Skylandic

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Skylandic
Himmeldeutsch, Ciellandais
Chiveduts
Pronunciation[ɕiv.dy]
Created byKazu Inoue
Datefirst version, 2021; third and latest version, 2024
SettingAlternate Earth where magic exists
Native toSkyland
Native speakers1.5 million (1600)
200,000 L2
Indo-European
  • Germanic
    • West Germanic
      • Aerial West Germanic
        • Skylandic
Early forms
Old Skylandic
  • Middle Skylandic
    • Early Modern Skylandic
Standard form
Standard Vögelbergean Skylandic
Dialects
  • Bernstein Skylandic
  • Primétoilean Skylandic
SourcesProto-Germanic, German, French
Official status
Official language in
Germany · France · Liechtenstein · Belgium · Switzerland · Austria
Recognised minority
language in
Italy · the Netherlands · Luxembourg · Great Britain
Regulated byEuropean Language Round Table (ELRT)

Skylandic (Chiveduts, pronounced [ɕiv.dy]) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family, mainly spoken in Western Europe. It is the national and official language of Skyland, the floating country above the Germany-France border. It is also the co-official language of Germany, France, Liechtenstein, Austria, Belgium and Switzerland; a recognized minority language in Italy, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Great Britain; and one of the official languages of the European Language Round Table (ELRT) alongside English, German, France, Neallish, Irish, Italian and Spanish.

It has over 1.5 million native speakers and over 200,000 L2 (or second language) speakers. A majority of its native speakers live in Skyland, Germany and France. It has two major dialects — the Bernstein and Primétoilean dialects. The Bernstein dialect is spoken by the people living in the east German-side of the country while the Primétoilean dialect is spoken in the west French-side of the country. The Bernstein dialect has more native Germanic words and German calques while the Primétoilean dialect has more French loanwords and calques.

The floating island's first inhabitants were ancient West Germanic mages who had stumbled upon the island using their flight magic. A couple of centuries later, the Old French mages also decided to explore and live on the island. From the mingling of the two communities, a new dialect of West Germanic was born which, over time, developed into a language of its own now known as Modern Skylandic.

Classification

Skylandic is an a posteriori language with its vocabularily mostly based on Proto-Germanic and its phonology and orthography based on French. One can say that it explores the question of "How German would look like if it evolved like French?"

It is also a tripartite or ERG-ACC language — meaning, it marks the subject of an intransitive verb, the agent and the patient of a transitive verb all differently.

It is inspired by the minority languages like Dungan (a Sinitic language written using the Cyrillic script) and Vilamovian (a Germanic language spelled using the Polish alphabet), and the conlang Venedic (a Romance language evolved to be like Polish).

The language has actually gone through three revisions with the third one being the current version. The first version used to have an Old English-y orthography while the second version used to have a German-ish orthography. According to the conlanger, the reason for the revision was that he was enthralled and fascinated by the spelling rule of the French language.


Evolution of Skylandic

As unfortunate as it may seem, the ELRT hasn't found any sufficient amount of surviving records yet of the language's early and middle stages. But they did made an end-to-end evolutionary list of the language starting from Proto-Germanic (PGmc) or sometimes Proto-West Germanic (PWG). All thanks to help of the Great Sage. The sound changes are shown below, in no particular order.

Sound and Spelling Changes

● *sC → /eC/. *sk becomes ⟨ch⟩ before ⟨e, i, y⟩. But can also happen randomly with other vowels.
PGmc *skrīaną → Skylandic "écrien" [e.kʁi.jɑ̃] (to shout)
PGmc *skiwô → Skylandic "Chive" [ɕiv] (sky)
PGmc *skawwoną → Skylandic "chauven" [ɕo.vɑ̃] (to show)
PWG *spil → Skylandic "Épeau" [e.po]

● Intervocalic *t(j) and *k → Ø (Elision)
PGmc *flutjaną → Skylandic "fluire" [flɥiʁ] (to move)

