Ilbiyoni

Ilbiyoni Ιlbiyonĭm
Timeline and Universe:	Lorech
Spoken:	National language in: Ilbiyon A community language in: Small areas of Western Jinyero (Esfoth) and South-Eastern Elitho
Total speakers:	1,610,740
Typology
Morphological type:	Fusional
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Ergative-absolutive
Basic word order:	Generally VOS
Credits
Creator:	A. Ayres
Created:	2011-

Ilbiyoni or Ilbiyonĭm - pronounced /ˈyˑlbyˌjoˑnəm/ (Eastern) or /ˈɨ̞lβʲo̞nɨ̞m/ (Western) - is a language isolate spoken in the Ilbiyon archipelago, a string of islands located in the Great Lake Lyric, which divides the nations of Elitho from Western Jinyero/Esfoth. Despite contact with both cultures dating back hundreds of years, Ilbiyon has retained its independence, and its language is relatively uninfluenced by Celinese and Jinyera - indeed, some claim that Ilbiyoni predates both languages.

As well as being spoken by 900,000 speakers in the independent Principality of Ilbiyon, it is also spoken in the Lake Lyric islands that are under Elithoan and Jinyer administration, and in small areas of mainland Elitho and Jinyero proper. There is also a robust community of non-Ilbiyoni researchers and explorers who have learnt the language in order to understand the myriad tomes of the Ĕlsinor Ilbiyonĕs - the Ilbiyon Palace of Books, the most expansive library in the world.

Nomenclature

Ilbiyoni's native name, Ilbiyonĭm, is a compound noun, composed of the words ilbĭ (lake) and yonim (language). Some believe that 'Lake Ilbiyoni' was one of several dialects, some of which were spoken on the mainland. Modern Ilbiyoni itself has a number of varieties, with the speech of each island being characterised by its own idiosyncracies; whilst these are usually classified as 'dialects' or 'regional varieties', an ongoing debate about whether Western and Eastern variety groups should be classified as competing standards of a single pluricentric language, or as languages in their own right.

Phonology

Pronunciation varies greatly from island to island, but two broad varieties - Eastern Ilbiyoni, spoken in the isles closer to Jinyero, and Western Ilbiyoni, in the islands closer to Elitho. Whilst there is no agreed standard dialect, it is an Eastern islands dialect - that of Sĕroği, usually - which tends to be taught to second language learners.

Eastern Ilbiyoni

The following phonology is based on the Ilbiyoni dialect spoken in Sĕroği, the most populous island in the peninsula and thus often considered to be the archetypal Eastern dialect. Most islands of Ilbiyon on the Jinyer side of Lake Lyric are more similar to the below than to the phonology of the average Western Ilbiyoni dialect, but the Săroği dialect does have idiosyncracies unshared by most Eastern dialects, such as the pronunciation of <v> as /b̪͡v/.

Consonants

Consonants
	Bilabial		Labiod.		Dental		Alveolar		Retroflex		Palatal		Velar
Nasal		m						n					ŋ
Plosive	p b						t	d					k	g
Affricates				b̪͡v			t͡s			ʈ͡ʂ ɖ͡ʐ
Approximants											j
Tap							ɾ
Lateral Approximant								l

Vowels

Vowels
	Front		Near-front		Central		Near-back		Back
High	y									u
Near-close			ʏ				ʊ
Close-mid	e									o
Close-mid						ə
Open-mid	ɛ									ɔ
Open	a									ɒ

Western Ilbiyoni

The archetypal Western Ilbiyoni phonology, described here, is that of the dialect of the isle of Erĕvir. The most notable divergence from Eastern Ilbiyoni is the spirantisation of medial and final plosives, such as /p/ to /ɸ/ and /t/ to /θ/.

