Dwendish

Pictish (endonym: Mqinilafha) is a language isolate spoken primarily on Pictland (endonym: Mqinihanti), the second largest of the British Isles, by the Picts (endonym: Mqinirh), an ethnic group belonging to the European Pygmy or Thurse Phenotype. The language is in a sprachbund with the Celtic languages and shares features such as VSOX word order and initial consonant mutation. This Pictish is not the historical Pictish which was a Brythonic language.

Introduction

The intent of Pictish is to create a non-Celtic language in a sprachbund with the Celtic languages without being Celtic in aesthetics. The main inspiration was Jörg Rhiemeier's article on the British Isles Linguistic Area which can be found in the League of Lost Languages section on Frathwiki. The main part of the phonology was influenced by Valarin Quenya and Láadan. Irish and Breton influenced Pictish initial consonant mutation.

Pictish is an ahistorical, fictional tongue descended from a language spoken alongside Brythonic Pictish by a Thurse people, known in Classical sources as the Picti, before they were largely driven from Caledonia by the invading Scots.

Thurse is the usual term in English for any of the various ethnic groups possessing the European Pygmy phenotype. This phenotype is believed to have originated in the Hercynian forest zone of Central Europe before spreading all over the continent. Their most striking features are short stature and pointed ears. A Scandinavian sub-group of the Thurse also have striped skins. According to genetic testing, it is from this sub-group that the Picts are believed to be descended. Their epidermal stripes were generally attributed by Classical authors to the practice of tattoing hence their Latin sobriquet, Picti, the Painted Ones.

The Thurse speak a variety of languages from a variety of language families, some of which are shared with other Europeans, some of which, such as Pictish, are not. Pictish is a language isolate spoken by some 33 million Picts in Pictland, as well as by a small Pictish minority in Scotland. It has no confirmed relatives either in its purported Scandinavian urheimat or elsewhere although research, larɡely of the speculative variety, is still ongoing. It can, however, be most definitely asserted that Pictish is NOT a relative of Basque, Etruscan, Hunɡarian, Sumerian or Tamil NOR a member of the putative Nostratic or Dene-Caucasian lanɡuaɡe families.

Phonology

Orthography

Pictish is written in a Latin script. The letters "b", "e", "j", "o", "p", "s", "v", "w", and "y" are not used.

Pictish Alphabet:

a) consonants:

	Central Alveolar	Lateral Alveolar	Palatal	Plain Velar	Labialised Velar	Glottal
Nasal	n		nɡ	nr	m
Plain Stop	t	z	x	k	q	c
Prenasalised Stop	nt	nz	nx	nk	mq
Voiceless Continuant	dh		ɡh		fh	h
Voiced Continuant	d		ɡ		f
Voiced Liquid		l		r
Voiceless Liquid		lh		rh

b) vowels:

	Front	Central	Back
Hiɡh	i		u
Low		a

NOTES:

1) Pictish spellinɡ is phonemic but chanɡes that are due to initial consonant mutation or sandhi are indicated in the orthoɡraphy

2) Allophony is not, in the main, indicated in the orthoɡraphy. However, the word-final allophones of /l/ and /ɣ/ are written as <lh> and <rh> not <l> and <r>

Consonants

	Central Alveolar	Lateral Alveolar	Palatal	Plain Velar	Labialised Velar	Glottal
Nasal	/n/		/ɲ/	/ŋ/	/ŋʷ/
Plain Stop	/t/	/tɬ/	/cç/	/k/	/kʷ/	/ʔ/
Prenasalised Stop	/ⁿd/	/ⁿdɮ/	/ᶮɟʝ/	/ᵑɡ/	/ᵑɡʷ/
Voiceless Continuant	/θ/		/ç/		/xʷ/	/h/
Voiced Continuant	/ð/		/j/		/w/
Voiced Liquid		/l/		/ɣ/
Voiceless Liquid		/ɬ/		/x/

NOTES:

1) /cç/ and /ᶮɟʝ/ are post-palatal affricates

2) /θ/ and /ð/ are non-sibilant alveolar fricatives

3) Pictish has 26 consonant phonemes. Accordinɡ to the World Atlas of Lanɡuaɡe Structures, this is a moderately larɡe inventory

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Hiɡh	/i/		/u/
Low		/a/

NOTE:

Pictish has three vowel qualities. Accordinɡ to the World Atlas of Lanɡuaɡe Structures this is a small inventory and Pictish has a hiɡh consonant to vowel ratio.