● *Vsk(ij)- → -Vst-er → Vître. This is a consequence of the previous sound change with just an infinitive ending change involved.
PWGm *aiskōn → Skylandic "aître" [ɛtʁ] (to ask)

● *Cw → Cɥ ; xʷ → ɥ
PGmc *kwedaną → Skylandic "cuiden" [kɥidɑ̃] (to say)
PGmc *hwann → Skylandic "huen" [ɥɑ̃] (if, when)

● *sw → ɕɥ
PGmc *swīną → Skylandic "Chuin" [ɕɥɑ̃] (pig)

● *k, x → ɕ
PWGmc *bōk → Skylandic "Bouch" [buɕ] (book)
PGmc *þauh → Skylandic "dauch" [doɕ] (infirmative yes)

● Word-initial *x → Ø (Elision).
PWG *hauh → Skylandic "hauch" [oɕ] (high)

● VxC → ViC
PGmc *nahts → Skylandic "Nait" [nɛ] (night)

● *iu, eu, ew → /ø/
PGmc *beudaz → Skylandic "Beute" [bøt] (table).
- Sometimes, this can arise from *au being fronted by a succeeding *i(j).

● *w → /v/ or /ɡ/
PGmc *aiwaz → Skylandic "Aive" [ɛv] (eternity)
PGmc *werþaną → Skylandic "guerdre" [ɡɛʁdʁ] (to become)

● *b → /v/, after and/or between vowels only.
PGmc *bilībjaną → Skylandic "bleivre" [blɛvʁ] (to stay)
PGmc *ab → Skylandic "av-" [av]

● *dj, dij, g → <y> /j/, sometimes ⟨i⟩.
PGmc *hūdijaną → Skylandic "huyen" [ɥi.jɑ̃] (to hide)
PGmc *dagaz → Skylandic "Daie" [dɛ] (day)
PGmc *maganą → Skylandic "mayen" [mɛ.jɑ̃] (would like, to want)

● *Vmb → Ṽʑ.
PWGmc *climbana → Skylandic "clingen" [klɛ̃ʑɑ̃] (to climb)

● *-Vng → /Ṽʑ/ <-Vnge>.
PWG *sangu → Skylandic "Sange" [sɑ̃ʑ] (song)

● *z → /ʁ/
PGmc *hauzjana → Skylandic "heuren" [øʁɑ̃] (to hear, listen)

● *r /r/ → /ʁ/
PGmc *rinnaną → Skylandic "rinnen" [ʁi.nɑ̃] (to run)

● *j → /ʑ/
PGmc *jainaz → Skylandic "jain" [ʑɛ̃] (that)

● *þ → /d/
PGmc *frawiþaz → Skylandic "Freude" [fʁød] (joy)

● *u, *ū → /y u/. Sometimes, if *ū is followed by *d(i)j, it becomes /ɥi(j)/.
PGmc *kunnaną → Skylandic "cunir" [ky.niʁ] (can, to be able)
PGmc *brūkan → Skylandic "brouchen" [bʁuɕɑ̃] (to need)

● *ei, oi → /wa/.Sometimes, this can stem from *-egi- where the *-g- is elided.
PGmc *legijaz → Skylandic "loir" [lwaʁ] (low)

● *Vn, Vm → /Ṽ/. The same SC as French except with *um, *un becoming /ʏ̃/.
PGmc *landą → Skylandic "Lant" [lɑ̃] (land)
PGmc *umbi → Skylandic "unge" [ʏ̃ʑ] (around)

● Intervocalic *g → /ʑ/. Sometimes, it fortizes into /g/.
PGmc *hlōgijaną → Skylandic "leugen" [løʑɑ̃] (to laugh)

● *Vl → ⟨Vu⟩
PGmc *albis → Skylandic "Euve" [øv] (elf)

● *Vkaną → ⟨Vire⟩
PGmc *makaną → Skylandic "maire" [mɛʁ] (to make)

