Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech

Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech is a script and language developed by Kitsune Sobo and Charlie Chey of Enigma Forge Studios for The Song of Eternavis, a multimedia project detailing the fictional world of Eternavis. It is inspired by Celtic scripts as well as Gothic and Mi'kmaw hieroglyphs.

In-universe History

Old Speech appears to have been an indigenous writing system used for a language isolate spoken by nomadic peoples in the Naristi and Silberland regions two millennia ago. With gradual migrations of Werenkean groups into the area, bringing with them Werenkean tongues such as Old Sweven, the language these mysterious people spoke was gradually subsumed, leaving only substratum influence on some of the languages used in the present day of Eternavis. Nonetheless, cave writings in the script of the enigmatic language are plentiful, allowing for careful reconstruction of the writing system and its speech by Eternavian linguists, including its phonology based on loanwords into other language as as well as sound changes it influenced in those tongues.

From what can be discerned, Θũʘṵʢṳ ("People's Tongue", as it may have been called by its speakers) used monosyllabic root words with the structure CVC, V for vowels and C for consonants. All roots ended in a consonant and could not appear without affixes. A root + suffix = word stem. A word stem + inflectional ending = fully inflected word.

It had eight grammatical inflections: Nominative (subject of a verb), Accusative (direct object), Genitive (possession/modification of another noun), Dative (indirect object), Instrumental (the instrument or means of an action), Ablative (expresses motion away from something), Locative (expresses location) and Vocative (used for direct address).

It had masculine, feminine and neuter grammatical gender, and verbs could fall into Stative (state of being), Imperfective (ongoing, habitual or repeated action) or Perfective (completed actions or actions viewed as a whole) classes. It had four moods: Indicative (statements of fact), Imperative (commands, prohibitions, requests), Subjunctive (hypotheticals, emotions, obligations) and Optative (wishes and hopes). It used an active and mediopassive voice, first, second and third grammatical persons, and singular, dual and plural numbers. Its syntax rules can be reconstructed as follows: SOV word order, adjectives preceded nouns, head nouns preceded genitives, prepositions (not postpositions), no dominant order in comparative constructions and main clauses came before relative clauses.

Notable features

Type of writing system: alphabet
Writing direction: variable.
Used to write: Θũʘṵʢṳ (Old Speech)
Old Speech was written on cave walls and ceilings in black pigment made of charcoal and soot rather than carved into the rock, allowing for the cursive shapes most of its letters possess
The ⟨u⟩ sound in Θũʘṵʢṳ has a nasal, “creaky” and “breathy” form (ũ, ṵ, ṳ) which are treated as separate phonemes
The language has eight vowels, eleven consonants and five click consonants: ⟨ⱱ⟩, ⟨ⱱ̟⟩, ⟨ʜ⟩, ⟨ʢ⟩, ⟨ɠ̊ɓ̥⟩, ⟨t̪ʙ̥⟩, ⟨ð⟩, ⟨θ⟩, ⟨ɻ⟩, ⟨j̃⟩, ⟨tɕʰ⟩, ⟨ʘ⟩, ⟨ǀ⟩, ⟨ǁ⟩, ⟨ǂ⟩, ⟨ǃ⟩, ⟨ɐ̃⟩, ⟨œ̃⟩, ⟨u⟩, ⟨ũ⟩, ⟨ṵ⟩, ⟨ṳ⟩, ⟨a⟩, and ⟨ɚ⟩
Θũʘṵʢṳ has a substantial phonetic influence on the fifteen documented Sweven dialects in Eternavis: East, West, North and South Edelsteiner Sweven, South, Central and West Sicari Sweven, North, South, East and West Grenzheimian Sweven, Treewright Sweven, Piscator Sweven, Delver Sweven and Bower Sweven

Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech

Download an alphabet chart for Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech (Excel)
Download a font for Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech

Sample text

Sample text in Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech

Transliteration

Ɠ̊ɓ̥ɐ̃ʜṵ tɕʰœ̃ⱱ̟a ɻũ ʘɚʢɚǀṵ ǁaθ. Ɠ̊ɓ̥ɐ̃ʜṵ t̪ʙ̥œ̃ ʜṳ tɕʰɚ ǂœ̃ðɐ̃ ʢaǀɚ ʘuj̃u ⱱṵǃɚ tɕʰṳǀɐ̃.

Translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Constructed scripts by Kitsune Sobo

Dust Witch Runes, Nomish, Θũʘṵʢṳ / Old Speech, Rountongue, Script of the All-Seers, Skálmvargic, Skyling Script, Thieṛian, Wind-and-Leaf Script

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