Allophony

1) /ɲ/ is realised as [dʒ] in word-final position

2) /ŋʷ/ is realised as [m] in word-initial position

3) /ŋʷ/ is realised as [b] in word-final position

4) Plain stops are aspirated in word-initial position

5) /tɬ/ is realised as [tθ] in word-final position

6) /cç/ is realised as [tʃ] in word-final position

7) /kʷ/ is realised as [p] in word-final position

8) /ʔ/ is realised as [q] in word-final position

9) Prenasalised stops are realised as plain voiced stops in word-initial position

10) /ⁿd, ᵑɡ/ are voiceless in word-final position

11) /ⁿdɮ/, /ᶮɟʝ/ and /ᵑɡʷ/ are realised as [ⁿθ], [ᶮtʃ] and [ᵐp] in word-final position

12) /l/ and /ɣ/ are realised as [θ] and [x] in word-final position.

13) High vowels are lowered to [ɛ, ɔ] after a palatal or labialised velar onset

14) High vowels are lowered to [ɛ, ɔ] before word-final /ʔ/ or a word-final liquid

Prosody

Stress

Pictish polysyllables bear the primary stress on the second syllable.

Intonation

1) Pictish polysyllables bear secondary stress on every alternate syllable after the one bearing the primary stress. Rhythm type is iambic.

2) Pictish has a slower speech tempo than Enɡlish does.

Phonotactics

1) Syllable template is CV(C)

2) Permitted codas are nasals, stops and voiced liquids

3) Consonant clusters are not permitted

4) A liquid may not follow another liquid in the same place of articulation

5) Morphemes take the following shapes:

a) roots, adjuncts, postpositions and modals: CVCV(C)

b) auxiliaries: CVC

c) pronouns and particles: CV(C)

d) prefixes: CV(C)

e) suffixes: (C)VC or CV(C)

Consonant Mutation

1) Consonant mutation is of three types:

a) Lenition or Soft Mutation

b) Eclipsis or Nasal Mutation

c) Provection or Hard Mutation

2) Lenition affects nasals and stops

3) Eclipsis affects plain stops, voiced liquids and voiced continuants

4) Provection affects nasals, prenasalised stops, voiced liquids and voiced continuants

5) Consonant mutation is triggered at:

a) the beginning of nouns, verbs or auxiliaries by preposed particles or pronouns

b) the beginning of adjectives or postpositions by gender concord

c) morpheme boundaries by sandhi

6) The term for the unmutated, base form of a mutatable consonant is the radical.

7) Table of mutations:

Radical	Lenition	Eclipsis	Provection
n	ð	-	ⁿd
ɲ	j	-	ᶮɟ
ŋ	ɣ	-	ᵑɡ
ŋʷ	w	-	ᵑɡʷ
t	θ	ⁿd	-
tɬ	ɬ	ⁿdɮ	-
cç	ç	ᶮɟʝ	-
k	x	ᵑɡ	-
kʷ	xʷ	ᵑɡʷ	-
ʔ	h	ᵑɡ	-
ⁿd	n	-	ð
ⁿdɮ	n	-	l
ᶮɟʝ	ɲ	-	j
ᵑɡ	ŋ	-	ɣ
ᵑɡʷ	ŋʷ	-	w
ð	-	n	θ
j	-	ɲ	ç
w	-	ŋʷ	xʷ
l	-	n	ɬ
ɣ	-	ŋ	x

NOTE:

A dash indicates no mutation takes place

8) Lenition commonly occurs as follows:

a) at the beginning of adjectives or postpositions following a masculine noun

b) at the beginning of masculine nouns following the masculine ergative particle na

c) at the beginning of feminine nouns following the feminine absolutive particle la

d) at the beginning of all nouns following the locative particle tu

e) at the beginning of verbs or auxiliaries following the perfective aspect particle nu

9) Eclipsis commonly occurs as follows:

a) at the beginning of adjectives and postpositions following a feminine noun

b) at the beginning of feminine nouns following the feminine ergative particle hu

c) at the beginning of all nouns following the dative particle nxi

d) at the beginning of all nouns following a singular possessive pronoun

10) Provection commonly occurs as follows:

a) at the beginning of masculine nouns following the masculine absolutive particle mi

b) at the beginning of all nouns following the ablative particle qa

c) at the beginning of all nouns following a plural possessive pronoun

d) at the beginning of verbs or auxiliaries following the perfective aspect particle ha

Sandhi

1) Sandhi occurs at morpheme boundaries, either through affixation or compounding.

2) All morpheme-final consonants are classified into three categories:

a) Soft: voiced liquids

b) Nasal: nasals

c) Hard: stops

3) At consonant-consonant morpheme boundaries the final consonant of the first morpheme is elided. The first consonant of the second morpheme mutates as follows:

a) following a soft consonant it lenites

b) following a nasal consonant it eclipses

c) following a hard consonant it provects

4) At consonant-vowel or vowel-consonant morpheme boundaries, the consonant lenites

5) At vowel-vowel morpheme boundaries, the first vowel is elided

6) If, due to consonant mutation, affixation or compounding, a liquid should follow another liquid in the same place of articulation then it dissimilates to its corresponding plain stop if voiceless or to its corresponding prenasalised stop if voiced.