● *okVną, *ukVną → ⟨uire⟩ /ɥiʁ/. Sometimes, if the PGmc verb contains *ū, it instead becomes ⟨ouire⟩ [wiʁ].
PGmc *hukaną → Skylandic "huire" [ɥiʁ] (to cower)
PGmc *lūkaną → Skylandic "louire" [lwiʁ] "to close"

● Word-final *-el, -il → /o/ or [ø]: ⟨eau⟩ or ⟨eu⟩
PGmc *wela → Skylandic "veau" [vo] (to make)

● *-aną in most verbs → /ɑ̃/ ⟨-en⟩
PGmc *haltaną → Skylandic "hauten" [otɑ̃] (to stop)

● *e (sometimes *a) between single consonants → /ə/, sometimes silent.
PGmc *upanana → Skylandic "ouvenir" [uvniʁ] (to open)
PGmc *lesaną → Skylandic "lesen" [lə.zɑ̃] (to read)

● *VsC → ⟨V̂C⟩
PGmc *isti → Skylandic "îte" [it] (be.PRES)

● *Vrh → /rVɕ/
PGmc *þurhw → Skylandic "druch" [dʁyɕ] (through)

● *l(i)j → /j/ ⟨ill⟩. Sometimes, this can happen even without the *j after *l.
PGmc *fallijana → Skylandic "faillen" [fajɑ̃] (to fall)

● *oCu → /ø/ ⟨œu⟩
PGmc *swotuz → Skylandic "sœuz" [sø] (sweet)

● Monosyllabic /ə/ from French loans → /ø/
French "que" → Skylandic "que" [kø] (conjunctive that)

Phonology

The phonology of Skylandic is almost identical to that of French with only some minor differences.

Consonant Inventory

Sky conso.png

Vowel Inventories

Modal Vowels

Sky vowel-a.png


Nasal Vowels

Sky vowels-b.png

The notation used on nasal vowels is based on Breton's spelling. The reason they are notated like that is that the conlanger is having a problem rendering the nasalization diacritic properly on MS Word. So he just resorted into using the n-tilde to signify nasalization.

Allophones

Vowel phonemes of Skylandic.

The mid central vowel /ə/ is realized as a close mid unrounded vowel [ɘ] in stressed syllables. In the Primétoilean dialect, this vowel is realized as [ø].

The front close-mid rounded vowel /ø/ in the present tense of regular verbs is realized in the Bernstein dialect as a mid-central vowel [ə] but is silent in the Primétoilean dialect.

The consonants /ɕ ʑ ʁ/ are often realized as [ʃ ʒ ɾ~r~ɹ], especially by younger generations. Bernstein dialect speakers vocalize the phoneme /ʁ/ as [ɐ] after vowels.

Liaison and Enchaînement

Just like French, Skylandic also exhibits liaison and enchaînement. Liaison is a phonological phenomenon in which a silent final consonant of word is pronounced and becomes the onset consonant of the next word's initial vowel. Unlike French, though, there are only two rules where liaison is impossible (see below). Otherwise, it's always possible.

The two rules that predict impossible liaison are as follows:

  1. If the first word ends with a consonant followed by the morpheme -s, making the grapheme sequence silent.
  2. If the next word starts a new clause.

Enchaînement [ɑ̃.ɕɛn.mɑ̃], on the other hand, is a phonological phenomenon where a pronounced final consonant from a word forms its own syllable with the initial vowel of the next word, or when two vowels become one long vowel or a phonetic diphthong. Unlike liaison which is mandatory, enchaînement is just optional and depends on the person speaking. In this phenomenon, the full vowels /i u y/ become the semi-vowels [j w ɥ].

Liaison:
les House
[le.z‿uz]
"the house"

Enchaînement:
Tu îte gout.
[tɥ‿it ɡu]
"You are good."

Stress

Skylandic has no lexical stress. That is, words on their own have no stressed syllable. Instead, it has sentential stress — stress on the sentence level. Stress only appears when words are combined together to form a complete sentence. The stress pattern of Skylandic sentences is always in iambs — syllable pairs consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. In fact, Skylandic poetry is entirely based on this stress pattern but in specific counts — iambic pentameter.

