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{{Infobox language
{{Infobox language
| name         = Lemobrogian
| name = Lemobrogian
| nativename   = Kèŋóľiyó
| nativename = Gidrenθive
| pronunciation = {{IPA|[kɛˈŋoʎijo]}}
| pronunciation = {{IPA|[giˈdɹɛnθiβɛ]}}
| states       = [[Lemobrogia]]
| states = [[Lemobrogia]]
|speakers       = L1 ~ 76,000,000
| speakers = ~ 43,791,300
|speakers_label = Speakers
| date = 2024
|speakers2      = L2 ~ 25,000,000
| iso1 = gi
| date         = 2024
| iso2 = gid
| iso1         = kľ
| iso3 = gid
| iso2         = kèŋ
| fam1 = Sidurian
| iso3         = kèŋ
| fam2 = Lemobrogic
| fam1         = Sidurian
| dia1 = Central Lemobrogic
| fam2         = Lemobrogic
| dia2 = Northern Lemobrogic
| dia1         = Central Lemobrogic  
| dia3 = Southern Lemobrogic
| dia2         = Northern Lemobrogic  
| ancestor = Old Lemobrogian
| dia3         = Southern Lemobrogic  
| ancestor2 = Classical Lemobrogian
| ancestor     = Kəyòkóľiyó
| ancestor3 = Vulgar Lemobrogian
| ancestor2     = Maèsóľiyó
| script = Lemobrogian alphabet <br />Lemobrogian Braille
| ancestor3     = Rèňəvóľiyó
| sign = Gidre Kʼembi
| ancestor4    = Aènóľiyó, Kælsóľiyó
| nation = {{flagicon image|LBFlag.png}} Lemobrogia<br/>{{flagicon image|FlagNID.png}} Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region <small>([[Gylias]])</small>
| script       = Lemobrogian alphabet <br />Lemobrogian Braille
| agency = Naŋgu dro rei Gidre
| sign         = Kèŋóľiyó Maŋósivə əd
| familycolor = Creole
| nation       = {{flagicon image|LBFlag.png}} Lemobrogia<br/>{{flagicon image|FlagNID.png}} Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region <small>([[Gylias]])</small>
| ethnicity = [[Lemobrogian_peoples|Lemobrogians]]
| agency       = Kèŋóľiyó ós Narèňəvó
}}
}}
'''Common Lemobrogic''' (''þar Muþoluyoös Rixevindeëŋ'', [ˈθäɹ muθo̞ˈlujo̞ːs ɹiʃe̞ˈvinde̞ːŋ]) is a Sidurian language of the Lemobrogic branch, spoken by the vast majority of the population of [[Lemobrogia]] and by [[Lemobrogian peoples|ethnic Lemobrogians]] outside of the country; it is the official language of Lemobrogia, and it is also official in the [[Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region]] of [[Gylias]] - the heart of the historical [[Nerveiík Kingdom]], itself the last incarnation of [[Xevden]], a state founded in present-day Gylias by the ethnically Lemobrogian Ŋež tribe. It is a highly isolating, subject–object–verb word order ''koiné'' language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum; even though it is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's 43,791,300 inhabitants, up to and including those whose native tongue is not part of the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, most people in the country do not speak it as their first language.
'''Lemobrogian''' (Gidrenθive, [giˈdɹɛnθiβɛ] or Gidre, [ˈgidɹɛ]) is a Siduric language of the Lemobrogic branch, spoken by the vast majority of the population of [[Lemobrogia]] and by [[Lemobrogian peoples|ethnic Lemobrogians]] outside of the country; it is the official language of Lemobrogia, and it is also official in the [[Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region]] of [[Gylias]] - the heart of the historical [[Nerveiík Kingdom]], itself the last incarnation of [[Xevden]], a state founded in present-day Gylias by the ethnically Lemobrogian Ŋež tribe. It is an analytic, subject–verb–object word order ''koiné'' language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum; even though it is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's 43,791,300 inhabitants, up to and including those whose native tongue is not part of the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, most people in the country do not speak it as their first language.
==Classification==
==Classification==
The Lemobrogic languages form a dialect continuum, in which neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but widely separated varieties are not; Common Lemobrogic is a ''koiné'' language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, and that became the ''lingua franca'' of the nation by the early 1500s. The Lemobrogic languages in general, that can be subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties, share several key features with the [[Gylic languages]] in general, especially those spoken by the Yaskans and Zinerans, and with reconstructed Proto-Gylic in particular; for this reason, several linguists have postulated the existence of a language family that would include all Gylic languages and all Lemobrogic languages, provisionally named Sidurian - whose dialects and languages are characterized by a highly isolating typology, a SOV sentence structure and a (C)V(C) syllable structure.
The Lemobrogic languages form a dialect continuum, in which neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but widely separated varieties are not; Lemobrogian is a ''koiné'' language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to this dialect continuum, and that became the ''lingua franca'' of the nation by the early 1500s. The Lemobrogic languages in general, that can be subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties, share several key features with the [[Gylic languages]] in general, especially those spoken by the Yaskans and Zinerans, and with reconstructed Proto-Gylic in particular; for this reason, several linguists have postulated the existence of a language family that would include all Gylic languages and all Lemobrogic languages, provisionally named Siduric, whose dialects and languages are characterized by an analytic typology and a SVO sentence structure.
==History==
==History==
The earliest historical linguistic evidence of the language, as the Ancient Lemobrogic spoken during the First Community era, dates back to around 3100 BCE, in the country's Bronze Age, when those corporate groups that had clustered near each other in Lemobrogia's first city-states developed the logographic Ancient Script in order to keep track of the exchanges of goods and services that served as the ''potlatch''-like basis of their society, whose main center was the city of Icqu; as soon as the nation began experiencing a cultural and societal decline, from around 1100 BCE, as a result of internecine warfare and resource overexploitation, and the First Community dissolved, Ancient Lemobrogic diverged into several separate dialects, and the Ancient Script diverged into several separate branches, often cursive or syllabic variants of the earlier logographic script. Due to the logographic nature of the Ancient Script, the phonology of Ancient Lemobrogic can not be reconstructed with absolute certainty.
The earliest historical linguistic evidence of the language, as the Old Lemobrogian spoken during the First Confederation era, dates back to around 3100 BCE, in the country's Bronze Age, when those corporate groups that had clustered near each other in Lemobrogia's first city-states developed a pidgin language in order to facilitate the exchanges of goods and services that served as the ''potlatch''-like basis of their society; as soon as the nation began experiencing a cultural and societal decline, from around 1100 BCE, as a result of internecine warfare and resource overexploitation, and the First Confederation dissolved, Old Lemobrogian - by then, a creole language rather than a pidgin language, and the native language of a significant part of the populace - diverged into several separate dialects. However, due to the logographic nature of the script with which Old Lemobrogian was written, its phonology can not be reconstructed with absolute certainty.


