Iáþi

Iáþi (/ ɪ.æ.θ ɪ/, anglicized Iathi) is a language of the Lhuban family. It is spoken in Se Nil é Λúbace on the planet Ajsliŋ (Aysling), where it is an official and national language. It is spoken as a first language by 64 million people and as a second language by an additional 4 million, mostly by native speakers of other Lhuban languages in the south of Se Nil é Λúbace.

Classification and Dialects
Iáþi is the most spoken member of the Lhuban family. It is one of three extant languages of the Northern branch, the only extant branch of the family. The other two languages, Éjaté and Umπyl, are closely related though not mutually intelligible with each other or Iáþi.

Consonants
Iáþi has the largest consonant inventory of any Lhuban language, totaling in at 35 native standard phonemes.
 * younger speakers are losing contrast of / ɴ/ and / ɢ/, merging them with /ŋ/ and /g/ respectively
 * / ʃ/ and /ʒ/ are found only in loanwords and may be replaced with either /s,z/ or / ç,ʝ/ by some speakers
 * some speakers may insert a glottal stop between adjacent vowels, though this is non-standard
 * /j/ and /w/ are analyzed as vowels, not consonants, by native speakers
 * voiceless plosives are aspirated in standard pronunciation, though aspiration is not phonemic and therefore in free variation

Vowels

 * all vowels except /ə/ can be nasalized
 * permitted diphthongs: /wV/, /jV/, /aw/, / ɛw/, /aj/, / ɔj/
 * some dialects may shift / ɔj/ to / ɤj/ (note that /ɤ/ does not occur). This is considered a notable feature of speech from Oϟa Alí.

Alphabet
Iáþi has two native scripts, one a true alphabet used for everyday purposes, and the other a featural abugida used for special purposes such as ceremonial events, religious scripture, or decorative design. All native speakers are taught to read in both.

The alphabetic script, known as __, has two cases, with capitalization rules similar to those of the Latin alphabet.

The abugida, known as Se Hízôl, has only one case, though it uses a diacritical mark to mark what would otherwise be a capital letter. It can however be written in two styles, one rounded and the other square, the former being more common.

In this article, Iáþi will be transcribed in a Latin script appended with some Greek and Cyrillic characters to maintain a 1:1 phoneme to grapheme ratio. This script is as follows.

Phonotactics
Syllables must be in the form (s)(C)(L1)V(L2)(s), where V is any vowel (including permitted diphthongs and triphthongs), C is any consonant, L1 is /s/ or /r/, and L2 is any sonorant. C must be voiceless if the syllable onset is a consonant cluster inscluding /s/. Thus, an example of the simplest syllable possible is / ɛ / (Eng. "a") and an example of the most complex is /scrwojls/ (a disease native to the continent of Meralû), though such highly complex syllables are incredibly rare.

Example text

 * Án lússä se iáþike.
 * "I speak Iathi." IPA: [æn lus.sə sɛ ɪ.æ.θɪ.kɛ]