Lilledic language

Lilledic language
Ja Lilledelje linge
Pronunciation	[jɑː ˌɫɪɫəˈð̙ɛʎə ˈɫɪŋˀə]
Native to	Crylante Navack
Region	Lhedwin
Ethnicity	Asuro-Lhedwinic
Native speakers	ca. 2,000,000 (2018)
Language family	Cataisuran Mydran Fiorentine Northern Fiorentine Lilledic language
Writing system	Fiorentine alphabet
Official status
Official language in	Crylante Navack
Language codes
ISO 639-1	li
ISO 639-2	asl (B) lil (T)
ISO 639-3	lil

Lilledic, also known as Lilledelic or Asuro-Lhedwinic (ja Lilledelje linge pronounced [jɑː ˌɫɪɫəˈð̙ɛʎə ˈɫɪŋˀə]) is a Fiorentine language spoken primarily by the almost two million Asuro-Lhedwinic people of Crylante with a smaller number of speakers in neighbouring Navack. It is the sole member of the Northern Fiorentine subgroup. Though derived directly from Fiorentine, the influence of Lhedwinic has caused major changes to occur to Lilledic, particularly with regards to the pronunciation.

Fiorentines migrated north into the area of modern Crylante as early as the first century BCE, eventually establishing their own identity as Asuro-Lhedwinics separately from the native Lhedwinics of the region. These settlers brought the Fiorentine language with them. As it interacted with Lhedwinic (and to a much lesser extent Nausikaan) and evolved it took on an aspect far different from those Fiorentine languages spoken in contiguous parts of mainland Asura. The area of their settlement was originally named by the Lhedwinics as Lilledal "small valley" but this later changed to Lilledel "small part". The Asuro-Lhedwinic people of Crylante adopted this name self-referentially, calling themselves ju Lilledelje poule "the Lilledic people".

History

As the Fiorentine Empire began its decline in the common era a number of the Asurans residing in the Empire began to migrate out of their traditional southern Asuran homelands. A group of Asurans generally referred to as Proto-Asuro-Lhedwinics migrated north, passing through modern Cuirpthe and reaching Lhedwin. This migratory group settled in modern Crylante by the second century CE, largely displacing the local people (relatives or ancestors of the Nausikaans and related groups) in the process. The Asuro-Lhedwinics retained a vulgarised form of the Fiorentine language which was at this point still mutually intelligible with the mainland varieties. A gradual process of linguistic development with a Nausikaan (or similar) substrate continued until about the seventh century.

During the seventh century the Dalish people originating in northern Lhedwin (modern Glanodel) began to invade south into Crylante, largely pushing the Asuro-Lhedwinic people into the west of the region, ie. Lilledel proper. Linguistically, by this point the Asuro-Lhedwinics were speaking a far more divergent form of Fiorentine, likely divergent enough to be considered a separate language, though the scarcity of contemporary texts makes this difficult to ascertain. At any rate, the invasions catalysed the evolution of the language, now with an Old Lhedwinic adstrate. This marks the conventional beginning of the Old Lilledic period, as well as the period at which the term "Lilledic" becomes acceptable for the people. Similarly the Dales of Crylante are hence known as "Rigjordic".

Conflict between the Lilledic, Rigjordic and Nausikaan peoples continued into the eighth century. Writings from the time mostly concern martial affairs, an example being f° 2 v. of the Codex Nebligae: Inſelaggrißures uöniöund di Borie & nos ixponöund "Nausikaan raiders were coming from the north and killing us". The modern equivalent of this would be iselagressures ønøve de børe e nås espøneve. After the eighth century, there was a degree of peaceful mixing between the groups (primarily between Lilledics and Rigjordics). During this period, an increased proportion of Lhedwinic vocabulary entered Lilledic and the grammar began to shift in a similar way to the contemporary Lhedwinic language. After the eleventh century, there was greater mixing amongst the region's populaces.

From the eleventh century the process of Crylantian unification began, and by the early twelfth century all of mainland Crylante including Lilledel was absorbed into the Duchy of Crylante. During this time Lhedwinic, as the language of the original rulers, was the primary language of government, but Lilledic persisted in non-official contexts. Many legal, political and religious words entered the language from Lhedwinic during the early second millennium as a result. Conversely, Lilledic words for commerce entered Lhedwinic in turn.

In around the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Old Lilledic entered the Middle Lilledic phase, around the same time as Old Lhedwinic had begun to differentiate into the modern dialects. The mutual influence is particularly noticeable at this point as it marks the first attestation of the suffixed definite article to Lilledic, already well established by the Old Lhedwinic period in that language group, as in f° 1 r. of the Alexandrian Edict: Sej schijt chin de hachura novu Hertoghil ius Ducoutili Crylanti est Alexander Hertog "Let it be known that the new Duke of the Duchy of Crylante is Duke Alexander". The emphasised forms are definite. The modern translation of this would be vol se skir ki nonde noue hertoge jus Duckateje Crylante es Alexander Herteg".

Crylante remained united and independent until 1557, when it came under the control of Llewellyn V of tir Lhaeraidd. Although Crylante was given a large degree of liberty at first, the Lhaeraidd rulers began to assert more control and in 1726 was merged with Vrnallia into a single administrative entity, the Kingdom of Crylante-Vrnallia. During this entire period Mân Lhaeraidd was the primary source of linguistic borrowing both for the languages of Crylante as well as Vrnallian. There was limited contact between Lilledic and Vrnallian, with a small number of words passing between the two languages. During this time the Modern Lilledic period began, and the widespread adoption of movable type led to greater consistency in the spelling of Lilledic.

In 1799, after three days of independence, Crylante joined the United Kingdom of Lhedwin and Lhedwinic once again became the standard language of the Lilledic people. Crylante was divided into numerous sovereign states after the Great War, with Lilledel becoming the Grand Duchy of Lilledel. From this point, continuing even after Crylantian reunification in 1915, the Lilledic language had equal status to the other languages of Crylante, Rigjordic and Nausikaan.

Classification

Lilledic is classified as the sole member of the Northern Fiorentine subbranch of the Fiorentine branch of the Mydran subfamily of the Cataisuran language family. This makes Lilledic a close relative to languages such as Midrasian, Veleazan and Aquidish (and other Fiorentine languages), a more distant but still near relative of extinct Mydran languages such as Oskish and Umbraic, and a very distant relative of all other Cataisuran languages including the Lhedwinic languages, Chalcian, Sclavonic languages and so on.

As a distinct Fiorentine branch, the mutual intelligibility between Lilledic and the other Fiorentine languages is far less than between, say, Aquidish and Veleazan, both in the spoken and written forms. Compare the following simple sentence across the three languages, meaning "a living fish swims in the water":

• Li. Ne nate pisk nå in acke [nə ˈnɑːdə pɪsk noː ʔiː ˈnagə]
• Aq. Un pesce vivo nuota in l'acqua [un ˈpeʃʃe ˈviːvo ˈnwoːta in ˈlakkwa]
• Ve. Un pez viva nada en el agua [un peθ ˈbiβa ˈnaða en el ˈaɣwa]

Although all three languages are pronounced very differently, the written Aquidish and Veleazan sentences are more readily understandable in comparison to each other due to a more consistently common lexicon and the same word order throughout (the Lilledic word nate "alive" is related to nato meaning "born", while the verb når derives from a different Fiorentine root than nuotare and nadar).

Although Lilledic has been profoundly influenced by Lhedwinic, the two languages are in fact not closely related. Both are Cataisuran, but Lilledic is Fiorentine while Lhedwinic is Theudish.