By around 700 BCE, the nation was reunified under the Second Community by the members of a philosophical school founded in 1728 BCE by Ciḱe Leňi, who believed that their founder and precursor had hypothesized or even prophesied the collapse of Lemobrogia's Bronze Age civilization; the script used and the tongue spoken by the members of Ciḱe Leňi's philosophical school, based on those of the city of Ðoleë in which it was located, formed the basis of Classical Lemobrogic and of the Classical Script, a cursive and syllabic descendant of the Ancient Script. As Ciḱe Leňi's philosophy turned into a religion, [[Naxóteíðó|Virocredia]], knowledge of Classical Lemobrogic and of the Classical Script spread to all corners of society; since the prestige and status of the priest-queens that headed the political and religious life of the bands, clans and tribes of Lemobrogia in the Second Community era hinged on their generosity and liberality, they erected schools and hired teachers for their subjects, giving birth to a golden age of literature and science.  
By around 700 BCE, the nation was reunified under the Second Confederation by the members of a philosophical school founded in 1728 BCE by Mamikʼa Drenθive, who believed that their founder and precursor had hypothesized or even prophesied the collapse of Lemobrogia's Bronze Age civilization; the language spoken by the members of Mamikʼa Drenθive's philosophical school formed the basis of Classical Lemobrogian. As Mamikʼa Drenθive's philosophy turned into a religion, [[Naxóteíðó|Virocredia]], knowledge of Classical Lemobrogian spread to all corners of society; since the prestige and status of the priest-queens that headed the political and religious life of the bands, clans and tribes of Lemobrogia in the Second Confederation era hinged on their generosity and liberality, they erected schools and hired teachers for their subjects, giving birth to a golden age of literature and science. Moreover, during this period, the ancient logographic script was replaced by a syllabic script; certain extensively used logographic characters were however retained.


By 246 BCE the Second Community had entered a declining phase and, by 843 CE, it had been fully partitioned between the [[Rideva Empire|Rideva]] in the south and [[Symmerian Empire|Symmeria]] in the north; Classical Lemobrogic diverged, again, into several separate dialects, influenced in the north by Greek and in the south by Sanskrit, and the Classical Script was replaced in the north by the Greek alphabet and in the south by Devanagari, with characters retained from the Classical Script for those sounds not covered by either of these writing systems. When this era of foreign rule over Lemobrogia came to an end, between 1305 CE and 1333 CE, the dialects that, by then,  were spoken in the country - the Vulgar Lemobrogic languages - had diverged enough from each other that, by the early 1500s, two separate bridge languages had emerged, one closely modeled after Classical Lemobrogic that served as the language of the faith and of the state, that is, Formal Lemobrogic, and a ''koiné'' language that served as the ''lingua franca'' of itinerant workers, traveling merchants and wandering entertainers, that is, Common Lemobrogic.
By 246 BCE the Second Confederation had entered a declining phase and, by 843 CE, it had been fully partitioned between the [[Rideva Empire|Rideva]] in the south and [[Symmerian Empire|Symmeria]] in the north; Classical Lemobrogian diverged, again, into several separate dialects, influenced in the north by Greek and in the south by Sanskrit, and the syllabic script with which it was written was replaced by the scripts used in said countries. When this era of foreign rule over Lemobrogia came to an end, between 1305 CE and 1333 CE, the dialects that, by then, were spoken in the country had diverged enough from each other that, by the early 1500s, while neighboring varieties of this Vulgar Lemobrogian register were mutually intelligible, widely separated varieties were not; while Classical Lemobrogian continued to serve as the language of the faith and of the state, itinerant workers, traveling merchants and wandering entertainers developed a ''koiné'' language of their own.


For the next several centuries, a language conflict ensued; even though, in 1333 CE, the Third Community adopted Formal Lemobrogic - as codified by the scholars of the university of the city of Buþir - as the country's new written standard, it was a compromise measure made necessary by the pluricentric nature of Common Lemobrogic, a pluricentrism that extended to the kind of script used by the language: even though the central varieties of the vernacular had retained the use of the syllabic Classical Script, its northern varieties had adopted the Greek alphabet, while its southern varieties had adopted the Devanagari abugida. The gulf between Common Lemobrogic and Formal Lemobrogic became even greater from 1504 CE onwards - as the nation became a protectorate of [[Acrea]] in exchange for Acrea's help in defeating the Xevdenite threat, the influence of Acrea's several languages on Common Lemobrogic's disparate varieties made the vernacular drift even further apart from the literary and stately register of Formal Lemobrogic.
For the next several centuries, a language conflict ensued; even though, in 1333 CE, the Third Federation re-adopted Classical Lemobrogian as the country's official language, it was a compromise measure made necessary by the pluricentric nature of Vulgar Lemobrogian. The gulf between Classical Lemobrogian and Vulgar Lemobrogian became even greater from 1504 CE onwards - as the nation became a protectorate of [[Acrea]] in exchange for Acrea's help in defeating the Xevdenite threat, the influence of Acrea's several languages on Vulgar Lemobrogian's disparate varieties made the vernacular drift even further apart from the literary and stately register of Classical Lemobrogian. However, by the early 20th century these disparate varieties had converged upon a single standard, easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's inhabitants, regardless of their native dialect or language, also due to the influence of several leading figures in the country's 19th century popular culture.
 