Nauvement Huie Ich Isen Ai Préseunu.
[nov'mɑ̃.t‿ɥi ' i'zɑ̃.n‿ɛ 'pʁe.zøˌny]
"Exactly How I Planned It."

Phonotactics

Unfortunately, according to the conlanger, he didn't actually lay out any phonotactic rules for the language. All he just said that the Skylandic might actually have an almost identical phonotactic rules as French.

Orthography

Skylandic uses the same alphabet and grapheme-to-phoneme correspondence as French, again with minor differences.

Skylandic Alphabet
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Xx Yy Zz

Collation Order
The alphabetical order is as shown above. However, for letters with diacritics, the base letter comes first before the one with diacritics. Thus, in a list or a dictionary, et comes first before ét, èt and êt. Within diacritics, the order is acute first, then grave, and lastly circumplex. The diaeresis diacritic is rare in Skylandic.

The language used to be written using the Hebrew-based Grimoire script and the Georgian-based Elvish script. But ever since adopting the French spelling rule, all of Skyland has now switched to the Latin script.

Grapheme-to-Phoneme Correspondence

Consonants and Clusters

Consonants
Graphemes Environment Phoneme Example
-bs, -cs, -ds, -fs,
-gs, -ps, -ts
Word-final Silent daincs [dɛ̃]
b elsewhere /b/ bleivre [blɛvʁ]
word-final silent Cramb [kʁɑ̃]
c before e, i, y /s/ ce [sø]
elsewhere /k/ Cou [ku]
ch everywhere /ɕ/ chans [ɕɑ̃]
d word-final silent gaid [ɡɛ]
elsewhere /d/ dou [du]
f everywhere /f/ fur [fyʁ]
g before <e, i, y> /ʑ/ gêtran [ʑɛ.tʁɑ]
elsewhere /ɡ/ gout [ɡu]
gn everywhere /ɲ/ agneuvre [a.ɲøvʁ]
h everywhere silent Hant [ɑ̃]
j /ʑ/ je [ʑø]
l, ll everywhere /l/ Lant [lɑ̃]
m, mm everywhere /m/ Mann [man]
n, nn everywhere /n/ neun [nœ̃]
p word-final silent Damp [dɑ̃]
elsewhere /p/ plus [ply]
q(u) everywhere /k/ que [kø]
r everywhere /ʁ/ Ruie [ʁɥi]
s between vowels /z/ House [uz]
word-final silent lasais [la.zɛ]
elsewhere /s/ Saive [sɛv]
t word-final silent Blout [blu]
elsewhere /t/ Trive [tʁiv]
v everywhere /v/ Veaut [vo]
x word-final silent Éleux [e.lø]
between vowels /k.s/ exaient [ɛk.sɛ]
z word-final silent houz [u]
elsewhere /z/ Zite [zit]

