Kiltin

Kiltin (Kiltin pronunciation: /kɨlˈtin/) is a Kindalic language of the central branch, spoken on the world of Maleka as a lingua franca across Kindal, where it is native to the central plains region, and some surrounding nations.

Classification and dialects
Kiltin is a member of the Kindalic language family. It is traditionally been classified as part of the central branch, which is one of the three branches that descend from the Tanamiya language.

The Tanamiya-descended Kindalic languages form a dialect continuum, and it is often unclear where languages begin and end, and often the distinction may be political. For example, the Cingadia dialect of Kiltin and the Ka'shtanda language are nearly identical (and they were both once regarded as the same Kiltin dialect), but since Cingadia and Ka'shtanda were controlled by different factions during the civil war, one continued to be regarded as a dialect of Kiltin while the other became regarded as a different language.

Some varieties usually considered as Kiltin dialects include:

The current standard form, which is used as the official language of Kindal and a lingua franca in the surrounding region, was established after the founding of the Republic of Kindal and is known as New Standard Kiltin (liuta zhanshkala kiltin, LZhK) to distinguish itself from the older standard form which was used by the Kiltin dynasty. LZhK is based mainly on the variety spoken in and just beyond the suburbs of the capital of Lushtanna, but not within the city itself, whose dialect features several innovations exclusive to the city. Unless otherwise specified, the following content in the article refers to LZhK.
 * Lushtanna
 * Ki'shlia-Kiaya
 * 'Ma'matiulla
 * Cingadia
 * Acioska

History
There has been evidence of the vernacular of the central plains region being used as a lingua franca in Kindal since the 9600's.

The name "Kiltin" comes from the Kiltin dynasty, which took control of most of Kindal in the mid 10100's. The Kiltin dynasty took their name from the word kilti meaning gold. They imposed a standardized form of the vernacular of the central plains region as the official language when they took control, replacing the classical Tanamiya language. While at first the rulers only referred to the standardized vernacular as mintiu jenna (common language), the commoners soon adopted the name kiltiniu jenna (language of the Kiltin) for this language.

The name kiltiniu jenna originally referred to the standardized official variety, but later it also came to refer to the non-standard local dialects which are closest to the official language. During the Kiltin dynasty many people took pride in "speaking Kiltin", so the term was also adopted by some dialects which are somewhat farther from the official language. As the Kiltin dynasty became a regional power and globalization trends begin, other nations in the region adopted Kiltin as a lingua franca for wider communication.

After the collapse of the Kiltin dynasty and the beginning of civil war in the 10700's, regionalism increased and some varieties formerly seen as dialects of Kiltin are then regarded as distinct languages.

When the Republic of Kindal was established in 10825, it adopted Kiltin as its official language, but it was restandardized to be closer to the vernacular at that time, which had changed noticeably, and to introduce words for new concepts. The standard form established by the Republic is now referred to as "New Standard Kiltin" (liuta zhanshkala kiltin, LZhK).

Consonants
Kiltin has 20 basic consonant phonemes:

* The phoneme x only appears in loanwords; it has disappeared from native words.

Most consonants can be palatalized (with the exception of ' and y) and/or glottalized (with the exception of b, d, g, z, zh, j, and '). Palatalized consonants are indicated with an i after the base consonant in the romanization, and while most of them are realized as the palatalized form of the base consonant, there are some exceptions:


 * ni - /ɲ/
 * ngi - /ɲ/
 * si - /ɕ/
 * shi - /ɕ/
 * zi - /ʑ/
 * zhi - /ʑ/
 * ci - /tɕ/
 * ji - /dʑ/
 * li - /ʎ/
 * wi - /jʷ/

Glottalized consonants are indicated by a ' before the base consonant in the romanization; most of them are realized as a cluster of the glottal stop /ʔ/ followed by the base consonant, but the following are realized as ejectives instead:


 * 'p - /pʼ/
 * 't - /tʼ/
 * 'k - /kʼ/
 * 'c - /tsʼ ~ tʃʼ/

In addition, the consonant clusters kl and gl are usually realized as /kʟ̥/ and /gʟ/, respectively.

