Minor Lenian languages
North Dreamlandic languages
These are ordered roughly east-to-west.
Cappini languages
Proto-Cappini was identical with Baywatch, but was grouped with the others for political reasons.
CONSONANTS:
Bilabials: p m b Alveolars: t n s l r
And the vowels were /a e i o u/ in both short and long forms. The geminates /pp ss tt/ occurred, and there were sound gaps of */te so bo lo ro/, except in a few rare words where contraction of long vowels before geminates had created new short vowels there.
Cappini to Wineapple
This was the language spoken in Olansele.
- The alveolars t n shifted to k ŋ before any of /o u/.
Cappini to Poise
This was the language spoken in Poise.
- The alveolars t n shifted to k ŋ before any of /o u/.
- This shift was added in the assumption that the language would be taking in many loans from Oyster languages, but if this is not the case, this shift does not create any new phonemes and can be ignored.
- Any singleton s disappeared to Ø.
- The geminates pp ss tt kk shifted to p s t k.
Other languages
The states of Ládara, Etatăni, Halaspa, Pumpkin, and Pointer did not have their own languages.
South Dreamlandic languages
These are ordered east-to-west.
These lists assume that all three languages are from the same branch of the family as Dolphin Rider (DPR), rather than being related to Wildfire, PDP, or independent.
Senampattore language
Pupa language
Lohi language
- The mid vowel e, which occurred almost entirely after palatalized consonants, shifted to a. Thus, the vowel inventory was reduced to /a i u/, with frequent sequences of /ya wa yi wu/ but no others.
- The true palatals ć ń ś shifted to č ň š .
- NOTE ON POLITICS: The main DPR list begins here.
- The labiovelars kʷ ŋʷ hʷ shifted to pʷ mʷ fʷ unconditionally.
- The sequences ya wa shifted to ye o.
- In a closed syllable, the vowels i u lowered to e o. Long vowels did not shift.
- The sequence āi shifted to ē.
- Between vowels, the sequence ta shifted to ra.
- The prenasals mp nt nč ŋk shifted to voiced stops b r r g.
- The voiceless coronals t č š shifted to s . Meanwhile ň shifted to n.
- The palatalized labials pʲ mʲ fʲ bʲ became f m f b. Thus palatalization was defeated.
- It appears that lʲ rʲ also shifted to l r.
- The sequences hi hu shifted to si fu. Then ŋi shifted to ni.
- NOTE ON POLITICS: DPR breaks away at this point.
Western languages
The western branch broke off around 1300 AD, and then lost contact with the others. There could be as many as five languages by 3370 AD, but the growth of the other branches would have prevented these daughter languages from splitting into further branches.
Changes unique to Western Fojy
- The voiceless non-sibilant fricatives f fʲ h hʷ shifted to Ø Ø Ø w.
- The palatalized labials pʲ mʲ shifted to p m.
- The bare vowel u shifted to ʉ. Then wa shifted to wo. Neither of these shifts were phonemic.
The language at this stage had exactly 100 syllables, if the clusters pp kk mp nt nk are counted as single onsets. This makes WF one of two related languages to evolve a 100-character syllabary early in their history, the other being the very early stages of the Gold language.
However, the 100 syllable analysis ignores the rare independent final nasal /n/. There were many vowel sequences, such as /ie/, as well as inherited long vowels which were now written as doubles.
The syllabary consisted of signs for
a i ʉ ya wo yi wu ye pa pi pʉ __ pwo __ pwu pe ma mi mʉ mwo mwu me ta (ci cʉ) tya tyi tye na ni nʉ nya nyi nye sa si sʉ sya syi sye la li lʉ lya lyi lye ra ri rʉ rya ryi rye ka ki kʉ kya kwo kyi kwu kye ŋa ŋi ŋʉ ŋya ŋwo ŋyi ŋwu ŋye ppa ppi ppʉ ppwo ppwu ppe kka kki kkʉ kkya kkwo kkyi kkwu kkye mpa mpi mpʉ mpwo mpwu mpe nta (nci ncʉ) ntya ntyi ntye ŋka ŋki ŋkʉ ŋkya ŋkwo ŋkyi ŋkwu ŋkye
In the year 3958, one of the languages of Western Fojy (here "WF", or Wildfire) took over all of Dreamland, only to be swept out by the Dolphin Rider language in 4108.
Proto-Western Fojy (1900) to Wildfire I (3958)
This language loses its /ʉ/, creating an unbalanced setup where most of the consonants cannot occur before a back vowel.
- The weak vowel ʉ disappeared to Ø, creating closed syllables.
- Triple consonant sequences became double.
Culture
The western tribes were well-known for their military ineptitude, but still were able to win wars when other Dreamer tribes were on their side.
Para-Birch languages
Bilabials: p m f w Alveolars: t n s l Postalveolars: š y Velars: k ŋ h g
There were four vowels, and the diphthongs /ai əi au əu/. The tone system was à/ă/ā and the schwa only occurred on the low tone.
