Shitullian

Shitullian Śitaall
Pronounced:	Native: /ʃi.təːʟ/ Anglicized: /ʃiː.tʌl.i.ən/
Timeline and Universe:	Alternate Earth
Species:	Human
Spoken:	Carnassus
Writing system:	"Abugida"
Genealogy:	Language Isolate
Typology
Morphological type:	Somewhat Isolating
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Ergative-Absolutive
Basic word order:	Typically VSO
Credits
Creator:	Thrice Xandvii | ✎
Created:	January 2014

Śitëel is a language isolate spoken by the Khongall people on Carnassus in a region known only as Khong. The name of the language is a compound word meaning "speaking tongue" (śi- being an archaic verbal root for "to speak" and tëel meaning "tongue").

The language is mostly isolating, except for the usage of noun incorporation to express the morphosyntactic alignment (absolutive arguments are incorporated), and in the process of verb serialization in which verb stems can sometime merge.

Phonology

Śituul has __ consonants and __ vowels. It also has a system of phonemic tone that alternates with different phonations and vowel lengths in certain dialects.

Consonants

		Labial	Coronal	Dorsal
Nasal		m /m/	n /n/	ŋ /ŋ/
Plosive	Plain	p /p/	t /t/	k /k/
	Aspir.	ph /pʰ/	th /tʰ/	kh /kʰ/
Fricative		f /f/	s /s/ and ś /ʃ/	h /x/ ~ [k͜x; h]
Affricate	Plain	ϕ /p͜f/	c /t͜s/ and ć /t͜ʃ/
	Aspir.	ϕh /p͜fʰ/	ch /t͜sʰ/ and ćh /t͜ʃʰ/
Approximant			r or -l /ɾ/ ~ [ɺ; l]/

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i /i/		u [u]
Middle		ë, e /ə/
Low	ạ [æ ~ a]		a /ɒ/

Allophonically, i moves to u [u] when following a labial consonant (or its aspirated version), i and a centralize to e [ə] before dorsal codas, and lastly a fronts to ạ [æ ~ a] after palato-alveolar consonants (or their aspirated versions). In all positions, e is neutral and has no allophonic variations.

Tone / Phonation

	Level	Falling	Dipping
Tone	a /a˦/ ~ [a]	a' (ả) /a˥˩/ ~ [a̰]	aa /a˨˩˦/ ~ [aː]

Tones in Śituul are not always rendered strictly as tone. Some speakers use length and phonation quality to render the same phonemic distinctions others would voice with tonal contours. Falling tone, when pronounced this way, is seen as a creaky-voiced phonation while the dipping tone would exist as increased vowel length with no presence of tone or alternate phonation. A syllable with a level tone in this situation would be "plain," that is with no noticeable alternate phonation and an unlengthened vowel.

Phonotactics

The building of a syllable in Śituul is governed by this basic expression: (C)V(n, ŋ, t, k, s, h, l)τ, where V is any vowel, C is any consonant, codas are listed in the romanization, and τ stands for the tone applied to the syllable. In order to avoid ambiguity of syllables, coda consonants are written with their voiced counterparts (ex. /k/ as g, /s/ as z and /h/ as x), nasals are written with a following interpunct (ex. n·) when the following syllable begins with a vowel.

Script

The native script is called Ćaanśoŋ (interpreted as "speaking paper" or "written speech"). Ćaanśoŋ is similar to an abugida, except that a letter's location can impact the status of its inherent vowel, and separate glyphs exist to represent the vowels in isolation as well as to write a long vowel. The following table lists all of the glyphs used to write Śituul and their meaning as bare consonants (or vowels as the case may be).

p	t	k		a	ı	u	o		-y
File:SHI-p.png									File:SHI-y.png
f	s	h		ja	ju	wa	wı		-ů
File:SHI-f.png				File:SHI-ja.png	File:SHI-ju.png	File:SHI-wa.png	File:SHI-wi.png		File:SHI-w.png
	ś			r	m	n	ŋ		+◌ʰ
									File:SHI-emph.png

Ćaanśoŋ is ordinarily written in two horizontal rows from left to right. Originally, it was written on strips of a bamboo-like wood with brushes. Each consonant glyph carries an inherent /ɑ/ when written upon the "baseline." If a long vowel is desired, a vowel glyph must be written after a consonant glyph. There are two diacritics that exist to alter the inherent vowel to /i/ and /ɯ/, they are (respectively) a dot placed just above a glyph or an upward slanting "accent" placed just below the baseline. A long vowel's corresponding glyph must match the vowel of the previous glyph or it will be interpreted as a separate syllable (so an /i/ glyph must be used following a dotted /ka/ glyph to create /kiː/).