By the early 20th century, however, these disparate varieties had converged upon a single standard, easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's inhabitants, regardless of their native dialect or language, the end result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum over the course of the previous centuries; in 1920, the Futurist party made Common Lemobrogic the new official language of the country, with a written standard heavily based on Acrean spelling conventions. This decision proved to be popular enough that, even after the end of Futurist rule in 1968, it was not reversed during Ðovu Žuro's tenure, even though the establishment of the Fourth Community was marked by several breaks with the old government - such as the relocation of the nation's capital to the city of Gevaõn; the only change to the written standard was a spelling reform, that simplified its orthography in order to make it more phonemic.
 
Despite the obvious influence that the [[Gylian languages reform of 1958–1959]] had on this development, there were no further changes to the written standard; even though several other reforms modeled after Gylias' own were proposed, none of them were approved by the Assembly of Delegates; to this day, Common Lemobrogic, unlike the Gylic languages, retains the use of grammatical gender and a T–V distinction, as well as the use of several words of Acrean, Syaran and Tennaiite origin that are often associated with monotheistic religions - in fact, the urban slang of the northern or lowland varieties of the Lemobrogic dialect continuum in general, and of those spoken in the Ŋežvin country in particular, has absorbed plenty of Salvationist and Xevdenite influences over the course of the last half century. The Classical Script has recently seen a revival for calligraphic and decorative purposes; there have been several proposals to modernize the syllabary, in order to make writing Common Lemobrogic words easier.