Vowels

Vowels and Vowel Combinations
Graphemes Environment Phoneme Example
a, à /a/ var [vaʁ] "true"
â /ɑ/ fâtenir [fɑt.niʁ] "to secure"
ai, aî, aie /ɛ/ Nait [nɛ] "night"
Daie [dɛ] "day"
au /o/ Traume [tʁom] "dream"
ay /ɛj/ dayen [dɛ.jɑ̃] "to suck"
e elsewhere /ə/ or Ø ouvenir [uv.niʁ] "to open"
bereuven [bəʁovɑ̃] "to rob"
before multiple consonants /ɛ/ brechen [bʁɛɕɑ̃] "to break"
before a pronounced final
consonant
Affel [afɛl] "apple"
before ⟨x⟩ exaient [ɛk.sɛ] "was going out"
before a silent final
consonant
/e/ des [de] "of the (singular)"
word-final in SG nouns Ø Trive [tʁiv] "tree"
word-final in mono-
syllabic open words
/ø/ je [ʑø] 1SG.INTR
é, ée /e/ éliven [elivɑ̃] "to split"
è, ê /ɛ/ gêtran [ʑɛtʁɑ̃] "to split"
eau /o/ Veaut [vo] "world"
ei, eî /ɛ/ reit [ʁɛ] "right. correct"
eu, eû /ø/ heuren [øʁɑ̃] "to hear, listen"
i elsewhere /i/ mit [mi] "with"
before other vowels /j/ étienne [e.tjɛn] (eat.PRES.SJV)
î /i/ îte [it] "is/am/are"
-ie word-final only Fantaisie [fɑ̃tɛzi] "fantasy"
o phonologically
final
/o/ fos [fo] (nurture.PRES)
elsewhere /ɔ/ Hoff [ɔf] "hope"
ô /o/ fôtre [fotʁ] "to nurture"
oi, oie, oî /wa/ loir [lwaʁ] "low"
œu /ø/ Mœur [møʁ] "mother"
ou, oû /u/ Flouch [fluɕ] "curse"
oue word-final only Cloue [klu] "lump"
oy /waj/ doyen [dwajɑ̃] "to die"
u elsewhere /y/ fur [fyʁ] "for"
after ⟨g1, q⟩ Ø guirds [ɡiʁ] "become/s"
dainquons [dɛ̃kɔ̃] (thank.IMP)
before other vowels /ɥ/ huiss [ɥis] "white"
û /y/ plûjain que [plyʑɛ̃ kø] "furthermore"
ue elsewhere /ɥɛ/ muenir [mɥɛniʁ] "may, be allowed to"
word-final, after ⟨g, q⟩ Ø chainque [ɕɛ̃k] (bestow-IMP)
-uie /ɥi/ luie [lɥi] (lie.PRES)
uy /ɥij/ luyen [lɥi.jɑ̃] "to lie"
y elsewhere /i/ y [i] 3SG.N.ERG
before vowels /j/ euyen [ø.jɑ̃] "to show"

1 Only applies if another vowel succeeds ⟨u⟩. Otherwise, it's pronounced as usual — /y/.

Vowels and Consonants

Vowel and Consonant Combos
Graphemes Environment Phonemes Example
aim,
ain
before consonant
or finally
/ɛ̃/ Ainte [ɛ̃t] "fear"
am, an before consonant
or finally
/ɑ̃/ Lant [lɑ̃] "land"
Nam [nɑ̃] "name
cqu /k/ acquimen [akimɑ̃] "to arrive"
eim, ein before consonant
or finally
/ɛ̃/ einhouten- [ɛ̃.u.tɑ̃] "to contain"
em, en before consonant
or finally elsewhere
/ɑ̃/ -ment [mɑ̃] "-ly"
PRES of some
verbs, after /j/
/ɛ̃/ ouviens [u.vjɛ̃] "open/s"
-ent conjugation ending
in verbs
Ø aivent [ɛv] (have.PRES.SJV)
-er elsewhere finally /e/ nier [nje] "under"
es word-sinally Ø Veautes [vot] "worlds"
eun before consonant or
finally
/œ̃/ cheun [ɕœ̃] "beautiful"
ge before ⟨a, o, u⟩ /ʑ/ hangeant [ɑ̃ʑɑ̃] "hanging"
gu before ⟨e, i, y⟩ /ɡ/ guerdre [ɡɛʁdʁ] "to become"
il after ⟨a, e, eu,
œ, ou, u, ue⟩
/j/ Faile [faj] "mistake"
elsewhere depends détoilen [detwalɑ̃] "to depart"
ill after ⟨a, e, eu,
œ, ou, u, ue⟩
/j/ écouillir [ekujiʁ] "should"
elsewhere depends épillen [epilɑ̃] "to play"
im, in before consonant or
finally
/ɛ̃/ Vint [vɛ̃] "wind"
oin before consonant
or finally
/wɛ̃/ moin [mwɛ̃] "hello"
om, on before consonant
or finally
/ɔ̃/ hayons [ɛjɔ̃] (have.IMP)
tiV anywhere /tj/ tiens [fɑtjɛ̃] "fasten/s"
um, un before consonant
or finally
/ʏ̃/ unge [ʏ̃ʑ] "around"

Nouns

Morphology

Just like German, Skylandic nouns have their first letter capitalized wherever they appear in the sentence. However, unlike German and French, Skylandic nouns don't have gender. While they do decline according to case, they rarely do so that much. The only grammatical feature that they almost consistently inflect is number — that is, whether they're singular or plural.