Phonology

Consonants

A phonemic inventory of the consonants of Lilledic is presented below. Entries in italics are allophonic.

Lilledic consonant phonemes

	Labial	Coronal	Palatal	Velar	Uvular	Glottal
Nasal	m	n	ɲ	ŋ
Stop	p b	t d		k g		ʔ
Fricative	f v	s z	ɕ		ʁ	h
Affricate		t͡s	t͡ɕ
Approximant	w ʋ β̙	l ɫ r ð̙	j ʎ	ɣ̙

• The consonants /ɲ ʎ/ occur for most speakers as variants of the clusters /nj lj/ respectively, wherever they appear in a word: rænj "principality" [ʁɛɲ]; elj "elk" [ʔɛʎ]. Around Haverslev, these clusters simplify to [n l] word finally: [ʁæn] and [ʔæɫ]. In some western dialects, in the word-final position the underlying sequence metathesises to give a diphthong: [ræi̯n] and [ʔɛi̯l].
• The consonant [ŋ] is an allophone of /n/ before an underlying velar consonant. However, most speakers convert the sequence /ng/ into a tense or glottalised velar nasal, losing any plosive element: linge "the language" [ˈlɪŋːə ~ ˈlɪŋˀə].
• Voiceless plosives are generally aspirated in the onset of a syllable, especially a stressed syllable: poul "people" [pʰɑu̯ɫ]; temper "time" [ˈtʰɛmbɑ]; catt "cat" [kʰat̚]. At the end of a word, as the last example shows, these tend to be unreleased, especially after nasals: student "student" [stʉːˈdɛn]. After vowels, except before a stressed vowel, voicing (partial or complete) is common: catte "the cat" [ˈkʰadə].
• The voiced plosives /b d g/ have a tendency to lenite to the approximants [β̙ ð̙ ɣ̙] after vowel, much as in many southern Lhedwinic dialects: fabul "stage play" [ˈfɑːβ̙əɫ]; modd "law, rule" [mʊð̙]; niger "black" [ˈniːɣ̙ɑ]. The precise realisation of these sounds varies both in the amount of closure as well as the place of articulation; after a front vowel for example the velar sound is often highly palatalised, barely distinguished from /j/ for some speakers.
• In central dialects the clusters /mb nd/ and sometimes /ng/ tend to become the glottalised nasals [mˀ nˀ ŋˀ]: omber "evil spirit" [ˈʔɔmˀɑ]; ammend "loving" [ˈʔamənˀ]; ling "language" [ɫɪŋˀ]. After this change the glottalisation may be lost entirely, leaving simply a tense nasal.
• [z] is an allophone of /s/ which occurs for most speakers between vowels: casse "the house" [ˈkʰazə]. Additionally, the cluster /st/ is frequently entirely voiced to [zd] between vowels: coste "the coast" [ˈkʰʊzdə]. The same voicing never seems to occur with /sp sk/.
• The phoneme /ɕ/ is usually followed by a noticeable approximant sound /j/: øsje "the eye" [ˈʔœɕjə]. This does not usually occur at the end of a word: n'øsj "an eye" [nœɕ], while after a consonant it is not pronounced by most speakers. In those dialects where word-final /nj lj/ undergo metathesis, a metathesis of /ɕj/ can occur but is significantly rarer: [nœi̯ɕ].
• The phonemes /t͡s t͡ɕ/ are entirely limited to loanwords, but are consistently distinguished: zuck "marrow" [t͡sʉ̞k̚] from Aquidish zucca; tsjannel "channel (of radio, TV etc.)" [ˈt͡ɕanəɫ] from Newreyan channel. The latter phoneme is not followed by [j] like its fricative counterpart often is.
• [w] is limited to a small number of words where it may vary with [β̙]: Neblige "Nebligen" [ˈnɛwlijə]. It also occurs in some interjections such as oaa! "wah! (an anguished cry)". Otherwise, foreign /w/ is replaced with /v/: vikend [ˈviːkɛnˀ] from Newreyan weekend.
• [ʋ] and [r] tend to replace /v/ and /ʁ/ in western dialects: vall "fjord" [ʋal]; retur "ruler" [reːˈdər]. Casually in those dialects the trill may be pronounced as a simple tap [ɾ]. In dialects with the uvular pronunciation a trilled [ʀ] is occasionally heard.
• [ɫ] is the usual pronunciation of /l/ in all positions for all speakers, though older western speakers may use a clear [l] in all positions. Dialects from Dybøll south to Vestby retain the clear pronunciation before front vowels or some consonants but have a velarised sound in other environments: lack "lake" [ɫak̚] but ling "language" [lɪŋˀ].

The status of the glottal stop as a distinct phoneme is questionable. For most speakers outside of the most western dialects, the glottal stop is a regular occurrence word-initially before vowels: år "church" [ʔoːɑ̯]. However, what is more variable is whether the glottal stop persists when prefixes are added to a word. Thus contreår "blasphemy" has the possible pronunciations [ˈkʰʊndʁəˌʔoːɑ̯] with a glottal stop and [ˈkʰʊndʁoːɑ̯] without a glottal stop. Moreover, in the middle of a phrase, the glottal stop may disappear when a consonant ends the preceding word, including quite regularly after a contraction: in åre "in the church" [ʔiːˈnoːʁə]; n'exercet "a mob" [nɛkˈsɛɑ̯zət̚].

The phoneme /ʁ/ has a number of variant pronunciations. A uvular fricative [ʁ] is the most common pronunciation, though a uvular trill [ʀ] is occasionally heard in eastern dialects while an alveolar trill [r] or tap [ɾ] is normal in the west and occurs in some northern dialects also. After a vowel, vocalisation tends to occur except in some western dialects, with the rhotic becoming an approximant usually transcribed as [ɑ̯] although the precise value may be different: tor "chair" [tʰuːɑ̯]. In many southern dialects for example the pronunciation is a more central [ə̯]: [tʰuːə̯]. A front off-glide [ɛ̯] is also attested. After phonemic /ɑː/ there is usually no discernible phonetic difference: car "car" [kʰɑː]; some speakers however do have a central offglide, giving [ɑːə̯]. After a schwa, the usual pronunciation is a clear vowel [ɑ]: ouratur "worker" [ɑu̯ˈʁɑːdɑ]. Additionally, in more "archaic" styles of speech as might be heard on stage, the pronunciation of [r] in all contexts predominates, reflecting the earlier standard.

Vowels

A phonemic inventory of the vowels of Lilledic is presented below.