This register, the end result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum over the course of the previous centuries, was declared to be the official language of the country by the Futurist leadership in the 1920s, with a written standard heavily based on Acrean spelling conventions. This decision proved to be popular enough that, even after the end of Futurist rule in 1968, it was not reversed during Neširewi Mizeŋkije's tenure, even though the establishment of the Fourth Confederation was marked by several breaks with the old government - up to and including the relocation of the nation's capital; the only change to the written standard was a spelling reform, based on the one that took place in Gylias during the [[Gylian languages reform of 1958–1959]], that simplified its orthography, in order to make it more phonemic. The old syllabic script has recently seen a revival for calligraphic and decorative purposes, and there have been several proposals to modernize it for daily use.
==Geographic distribution==
==Geographic distribution==
Even though most people in the country do not speak Common Lemobrogic as their first language, and speak either one of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum (72% of the population) or a language that does not belong to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, often an Acrean, Syaran or Tennaiite dialect (28% of the population), Common Lemobrogic is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of the nation's inhabitants; therefore, it serves as Lemobrogia's ''lingua franca'', used in the country's chief institutions and official documents. Traditionally, the Lemobrogic languages have been subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties; the status of the Gylic dialect spoken by those Ŋež that left Gylias for Lemobrogia, and their descendants, is a subject of debate: scholars are divided on whether it's a Gylic dialect with a North Lemobrogic substrate, a Lemobrogic dialect with a South Gylic superstrate, or a transitional dialect.
Even though most people in the country do not speak Lemobrogian as their first language, and speak either one of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum (72% of the population) or a language that does not belong to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, often an Acrean, Syaran or Tennaiite dialect (28% of the population), Lemobrogian is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of the nation's inhabitants; therefore, it serves as Lemobrogia's ''lingua franca'', used in the country's chief institutions and official documents. Traditionally, the Lemobrogic languages have been subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties; the status of the Gylic dialect spoken by those Ŋež that left Gylias for Lemobrogia, and their descendants, is a subject of debate: scholars are divided on whether it's a Gylic dialect with a North Lemobrogic substrate, a Lemobrogic dialect with a South Gylic superstrate, or a transitional dialect.
==Phonology==
==Phonology==
The phonology and phonotactics of Common Lemobrogic are fairly plain and regular, sharing several key characteristics with those of the Gylic languages; the language consists of 30 consonant phonemes and 6 vowel phonemes, and its syllable structure follows a strict (C)V(C) standard: the nucleus of any syllable is always a vowel - either short or long - or a diphthong, that can be preceded by an optional initial consonant in the onset, or followed by an optional final consonant in the coda. Moreover, consonant clusters and vowel sequences are entirely forbidden, with the exception of coda/onset consonant sequences across syllable boundaries; word stress is fixed, always falling on the third from last syllable in words with three or more syllables, and on the first or only syllable in other words. The phonology of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, is characterized by the presence of several ejective consonants, three of which, [pʼ], [tʼ] and [kʼ], are also found in the Common Lemobrogic ''koiné'' language.
The phonotactics of Lemobrogian - a language that has preserved certain Siduric consonant clusters, that were lost in related vernaculars - follow a (C)(C)V(C)(C) syllable structure; the nucleus of the syllable is always a short vowel, that can be preceded by an onset of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a fricative or stop, and a homorganic approximant) or followed by a coda of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a nasal and a homorganic fricative or stop); in polysyllabic words, double consonants can also occur, but sequences of more than 2 consonants are still forbidden. There are no diphthongs or long vowels: while vowel sequences of up to 2 vowels (always consisting of one vowel and an identical vowel, or of a back, central or front vowel and the other back, central or front vowel) can and do occur, these vowels are always counted as nuclei of separate syllables, rather than as part of a single syllable.
===Consonants===
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+Consonants
|-
|-
!  
!  
! Bilabial
! Labial
! Labio-dental
! Coronal
! Dental
! Dorsal
! Alveolar
!Laryngeal
! Post-alveolar
|-
! Palatal
! Stop
! Velar
| pʼ p b ɓ
! Glottal
| tʼ t d ɗ
| kʼ k g ɠ
|ʔ
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Nasal
! Nasal
| m
| m
|
|
| n
| n
|
| ɲ
| ŋ
| ŋ
|
|
|-
! scope="row" | Plosive
| pʼ p b
|
|
| tʼ t d
|
|
| kʼ k g
| ʔ
|-
! scope="row" | Sibilant affricate
|
|
|
|
| ʧ ʤ
|
|
|
|-
! scope="row" | Sibilant fricative
|
|
|
| s z
| ʃ ʒ
|
|
|  
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Non-sibilant fricative
! Fricative
|  
| ɸ β
| f v
| θ ð s z ʃ ʒ
| θ ð
| x ɣ
|  
|h
|
|
|
| h
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Approximant
! Approximant
|
|
|
| ɹ
|
| j
| w
| w
|
|-
! scope="row" | Lateral approximant
|
|
|
| l
| l
|  
| j
| ʎ
|
|
|  
|}
|}
===Vowels===
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+Vowels
|-
|-
!  
!  
! Close
! Front
! Central
! Central
! Back
! Back
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Front
! Close
| i iː
| i
|  
|
| u uː
| u
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Mid
! Mid
| e̞ e̞ː
| ɛ
| ə əː
| ə
| o̞ o̞ː
| ɔ
|-
|-
! scope="row" | Open
! Open
|
|  
| ä äː
| a
|
|  
|}
|}
In addition to the above, there are also 12 diphthongs: in order of frequency, they are the 6 closing diphthongs [e̞i̯], [o̞u̯], [äi̯], [äu̯], [äe̞̯] and [äo̞̯], and the 6 opening diphthongs [e̞̯ä], [i̯ä], [i̯e̞], [o̞̯ä], [u̯ä] and [u̯o̞]. While the six-vowel system of the Lemobrogic languages is very closely related to the six-vowel system of the Gylic languages, in which the original [ə] turned into [ɨ], their consonantal inventories have diverged to a greater degree: in addition to the [pʼ], [tʼ] and [kʼ] phonemes mentioned above (it has been argued that the decreased air pressure found in highland areas, such as Lemobrogia, makes ejectives easier to produce), in the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum in general, and in Common Lemobrogic in particular, the nasals [ɲ] and [ŋ], the plosive [ʔ] and the approximants [ɹ] and [ʎ], that the Gylic languages lack, can be found, while most Lemobrogic languages lack the phonemes [d͡z], [ɸ], [r], [ts] and [x].
The phonotactics of Lemobrogian follow a (C)(C)V(C)(C) syllable structure; the nucleus of the syllable is always a short vowel, that can be preceded by an onset of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a stop and a homorganic approximant) or followed by a coda of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a nasal and a homorganic stop); in polysyllabic words, double consonants and clusters consisting of a fricative and a homorganic approximant, or of a nasal and a homorganic fricative, can also occur, but sequences of more than 2 consonants are still forbidden. There are no diphthongs or long vowels: while vowel sequences of up to 2 vowels (always consisting of one vowel and an identical vowel, or of a back, central or front vowel and the other back, central or front vowel) can and do occur, these vowels are always counted as nuclei of separate syllables, rather than as part of a single syllable.
==Grammar==
==Grammar==
Common Lemobrogic is a highly isolating, subject–object–verb word order language: no part of speech is inflected, and content words can be adjectives, adverbs, nouns or verbs depending on their position in the sentence, and depending on the function words they are preceded by. Nouns have to be preceded by function words denoting their case, gender and number, in this order, while verbs have to be preceded by function words denoting their mood, tense and voice, in this order; moreover, adjectives and adverbs have to follow the function words tied to the noun or verb they depend on, but have to precede said noun or verb. Personal pronouns, one each for the first, second and third person, have to follow the function word denoting their grammatical case, but have to precede the function word denoting their grammatical number; a T–V distinction is present, characterized by illeism - that is, the use of the third person by and to address the individual perceived as superior, both in the spoken and in the written word.
Lemobrogian is an analytic, subject–verb–object word order language: content words can be nouns, adjectives, verbs or adverbs depending on their position in a sentence, and they are not inflected in any way; to express grammatical relationships between these, Lemobrogian utilizes derivational affixes and function words. Gender and T-V distinctions became obsolete in the Lemobrogic branch of the Siduric language family quite earlier than in the Gylic branch of said language family, that began to phase those distinctions out - by decree - only after the [[Gylian languages reform of 1958–1959]]; as is typical for subject–verb–object word order languages, Lemobrogian uses prepositions rather than postpositions, while adjectives, demonstratives, genitives, numerals, possessives and relative clauses follow the nouns they modify. Moreover, Lemobrogian places auxiliary verbs before action verbs, proper names after titles and honorifics, and uses a place–manner–time ordering of adpositional phrases.
==Vocabulary==
72% of the vocabulary of Lemobrogian is of native origin, with most of said native vocabulary consisting of words that have cognates in at least one Gylic language, often a Yaskan or Zineran dialect; that said, while reconstructed Proto-Gylic and reconstructed Proto-Lemobrogic are mutually intelligible, modern Gylic languages and modern Lemobrogic languages are not, due to divergent semantic changes and sound shifts, and neither are Lemobrogian and the Gylic ''koiné''. The remaining 28% of the language's vocabulary largely consists of words taken from Proto-Erani-Eracuran during the Bronze Age, or of words of Greek, Nordic or Sanskrit descent adopted due to the influence of Syara, Acrea or the Rideva much later on; an even higher percentage of words of Greek, Nordic or Sanskrit descent is characteristic of the dialects spoken in, respectively, the lowland north, the midland center or the highland south of the country, while Lemobrogian favours words of native origin that are shared by most of the country's languages.