Cases

Skylandic has five cases — namely, ergative, intransitive, accusative, dative and genitive.

A. Ergative Case (ERG)
The ERG case is used in marking the agent of a transitive verb and the subject of a relative clause. Depending on the noun's spelling, the nouns form their singular ERG form as follows:
1. If the noun ends in a silent -e, it doesn't really change form.
Trive tree → Trive

2. If the noun ends with a silent consonant, a silent -e is added.
Lant [lɑ̃] country → Lante [lɑ̃t]

3. If the noun ends in a consonant phoneme, the suffix -ée is added.
Bouch [buɕ] book → Bouchée [bu.ɕe]

B. Intransitive Case (INTR)
The INTR case is the dictionary form of the nouns. It is used in marking the lone argument (subject) of an intransitive verb. Lone nouns in books and plays are usually in this case. Even if the verb can be transitive, as long as no direct object is present in the sentence, the subject still declines in INTR case. Both the subject and the complement of a copular verb like "guesen" are also declined into INTR (or more like doesn't really decline).

Soyons un Mann!
be.IMP NDEF.INTR man
"Be a man!"

C. Accusative Case (ACC)
The ACC case is most commonly used in marking the patient of transitive verbs. Most locational prepositions also require their objects to be in ACC case. The object in a relative case is also declined in ACC case even though the subject has been replaced by the relative pronoun.

Essons den Fiche.
eat-IMP DEF.ACC.SG fish
"Eat the fish."

D. Dative Case (DAT)
The DAT case is mainly used in marking the indirect object of ditransitive verbs. The preposition "du" to, a majority of directional prepositions and other prepositions require the DAT case. Some verbs of feeling also require a DAT object. AN example of which is laid-toire "to feel sorry".

Dou tois mir laid.
2SG.ERG do.PRES 1SG.DAT displeasing
"I feel sorry for you."

ERG and DAT case are the only cases that declinable nouns really do decline in their singular form. The inflection rules of the dative case are the same as with ERG.

E. Genitive Case (GEN)
The main function of the GEN case is to mark the possessor noun in a possessive phrase. Some adverbial phrases relating to points in time are also declined in GEN.

Ainis Daie, vinniront je.
one-GEN.SG day | win-FUT 1SG.INTR
"One day I'll win."

End des Veaut
end DEF.GEN.SG world
"End of the World"

Articles

Because Skylandic nouns don't really decline that much, one must rely on grammatical articles to denote or signify the positional function of a word in a sentence. The articles of Skylandic only decline in number and case. These articles are shown on the image below.

Grammatical articles of Skylandic.

Plural Nouns

Nouns form their plurals depending on how their singular form is spelled.

1. Nouns ending in a silent final -e form their plural in all cases by just adding a final -n.

Trive → Triven trees

2. Nouns ending in -el and -al form their INTR, ACC and GEN plurals by changing those endings to -eux and -aux, respectively; and their ERG and DAT plural by changing those endings to -euse and -ause.

Type 2 plural.png

3. Monosyllabic nouns ending with a cluster grapheme where the last consonant is silent form their INTR, ACC and GEN plurals by umlauting and adding the suffix -er [e]; and their ERG and DAT plurals by adding the -reux instead of -er.

Type 3 noun.png

4. Nouns that end in a single silent consonant form their INTR, ACC, and GEN by adding the silent final -es; and their ERG and DAT plurals by adding -en.