Kiltin also has sibilant harmony, meaning that "hissing" sibilants (s, z) and "hushing" sibilants (sh, zh) cannot occur within the same word. Sibilant harmony also affects the pronunciation of the affricates (c, j), which are pronounced as /ts/ and /dz/ in words containing s or z, and /tʃ/ and /dʒ/ otherwise.

Vowels
Kiltin has 9 basic vowel phonemes (5 monophthongs and 4 diphthongs):

However, the vowel i can only follow palatalized consonants, while the vowels e and ei cannot follow palatalized consonants.

All of the vowel phonemes can be realized in 2 or 3 different ways depending on where they occur in a word due to vowel reduction:

The "mode" of a given vowel is determined by its position in a word:


 * Penultimately stressed words: ...-1-2-1-2-1-3
 * Ultimately stressed words: ...-2-1-2-1-3-1

All vowels can be nasalized, which is indicated by a m, n, ng, or l (depending on the following consonant) after the base vowel in the romanization. Nasalized vowels are realized as the oral vowel followed by a nasal consonant, depending on the following consonant:


 * m, p, b - /m/ (represented by m)
 * n, t, d, s, z, sh, zh, c, j - /n/ (represented by n)
 * ng, k, g, x, w, ' - /ŋ/ (represented by n, except for g, where it is represented by ng)
 * l - /l/ (represented by l, technically not a nasal consonant)
 * y - /ɲ/ (represented by n)
 * no following consonant: /ŋ/ (represented by n)

Stress
Generally, for root words, primary stress falls on the last syllable if the word ends in a consonant, or on the second-last syllable if the word ends in a vowel, with secondary stress falling on alternating syllables before the primary stress. There is a small set of words that end with a vowel but are stressed on the last syllable.

Inflectional affixes do not affect the stress of a word; the stressed syllable in an inflected word is the same as the stressed syllable in the root word. For inflected words with multisyllabic suffixes, secondary stress also falls on alternating syllables after the primary stress.

Syllable structure
Kiltin syllable structure is (C)(C)V(C), or more accurately, (ʔ)(C)(C)V(N)(C) since most glottalized consonants are realized as a sequence of /ʔ/ and the base consonant, and nasalized vowels are realized as the oral vowel followed by a nasal consonant.

All single consonants are permitted in the onset of a syllable, while the permitted consonant clusters are: kl, gl, pl, bl, shk, sht, shp, shng, shn, shm, shl, shc, ck, ct, cp, cng, cn, cm, cl, sk, st, sp, sng, sn, sm, sl, sc, zhg, zhd, zhb, zhj, jg, jd, jb, zg, zd, zb, zj. In a consonant cluster, only the first consonant can be glottalized, while only the second consonant can be palatalized.

The following consonants are prohibited in the coda of a syllable: g, d, b, w, y, zh, j, z. Glottalized and palatalized consonants are also prohibited in the coda, Although it is not uncommon to find consonants written as if they were palatalized in the coda of a syllable, however, they are pronounced the same as their base consonants and merely serve as an indication that they are to be palatalized if a vocalic suffix is added.

Writing system
Kiltin is most commonly written with the Liskiu script, one of the five major writing systems of Kindal that descend from the Tanamiya script. The Liskiu script, as used for Kiltin, has 18 consonant letters, 9 vowel diacritics, 5 standalone vowel characters, and 3 special symbols. The Liskiu script allows for stacking of two consonant letters to represent a consonant cluster, where the top letter represents the first consonant and the bottom letter represents the second consonant. Although Kiltin has 20 consonants, only 18 of them are written with consonant letters. The remaining two, y and ', are written using special symbols. In the Liskiu script, unmarked consonants have an inherent vowel (usually a in Kiltin), however, they can be marked to indicate that there is no vowel after the consonant.

