Bźatga
Phonology and Orthography
Orthography
Bźatga is written with the following 18 letters of the Latin alphabet:
a b c d e g i j l m n o r s t u v z
In addition to these base forms, called primary or unmarked letters, diacritics are used to create secondary and tertiary forms, which are collectively called the marked letters. In the case of vowels, secondary forms represent pretonic and therefore unstressed variants and are marked with a breve, e.g. răveusemi "I have seen". Secondary forms of consonants are iotised variants of the primary sounds and are marked with an acute accent, e.g. craśu "drier". The tertiary forms of both vowels and consonants are marked with the caret and only the letters ê, ô, ŝ and ẑ occur. They are not derived from the primary forms.
The table below shows the various forms of the letters:
| Vowels | Stops | Fricatives | Sonorants | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Primary | a | e | i | o | u | b | t | d | c | g | v | s | z | j | l | m | n | r |
| Secondary | ă | ĕ | ĭ | ŏ | ŭ | ć | ǵ | ś | ź | ł | ń | ŕ | ||||||
| Tertiary | ê | ô | ŝ | ẑ |
Additionally, two purely orthographic conventions are used:
- The letters î and û occur in diphthongs deriving from vi, *ji and *vu; e.g. doû, doî "black" from **dovu, **dovi
- The hook is used with any vowel or diphthong to show the absence of a following nasal, in Class 4 Nominals; e.g. camvǫ "foster son", pl. camvone.
Taken together the following letters may occur in Bźatga orthography:
a ă ą b c ć d e ĕ ê ę g ǵ i ĭ î į j l ł m n ń o ŏ ô ǫ r ŕ s ś ŝ t u ŭ û ų v z ź ẑ
Consonants
Bźatga contains the following consonant inventory:
| Bilabial | Alveolar | Post-alveolar | Palatal | Velar | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ||
| Plosive | b | t d | k g | ||
| Fricative | β | s z | ʃ ʒ | ||
| Affricate | t͡s d͡z | t͡ʃ d͡ʒ | |||
| Approximant | j | ||||
| Trill | r | ||||
| Lateral app. | l | ʎ |
Vowels
Bźatga has the following eight pure vowels:
| Front | Near- front | Central | Near- back | Back | ||
| Close | 
| |||||
| Near-close | ||||||
| Close-mid | ||||||
| Mid | ||||||
| Open-mid | ||||||
| Near-open | ||||||
| Open | ||||||
Note: /ɐ/ is an allophone of /a/ found in unstressed final or pretonic position.
In addition there are the following six diphthongs: /aj/, /ɛj/, /ɔj/, /aw/, /ɛw/, /ɔw/.
Stress
Stress placement is regularly on the first syllable of a word. The only exception to this is in words with an unstressed prefix, the vowel of which is marked with a breve, e.g. căbrova "tribesman" /kɐˈbrɔvɐ/.
Phonetic Processes
Bźatga has a number of phonetic processes which affect the spelling and pronunciation of words in inflexion and composition.
Iotisation
Iotisation is the process by which an inflexional j affects the preceding consonant. It is seen, for example, in the comparative forms of adjectives and in some verb forms. All consonants, except j itself, are affected by iotisation, in the following ways:
- most consonants change to their secondary form, e.g. glasa "clear, blue", cpv. glaśu "bluer".
- d and t become ć and ǵ respectively, e.g. môde "soft", cpv. môǵu "softer".
- b and m are simply followed by the letter j, e.g. caba "crooked", cpv. cabju "more crooked".
- v becomes j, e.g. dova "black", cpv. doju "blacker".
Palatalisation
Palatalisation is an allophonic process whereby certain consonants are affected by a following i. This mainly affects the sonorants l, n and r, which are altered to their secondary form, and the letters d and t which become ẑ and ŝ respectively. For example, dana "gift", pl. dańi, cata "pool", pl. caŝi.