=== Nouns ===
== Writing system ==
{| class="wikitable"
While Old Lemobrogian was written in a logographic script, and Classical Lemobrogian was written in a syllabic descendant of the previous script - that nonetheless retained certain extensively used logographic characters - the Vulgar Lemobrogian dialects eventually adopted the Devanagari abugida (in the south) and the Greek alphabet (in the north). While the earlier syllabic script was brought back into use after the re-adoption of Classical Lemobrogian as the country's official language in 1333 CE, by then the gulf between spelling and pronunciation had grown, and it would widen even further over the course of the following centuries; because of this, a version of the Latin alphabet heavily based on Acrean spelling conventions was eventually adopted in the 1920s, when the current register of the Lemobrogian language was adopted as the official standard. A further spelling reform took place in 1968, that simplified the orthography of the above version of the Latin alphabet, in order to make it more phonemic.
! colspan="2" |Case
! colspan="2" |Gender
! colspan="2" |Number
|-
! rowspan="1" |Nominative
|
! rowspan="2" |Feminine
| rowspan="2" |
! rowspan="2" |Singular
| rowspan="2" |
|-
! rowspan="1" |Accusative
|
|-
! rowspan="1" |Genitive
|
! rowspan="2" |Masculine
| rowspan="2" |
! rowspan="2" |Paucal
| rowspan="2" |
|-
! rowspan="1" |Dative
|
|-
! rowspan="1" |Locative
|
! rowspan="2" |Neuter
| rowspan="2" |
! rowspan="2" |Plural
| rowspan="2" |
|-
! rowspan="1" |Instrumental
|
|}
 
== Vocabulary ==
Most of the vocabulary of Lemobrogian is of Proto-Lemobrogic origin; however, while reconstructed Proto-Gylic and reconstructed Proto-Lemobrogic are mutually intelligible, modern Gylic languages and modern Lemobrogic languages are not, cultured and educated speakers of either tongue being the exception. While the standardized Kèŋóľiyó register was purged of foreign influence, chiefly Hellenic and Indic, several words of Erani-Eracuran origin had been borrowed at a very early phase of the development of the Lemobrogic languages as a whole, to such an extent they were perceived as native by the 16th century scholars tasked with the development of that literary standard, and kept as they were. Moreover, even this conservative and literary register was influenced by the Nordic tongue during Acrea's protectorate over Lemobrogia; in recent years, words of English, French and Italian origin have entered the vernacular through the cultural influence of Gylias and Megelan.
 