The vowel phonemes ai, au, ei, and ou do not have standalone letters. Instead, to represent these vowel phonemes without a preceding consonant, their vowel diacritic is added to the letters for a, a, e, and o, respectively.

Romanization
After contact between Maleka and Earth was made in early 10986, two romanization systems were developed. The first system was created in the first months of contact by Annie Collins and her team, who were the first people from Earth to set foot on Maleka. This system is the one used in this article, and is the more popular of the two. The second system was developed by NASA officials a few years later, and although it is more accurate of the two, it is less popular, used mainly by government organizations.

Syntax
The default word order in Kiltin is VSO (Verb-Subject-Object), however, word order is generally more free than in English. While the verb generally remains at the beginning of the sentence, its arguments can be moved around, for example, to show emphasis.

Kiltin allows the inversion of word order and fronting of an argument through the inversion particle la, which appears between the fronted constituent and the verb phrase. Interrogative clauses do not require la to be fronted.

Like most Kindalic languages, Kiltin shows an unusual morphosyntactic alignment known on Maleka as Kindalian alignment, on Earth as Austronesian alignment, or more generally as symmetrical voice.

Nouns
In Kiltin, nouns can be singular or plural and they have 5 cases (direct, indirect, oblique, genitive, and locative). However, Kiltin has no grammatical gender or articles. Although there are no articles and definiteness is not marked on nouns, the direct case generally implies definiteness while the indirect and oblique cases generally imply indefiniteness.

Plurals are marked using one of three endings (Y, Sh, K), whose exact forms depend on the final vowel of the noun, with the ending being used depending on the noun. However, due to sibilant harmony, the Sh ending becomes -s rather than -sh in words that contain the sounds s or z.

The indirect, oblique, and genitive cases are marked with endings that replace the last vowel of the noun. These declensions fit into two patterns (where V represents the last vowel of a noun): However, if an unmarked noun ends in -o, its oblique forms are -u in the singular and -i in the Y plural. The endings -en and -ein both become -in if the consonant before it is palatalized. If a suffix beginning with a consonant is added to a word whose last syllable is and the second consonant are dropped.

The locative case is marked with the suffixes -sa, -ya, or -da, depending on the noun. The exact form of these suffixes also depend on the last vowel of the noun: This chart shows the -sa ending; the -da and -ya endings decline similarly. Due to sibilant harmony, the -sa ending becomes -sha after the Sh plural (as seen on the table) or words containing the sounds sh or zh.

Pronouns
Like nouns, pronouns decline for case and number. Personal pronouns are: Kiltin makes a distinction between 3rd person subjective pronouns, which replace nouns first mentioned in the direct case, and 3rd person objective pronouns, which replace nouns first mentioned in other cases.

Although some dialects maintain a basic two- or three-way politeness distinction in pronouns, it has been completely lost in LZhK. The only politeness marker that is still used in LZhK is lam, which is now fairly inconsistently used.

Demonstrative pronouns are:

Kiltin also has a rich system of indefinite pronouns, which can also be used as interrogative pronouns. The particle ja, which marks a relative clause, can also be prefixed to some indefinite pronouns to form relative pronouns.

Verbs
Kiltin features a highly complex verb system, showing tense, aspect, mood, voice, and polypersonal agreement, through use of prefixes, suffixes, and infixes. Tense, aspect, mood, and voice are marked by a system of prefixes, infixes, and suffixes that interact with each other and the base form of the verb to create stem forms, which are then conjugated with a suffix for the person of their subjects and direct objects. In total, there are 99 stem forms for every verb, and intransitive verbs can have 1478 distinct forms, while transitive verbs can have 8868 distinct forms.

