usually dental [n̪, t̪, d̪].
• /s/ is laminal alveolar [s].
• /ŋ, k, g/ are usually velar [ŋ, k, g], but are often labialized pharyngealized uvular [qʷ, qʷˁ, ɢʷˁ] next to /ʀ~ʟ/. /kʟ/ becomes an affricate or a trilled affricate [qχ].
• /ŋ, k, g, x, ɣ/ are prevelar before front vowels.
• In dialects and classical singing and drama, ł /w/ is pronounced as [ɫ] and l is a separate phoneme /lʲ/.
• After a vowel, /ɣ/ colloquially disappears with compensatory lengthening of the vowel if the vowel is short (unless the /ɣ/ begins a stressed syllable.)

Fortis and lenis resonants

Certain conservative accents and dialects preserve to varying degrees the Old Eevo distinction between fortis and lenis resonants: /l L n N r R/. In fact, the Tumacaimh dialect has:

• /l/ > /ʁᵝˤ/
• /L/ > /l̪ˠ/
• /n/ > /ð̞̃/
• /N/ > /n/
• /r/ > /ɹ/
• /R/ > /ɾ/

Mutations

Consonant mutations

Grapheme	m	p	b	f	t	d	s*	x	c	g	0
IPA	/m/	/p/	/b/	/f/	/t/	/d/	/s/	/ʃ/	/k/, /tʃ/	/g/, /dʒ/	/ ∅/
Lenited	v	f	v	h	ħ	0	h	-	ch	gh	h-
IPA	/v/	/f/	/v/	/h/	/ħ/	/∅/	/h/	/∅/	/x/, /ʃ/	/ɣ/, /j/	/h/
Eclipsed	-	b	m	v	d	n	-	-	g	ŋ	n-
IPA	-	/b/	/m/	/v/	/d/	/n/	/z/	-	/g/, /dʒ/	/ŋ/	/n/

^*The clusters written sp, st, sc do not mutate.

Vowels

Ciètian has a moderately large vowel system.

Ciètian vowels

	Front		Central		Back
	unrounded		unrounded	rounded	unrounded	rounded
	short	long	short	long	short	short	long
Close	i, y /ɪ/	î, ŷ /iː/		û, iû /ʉː/		u, iu /ʊ/	[uː]
Mid		ê, ø̂ /eː/	-a /ə/	ô, eô /ɵː/	[ɤˁ]		[oː]
Open-mid	e, ø /ɛ/	è, ø̀ /ɛː/				o, eo /ɔ/	ò, eò /ɔː/
Open			a, ea /a/	â, eâ /aː/

/ʉː, ɵː/ retain fully back allophones [uː, oː] before /ɹ/.

Phonotactics

Allowed initial clusters in roots (in native words), not counting clusters from initial mutations:

• bl br cl cn cr dl dr fl fr gl gn gr ml mn mr ŋl ŋr (pl) (pr) sc scl scr (sp) sl sm sn sñ sŋ sr st tn tl tr

Prosody

Ciètian has a distinctive intonation paradigm.

• In declarative sentences, the stressed syllable of the focus word (if there is no focused constituent, the last word) has a lower pitch than the immediately preceding syllable. ("...mid ꜜ LOW mid...") This originates from discursive uptalk in older forms of Ciètian, which has since generalized to all declarative sentences. A few accents, such as Tumacan accents, do not use this pattern.
• In interrogative sentences, the stressed syllable of the focus word has a higher pitch than the syllable immediately before. ("... mid ꜛ HIGH mid ... ?")
• In exclamations, the pattern is "... mid ꜜ LOW-HIGH mid ... !", possibly with a gradual drop to low pitch in the end. Angry or indignant questions also use an exclamatory intonation.

Dialectology

Ciètian is subject to a fair amount of accentual and dialectal variation.