Chlouvānem: Difference between revisions

The language currently known as Chlouvānem was first attested about 2400 years ago in documents from the Lällshag civilization, as the language of a [[Lahob languages|Lahob-speaking]] people that settled in the southern part of the Lāmiejāya-Lāmberah plain, particularly near Lūlunīkam Lake. Around year 4000 of the Chlouvānem calendar (itself an adaptation of the Lällshag one), the ''Chlamiṣvatrā'', the great Prophet of the Yunyalīlta, lived and taught her doctrine in the Chlouvānem language, paving the way for it to gain the role of most important language and lingua franca in the at the time massively linguistically fragmented lower Plain. While the Chlamiṣvatrā's language is what we now call "Archaic Chlouvānem" (''chlǣvānumi sārvire dhāḍa''), most of the Yunyalīlti doctrine as we now know it is in the later stage of Classical Chlouvānem (''chlǣvānumi lallapårṣire dhāḍa''), a koiné developed in the mid-5th millennium. Since then, for nearly two millennia, this classical language has been kept alive as the lingua franca in the Yunyalīlti world, resulting in the state of diglossia that persists today.

Chlouvānem as spoken today is the standardized version of the literary language of the mid-5th millennium ''Lāmiejāya'' plain, the one in which most sacred texts of the Yunyalīlta are written. Since then, the language has been kept alive for more than 1500 years and counting in a diglossic state with many descendant and creole languages developing in the areas that gradually came under Chlouvānem control, and Classical Chlouvānem is in fact [[Verse:Chlouvānem Inquisition#Chlouvānem ethnicity|a major defining factor of Chlouvānem ethnicity]], enabling the existence of a single cultural area spread across half a continent despite the individual areas each having their own vernaculars.

* Jade Coast, Rainforest, and Eastern Plain (''lūṇḍhyalēnei nanayi no naleidhoyi no''), including pronunciations of the eastern part of the Lāmiejāya plain, the Jade Coast, and its interior (the main Chlouvānem heartlands and the northern parts of the rainforest). Standard Chlouvānem is one of these.

* Western Plain and Sand Coast (''samvāldhoyi chleblēnei no''), including the whole western part of the Lāmiejāya plain and the Sand Coast in the central-western Inquisition.

** Eastern Plain and Jade Coast dialect continuum (''naleidhoyi lūṇḍhyalēnei no maivai'') — spoken in the eastern half of the Lāmiejāya plain, the Jade Coast (littoral and interior), and the northern part of the rainforest. If Chlouvānem itself is not counted as being spoken natively, then this dialect continuum constitutes Calémere's most spoken language by number of native speakers.

** Northern Plain dialect continuum (''kehaṃdhoyi maivai'') — spoken in the northern Lāmiejāya plain, in the foothills of the Camipāṇḍa mountains. It has traits of both the Eastern Plain and the Western Plain continua, but also has its odd features common throughout the area but lacking in the other two groups. However, due to internal migration, the linguistic border is rather odd, especially the one with the Eastern Plain continuum: the contemporary vernacular of Mamaikala, the largest city of the Northern Plain, as well as nearby areas on the mid-Lāmberah river, is undoubtedly Eastern, despite being well into Northern-speaking territory.

** Western Plain dialect continuum (''samvāldhoyi maivai'') — spoken in the western half of the Lāmiejāya plain, including the Inland Southwest

* Words from pre-Inquisitorial indigenous languages of the Plain and of the Jade Coast (''dhoyi olelų maivai''), most of them sparsely attested such as Ancient Yodhvāsi, Tamukāyi, Laiputaši, Old Kāṃradeši, and Aṣasṝkhami. possibly forming the majority of roots. Early Chlouvānem, soon after the Ur-Chlouvānem settled in the lower Lāmiejāya plain, was enriched by a very large number of roots taken from local languages. Such words are found in all semantic fields, and are particularly numerous in words for the family, plants, animals, and the earliest artifacts and practices of settled civilization.