Tense, aspect, and mood
In Kiltin, verbs have three tenses (past, present, future), four aspects (simple, habitual, continuous, perfective), and five moods (indicative, subjunctive, conditional, imperative, interrogative). However, the perfective aspect cannot be used with the present tense. The tenses, aspects, and three of the moods are marked in the stem of the verb using a rather fusional system of prefixes, infixes, and suffixes, while the other two moods (imperative and interrogative) are marked in the personal conjugations.

Trigger
One of the unique aspects about Kindalic languages is their trigger system, which functions similarly to a voice system. Kiltin verbs have 4 triggers (actor, patient, circumstantial, and locative), however, the patient trigger is only used with transitive verbs and the locative trigger with intransitive verbs. Trigger is also marked by prefixes, infixes, or suffixes in the stem of the verb.

Actor Trigger

Patient Trigger

Circumstantial Trigger

Stem conjugation chart
All Kiltin verb stems fall under one of three stem conjugation patterns. Generally, verbs of direct action use the first conjugation pattern, while causative verbs use the second and third conjugation patterns. The third conjugation features reduplication of the initial consonant in the base word, which is represented by C. A consonant followed by (i) represents that the consonant is palatalized, but the following vowel is part of the base word.

Personal conjugations
Kiltin has polypersonal agreement; its verbs agree in number and person for both their subjects and direct objects. The personal conjugations are suffixes which are added after the stem of the verb. There are three sets of verb suffixes for person: one for the indicative, subjunctive, and conditional moods; one for the imperative mood; and one for the interrogative mood. However, these endings vary depending on the last vowel of the verb stem. There are also a few verb stems with irregular personal conjugations such as most forms of the verbs e (be), ma (do),  'shka (go), kle (come), as well as the future tense marker -sha.

Copula
In Kiltin, many verbs can function as copulas. While the most common copula is e, verbs like  'shka and kle can also function as copulas. Unlike other transitive verbs, copulas do not agree for direct object, only subject.

The copula e is prone to dropping. It is usually dropped in the present indicative, and it is only used if the predicate is a noun phrase. If the predicate is an adjective or adpositional phrase, e is not used, rather, the predicate is treated as a verb phrase: it is moved to the beginning of the sentence and the head adjective or adposition is conjugated as if it were a verb.

Compound verbs
Kiltin verbs can combine to form compound verbs, which can function similarly to auxilliary verbs. In compound verbs, only the last verb is conjugated; the rest are in their base forms. The ordering of verbs in a compound verb is opposite that of English, for example:


 * meki mina  ( can see)
 * meki lenna  ( want to see)
 *  'shka mina  ( can go)
 *  'shka lenna  ( want to go)

Adjectives
Most adjectives ending in -u decline as following:

Other adjectives decline similarly to nouns, except that the locative case uses the same endings as the oblique case.

Adjectives have three degrees of comparison: regular, comparative, and superlative. Generally, the comparative is formed by dropping the last vowel of the adjective (if it ends in a vowel) and adding the suffix -liu, while the superlative is formed by adding the prefix nai- to the comparative form. For example, keimiu (beautiful), keimliu (more beautiful), naikeimliu (most beautiful). Some irregular forms include: kaliu (good),  'shpiliu (better), nai'shpiliu (best); cmanna (bad), niailliu (worse), nainiailliu (worst).

There are two main ways of intensifying adjectives. The first is to simply use the superlative form of the adjective: keimiu (beautiful), naikeimliu (very beautiful). The second is to repeat the whole adjective except for the last vowel (if it ends in a vowel) or the last vowel and consonant (if it ends in a consonant): keimiu (beautiful), keim keimiu (very beautiful).

The suffix -an can be used to derive adverbs from adjectives.

