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This article is about the conlang, Theodian, which is one of the two national languages of The Kingdom of Theodia. It discusses the history, writing system, grammar, and proper pronunciation of the language. This page makes heavy use of IPA characters and symbols. It is recommended that you download a font with the capability to display all of the symbols, such as the DejaVu font. This page also makes use of Milic Runes, which require a special font to dislay correctly, such as [ this] modified Segoe UI Symbol font.

About the Language


Dıt Þaodzıt Spragê [], or Theodian, is the first of the the two national languages of the Kingdom of Theodia. It is a micronational engelang/explang (a type of constructed language, or 'conlang'). Lexically, it draws heavily from languages like Old English, Modern English, Norwegian, and German. It uses a mixed case runic fuþark, called "Milic Runes" and designed by amateur linguist, Miles Bradley Huff, for its written system. It is the preferred language of many Theodians.

A Note on the Philosophical Goals of Theodian
It should be noted that the main jobs of language are to communicate and to organize thoughts and throught processes. This is why Theodian is what it is; it follows Miles Bradley Huff's [ theory] of language-syntax by being a truly objective language (obsseively head-final), thus emphasizing the details over the big picture. Such a syntax allows for the maximum potential for success in the civilized world. Also as per Miles's theory, the required OVS word-order forces one to think about others before oneself -- a socialist word-order, yes, but it is also one of the most objective word-orders (continuing the theme from above) because of the effects of serial processing and the properties of mnemonics. It is, however, generally a weak language in terms of tradition, as verbs are usually in the middle of sentences. Theodian is also, by nature, an amazing language for the scientific fields -- this due to its high level of objectivity and its rapid speaking-pace, which speeds-up thought-processes. (Miles's Theory is copyrighted and he must be [mailto:Sweyn78@Yahoo.com contacted] before material from this theory of his is used)

Sample Texts
Here are some sample texts:

Babylon
Here is the Tower of Babylon:

English Translation

 * 1) Then they said, “Come, let’s build a great city for ourselves with a tower that reaches into the sky. This will make us famous and keep us from being scattered all over the world.  ”
 * 2) But the Lord came down to look at the city and the tower the people were building.
 * 3) “Look!” he said. “The people are united, and they all speak the same language.  After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them!
 * 4) Come, let’s go down and confuse the people with different languages. Then they won’t be able to understand each other.  ”
 * 5) In that way, the Lord scattered them all over the world, and they stopped building the city.
 * 6) That is why the city was called Babel, because that is where the Lord confused the people with different languages. In this way he scattered them all over the world.

National Anthem
Here is the national anthem of the Kingdom of Theodia:

Transcription

 * 

English Translation (exact)

 * 

Pronunciation
Pronunciations are shown in the IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet).

Written System
The written system of Theodian is Milic Runic. That means that it is based-upon the runic alphabets of the Nordic and Germanic peoples of pre-Christian Europe. One of its primary influences is the Elder Fuþark, although, in its younger stages (back when it was 43-characters and single-case), its primary influence was the Anglo-Saxon Fuþorc. The current system, referred to as the Maelit FUÞARK, consists of a mixed-case system, with 24 capital and 24 lowercase runes, organized into three ættir of eight runes each. Two notable things about this written system is its use of a dot for a space and its lack of horizontal lines, with all lines being at either vertical or drawn at 45', 90', or 135' angles. The Runes themselves are an inseparable part of Theodian culture, as is apparent on Theodia's monetary-unit, where a different rune is displayed in the background of each different type of bill.
 * On Monday, the 14th of June, 2010, Theodian switched-over to the version of the Runic Fuþark agreed-upon for the Runic Union.
 * Theodian later switched back over to its traditional script from the Runic Union's Standard Runic Script and also adopted an informal script for handwriting.
 * Sometime in the Theodian Dark Age, a cursive version of the Milic-Runic script was also invented.
 * A font approved by the Lingustic Council of Theodia is required in order for the runes to display properly. Else, the runes will either show up as an undefined character or as an incorrect glyph.
 * Approved fonts:
 * [ Ilandit Runê]
 * [ Modified Segoe UI Symbol]
 * [ Modified Arial]
 * [ Modified Times New Roman]

Individual Runes
This is the basic pronunciation-chart. The first two columns show the names of the Runes. "Runic", "Latin", "Cyrillic", and "Greek" denote how to properly transliterate Theodian into other writing-systems. "Strong" shows how stressed vowels should be pronounced, and how one should generally pronounce enunciated consonants. "Lax" shows how the runes are usually pronounced when they are lenited (softened), althugh some are often lenited even furthur. No lax vowel-sound may ever take-place word-finally. The Circumflex accent is called a "Sewroŋae" in Theodian (Schevrong in English (originally from the French word "Chevron")). The Schevrong causes vowel pronunciations to change. "Schevrong (Strong)" denotes a stronger version of a Schevronged vowel, while "Schevrong (Lax)" denotes the lax pronunciation of a Schevronged vowel (comparable to the previously mentioned Strong/Lax vowel-distinction). Blank spaces in the chart indicate that there is no pronunciation of that type for that particular rune. There is a slash (/) present whenever there is more than one acceptable way to pronounce a particular rune. The pronunciations are shown here in the IPA:
 * Please note that this article...
 * ...uses the plus diacritic to increase frontness
 * ...uses the minus diacritic to increase backness
 * ...uses the uptack diacritic to increase closeness
 * ...uses the downtack diacritic to increase openess
 * ...may require you to scroll to your right in order to see the entirety of this particular chart. 