Another quirk of Lemobrogian, and of Lemobrogic languages as a whole, is how often its vocabulary has been expanded by attaching an affix to a pre-existing word, or by switching the grammatical gender of a pre-existing word: for example, while the animate gender word ''deíné'' is used to refer to a country in its geographical or natural sense, its inanimate gender counterpart ''deínó'' is used to refer to a province or subdivision, and used to refer to a country as an organized nation or state until it was displaced by ''kèŋó'' - a word that derives from a metathesized rendition of the Nordic word ''konge'', that is, "king", a semantic shift happened relatively recently in Lemobrogia's history, with he name of Xevden preserving the older meaning of the word. Additionally, the prefix ''na'', that indicates entirety or totality, is present in the word ''naþòsu'', or "eternal" (literally, "all-time"), and the word ''nabési'', or "everyone" (literally, "all-beings").
==Writing system ==
While the Kəyòkóľiyó, Maèsóľiyó and Rèňəvóľiyó varieties of the standardized Lemobrogian language were written using a native script that started as logographic, only to turn into a syllabic and then alphabetical script over the course of several thousand years, Aènóľiyó and Kælsóľiyó were written using the Greek alphabet and the Brahmi script, respectively. While the Kèŋóľiyó standard briefly reverted to said native script in its early days, it eventually adopted the Latin alphabet, using Nordic-influenced spelling rules, under the influence of Acrea. The variant of the Latin alphabet used to write present-day Lemobrogian, based on the Gylic one, was adopted only as late as 1992 CE, with the end of Acrea's protectorate over Lemobrogia. This alphabet is highly phonetic, and each letter represents exactly one sound; while there are, in fact, instances in which the present-day Lemobrogian alphabet does not fully align with how it is spoken, these instances follow very specific and predictable rules.
===Alphabet===
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
|+Alphabet
|-
|-
!Letter
!Letter
Line 212: Line 119:
|I i
|I i
|[i]
|[i]
|Q q
|S s
|[ʔ]
|[s]
|-
|-
|Æ æ
|B b
|[ä]
|[b]
|J j
|J j
|[ʤ]
|[j]
|R r
|Š š
|[ɹ]
|[ʃ]
|-
|-
|B b
|Ḅ ḅ
|[b]
|[ɓ]
| K k
| K k
|[k]
|[k]
|S s
|[s]
|-
|C c
|[ʧ]
|L l
|[l]
|T t
|T t
|[t]
|[t]
Line 238: Line 138:
|D d
|D d
|[d]
|[d]
|Ľ ľ
|Kʼ kʼ
|[ʎ]
|[kʼ]
|Þ þ
|Tʼ tʼ
|[tʼ]
|-
|Ḍ ḍ
|[ɗ]
|L l
|[l]
|ϴ θ
|[θ]
|[θ]
|-
|-
Line 250: Line 157:
|[u]
|[u]
|-
|-
|È è
|E e
| [ɛ]
| [ɛ]
|N n
|N n
|[n]
|[n]
|V v
|V v
|[v]
|[β]
|-
|-
| É é
| F f
|[e]
|[ɸ]
|Ň ň
|Ŋ ŋ
|[ɲ]
|[ŋ]
|W w
|W w
| [w]
| [w]
|-
|-
|Ə ə
|G g
|[ə]
|[g]
|Ŋ ŋ
|O o
|[ŋ]
|[ɔ]
|X x
|X x
|[ʃ]
|[x]
|-
|-
|F f
|G̣ g̣
|[f]
|[ɠ]
| Ò ò
| P p
| [ɔ]
| [p]
| Y y
| Y y
| [j]
| [ə]
|-
|-
|G g
|Ɣ ɣ
|[g]
|[ɣ]
| Ó ó
| Pʼ pʼ
| [o]
| [pʼ]
| Z z
| Z z  
|[z]
|[z]
|-
|-
| H h
| H h
| [h]
| [h]
|P p
|Q q
| [p]
| [ʔ]
|Ž ž
|Ž ž
|[ʒ]
|[ʒ]
Line 294: Line 201:
==Examples==
==Examples==
The following is a sample text in Lemobrogian of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
The following is a sample text in Lemobrogian of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;"
{| class="wikitable"  
|-
|-
! English
! Lemobrogian
| Kisu 1: Lei jenopen se pouno miju aθ nixu on keži aθ ḍeli. Napen se taysa voku aθ honu, aθ meite seiðe eŋ sypen on hou θemi us nedi.
|-
|-
|All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.<br />They are endowed with reason and conscience.<br />Therefore, they should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
! IPA
| ˈkisu ˈβinu: ˈlɛi ˈjɛnɔpɛn sɛ ˈpɔunɔ ˈmiju aθ ˈnixu ɔn ˈkɛʒi aθ ˈɗɛli. ˈnapɛn sɛ ˈtaəsa ˈβɔku aθ ˈhɔnu, aθ ˈmɛitɛ ˈsɛiðɛ ɛŋ ˈsəpɛn ɔn ˈhɔu ˈθɛmi us ˈnɛdi.  
|-
|-
!Lemobrogian
! Gloss
| piece 1: DEF human-all PASS born free and same in worth and law. 3-all PASS give reason and soul, and ACT need act among REFL-all in INDEF spirit of friend.
|-
|-
|Xòr-eí rèňəv-i na-bés-i þaèn-ə, kèrnév-ó suŋdal-ó òn yéb-eí.<br />Aŋéx-u óþék-u òc ž-aè haèy-ə.<br />Biqəy-ó ós ciňak-ó òn ž-aè veís èc, oúna ž-aè aèz-ə əx.
! English
|-
| Article 1: 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.
!IPA
|-
|ˈʃɔɹei̯ ˈɹɛnəvi ˈnabesi ˈθaɛ̯nə, ˈkɛrnevo ˈsuŋdalo ˈɔn ˈjebei̯.<br />ˈaŋeʃu ˈoθeku ˈɔʧ ˈʒaɛ̯ ˈhaɛ̯jə.<br />ˈbiʔəjo ˈos ˈʧiɲako ˈɔn ˈʒaɛ̯ ˈvei̯s ˈɛʧ, ˈou̯na ˈʒaɛ̯ ˈaɛ̯zə ˈəʃ.
|-
!Gloss
|-
|free-{{sc|an}} human-{{sc|an}} {{sc|col}}-number-{{sc|an}} birth-{{sc|nfut.inf}}, dignity-{{sc|inan}} right-{{sc|inan}} {{sc|acc.inan}} equal-{{sc|an}}.<br />reason-{{sc|inan}} conscience-{{sc|inan}} {{sc|ins.inan}} {{sc|3.for.an}} endow-{{sc|nfut.inf}}<br />brotherhood-{{sc|inan}} {{sc|gen.inan}} spirit {{sc|acc.inan}} {{sc|3.for.recp.an}} {{sc|ins.an}}, therefore {{sc|3.for.an}} act-{{sc|nfut.imp}}.
|}
|}
{{Template:Lemobrogia Navbox}}
{{Template:Lemobrogia Navbox}}
[[Category: Lemobrogia]]
[[Category: Lemobrogia]]
[[Category: Tyran]]
[[Category: Tyran]]

Latest revision as of 18:20, 19 December 2024

Lemobrogian
Gidrenθive
Pronunciation[giˈdɹɛnθiβɛ]
Native toLemobrogia
EthnicityLemobrogians
Native speakers
~ 43,791,300 (2024)
Sidurian
  • Lemobrogic
    • Lemobrogian
Early forms
Old Lemobrogian
  • Classical Lemobrogian
    • Vulgar Lemobrogian
Dialects
  • Central Lemobrogic
  • Northern Lemobrogic
  • Southern Lemobrogic
Lemobrogian alphabet
Lemobrogian Braille
Gidre Kʼembi
Official status
Official language in
 Lemobrogia
Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region (Gylias)
Regulated byNaŋgu dro rei Gidre
Language codes
ISO 639-1gi
ISO 639-2gid
ISO 639-3gid

Lemobrogian (Gidrenθive, [giˈdɹɛnθiβɛ] or Gidre, [ˈgidɹɛ]) is a Siduric language of the Lemobrogic branch, spoken by the vast majority of the population of Lemobrogia and by ethnic Lemobrogians outside of the country; it is the official language of Lemobrogia, and it is also official in the Nerveiík-Iárus-Daláyk Region of Gylias - the heart of the historical Nerveiík Kingdom, itself the last incarnation of Xevden, a state founded in present-day Gylias by the ethnically Lemobrogian Ŋež tribe. It is an analytic, subject–verb–object word order koiné language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum; even though it is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's 43,791,300 inhabitants, up to and including those whose native tongue is not part of the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, most people in the country do not speak it as their first language.