Final consonants are written below the baseline of the last vowel or consonant glyph in that syllable. As such, the syllable /kət/ is written by placing a /ka/ glyph on the baseline and then writing the /ta/ glyph below it. Any consonant glyph written below the baseline is understood to lack its inherent vowel.

In order to write a syllable containing an "iotated" vowel, the glyph for /ja/ is written below the baseline for a syllable containing ja and a special form of /ja/ is written below the baseline for ju (it lacks the middle connecting stroke). Should an iotated syllable also contain a final consonant, it is written below the baseline as well and to the right of the vowel glyph. The space above this consonant glyph is not written in to keep from confusion as to which syllable contains the final consonant.

For affricates, a special diacritic written to the right of a consonant is used, this diacritic is in the form of a line that extends from the height of a standard glyph through the baseline to touch where the bottom of a glyph written below the baseline would end. Writing /pa/ with this bar forms the labial affricate, /ta/ the alveolar affricate, and the velar affricate has since merged with /h/, but would have been written with the /ka/ glyph. To disambiguate between /t͜s/ and /t͜ʃ/, a variant form of the "affricate bar" is used for /t͜ʃa/ that actually connects to the right-most stroke of the /ta/ glyph.

In order to write a syllable that begins with a reduced vowel, one must use the "null" vowel sign above noted as o. In any other case in which the reduced vowel appears, the normal version of the glyph can be used, it is just assumed to contain /ə/ rather than the inherent /ɑ/.

Finally, to write a strong consonant, one must use the "emphatic" mark directly following the glyph containing the consonant to be strengthened. If this syllable ends in a consonant, the consonant glyph is written below the baseline and under the consonant portion, not below the emphatic mark.

There is one respect in which Ćaanśoŋ is considered a "defective" script, and that is that tone is never indicated in the written script. It must either be determined from context and knowing the correct word, or some measure of ambiguity will result. For instance, ḵara means fruit, but ḵarạ means beer, so some confusion could definitely result from the written word in isolation (however, if the word is accompanied by the verb 'eat' it becomes quite clear which is meant).

The following examples show some of the different results one can achieve by writing the glyphs in differing combinations:

File:SHI-p.png

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File:SHI-p.png

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File:SHI-p.png

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File:SHI-p.png

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File:SHI-p.png

File:SHI-ju.png

paat	pa.ot	paa.ta	pot	pjut

Examples

The following written examples serve to help illustrate how these elements work together in the native script.

File:SHI-ja.png File:SHI-wa.png File:SHI-grave.png Śıśıtuuljaan wa. Śı śıtuul jaan wa speak Śıtuul.abs do.vol 1sg.erg I (am) speak(ing) Śituul.*

File:SHI-p.png File:SHI-bar.png File:SHI-stroke.png File:SHI-j.png Maa βanaanḵarajoŋ nı? Maa βa naan ḵara joŋ nı int neg eat fruit.abs occur.avol 2sg.erg Don't you (accidentally) eat fruit?

File:SHI-f.png File:SHI-wa.png File:SHI-bar.png File:SHI-y.png Fııwacayol. Fıı wacay ol flow water.abs be.stat Water flows.

• Note: It would also be possible to translate this sentence as using the stative ending, but that translation would have less emphasis on what is happening, and more on the fact of being able to speak the language. As is, the action is in the speaking the language, not in being able to.

Grammar

Coming... at some point. (Soon™)

Lexicon

—For a full list of words in Śituul, see: Lexicon.

The word list for Śituul is small at the moment, but expanding.

Creator Comments

I have worked on many different conlangs in the past, and all have died a slow painful death. This one was meant to be one I could focus on for the long haul and finally move from being a "scrapper" (i.e. someone who creates the skeleton of a language and then immediately stops working on it in favor of a new language) into being more of a "completist." I have had some success, but my attention has wandered still.

What I aim to do here, is create a mostly naturalistic language that integrates features from some of my scrapped languages over the years, as well as develop a language that is pleasing to me. This page will likely be slow to update, but rest assured that the script, at the very least, will be described fully here! (Scripts tend to be the feature of languages that I work on the hardest and enjoy creating the most.)