Consonants

Consonants
	Bilabial		Labiod.		Dental		Alveolar		Retroflex		Palatal		Velar		Uvular
Nasal		m						n					ŋ
Plosive	(p) (b)						(t)	(d)					(k)	(g)
Fricative	ɸ β				θ	ð	s				ç	ʝ
Approximants											j
Trill							r
Lateral Approximant								l

Vowels

Vowels
	Front		Near-front		Central		Near-back		Back
High		y			ɨ
Mid		e̞			ɘ					o̞
Near-open		ɶ̝
Open						ä				ɒ

Stress and length

In most words, primary stress falls on the first syllable, with secondary stress falling on every subsequently odd-numbered syllable: aĭniyadĕs - the teacher's - pronounced ['aʏnyˌjaˑdɛs] in the East and ['äɨnɨˌjäðɘs]in the West is a good example of regular stress. Primary stress can fall on breve-accented vowels - such as ĕlosimto ['ɛˑlo't͡syˑmto] (dawn) - but secondary stress cannot - c̆elorĕ (music) is pronounced ['ʈ͡ʂeˑlorɛ], not *['ʈ͡ʂeˑloˌrɛˑ]. Some speakers also do not place secondary stress on grammatical endings - so telbunen, from the child, where the -nen marks the the ablative case is often pronounced ['teˑlbunen] rather than ['teˑlbuˌneˑn].

In Western Ilbiyoni varieties, stress does not ever change vowel length. In most Eastern Ilbiyoni varients, when primary or secondary stress falls upon a monophthong vowel, it is pronounced half-long. Diphthongs are unchanged by stress.

Orthography

Ilbiyoni dialects are united through the use of a shared orthography. Eastern Jinyero has more accented consonants to reflect its somewhat larger number of phonemes.

Vowels

Orthography	Eastern Ilbiyoni	Western Ilbiyoni
A	/a/	/ä/
Ă	/ɒ/	"
E	/e/	/e̞/
Ĕ	/ɛ/	/ɘ/
I	/y/	/ɨ/
Ĭ	/ʏ/	/ɶ̝/
O	/o/	/o̞/
Ŏ	/ɔ/	Not used
U	/u/	/y/
Ŭ	/ʊ/	Not used
Y	/ə/	Not used

Consonants and semi-vowels

Orthography	Eastern Ilbiyoni	Western Ilbiyoni
b	/b/	/b/ at the beginning of words, and /β/ elsewhere.
c	/k/	/k/ word-initial, and /ç/ elsewhere.
c̆	/ʈ͡ʂ/	Not used
d	/d/	/d/ word-initial, /ð/ elsewhere
g	/g/	/g/ word-initial, /ʝ/ elsewhere.
ğ	/ɖ͡ʐ/	Not used
l	/l/	/l/
m	/m/	/m/
n	/n/	/n/
nc	/ŋ/	/ŋ/
p	/p/	/p/ initial, /ɸ/ elsewhere
r	/ɾ/	/r/
s	/t͡s/	/s/
t	/t/	/t/ initial, /θ/ elsewhere
v	/b̪͡v/	/w/
y	/j/	/j/

Grammar

Nouns

	Case		Final consonant		Final vowel (not i, u)		Final vowel (i, u)
	Ergative		Ĕlsinor		Dolina		Ilbi
	Absolutive		Ĕlsinorem		Dolinam		Ilbiem
	Dative		Ĕlsinorar		Dolinar		Ilbi(a)r
	Ablative		Ĕlsinorain		Dolinain		Ilbiain
	Genitive		Ĕlsinorĕs		Dolinĕs		Ilbiĕs

Modern Ilbiyoni retains a case system that it had several hundreds of years ago, which makes it unusual amongst languages of Greater Tygenoc - Celinese losts the last vestiges of the case system some two hundred years ago, and Jinyera is believed to have never had cases. Whilst there are some irregularly declined nouns, most words follow a pattern determined by how they end - with one pattern covering most words with final consonants, another for words ending in vowels other than i or u, and a third for ending in i or u.

The first cases that the learner becomes acquainted with are the ergative and absolutive cases. The ergative is an unmarked case, used for the subject of transitive verbs, whereas the absolutive is used not only to mark the direct object of a transitive verb, but the subject of intransitive verbs. Compare lonibu telbum (the child is reading) with lonibur liyorem telbu (the child is reading a book.) In the first sentence, the absolutive suffix is added to the word for child: telbum, because reading is being used as an intransitive verb. When a direct object is added, the absolutive suffix moves to the word for book - liyorem - and the child is now in the ergative case.