Numbers
Kiltin number words have a unique declension system. The basic numerals include:

Kiltin base numerals always end in either -k, -sh, or -i, and they are stressed on the last syllable. Numerals also have conjoining forms; to form conjoining forms, numerals that end in -k or -sh drop the final consonant and nasalize the previous vowel (if it is not nasalized already), and those that end in -i remain unchanged; unlike the base forms, conjoining forms are stressed on the second-last syllable. For example, tak (1) -> tan, mesh (2) -> men, bi (3) - bi. Conjoining forms are used in compound numerals (e.g. menjin tak, 21) and as cardinal modifiers. They are invariable; they do not decline for case or number.

When numbers are used as nouns, they decline as following:

Ordinal numerals take a suffix and decline as normal adjectives:

Adpositions
Kiltin adpositions fall under two categories: locative and non-locative. There are two main distinctions between the two types. The first is that nouns used with locative adpositions take the locative case, while those used with non-locative adpositions take the oblique case. The second is that most non-locative adpositions may go before or after the noun, while locative adpositions that go before a noun cannot be used after a noun and vice versa. Many locative adpositions consist of two parts: one before the noun and the other after the noun.

Common non-locative adpositions include:


 * ska (with, by means of)
 * pa (with, in company with)
 * ce (with, in possession of)
 * 'ap (for)
 * ni (without)
 * ka (in)
 * lusia (before)
 * lukia (after)
 * klu (by)
 * caushta (through)
 * she (from)
 * ko (to)

Common locative adpositions include:


 * cu (N) (at)
 * cu (N) da (on)
 * cu (N) sa (in)
 * cu (N) ki (from)
 * cu (N) ka (to)
 * mi (N) (near)
 * mi (N) ki (over)
 * mi (N) ka (under)
 * mi (N) shni (in front of)
 * mi (N) shna (behind)
 * mi (N) pli (to the left of)
 * mi (N) pla (to the right of)

Conjunctions
Kiltin uses several conjunctions, such as:


 * a (and, used with phrases without verbs)
 * as (and, used with phrases with verbs)
 * i (or, used with phrases without verbs)
 * is (or, used with phrases with verbs)
 * ko (but)
 * ja (that)
 * shak (because)
 * kash (so, therefore)
 * tau (if)
 * kimi (although)
 * enko (in order to)

Vocabulary
Most Kiltin vocabulary is inherited from Tanamiya, although there is also a sizeable amount of direct borrowings from classical Tanamiya, as well as words of pre-Kindalic origin and those from neighboring languages.

After contact between Earth and Maleka, many Kiltin loanwords entered the English language, especially those referring to life-forms and technology found on Maleka that were not present on Earth, as well as those relating to magic. There is also a small amount of slang words in English that comes from Kiltin; these words are most heard in midwestern cities such as St. Louis, Chicago, and Kansas City. They include maggie (a new or inexperienced person, from  'magisha "seedling"), cote, and lellah/leller/lellie (both meaning mosquito, from  'kotalella "little flying one").

Sample text
The following is a translation of the chorus of Taylor Swift's Blank Space:

Liskiu script:



Romanization (Collins): Kash ‘apshe ‘kitum

Is klanda'shkashe cu nushkaya sa

Jani'sha shnaksha mai la ellada minashma

Ja'shta punalka kaliumensha shmushla

Cel okelladayu kai me dicngu

Lusiallu laga 'misma

Shak 'mukam bleshalkum la zanniaunn

As bleshkum la zanniam

Shak cialin as nizhdammin

 'Shkaliashe ngat mama lukas

Nialikleshca yashnum

Is calikleshca cmankla piullum

Cel okelladayu kai me dicngu

Lusiallu laga 'misma

Ko cel tampa ka'shkada, nialu

As ideshau kin stallum English original: So it's gonna be forever

Or it's gonna go down in flames

You can tell me when it's over

If the high was worth the pain

Got a long list of ex-lovers

They'll tell you I'm insane

'Cause you know I love the players

And you love the game

'Cause we're young, and we're reckless

We'll take this way too far

It'll leave you breathless

Or with a nasty scar

Got a long list of ex-lovers

They'll tell you I'm insane

But I've got a blank space, baby

And I'll write your name