Lilledic vowel phonemes

	Front	Central	Back
Close	iː ɪ yː ʏ	ʉː ʉ̞	uː ʊ
Close-mid	eː øː øy̯~øi̯	ə	oː
Open-mid	ɛː~ɛə̯ ɛ(~æ) œ		ɔ
Open		a ai̯	ɑː ɑu̯~ou̯

Most vowels can be broken down into pairs of long and short or, more accurately, tense and lax vowels. Generally, but by no means always, a lax vowel will occur before more than one consonant. Orthographically, each pair attaches to one letter. The pairs are as follows:

Orthography	Tense	Lax
i	/iː/	/ɪ/
y	/yː/	/ʏ/
u	/ʉː/	/ʉ̞/
e	/eː/	/ɛ/1
ø	/øː/	/œ/
o	/uː/	/ʊ/
æ	/ɛː~ɛə̯/	/ɛ/2
a	/ɑː/	/a/
å	/oː/	/ɔ/

The orthography uses two letters to write /ɛ/ depending on whether the variant pronunciation of [æ] can occur. The letter <e> can never be pronounced this way, but the letter <æ> can (except that in some eastern dialects, this can happen due to a particular merger of these sounds before sonorants). Usage of [æ] is somewhat rare. Some western dialects use it in all situations, and therefore clearly distinguish the lax values of <e> and <æ>. Northern speakers, however, tend to only use [æ] before nasal consonants and /l/. Thus the words rænj "principality (dir. s. ind.)" and cytættes "cities (dir. pl. ind.)" have the following pronunciations:

	Western	Northern	Central-Eastern
rænj	[ræɲ]		[ʁɛɲ]
cytættes	[səˈtʰædəs]	[səˈtʰɛdəs]

The diphthongs written <øy> and <ou> have variant pronunciations. For the former, the pronunciation of [øy̯] is still widespread amongst older speakers in all areas, as well as normal in western dialects. Elsewhere, [øi̯] predominates. For the latter, the usual pronunciation is [ɑu̯] while eastern and some northern dialects have [ou̯] instead. In unstressed syllables, the nucleic element of these dipthongs may become a schwa resulting in [əi̯ əu̯] respectively.

The diphthong /ai̯/ occurs only in loanwords, where it is however consistently distinguished. Its pronunciation varies, typically having a more central nucleus [ai̯] in the east but a more back nucleus elsewhere. In central dialects it tends to remain low [ɑi̯] but is rarely rounded to [ɒi̯]. In the west rounding is more usual but the vowel is also higher [ɔi̯] or [oi̯].

Lax vowels frequently experience reduction in unstressed positions. Typically the result is the schwa. The precise rules for this reduction are unclear, as some vowels are never reduced, such as the diminutive ending -it which always contains the vowel [ɪ]: cassit "little house" [ˈkʰazɪt̚]. These exceptions, which may be tense or lax, are not predictable but rather lexical. Additionally, some occurrences of schwa can never be pronounced with a "full" pronunciation, and most such occurrences are written with <e>. An example of such is the definite suffix -e: catte "the cat" [ˈkʰadə].

Stress

Generally in native words stress falls on the penultimate syllable, though there are many exceptions to this even within the inherited vocabulary. Antepenultimate stress is common before the definite plural suffix -ejes: lingejes "the languages" [ˈɫɪŋˀijəs]. Final stress is also common with many suffixes, such as the derivational suffix -tæt: cyttæt "city" [səˈtʰɛːt̚].. Stress is almost never indicated orthographically, though some loanwords such as café "coffee" show it with a diacritic: [kʰaˈfeː]. Because of this, morphological alternations of stress which occur in speech are not reflected in the written language: cantur "singer" is [ˈkʰandɑ] in the direct singular indefinite but [kʰənˈtʰʉːɑ̯] in the oblique singular indefinite. The positioning of stress is largely due to historical factors, and thus is mostly unpredictable in the modern language. Certain inflections may be always stressed or unstressed, but often even this must be seen as a tendency rather than a rule.

Across phrases, function words are not usually stressed. In the phrase isjeck es mi can "this is my dog" the primary phrasal stress occurs on the first syllable (the stressed syllable of a content word) and last syllable (a monosyllabic content word) only, with a secondary stress on mi which although serving a grammatical function is part of the prosodic unit mi can "my dog". The word es is entirely unstressed within the phrase. Thus: [ˈʔɪɕjəgəs ˌmiːˈkʰɑːn].

Orthography

The Lilledic alphabet is a form of the Fiorentine alphabet and consists of the following letters: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V X Y Z Æ Å Ø. The additional letters Q W Þ Ð can occur in loanwords, primarily from Newreyan (W) and Lhedwinic (Þ Ð), such as weekend “weekend” [ˈviːkɛnˀ], þing [ˈtʰɪŋˀ] "assembly" and Truaði “Truathi” [ˈtʰʁuːəð̞iː]. Generally however these are replaced with V T D respectively (vikend, ting, Truadi). The letter Q is significantly more common, and almost always occurs in the sequence <qu> which is pronounced /kv/: quæstor "financier" [ˈkvɛzdɑ].

Many letters have various possible pronunciations depending on their position in relation to surrounding letters. The following table gives the various pronunciations. There are frequently exceptions to any given rule - for example, borrowed words may not experience vowel reduction, as with student [stʉːˈdɛn]:

Letter	Environment	Pronunciation	Example
A	Before two consonants	[a]	mank "useless" [maŋ]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		man "group" [man]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[ɑː]	ater "black-skinned" [ˈʔɑːdɑ]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		can "dog" [kʰɑːn]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	amår "to love" [ʔəˈmoːɑ̯]
Aa	When stressed	[ɑː]	paas "peace" [pʰɑːs]
	When unstressed	[ə]	Nausikaa "Nausikaa" [ˈnɑu̯zɪgə] or [ˈnou̯zɪgə]
Au	Always	[ɑu̯] or [ou̯]
Ai	Always	[ai̯] (but see above)	lain "delay" [ɫai̯n]
B	After a vowel (except immediately before a stressed vowel)	[β̙]	fabul "stage play" [ˈfɑːβ̙əɫ]
	After a vowel in a minority of loanwords	[w]	Neblige "Nebligen" [ˈnɛwɫijə]
	After <m>	[ˀ]	gamb "leg of an animal" [gamˀ]
	Elsewhere	[b]	bou "cow, bull" [bɑu̯]
C	Before <e i y æ ø>	[s]	cæd "murder" [sɛːð̙]
	Before <a o u å> word-initially or before a stressed syllable	[kʰ]	catt "cat" [kʰat̚]
	After a vowel or after <n>	[g]	academ "academy" [ˌʔagəˈdeːm]
Ci	Before a vowel	[ɕj]	officiator "civil servant" [ˌʔʊfɪˈɕjɑːdɑ]
Ck	Before a stressed syllable	[kʰ]	duckåt "duchy" [dəˈkʰoːt̚]
	After a vowel	[g]	acke "the water" [ˈagə]
	Word-finally	[k̚]	lack "lake" [ɫak̚]
D	After a vowel (except immediately before a stressed vowel)	[ð̙]	modd "law, rule" [mʊð̙]
	After <n>	[ˀ]	ammend "loving" [ˈʔamənˀ]
	Elsewhere	[d]	dom "community" [duːm]
Dj	Always	[ɕj]	djødes "twelve" [ˈɕjøːð̙əs]
Ð	Always	Identical to <d>	Truaði "Trúathi" [ˈtʰʁ̥uːəˌð̙iː]
E	Before two consonants	[ɛ]	cent "hundred" [sɛn]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		es "out of" [ʔɛs]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[eː]	retur "ruler" [ˈʁeːdɑ]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		sen "old person" [seːn]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	regge "rules" [ˈʁɛɣ̙ə]
	In suffixes containing -eje-	[i]	lingejes "the languages" [ˈɫɪŋːijəs]
Eg	Irregular pronunciation in the pronoun eg	[aj]	eg "I" [ʔaj]
Ei	Before a vowel	[eːj]	leie "the structure, the system" [ˈɫeːjə]
	Elsewhere	[eː]	lei "structure, system" [ɫeː]
F	Always	[f]	faast "permitted by religion" [fɑːst]
G	After a vowel (except immediately before a stressed vowel)	[ɣ̙]	reger "to rule" [ˈʁeːɣ̙ɑ]
	After <n>	[ː] or [ˀ]	ting "assembly" [tʰɪŋː] or [tʰɪŋˀ]
	After a front vowel in some loanwords	[j]	Neblige "Nebligen" [ˈnɛwɫijə]
	Elsewhere	[g]	goudend "happy" [ˈgɑu̯ð̙ənˀ]
Gj	Always	[j]	egjer "to want" [ˈʔɛjɑ]
H	Always	[h]	høy reite "has ruled" [høi̯ˈʁeːtə]
I	Before two consonants	[ɪ]	isje "that" [ˈʔɪɕjə]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		rin "channel" [ʁɪn]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[iː]	Lentine "Lentini" [lɛnˈtʰiːnə]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		fin "end" [fiːn]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	regering "government" [ʁəˈgeːʁəŋˀ]
Ii	Always	[iː]	mii "thousand" [miː]
J	Always	[j]	jæker "to suggest, propose" [ˈjɛːgɑ]
K	Word-initially and before a stressed syllable	[kʰ]	kimp "five" [kʰɪm]
	Word-finally	[k̚]	ark "arch" [ʔɑːk̚]
	After a vowel or after <n>	[g]	arke "the arch" [ˈʔɑːgə]
Kj	Always	[ɕj]	kju "food" [ɕjʉː]
L	Always	[ɫ] or [l]	cell "room" [sɛɫ] or [sɛl]
Lj	Always	[ʎ]	væljes "fjords" [ˈvɛʎəs]
M	Always	[m]	mort "death" [mɔɑ̯]
N	Before <k g> and velar <c>	[ŋ]	anker "anchor" [ˈʔaŋgɑ]
	Elsewhere	[n]	nou "nine" [nɑu̯]
Nj	Always	[ɲ]	linj "fireplace" [ɫɪɲ]
O	Before two consonants	[ʊ]	coll "throat" [kʰʊɫ]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		mos "soon" [mʊs]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[uː]	sole "alone (attributive singular)" [ˈsuːɫə]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		sol "alone (predicative)" [suːɫ]
	Before <r> when lax	[ɔ]	pork "pig" [pʰɔɑ̯k̚]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	ocult "mysterious" [əˈkʰʉ̞ɫt̚]
Ou	Always	[ɑu̯] or [ou̯]	poul "people" [pʰɑu̯ɫ] or [pʰou̯ɫ]
P	Word-initially and before a stressed syllable	[pʰ]	paas "peace" [pʰɑːs]
	Word-finally	[p̚]	mapp "paper" [map̚]
	After a vowel or after <m>	[b]	coppe "also" [ˈkʰʊbə]
Q	Except before <u> and a vowel	Identical to <k>	qat "khat" [kʰɑːt̚]
Qu	Always	[kv]	quæstor "financier" [ˈkvɛzdɑ]
R	Before a vowel	[ʁ]	rug "grave" [ʁʉːg]
	After tense <a>	[ː]	car "car" [kʰɑː]
	After a vowel	[ɑ̯]	tor "chair" [tʰuːɑ̯]
	After a schwa	[ɑ]	saker "holy" [ˈsɑːgɑ]
S	Between vowels	[z]	isel "island" [ˈʔiːzəl]
	Before a voiced consonant		esbursår "to flay" [ʔɛzbɑˈsoːɑ̯]
	After a vowel, before <t> and a vowel		coste "the coast" [ˈkʰʊzdə]
	Elsewhere	[s]	sperår "to suppose, to assume" [spəˈʁoːɑ̯]
Si	Before a vowel	[ɕj]	vision "vision" [vɪˈɕjuːn]
Sj	Always		sjanet "planet" [ɕjəˈneːt̚]
Skj	Always		skjøve "understood" [ˈɕjøːvə]
T	Word-initially and before a stressed syllable	[tʰ]	temper "time" [ˈtʰɛmbɑ]
	Word-finally after <r>	[-]	mort "death" [mɔɑ̯]
	Word-finally	[t̚]	catt "cat" [kʰat̚]
	After a vowel or after <n>	[d]	catte "the cat" [ˈkʰadə]
Ti	Before a vowel	[ɕj]	action "action" [ʔakˈɕjuːn]
Tj	Always		tjær "shawl, headscarf" [ɕjɛːɑ̯]
Tsj	Always	[t͡ɕ]	tsjannel "channel" [ˈt͡ɕanəɫ]
Þ	Always	Identical to <t>	þing "council" [tʰɪŋˀ]
U	Before two consonants	[ʉ̞]	culp "failing" [kʰʉ̞ɫp̚]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		cur "riding horse" [kʰʉ̞ɑ̯]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[ʉː]	luce "the light" [ˈɫʉːsə]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		lus "light" [ɫʉːs]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	duckåt "duchy" [dəˈkʰoːt̚]
V	Always	[v]	vall "fjord" [vaɫ]
W	Always	Identical to <v>	weekend "weekend" [ˈviːkɛnˀ]
X	Always	[ks]	exercet "mob" [ʔɛkˈsɛɑ̯zət̚]
Y	Before two consonants	[ʏ]	yngre "to join" [ˈʔʏŋgʁə]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		cyv "bait" [sʏv]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[yː]	ydes "judge" [ˈʔyːð̙əs]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		ys "divine will" [ʔyːs]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	cytæt "city" [səˈtʰɛːt̚]
Z	Always	[t͡s]	zuck "marrow" [t͡sʉ̞k̚]
Æ	Before two consonants	[æ] or [ɛ]	ætt "noble bloodline" [ʔæt̚] or [ʔɛt̚]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		mæs "more" [mæs] or [mɛs]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[ɛː] or [ɛə̯]	jæker "to suggest, propose" [ˈjɛːgɑ] or [ˈjɛə̯gɑ]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		cæl "sky" [sɛːɫ] or [sɛə̯ɫ]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	cællur "of weather" [səˈɫʉːɑ̯]
Å	Before two consonants	[ɔ]	ånd "ghost" [ʔɔnˀ]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		vån "water vole" [vɔn]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[oː]	dåte "given" [ˈdoːdə]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		nåt "alive" [ˈnoːt̚]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	åndor "of ghosts" [ʔəˈnˀuːɑ̯]
Ø	Before two consonants	[œ]	øffer "to oink" [ˈʔœfɑ]
	Before a single consonant in some monosyllables		løn "maple tree" [ɫœn]
	Before a single consonant followed by a vowel	[øː]	djødes "twelve" [ˈɕjøːð̙əs]
	Before a single consonant in most monosyllables and some stressed syllables		bør "north" [bøːɑ̯]
	In unstressed syllables	[ə]	ønøve "was arriving" [ʔəˈnøːvə]
Øy	Always	[øy̯] or [øi̯]	nøys "to us" [nøy̯s] or [nøi̯s]

Lilledic possesses numerous homonyms and homographs, and as a result there are various alternative spellings of words which add diacritics for disambiguation. For example, the sentence i i i i "it goes into in" can be written ì í ĩ ī, while one can also distinguish ês "out of" from és "is" and so on. In general, except where there would otherwise be a misunderstanding or in exceptional instances such as i i i, these diacritics are never written. They do not affect the pronunciation at all, except for a few instances in which a diacritic can indicate contrastive vowel length, and which diacritic to use is dependent entirely on historical factors and is not predictable (the acute for example is used in words formerly containing /t/: est → és "is" and it → í "goes"). Often some words will bear diacritics while others will not, since only identifying certain parts of a phrase is necessary to allow context to determine the rest: i í i i e i í e i "it goes into it and it goes out of it" where the only accented word is í "goes" (i "into" and e "out of" are colloquial pronunciations of what would otherwise be in and es here).