Type 4 noun.png

5. Some nouns are just plain irregular.

Irreg sky noun.png

Pronouns

Personal Pronouns

Pronouns.png

◆ NOTES:

  1. The pronouns je and mich become clitics j' and m' before vowels. As for "tu", it only becomes a clitic t' before a word that starts with ⟨u⟩.
  2. "Y" is pronounced [i] before consonants but [i.j‿] before vowels.

Relative Pronoun

There are two types of relative pronouns in Skylandic. Namely, the anaphoric and non-anaphoric relative pronouns.

Anaphoric REL pronouns are used when an antecedent word or phrase is present in the sentence. The pronoun huich and its forms below are anaphoric.

Relpron.png

Interrogative Pronouns

Questionpro.png

Verbs

Morphology and Types

Skylandic verbs are classified using two sets of classifications — based on how they conjugate and on how they look. Based on how they look, a Skylandic verb can either be Germanic or French-y. Germanic verbs are called that not because they evolved from PGmc, but because end in the infinitive suffix -en while French-y verbs are called that not because they are French loans, but because they end in one of these endings: -ir, oir, or -re. Based on how they conjugate, they can be strong, weak, irregular or special. Most of the Germanic verbs are either weak or strong (depending on spelling; see below) while French-y verbs are mostly irregular. Special verbs, on the other hand, are a set of regular French-y verbs that have a separate regular conjugation scheme of their own.

Strong Verbs

Strong verbs are verbs that conjugate by changing their stem vowel alongside annexing a conjugation suffix. This kind of vowel change is usually called ablaut and in this case it's a PIE or Proto-Indo-European ablaut. But unlike its IRL relatives, Skylandic doesn't classify strong verbs based on its etymological root's spelling, but on the verbs' current spelling themselves. Also, instead of having all seven classes, Skylandic now only has five (5) strong verb classes.

Class 1. These are verbs that contain the stem vowel -ei- [ɛ]. Most of these verbs evolved from PGmc verbs that has the stem vowel *ī. Their vowel changes are as follows.

Class 1.png

Class 2. These are verbs that contain the stem vowel digraph -eu- [ø]. These verbs evolved from PGmc verbs that have the diphthong *eu or an *au that has undergone an umlaut.

Class 2.png

Class 3. These are verbs that contain the stem vowel -e- or -i- followed by a consonant cluster or a double consonant. Sometimes, these consonant clusters are reduced to a single consonant and their previous presence is now just signaled by a circumplex diacritic (ê î) before the remaining consonant of the stem. This diacritic is carried onto the verb's conjugations.

Class 3a.png
Class 3b.png

Class 4. These are verbs that contain the stem vowel -é- followed by any of the four sonorants (l, m, n, or r) and no other consonants. The sonorants may or may not be doubled.

Class 4.png

Class 5. The last of the five classes of Skylandic strong verbs. These are verbs that contain the stem vowel -e- followed by a lone non-sonorant consonant.

Class 5.png

Weak Verbs

The weak verbs are the so-called "regular verbs" of the language. All verbs under this category follow the same conjugation pattern and all of them don't change their spelling except from their infinitive ending -en.

Regular2.png

Take Note:
1. The imperfect subjunctive conjugation suffix becomes -asse if the verb's stem ends in ⟨y⟩.
2. The strong verbs also use the same conjugation endings for PRES, PRESP, PRES.SJV, FUT, and IMP "tenses".

Special Verbs

The following are the sets of special verbs.

1. -enir Verbs
These are verbs that have the infinitive ending -enir preceded by a consonant, thus excluding the modal verb "muenir". These verbs are attested to have evolved from PGmc class 4 weak verbs — the ones that end in *-naną, though there are exceptions, like ouvenir below. Their conjugation scheme is as follows:

-enir.png

2. -ayen, -oyen & -uyen Verbs
The ELRT is still debating on whether to include this in the sets of Special Verbs or if they are just special cases of weak verbs. Because, while they conjugate like weak verbs, the ⟨y⟩ on their INF ending becomes when followed by a silent ⟨e⟩. Examples are dayen, reinoyen and luyen.


Example texts

Other resources

Skylandic Book