Sinatolean
Sinatolean(sinadoleya; [ɕinaˈdɔleja]) is the official and national language of the Sinatolean Federation, a federative archipelago nation. Before the unification and subsequent formation of the Federation, Sinatolean was still used as a lingua franca in the region as far back as around 900 BCE. It is the most spoken Sinatolean language, with an estimated 680,000 total native speakers as of 2024.
Sinatolean is a heavily agglutinative language. In fact, the autonym of the language is itself an agglutinated phrase:
sin -a dol -e ya
person -SING island -PL speech
Thus, sinadoleya means "speech of the island person".
Phonology
Orthography
Consonants
| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | p b | t d | (c) (ɟ) | k g | ʔ | |
| Nasal | m | (ɱ) | n | (ɲ) | ŋ | |
| Fricative | (f) (v) | s z, (ɕ) (ʑ) | (x) | h | ||
| Affricate | t͡ɕ d͡ʑ | |||||
| Semivowel | w | j | ||||
| Lateral | l̪~l | |||||
Broad and slender
Like in Irish, the realisation of consonants change depending on the vowel after it. For example, a /g/ before an /i/, /ø/ or /e/(slender vowels) changes to /ɟ/, while the same for /k/ changes it to /c/. These changes are not shown in the orthography.
| Phoneme | Broad | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Slender | ||
| /p/ | /p/ | pola [pɔla] "move(jussive)" |
| /f/ | pisani [fisaɲi] "those dogs" | |
| /b/ | /b/ | boso [bɔsɔ] "roof" |
| /v/ | labin [laviɲ] "wave" | |
| /t/ | tolo [tɔlɔ] "triggerfish" | |
| /d/ | /d/ | dole [dɔle] "islands" |
| /ɟ/ | didika [ɟiɟika] "beach" | |
| /k/ | /k/ | angaka [aŋaka] "temple, shrine" |
| /c/ | kēnene [ceːɲeɲe] "waterfalls" | |
| /g/ | /g/ | ganeu [gaɲəw] "pet food" |
| /ɟ/ | ginja [ɟiɲd͡ʑa] "june, 6 months" | |
| /ʔ/ | āyo [ʔajɔ] "hey (Sinatʼ regional variation)", janiʼpi [d͡ʑaɲiʔfi] "jasmine tea" | |
| /h/ | /x/ | sahala [saxala] "Sahara desert" |
| /h/ | mēhi [meːhi] "May, 5 months" | |
| /s/ | /s/ | sāno [saːnɔ] "wind" |
| /ɕ/ | sinadoleya [ɕinaˈdɔleja] "Sinatolean language" | |
| /z/ | /z/ | zon [zɔn] "zone" |
| /ʑ/ | uklēzin [ukleːʑiɲ] "Ukrainian" | |
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | u | |
| Close-mid | e ø | ||
| Mid | (ə)* | ||
| Open-mid | ɔ | ||
| Open | a |
/ə/ is a common unstressed allophone that can theoretically be used for any vowel, though it is mostly only used for /e/ when it precedes a semivowel like /w/ or /j/, such as in ganeu [gaɲəw], "pet food"