Grammar

Nouns

Nouns in Lilledic generally inflect for direct and genitive cases, singular and plural numbers and definiteness. A small number of nouns split the direct case into a nominative and oblique case, usually nouns with the ending -ur. A few nouns are indeclinable. Nouns also possess either masculine or feminine gender, which is primarily reflected through the choice of definite article and referential pronouns. The five major declension classes of Fiorentine have been levelled and reformatted into often more complicated paradigms. The following table shows the declensions of the regular first declension nouns catt "cat" (masculine) and ling "tongue, language" (feminine).

	catt				ling
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ne catt	cattes	(ju) catte	(jås) cattejes	ne ling	linges	(ja) linge	(jås) lingejes
Genitive	de ni catte	de cattur	jus catte	jur cattureje	de ni linge	de lingor	jus linge	jor lingoreje

The direct definite forms only require the article when an adjective is inserted: catte "the cat" but ju bonne catte "the good cat". Articles with a genitive noun are mandatory.

Although the differences between the above paradigms usually correspond to the noun's gender, there are exceptions to this trend. For example, the noun fåg "beech" is feminine (jor mænjur faggureje "of the big beech trees" with feminine article jor) while the noun nout "sailor" is masculine (jur mænjur noutoreje "of the big sailors" with masculine article jur).

The paradigms above may be complicated by a system of ablaut which has developed on some Lilledic nouns. The aforementioned fåg "beech" is one such word, with a change in vowel quality (and a zero ending direct plural; see below); a different pattern is seen with sjanet "planet" which has a change in vowel length. The declensions of these words are shown in the following table. Note that fåg is a feminine noun while sjanet is a masculine noun, but both have unexpected genitive plural forms.

	fåg				sjanet
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ne fåg [foːɣ̙]	fåg	(ja) fage [ˈfɑːɣ̙ə]	(jås) fagejes	ne sjanet [ɕjəˈneːt̚]	sjanettes [ɕjəˈnɛdəs]	(ju) sjanete	(jås) sjanettejes
Genitive	de ni fæge [ˈfɛːɑ̯ɣ̙ə]	de faggur [fəˈgʉːɑ̯]	jus fæge	jor faggureje	de ni sjanete	de sjanettor	jus sjanete	jur sjanettoreje

The above nouns all derive from the Fiorentine first and second declension. Many nouns which were originally fourth declension have been merged into the paradigm entirely, though a few retain an irregularity in the genitive plural. Feminine nouns typically retain their gender though a few shifts have occurred, such as man "group" which has become masculine, perhaps under influence from the similar Lhedwinic mand "man". Two examples follow, exercet (or exerst) "mob" which has been regularised and lack "lake" which has not.

	exercet				lack
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	n'exercet	exercetes	(ju) exercete	(jås) exercetejes	ne lack	lackes	(ja) lacke	(jås) lackejes
Genitive	de ni exercete	d'exercetur	jus exercete	jur exercetureje	de ni lacke	de lacku [ɫəˈkʰʉː]	jus lacke	jor lackuje

As the neuter gender has been lost in Lilledic, so too have most second declension neuter nouns merged with their masculine equivalents. However, a small number of nouns have retained an irregular direct plural, which has no ending and is therefore identical to the direct singular: coll "throat(s)", fon "forest shrine(s)". Others have been regularised: rænj "principality", rænjes "principalities". Rarely, for reasons of analogy, second declension common nouns have acquired the same irregularity, such as the already-mentioned fåg "beech(es)".

The Fiorentine third declension remains largely distinct in Lilledic. Notably, a small number of original third declension nouns have retained a distinct nominative case. The table below shows two regular nouns, the masculine can "dog" and the feminine etjøn "civil service".

	can				etjøn
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ne can [kʰɑːn]	cannes [ˈkʰanəs]	(ju) cane	(jås) cannesje	n'etjøn [ʔɛˈɕjøːn]	etjønes	(ja) etjøne	(jås) etjønesje
Genitive	de ni cannes	de can	jus cannesje	jur cane	de ni etjønes	d'etjøn	jus etjønesje	jor etjøne

Third declension nouns which originally had the genitive plural -ium rather than -um have spawned a new sub-paradigm in which a -j- appears in the plural. These are referred to as iotated nouns (jotafeite nomines) The following table demonstrates masculine pisk and feminine cæd "murder".

	pisk				cæd
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ne pisk [pʰɪsk]	piskjes [ˈpʰɪɕjəs]	(ju) piske	(jås) piskjesje	ne cæd [sɛːð̙]	cædjes [ˈsɛːɕjəs]	(ja) cæde	(jås) cædjesje
Genitive	de ni piskes	de piskje	jus piskesje	jur piskje	de ni cædes	de cædje	jus cædesje	jor cædje

Unlike second declension neuter nouns, all third declension neuter nouns have been completely regularised: noun "name" has the plural nounes (from *nominēs) rather than *noun (from nomina).

A group of nouns which regularly differentiate between nominative and oblique (sometimes called '"accusative") forms in the singular are those ending in the (masculine) Fiorentine agent suffix -or which is usually reflected as modern -ur. This suffix, which forms the overwhelming majority of nouns with this distinction, is unstressed in the nominative and stressed in the oblique, with no difference in spelling. The declension of cantur "(male) singer" is given in the next table.

	cantur
	Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Nominative	ne cantur [ˈkʰandɑ]	cantures [kʰəntʰʉːʁəs]	(ju) canture [ˈkʰandəʁə]	(jås) canturesje
Accusative	ne cantur [kʰəntʰʉːɑ̯]		(ju) canture [kʰəntʰʉːʁə]
Genitive	de ni cantures [kʰəntʰʉːʁəs]	de cantur [kʰəntʰʉːɑ̯]	jus canturesje	jur canture

Some nouns outside this paradigm also retain this distinction however, such as pes "foot" [pʰeːs] which has the oblique pedde [ˈpʰɛð̙ə] demonstrating the form from which other cases are built, such as the direct plural peddes. In some instances a distinct nominative form has now become poetic and otherwise generalised with the oblique to produce a more usual direct case. For example, the noun oun "man" is now a regular noun but formerly and still in poetry oun is oblique while the nominative is omme.

The Fiorentine fifth declension is typically analysed as yielding totally irregular feminine nouns in Lilledic, with few having been regularised. Two examples follow: re "matter" and dje "day".

	re				dje
	Indefinite		Definite		Indefinite		Definite
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ne re	res [reːs]	(ja) reë [ˈreː.ə]	(jås) resje [ˈreːɕjə]	ne dje [ɕjeː]	djes [ɕjeːs]	(ja) djeë	(jås) djesje [ˈɕjeːɕjə]
Genitive	de ni ri	de rer [ʁeːɑ̯]	jus rië [ˈʁiː.ə]	jor rere	de ni djeë [ˈɕjeː.ə]	de djer [ɕjeːɑ̯]	jus djeë	jor djere

Some nouns are indeclinable for case and number, and some also do not distinguish definiteness. For example, the masculine noun kju "food" has no case or number, and the sole definite form is kjue: eg mande kjue "I eat the food" but sapure jus kjue es bon "the flavour of the food is good". The noun brættje "arm(s)" is completely indeclinable, and only the presence of a definite article can distinguish this sense.