The dative case is used for indirect objects - sedir ĕlsinorar liyorem eldi means 'I gave a/the book to a/the book palace.' Book palace is in the dative, as an indirect object. The ablative is used not only to designate movement away or out of the marked object - e.g. Ğiniyŏrain (from Jinyero) - but to show causation - elğu piyŏrain (to leave due to fear). The genitive marks possession, and is placed on the possessor - c̆eră Sarĕs (Sara's dog). The possessed noun can be put into different cases, e.g. liyor Ĕlsinorain Ilbiyonĕs (a book from the Book Palace of Ilbiyon).

Number

In Modern Ilbiyoni, nouns are not declined for number. For disambiguation, speakers may add onŭr or the abbreviated form on (one) after a noun to specify that it is in the singular, and dĭbrin or the abbreviated for dir (two) to specify that it is in the plural:

	Ilbiyoni		English
	Ilbi on		Island (singular)
	On(ŭr) ilbi		One island
	Ilbi dir		Islands (general plural)
	Dir/dĭbrin Ilbi		Specifically, two islands

Pronouns

Ilbiyoni has a fairly complex pronoun system that declines for case and number. However, it is not uncommon for speakers to stick to the singular pronouns to communicate singular and plural, except where emphasising or disambiguating.

Case

1SG

1PL

2SG

2PL

3SG

3PL

Ergative

eldi

eldir

indrĕ

indrir

lor

lorir

Absolutive

eldiem

eldirem

indrĕm

indrirem

lorem

lorirem

Dative

eldiar

eldirar

indrĕr

indrirar

lorar

lorirar

Ablative

eldiain

eldirain

indrain

indrirain

lorain

lorirain

Genitive

eldiĕs

eldirĕs

indrĕs

indrirĕs

lorĕs

lorirĕs

Adjectives and Adverbs

One unusual aspect of the Ilbiyoni lexicon is the relative paucity of dedicated adjectives. Most of the time, nouns in the genitive case are used in much the same way as adjectives are. An honourable person would be translated as noriyĕs misor (a person of honour.) This is not completely alien to English - consider the English constructions 'a woman of influence', 'a city of chaos', 'a song of sorrow;' semantically, these are not dissimilar to 'an influential woman', 'a chaotic city', 'a sorrowful song.' Ilbiyoni nearly always only has constructions similar to the former list.

To avoid confusion between the adjectival and possessive uses of the genitive, the former is always marked by putting the adjectival genitive before the noun that it is modifying, whereas the possessive nearly always follows the noun. Thus telbuĕs c̆eră (a young dog) differs from c̆eră telbuĕs (the child's dog).

These genitive constructions can be used as adverbs when juxtaposed with verbs: telbuĕs dirbu (child.GEN complain) can be analysed as 'to complain childishly.'

Verbs

In some ways, the verbal system of Ilbiyoni can be compared to that of neighbouring language, Jinyera - there are only two inflected tenses, past and nonpast (the latter used to communicate present and future), and verbs are not conjugated for subject - so ĕledu (to love) can also mean 'I love', 'he loves', 'they love' etc. Unlike Jinyero, the direct object of a verb can be noted by adding a direct object suffix to the verb, much like Celinese. Unlike in Celinese, this marking is obligatory, even when there is a separate direct object noun in the clause, so in Ilbiyoni, one would not say 'I'm reading the book' but quite literally 'I read it, the book': 'lonibur liyorem (eldi).' In that phrase, lonib is the root, to read; -u marks the non-past tense and -r marks a third person direct object.

	Ilbiyoni		English
	Ĕledu eldi		I love/will love (no direct object)
	Ĕleduol eldi		I love/will love myself
	Ĕledunt eldi		I love/will love you (singular or plural)
	Ĕledur eldi		I love/will love him, her, it or them
	Ĕledi eldi		I loved (no direct object)
	Ĕlediol eldi		I loved myself
	Ĕledint eldi		I loved you (singular or plural)
	Ĕledir eldi		I loved him, her, it or them

To change the subject, a different subject pronoun is used in the place of eldi - though often, the subject pronoun is dropped completely when the subject is implied or inferred, or when it has already been mentioned in a prior clause: hĕcidir ğinoyem eldi id ĕledir (I watched the film and loved it.)

To distinguish between singular and plural direct objects, 'on' (for the singular) or 'dir' (for the plural) is often placed directly after the verb, thus I hated him/her can be phrased ăvedir on (eldi), to distinguish from ăvedir dir (eldi), I hated them.