Notes: 
 * All coronal consonants are laminal
 * Velar plosives are further palatized before 'I', 'J', 'U, 'Û'.
 * Velar plosives are not palatized at all before 'A', 'O', 'V', 'Êl', and 'L' (strong).
 * Velar plosives are uvelarized before 'Âvl', 'L' (lax).
 * "V" is a relic; the phoneme has dropped-out of the language.
 * Normally palatized consonants may not always be pronounced palatizedly.
 * Consonants are labalized before all rounded vowels and rounded semi-vowels.
 * Vowels are nasalized before nasals.
 * 'N' shifts to 'Ŋ' when it directly precedes a Velar/Velarized consonant, and 'T' and 'D' are lenited before these.
 * 'Ŋ' shifts to 'N' after 'S' and 'Z'.
 * 'S' and 'Z' are always lenited before all other alveolars.
 * Other Things Pertaining to the Othography of Theodian: 
 * In any instance where one can not type 'Þ', 'Dt' is an acceptable alternative.	' '	' '
 * In any instance where an 'ı' is unavailable, typing 'i' is an acceptable alternative.
 * In any instance where an 'ȷ' is unavailable, typing 'j' is an acceptable alternative.
 * In any instance where one can not type 'Ŋ', 'Gn' is an acceptable substitution in front positions and 'Ng' in final positions.	' '	' '
 * In any instance where an Schevrong is unavailable, typing the letter and then '^' or simply leaving the diacritic out are acceptable solutions.	' '

Stress
Theodian is a post-lexical stress-accent language in which the prepenultimate syllable is always stressed (except in one and two-syllable words). The numbers here correspond to the total number of syllables in a given word. Stressed syllables are usually held slightly longer than unstressed syllables.
 * 1) Unstressed
 * 2) Stressed-Unstressed
 * 3) Stressed-Unstressed-Unstressed
 * 4) Unstressed-Stressed-Unstressed-Unstressed
 * 5) Unstressed-Unstressed-Stressed-Unstressed-Unstressed
 * 6) Unstressed-Unstressed-Unstressed-Stressed-Unstressed-Unstressed
 * 7) Unstressed-Unstressed-Unstressed-Unstressed-Stressed-Unstressed-Unstressed

Consonantal Groups
There are a great many consonantal groups in Theodian, but a few are irregular or otherwise special. These are as follows: Notes: 
 * Plosives are unaspirated after fricatives
 * 'N' shifts to 'Ŋ' when it directly precedes a Velar/Velarized consonant, and 'T' and 'D' are lenited before these.
 * 'Ŋ' shifts to 'N' after 'S' and 'Z'.
 * 'S' and 'Z' are always lenited before all other alveolars.
 * Velar plosives are further palatized before 'J'.
 * Velar plosives are not palatized at all before 'V' and 'L' (strong).
 * Velar plosives are uvelarized before 'L' (lax).
 * Double consonants are always trilled.

Vowel-Consonant Groups
These are the three differently pronounced vowel-consonant groups

Vowels Ending with 'J' or 'V'
Vowels ending with either 'J' or 'V' are tense. This feature used to be very common in Theodian -- even required in all words, at one point -- but is now merely a relic. It is considered archaic and almost mystical and secretive to write Theodian using these in every word. Their current usage is restricted almost entirely to the names of deities.

Vowels Ending with 'H'
'H's are pronounced as [] when they postcede a vowel, even if it isn't at the end of the word. The only exception is when the 'H' is part of a consonant group. This is from the Old English convention of pronouncing certain 'H's as IPA [].

Diphthongs and Triphthongs
These are the diphthongs of Theodian. All pronunciations are in the IPA. They mutate-into a "strong" form when the consonant following them is voiceless. All other instances of them are "weak".
 * *Triphthongs can be formed by appending an "êl".

Other
These are other things that one might see in the orthography that may, or may not, have their own distinct pronunciations. They are as follows:

Phonology


Consonants
The Theodian language has 21 consonants, all of which are subject to allophonic variation (as can be seen in the pronunciation-chart higher-up in this article). Several can be trilled to emphasize things, but the trilling is by no means lexical and/or mandatory. The six trills of Theodian are Rr, Nn, Pp, Bb, Ll, and Dd. Here is a chart of the 21 Theodian consonants and the six Theodian trills in their most common forms:

Grammar
 Grammar is the most important part of Theodian.