It is common for proper nouns to be indeclinable, such as Lentine "Lentini". However, declinable proper nouns have a slight irregularity wherein the direct case is marked by zero suffix except when preceded by a preposition, in which case the suffix -e is attached: Lilledel es ne tryredjøn de Crylante "Lilledel is a region of Crylante" but nås inoute i Lilledele "we live in Lilledel".

The genitive case is used to mark possession on a noun: coude de ni catte "the tail of a cat"; coude jus catte "the tail of the cat". In all other situations the direct form is used: eg peddættje catte "I kick the cat" (direct object); eg stå pedde per catte "I stand on the cat" (preposition). Formerly, a small set of fossilised forms could govern the genitive (with or without a definite article) such as gratje myljeresje "for the sake of the (my) wife", but today the direct is used instead: gratje myljere. When a distinction between nominative and oblique exists, the nominative is used for a clause subject while the oblique is used everywhere else.

Articles and demonstratives

Articles, specifically definite articles, are one of the few remaining areas of agreement where gender is indicated in Lilledic. Lilledic has a definite article and, in the singular only, an indefinite article. Both decline for case and the definite article differentiates some cases by gender.

The indefinite article is ne in the direct case and ni in the genitive case. The latter only occurs in the phrase de ni, since this must always be preceded by the preposition de "of".

The definite article declines with the following forms. It is mandatory in the genitive, in which the preposition de is not normally used (its usage is colloquial). In the direct case however it is not used when a noun occurs alone, but rather only when it is governed by an adjective. This is because definiteness is preferentially marked through noun inflection rather than use of the article: foule "the story"; ja goudente foule "the happy story"; fine jus foule "the end of the story".

	Masculine		Feminine
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	ju	jås	ja	jås
Genitive	jus	jur	jus	jor

The genitive singular and direct plural do not, therefore, distinguish gender.

Another class of words which distinguish gender are the demonstrative adjectives, though to only a limited extent. Only singular adjectives mark gender, and only in direct cases. The basic forms of these are is "that", iseck "this", i "those" and ædje "these, those". These words have irregular declensions. Moreover, i and ædje can also be used as free pronouns meaning "these, those" as well as "they, them" and so on, but in the singular distinct words are used for free demonstrative pronouns. These are covered in the section on pronouns.

Exceptionally, not only do these adjectives distinguish a nominative, but they also distinguish an accusative (object of verb) from a dative (object of a preposition). This was formerly also true of the definite article but that dimension has been lost in the modern language.

The singular demonstratives clearly distinguish obviative is "that" from proximate iseck "this". The declension of these words is given below.

	is		iseck
	Masculine	Feminine	Masculine	Feminine
Nominative	is	ja	iseck	jak
Accusative	ju		jun	jan
Genitive	eis		esus [ʔeːˈsʉːs]
Dative	i		jyk

Originally, the plural pronoun was i while ædje was used only as an adjective, neither consistently differentiating between proximate and obviative meanings. However, in the modern language, both can be used largely interchangeably as free pronouns while in demonstrative use i has exclusively obviative meaning and for ædje a proximate usage is predominant.

These words decline as follows. There is no distinction between their usage as modifiers and their usage as pronouns. For the meaning "they" i is used while for "these" or "those" ædje is more common.

	ædje	i
Nominative	ædje	i, ije
Accusative	ædjes	ijes
Genitive	ædjur [ʔɛɕˈjʉːɑ̯]	ijur [ʔiˈjʉːɑ̯]
Dative	ædje(s)	ijes

The nominative of i is sometimes ije. Both of these forms are in fact ambiguous, with the former also being the dative of is "that (adjective)" and the latter being the dative of isje "that (pronoun). In addition, the dative of ædje is sometimes ædjes by analogy to that of i.

Adjectives

Adjectives have an unchanging, zero-ending predicative form which is used after the verb "to be" as well as an inflecting attributive form used when governing a noun: jøke es bon "the joke is good" but ju bonne jøke "the good joke". The attributive forms decline for case and number, but do not decline for gender in the modern language. Adjectives also have comparative and superlative forms. Much like nouns, there are various paradigms of adjective declension and numerous irregular adjectives.

The most common paradigm for adjectival declension is given below. In the singular, there is no distinction between cases. The absence of an ending gives the predicative form. Much like nouns, these adjectives may experience ablaut. The adjective mænj "big" experiences no ablaut while notoul "significant" does:

	mænj		notoul
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	mænje	mænjes	notoule [nəˈtʰɑu̯ɫə]	notøyles [nətʰøi̯ˈɫəs]
Genitive		mænjur [məˈɲʉːɑ̯]		notøylur [nədøi̯ˈɫʉːɑ̯]

Iotation exists amongst adjectives as well. One paradigm to which this consistently applies is the (slightly irregular) present participle. The predicative participle ending is -nd but before attributive endings this becomes -nt-. The declension of goudend "happy", a fossilised participle for which there is no corresponding verb, is given below. As this derives from third-declension adjectives in Fiorentine, another such adjective, mellyr "better", the irregular comparative of bon "good" is also given.

	goudend [ˈgɑu̯ð̙ənˀ]		mellyr [ˈmɛɫɑ]
	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Direct	goudente [gɑu̯ˈdɛndə]	goudentjes [gɑu̯ˈdɛnɕə]	melyre [mɛˈɫyːʁə]	melyrres [mɛˈɫʏʁəs]
Genitive		goudentje [gɑu̯ˈdɛnɕə]		melyr [mɛˈɫyːɑ̯]

Note that the distinction between zero ending and -e in the genitive plural is a regular difference between regular and iotated adjectives, not an irregularity. Moreover, various third declension adjectives have been regularised to a greater or lesser extent, an example being notoul above which has been moved into the more common declension. Indeed, the paucity of the remaining third declension adjectives outside of particular derivational endings (present participle, comparative etc.) has led to some scholars declaring them to simply be irregular.

A small number of adjectives do not distinguish between the predicative and attributive singular forms. Such adjectives, aside from that detail and the possible presence of ablaut, are otherwise regular. An example of such an adjective is ater "black (skin)" which declines as in the following table.

	Singular	Plural
Direct	ater [ˈʔɑːdɑ]	atres [ˈʔadʁəs]
Genitive		atrur [ʔəˈtʰʁʉːɑ̯]

Regular adjectives form their comparative with the ending -yr. This declines like mellyr above. The superlative is formed with -issem which declines like regular adjectives.

Verbs

Verbs in Lilledic inflect for two primary tenses (present and imperfect), with periphrastic constructions providing additional tense-aspect-mode (TAM) forms. Features such as mood and voice are expressed entirely periphrastically. There are also a number of non-finite forms. Regular verbs fall into one of three regular conjugational classes, with the Fiorentine second and third conjugations having been mostly conflated in Lilledic. Irregular verbs are numerous as well.

Only the highly irregular verb esse "to be" has retained conjugation for person and number. Other verbs, much like the Lhedwinic languages, have lost this aspect of their inflection and do no indicate their subject through inflection.

Verbs are generally cited in their infinitive form, which for first declension verbs ends in -år and third declension verbs in -ir, both of which are stressed: cantår "to sing"; ønir "to come". For second declension verbs the ending is unstressed -er: strenner "to spread"; bættjer "to strike". Irregular verbs may have the ending -re attached directly to the stem such as ire "to go" or may have a totally irregular ending such as esse "to be".

The present tense is generally formed by replacing the infinitive ending with -e, with stress on the preceding syllable. This may cause a change in spelling after a short vowel: amår "to love" but eg amme ja "I love her". Irregular verbs do not necessarily follow this rule: ire → i, høyre "to have (done) → høy. For monosyllabic verb roots such as står "to stand; to set; to exist" or skir "to know", the present ending is instead -å or -i respectively: stå, ski.