Classification

The Lemobrogic languages form a dialect continuum, in which neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but widely separated varieties are not; Lemobrogian is a koiné language, that arose as the result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to this dialect continuum, and that became the lingua franca of the nation by the early 1500s. The Lemobrogic languages in general, that can be subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties, share several key features with the Gylic languages in general, especially those spoken by the Yaskans and Zinerans, and with reconstructed Proto-Gylic in particular; for this reason, several linguists have postulated the existence of a language family that would include all Gylic languages and all Lemobrogic languages, provisionally named Siduric, whose dialects and languages are characterized by an analytic typology and a SVO sentence structure.

History

The earliest historical linguistic evidence of the language, as the Old Lemobrogian spoken during the First Confederation era, dates back to around 3100 BCE, in the country's Bronze Age, when those corporate groups that had clustered near each other in Lemobrogia's first city-states developed a pidgin language in order to facilitate the exchanges of goods and services that served as the potlatch-like basis of their society; as soon as the nation began experiencing a cultural and societal decline, from around 1100 BCE, as a result of internecine warfare and resource overexploitation, and the First Confederation dissolved, Old Lemobrogian - by then, a creole language rather than a pidgin language, and the native language of a significant part of the populace - diverged into several separate dialects. However, due to the logographic nature of the script with which Old Lemobrogian was written, its phonology can not be reconstructed with absolute certainty.

By around 700 BCE, the nation was reunified under the Second Confederation by the members of a philosophical school founded in 1728 BCE by Mamikʼa Drenθive, who believed that their founder and precursor had hypothesized or even prophesied the collapse of Lemobrogia's Bronze Age civilization; the language spoken by the members of Mamikʼa Drenθive's philosophical school formed the basis of Classical Lemobrogian. As Mamikʼa Drenθive's philosophy turned into a religion, Virocredia, knowledge of Classical Lemobrogian spread to all corners of society; since the prestige and status of the priest-queens that headed the political and religious life of the bands, clans and tribes of Lemobrogia in the Second Confederation era hinged on their generosity and liberality, they erected schools and hired teachers for their subjects, giving birth to a golden age of literature and science. Moreover, during this period, the ancient logographic script was replaced by a syllabic script; certain extensively used logographic characters were however retained.

By 246 BCE the Second Confederation had entered a declining phase and, by 843 CE, it had been fully partitioned between the Rideva in the south and Symmeria in the north; Classical Lemobrogian diverged, again, into several separate dialects, influenced in the north by Greek and in the south by Sanskrit, and the syllabic script with which it was written was replaced by the scripts used in said countries. When this era of foreign rule over Lemobrogia came to an end, between 1305 CE and 1333 CE, the dialects that, by then, were spoken in the country had diverged enough from each other that, by the early 1500s, while neighboring varieties of this Vulgar Lemobrogian register were mutually intelligible, widely separated varieties were not; while Classical Lemobrogian continued to serve as the language of the faith and of the state, itinerant workers, traveling merchants and wandering entertainers developed a koiné language of their own.

For the next several centuries, a language conflict ensued; even though, in 1333 CE, the Third Federation re-adopted Classical Lemobrogian as the country's official language, it was a compromise measure made necessary by the pluricentric nature of Vulgar Lemobrogian. The gulf between Classical Lemobrogian and Vulgar Lemobrogian became even greater from 1504 CE onwards - as the nation became a protectorate of Acrea in exchange for Acrea's help in defeating the Xevdenite threat, the influence of Acrea's several languages on Vulgar Lemobrogian's disparate varieties made the vernacular drift even further apart from the literary and stately register of Classical Lemobrogian. However, by the early 20th century these disparate varieties had converged upon a single standard, easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of Lemobrogia's inhabitants, regardless of their native dialect or language, also due to the influence of several leading figures in the country's 19th century popular culture.

This register, the end result of the contact, mixing and simplification of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum over the course of the previous centuries, was declared to be the official language of the country by the Futurist leadership in the 1920s, with a written standard heavily based on Acrean spelling conventions. This decision proved to be popular enough that, even after the end of Futurist rule in 1968, it was not reversed during Neširewi Mizeŋkije's tenure, even though the establishment of the Fourth Confederation was marked by several breaks with the old government - up to and including the relocation of the nation's capital; the only change to the written standard was a spelling reform, based on the one that took place in Gylias during the Gylian languages reform of 1958–1959, that simplified its orthography, in order to make it more phonemic. The old syllabic script has recently seen a revival for calligraphic and decorative purposes, and there have been several proposals to modernize it for daily use.

Geographic distribution

Even though most people in the country do not speak Lemobrogian as their first language, and speak either one of the languages belonging to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum (72% of the population) or a language that does not belong to the Lemobrogic dialect continuum, often an Acrean, Syaran or Tennaiite dialect (28% of the population), Lemobrogian is easily comprehensible and largely intelligible by the vast majority of the nation's inhabitants; therefore, it serves as Lemobrogia's lingua franca, used in the country's chief institutions and official documents. Traditionally, the Lemobrogic languages have been subdivided into central or midland, northern or lowland and southern or highland varieties; the status of the Gylic dialect spoken by those Ŋež that left Gylias for Lemobrogia, and their descendants, is a subject of debate: scholars are divided on whether it's a Gylic dialect with a North Lemobrogic substrate, a Lemobrogic dialect with a South Gylic superstrate, or a transitional dialect.

Phonology

The phonotactics of Lemobrogian - a language that has preserved certain Siduric consonant clusters, that were lost in related vernaculars - follow a (C)(C)V(C)(C) syllable structure; the nucleus of the syllable is always a short vowel, that can be preceded by an onset of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a fricative or stop, and a homorganic approximant) or followed by a coda of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a nasal and a homorganic fricative or stop); in polysyllabic words, double consonants can also occur, but sequences of more than 2 consonants are still forbidden. There are no diphthongs or long vowels: while vowel sequences of up to 2 vowels (always consisting of one vowel and an identical vowel, or of a back, central or front vowel and the other back, central or front vowel) can and do occur, these vowels are always counted as nuclei of separate syllables, rather than as part of a single syllable.

