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The Ashouctian language uses the Latin alphabet. The 70 consonants and 4 vowels of the language are not represented in a 1:1 grapheme to phoneme ratio, but the language can be transcribed with little abiguity.

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Alphabet

Despite the large number of sounds in the language, it only uses 18 letters of the Latin alphabet, but also makes use of the accute accent.

a á b c d e é f g h i í l m n o ó p r s t u ú

The letters are named as follows:

a be ca de e fa ga fhas i al am an u-* pe rra si ta u

Letters with the acute accent are ignored when reciting the alphabet because the acute accent is used to mark ejective consonants. The language never makes use of j k q v w x y and z outside of foreign names. Loanwords are transcribed phonetically into the language. 

Ashouctianization of Loanwords

Grapheme IPA Ashouctian spelling
j /d͡ʒ/ d and strong vowel
/j/ i
/ʒ/ sh and strong vowel
k /k/ c
q(u) /k/
/kʷ/ co
v /v/ mh
w /v/
/w/ bh
/u/ u
x /ks/ cs
/x/ h
y /j/ i
/i/
z /z/ sh

Consonants

The 70 consonants of Ashouctian are transcribes using the following system.

Labial Alveolar Post-alv. Retroflex Palatal Velar Uvular Glottal
Plain Lab. Central Lat. Pl. Lab. Pl. Lab. Pl. Lab. Pl. Lab. Pl. Lab. Pl. Lab.
Pl. Lab.
Nasal m mo n no ng ngo
Stop Voiceless p po t to c co c co dt dto
Voiced b d do g go
Ejective toʼ coʼ coʼ
Affricate Voiceless th tho t to
Voiced ts d
Ejective thʼ
Fricative Voiceless f fo s so ll s so sr sro h ho ch cho fh
Voiced mh sh sho sh sho shr shro gh gho
Ejective llʼ chʼ
Approximant l r ro i io bh
Trill rr
  • The acute accent marking an ejective consonant is written on the following vowel, but never on ‹o›

Strong and weak consonants

The graphemes ‹t to d tʼ s so sh sho sʼ c co cʼ coʼ› can all represent two distinct consonant sounds. In order to distinguish the two different sounds, the vowels following the grapheme are written differently.

Grapheme t to d s so sh sho c co coʼ
Weak sound /t/ /tʷ/ /d/ /tʼ/ /s/ /sʷ/ /z/ /zʷ/ /sʼ/ /k/ /kʷ/ /kʼ/ /kʼʷ/
Strong sound /t͡ʃ/ /t͡ʃʷ/ /d͡ʒ/ /t͡ʃʼ/ /ʃ/  /ʃʷ/ /ʒ/ /ʒʷ/ /ʃʼʷ/ /q/ /qʷ/ /qʼ/ /qʼʷ/

Vowels

There are 4 vowels in Ashouctian asl well as 4 diphthongs. Each vowel and diphthong has a weak and a strong variant, the strong variants of which are used after certain consonant graphemes in order to distinguish it from it's weak counterpart.

Weak vowels

These vowels are used after the so-called weak consonants, namely /t tʷ d tʼ s sʷ z zʷ sʼ k kʷ kʼ kʼʷ/

Front Mid Back
Close i u
Mid e
Open a

Diphthongs

/ai/ /au/ /əi/ /əu/
Grapheme ai ao ei eo

Strong vowels

There are two types of strong vowels: those that modify the consonant immediately before the vowel grapheme (as in seas - /ʃas/),  deemed adjacent vowels, and those that modify the consonant preceeding the consonant immediately before the vowel grapheme, given that the consonant immediately before the vowel grapheme is also a weak-strong consonant (as in staes - /ʃtas/ not /st͡ʃas/), deemed far vowels.

adjacent vowels far vowels
Front Mid Back Front Mid Back
Close ie eu Close iui eou
Mid iae Mid ue
Open ea Open ae

Diphthongs

/ai/ /au/ /əi/ /əu/
adjacent vowels aedh oedh eidh eodh
far vowels auidh eaodh euidh euodh

Usage of Ó and other modifying characters

In order to to fully phonetically transcribe the language, the language requires special modifying characters. They are listed in the table below along with their useage and an example.

Grapheme Usage Example
Óó

to indicate hiatus between vowels that are normally written as a diphthong

to indicate that two consonants written as a digraph are pronounced seperately amhi -/avi/
amóhi -/amxi/
-ídh to indicate ejectiveness of a (weak) consonant preceeding another consonant thídhkád - /t͡sʼkʼad/
-édh to indicate ejectiveness of a strong consonant preceeding another consonant
-dh to indicate pronounciation of a syllable- or word-final consonant as strong bhanusodh - /wanuʃʷ/
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