The verb esse is exceptional in being the only verb to have retained personal conjugation, distinguishing the first person singular, non-first person singular and plural in its conjugation. The present tense is therefore shown below.

	Singular	Plural
First Person	su [sʉː]	son [suːn]
Second Person	es [ʔeːs]
Third Person

The imperfect tense is formed with a slightly different suffix for each conjugation class. First conjugation verbs replace the infinitive ending with -ouve, second conjugation verbs replace it with unstressed -eve and third conjugation verbs replace it with -øve which has a short stressed vowel. Some verbs also experience iotation in the imperfect, particularly those whose stem ends in [k] or [g]: reger "to rule" → regjeve "was ruling". Irregular verbs often have completely unpredictable imperfect forms: ir → yve, skir → skjøve, ølle "will (do)" → volleve. The first vowel of the ending -eve, on account of being unstressed, is often unpronounced, so that for example volleve becomes volve [ˈvʊɫvə].

Once again, the verb esse retains personal endings in the imperfect, which are as follows.

	Singular	Plural
First Person	er [ʔeːɑ̯]	errend [ˈʔɛʁənˀ]
Second Person	erres [ˈʔɛʁəs]
Third Person

There is also a non-tense-marked (usually present or gnomic) passive-impersonal form. This always ends in unstressed -ter and is sometimes redundantly called the "-ter passive" to contrast with the more usual periphrastic passive. This form invariably uses the infinitive stem as its basis and is therefore always predictable, though a few dialects may retain slight irregularities in some second conjugation verbs. For first and third conjugation verbs, the -ter replaces the -r of the infinitive: cantår → cantåter; ønir → øniter. With second conjugation verbs it replaces the entire ending -er: strenner → strenter; reger "to rule" → regter or reiter in some dialects. With irregular verbs the relevant form is not necessarily predictable: ølle → ølter.

Primarily now a literary construction is a plural imperative distinct from the singular. The singular imperative is always identical to the present tense form. The plural imperative on the other hand is formed with the ending -æ for the first declension, -ei for the second declension and -i for the third declension, all of which are stressed: amæ "love!"; regei "rule!"; øni "come!". However, in modern speech these tend to be replaced with their singular counterparts.

Synthetic verb constructions

	First conjugation	Second conjugation	Third conjugation	Irregular
Infinitive	amår "love" sperår "suppose, await" står "stand, set, exist"	reger "rule" ouder "dare" strenner "spread"	mentir "pretend" øydir "hear" injir "ignite, seduce"	høyre "have done" ir "go" ølle "will do"
Present	amme spere stå	regge oude strenne	mente øyde inje	høy i vol
Imperfect	amouve sperouve stouve	regjeve oudeve strenneve	mentøve øydjøve injøve	houve yve volleve
Passive	amåter speråter ståter	regter or reiter oudter strenter	mentiter øyditer injiter	høyter iter ølter

Additional TAM forms can be formed periphrastically. The perfect or preterite tense is formed using the present tense of the verb høyre (from "to have"), høy, with the past participle of a verb. All first and third conjugation verbs form their past participle by replacing the infinitive ending with -t, but second conjugation verbs add replace the full ending -er. Put differently, regular verbs form their past participle identically to the impersonal-passive but with -t instead of -ter. After some consonant clusters the suffix requires an additional -e, but elsewhere this is only used attributively. Irregular verbs may not follow this rule: reifiker "crown (a monarch)" [ʁeːˈfiːgɑ] → reifeit [ʁeːˈfeːt̚]. Using the past tense of høy, houve provides the pluperfect or past-of-past tense.

Since both the perfect and pluperfect tenses involve completion of an action, they cannot be used with verbs which are inherently stative, thus for example esse "be" has no past participle.

The future tense can be expressed using the present form, but it is more commonly expressed with the present tense of the verb ølle (from "to want"), vol, with the infinitive. Some irregular verbs possess distinct future forms such as (invariable) fi from esse, but in speech the use of vol is far more common: vol esse. Distinct future tense forms are now largely literary. Additionally, the use of the past tense of ølle, volleve, forms a future-of-past tense: eg volleve jøckår "I was going to play".

The habitual present is formed with jo or je (both are accepted) and the present participle, which for all regular verbs is formed with the ending -end after the present stem: eg jo/je mentend esse ne myljer per interrete "I pretend to be a woman on the internet". The habitual past is formed either with jo/je and the past participle or with fy jo/je or the variant fytje (the latter especially in speech) and the present participle: eg jo/je itt a ne scol i Lillehaune or eg fyt jo/je jend a ne scol i Lillehaune "I went to a school in Lillehavn".

Conditionals are formed using the particle døy (from "should") before the apodosis: si tu egje ne catt, døy renne søll "if you want a cat, you should save up some money". This can be used before the imperfect form of a verb: si eg egjeve ne catt, døy renneve søll "if I wanted a cat I would've been saving money"; ...døy volleve renner søll "...I would've saved (started to save) money".

Periphrastic verb constructions

	First conjugation	Second conjugation	Third conjugation
Perfect/preterite	høy amåt høy speråt høy ståt	høy regte or reit høy oudte høy strent	høy mentit høy øydit høy injit
Pluperfect	houve amåt houve speråt houve ståt	houve regte or reit houve oudte houve strent	houve mentit houve øydit houve injit
Future of present	vol amår vol sperår vol står	vol reger vol ouder vol strenner	vol mentir vol øydir vol injir
Future of past	volleve amår volleve sperår volleve står	volleve reger volleve ouder volleve strenner	volleve mentir volleve øydir volleve injir
Habitual present	jo/je ammend jo/je sperend jo/je jøkend	jo/je reggend jo/je oudend jo/je strennend	jo/je mentend jo/je øydend jo/je injend
Habitual past	jo/je amåt; fy jo/je ammend jo/je speråt; fy jo/je sperend jo/je ståt; fy jo/je jøckend	jo/je regte or reit; fy jo/je reggend jo/je oudte; fy jo/je oudend jo/je strent; fy jo/je strennend	jo/je mentite; fy jo/je mentend jo/je ådite; fy jo/je øydend jo/je injit; fy jo/je injend

Lilledic is generally a verb-framed language, with motion verbs primarily showing the direction of the movement rather than manner. Manner is specified using adverbs, typically participles of manner-motion verbs: eg høy intråt æde currend "I entered the building running" for "I ran into the building" instead of the less natural-sounding *eg høy curt in æde. In this case "run in" is translated by intrår currend rather than the more literal currer in.

Pronouns

Pronouns are exceptional in Lilledic as they retain as many as four distinct cases: nominative, accusative, genitive and dative (or "oblique"). Both the first and second person singular pronouns distinguish all of these while the plurals do not distinguish nominative and accusative. These pronouns are given below.

	Singular		Plural
	First person	Second person	First person	Second person
Nominative	eg	tu	nås	ås
Accusative	me	te
Genitive	mi	ti	noster	øster
Dative	my	ty	nøys	øys

Note that there is an important variant set of second person plural forms which simply add a /h/ to the beginning of the words: hås, høster, høys. These forms are used to increase distinctiveness from the first person forms in situations where the avoidance of ambiguity is necessary, but are never used in writing.