Consonants
Labial Coronal Dorsal Laryngeal
Stop pʼ p b ɓ tʼ t d ɗ kʼ k g ɠ ʔ
Nasal m n ŋ
Fricative ɸ β θ ð s z ʃ ʒ x ɣ h
Approximant w l j
Vowels
Front Central Back
Close i u
Mid ɛ ə ɔ
Open a

The phonotactics of Lemobrogian follow a (C)(C)V(C)(C) syllable structure; the nucleus of the syllable is always a short vowel, that can be preceded by an onset of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a stop and a homorganic approximant) or followed by a coda of 1 or 2 consonants (in the latter case, the only allowed cluster is that of a nasal and a homorganic stop); in polysyllabic words, double consonants and clusters consisting of a fricative and a homorganic approximant, or of a nasal and a homorganic fricative, can also occur, but sequences of more than 2 consonants are still forbidden. There are no diphthongs or long vowels: while vowel sequences of up to 2 vowels (always consisting of one vowel and an identical vowel, or of a back, central or front vowel and the other back, central or front vowel) can and do occur, these vowels are always counted as nuclei of separate syllables, rather than as part of a single syllable.

Grammar

Lemobrogian is an analytic, subject–verb–object word order language: content words can be nouns, adjectives, verbs or adverbs depending on their position in a sentence, and they are not inflected in any way; to express grammatical relationships between these, Lemobrogian utilizes derivational affixes and function words. Gender and T-V distinctions became obsolete in the Lemobrogic branch of the Siduric language family quite earlier than in the Gylic branch of said language family, that began to phase those distinctions out - by decree - only after the Gylian languages reform of 1958–1959; as is typical for subject–verb–object word order languages, Lemobrogian uses prepositions rather than postpositions, while adjectives, demonstratives, genitives, numerals, possessives and relative clauses follow the nouns they modify. Moreover, Lemobrogian places auxiliary verbs before action verbs, proper names after titles and honorifics, and uses a place–manner–time ordering of adpositional phrases.

Vocabulary

72% of the vocabulary of Lemobrogian is of native origin, with most of said native vocabulary consisting of words that have cognates in at least one Gylic language, often a Yaskan or Zineran dialect; that said, while reconstructed Proto-Gylic and reconstructed Proto-Lemobrogic are mutually intelligible, modern Gylic languages and modern Lemobrogic languages are not, due to divergent semantic changes and sound shifts, and neither are Lemobrogian and the Gylic koiné. The remaining 28% of the language's vocabulary largely consists of words taken from Proto-Erani-Eracuran during the Bronze Age, or of words of Greek, Nordic or Sanskrit descent adopted due to the influence of Syara, Acrea or the Rideva much later on; an even higher percentage of words of Greek, Nordic or Sanskrit descent is characteristic of the dialects spoken in, respectively, the lowland north, the midland center or the highland south of the country, while Lemobrogian favours words of native origin that are shared by most of the country's languages.

Writing system

While Old Lemobrogian was written in a logographic script, and Classical Lemobrogian was written in a syllabic descendant of the previous script - that nonetheless retained certain extensively used logographic characters - the Vulgar Lemobrogian dialects eventually adopted the Devanagari abugida (in the south) and the Greek alphabet (in the north). While the earlier syllabic script was brought back into use after the re-adoption of Classical Lemobrogian as the country's official language in 1333 CE, by then the gulf between spelling and pronunciation had grown, and it would widen even further over the course of the following centuries; because of this, a version of the Latin alphabet heavily based on Acrean spelling conventions was eventually adopted in the 1920s, when the current register of the Lemobrogian language was adopted as the official standard. A further spelling reform took place in 1968, that simplified the orthography of the above version of the Latin alphabet, in order to make it more phonemic.

Alphabet
Letter IPA Letter IPA Letter IPA
A a [a] I i [i] S s [s]
B b [b] J j [j] Š š [ʃ]
Ḅ ḅ [ɓ] K k [k] T t [t]
D d [d] Kʼ kʼ [kʼ] Tʼ tʼ [tʼ]
Ḍ ḍ [ɗ] L l [l] ϴ θ [θ]
Ð ð [ð] M m [m] U u [u]
E e [ɛ] N n [n] V v [β]
F f [ɸ] Ŋ ŋ [ŋ] W w [w]
G g [g] O o [ɔ] X x [x]
G̣ g̣ [ɠ] P p [p] Y y [ə]
Ɣ ɣ [ɣ] Pʼ pʼ [pʼ] Z z [z]
H h [h] Q q [ʔ] Ž ž [ʒ]

Examples

The following is a sample text in Lemobrogian of Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

Lemobrogian Kisu 1: Lei jenopen se pouno miju aθ nixu on keži aθ ḍeli. Napen se taysa voku aθ honu, aθ meite seiðe eŋ sypen on hou θemi us nedi.
IPA ˈkisu ˈβinu: ˈlɛi ˈjɛnɔpɛn sɛ ˈpɔunɔ ˈmiju aθ ˈnixu ɔn ˈkɛʒi aθ ˈɗɛli. ˈnapɛn sɛ ˈtaəsa ˈβɔku aθ ˈhɔnu, aθ ˈmɛitɛ ˈsɛiðɛ ɛŋ ˈsəpɛn ɔn ˈhɔu ˈθɛmi us ˈnɛdi.
Gloss piece 1: DEF human-all PASS born free and same in worth and law. 3-all PASS give reason and soul, and ACT need act among REFL-all in INDEF spirit of friend.
English Article 1: 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.
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