The third person pronouns include both the personal pronouns as well as demonstrative pronouns. The personal pronouns "he, she, it" are in fact the same as the demonstrative adjective is "that", the declension of which is given in the section on articles and demonstratives. This pronoun has no distinct neuter form anymore; any neuter reference usually matches the grammatical gender of the referent or else defaults to the masculine. Similarly, the plural "they" is i which is also the adjective "those". Rarely one may instead hear ædje "these". Both of these words are similarly declined in the articles and demonstratives section.

The demonstrative pronouns in the plural are not distinct from the demonstrative adjectives i and ædje. However, in the singular the free singular demonstrative pronouns use different words to the adjectives (and therefore to the generic pronouns). "This" is isjeck (cf. iseck) while "that" is isje (cf. is); these are declined below.

	Proximate	Obviative
Nominative	isjeck [ˈʔɪɕjək̚]	isje [ˈʔɪɕjə]
Accusative	jusjun [ˈjʉːɕjʉːn]	juje [ˈjʉːjə]
Genitive	ejusjes [ʔeːˈjʉːɕjəs]	eisje [ˈʔeːɕjə]
Dative	isjyk [ʔiːɕˈjyːk̚]	ije [ʔiːjə]

The interrogative pronoun "who, what" distinguishes masculine and feminine gender as well as four cases in the singular, with no gender and three cases in the plural. It declines as follows.

	Singular		Plural
	Masculine	Feminine
Nominative	ki	kæ	cås
Accusative	ke	ca
Genitive	cujes, cues		cur
Dative	ky		kies

The variant genitive singular form cues is never used in writing, but is very common in speech. In addition, the older spelling kijes for kies is still sometimes seen, though it is now proscribed.

The interrogative pronoun is also used as a relative pronoun: eg yseve oune, ke tu ski "I saw the man whom you know". When there is discord between the grammatical role of the referent in the main and relative clauses, the pronoun invariably matches the case used in the main clause: eg yseve oune, a ke tu houve foulåt "I saw the man to whom you had spoken". The preposition a normally governs the dative, which would be ky, but a ky would be ungrammatical here. This is believed to be due to Nausikaan influence. In colloquial speech and only after a definite noun, an additional free pronoun may be inserted to avoid this lack of agreement: eg yseve oune, ke an i tu houve foulåt.

The exception to this is that in clefting constructions the pronoun's case is that of the dependent clause: erres ja, cujes fii eg yseve "it is she (direct) whose (genitive) child I saw". In this instance erres ja, de kæ... where the relative pronoun matches the case of the referent in the main clause (nominative) would be completely ungrammatical.

Syntax

Lilledic has a normal word order of subject-verb-object (SVO) in all clauses. Unlike Lhedwinic, Lilledic is not a V2 language, and there is no limit to the number of elements which may precede the verb. Also, unlike in many Fiorentine languages Lilledic is not a pro-drop language meaning pronouns can never be omitted. In certain construction, an order of SOV is an acceptable variant, such as in perfective constructions. Overall SOV order is more common in eastern dialects:

• Eg yse ne film "I am watching a movie" (SVO)
• Eg høy yst ne film "I watched a movie" (SVO, more common)
• Eg høy ne film yst "I watched a movie" (SOV, less common)

There has been a steady decline in how frequently pronominal objects are placed before the verb in an unmarked clause. Like other Fiorentine languages, Lilledic retained the Fiorentine SOV order for pronouns only. Today however this is less common and even with pronouns the order SVO is preferred:

• Eg mitte ju per mese "I put it on the table" (SVO, more common)
• Eg ju mitte per mese "I put it on the table" (SOV, less common)

In particular, the order OV has been completely abandoned in imperative clauses: sjæleske me "kiss me", never *me sjæleske.

Unlike in Rigjordic, the argument(s) preceding the verb need not be in any way pragmatically marked. However, like in Rigjordic a question word must always occur first in the clause rather than in situ. This often leads to OVS or OSV order, and very rarely SOV:

• Tu amme ja "You love her" (SVO)
• Ke amme tu? "Whom (m.) do you love?" (OVS, more common)
• Ke tu amme? "Whom do you love?" (OSV, less common)
• Ki amme ja? "Who loves her?" (SVO, normal)
• Ki ja amme? "Who loves her?" (SOV, rare)

When a question does not contain a specific interrogative word, there are two possibilities. Either the syntax of a declarative statement is used, but with a rising intonation, or the verb is promoted to the front of the clause. This places a subtle emphasis onto the verb itself, but for many speakers is the normal order for questions. These seem to be about evenly distributed throughout the Lilledic Sprachraum, with promotion being more common in the east:

• Tu høy yst fabule "You have seen the play"
• Tu høy yst fabule? "Have you seen the play?" (SVO)
• Høy tu yst fabule? "Have you seen the play?" (VSO)

When a positive answer is expected the tag phrase sju ni? "or not?" is often added: tu høy yst fabule, sju ni? "you've seen the play, haven't you?". This is not used when an inversion has occurred, or put differently, this is appended to a declarative sentence to make a tag question.

Verbs are negated by placing the adverb ni (sometimes pronounced ne) before them. Before a vowel, some speakers use an elided form n' while others use the full form. Only finite verbs can usually be negated, which can lead to ambiguity:

• Eg ni inoute Lillehaun or eg n'inoute Lillehaun "I do not live in Lillehavn"
• Eg n'egje yser ju liber "I don't want to read that book" or "I want to not read that book"

Whereas in Newreyan the non-finite verb in the second example can be directly negated, this is not possible in Lilledic. Instead, the following circumlocution must be used:

• Eg n'egje, ki is liber yster lit. "I do not want that this book be read"
• Eg egje, ki is liber ni yster lit. "I want that this book not be read"

The adverb imbe is used instead to negate non-verbal elements such as adjectives or prepositional clauses:

• Imbe eg øydjøve tove øse "Not I heard your voice" → "Somebody else heard your voice"
• Eg acatte imbe jun liber "I bought not this book" → "I bought a different book"

Adjectives always precede their head noun in Lilledic, never follow: ne mænje cælje mar "the big blue sea". Attributive adjectives agree with their head in gender, number and case. Adjectives used predicatively after esse "to be" do not agree, instead taking the unmarked predicative form: ne mar es mænj e cælj "the sea is big and blue".

Questions with interrogative words are formed as discussed above. In other questions, the focus of the question is placed into the initial position. Typically this is the finite verb. When a non-finite form is fronted, it is permissible for no other change to occur. However, a cleft construction is frequent in speech:

• Scri tu misse? "Are you writing the letter?"
• Scrøve tu misse? "Were you writing the letter?"
• Misse scri tu? "Is it the letter you're writing?" (inversion)
• Es misse ke tu scri? "Is it the letter you're writing?" (cleft)

Note that periphrastic verbal constructions place the finite verb first and the non-finite verb at its usual position in the clause: høy tu scrit misse? or høy tu misse scrit? "did you write the letter?"

Adverbs are generally placed adjacent to the verb, but can go before or after it as desired:

• Eg i non a scole "I'm going to school now" (adverb after verb)
• Is non jo rennend søll "He saves money now" (adverb before verb)

If a verb is promoted to the front of a question, than the adverb may only follow the verb, but may be placed before or after the subject:

• Oureske tu non gratje penkennele? "Do you work for the governor now?" (adverb after subject)
• Ønne acu studentjes? "Are the students coming here?" (adverb before subject)

Purpose clauses are formed either using the conjunction ki or with a non-finite verb form. Some clauses can be formed either way, but often only one formation is permitted:

• Eg egje, ki (eg) då Øys jun sacrifickåt "[to a god] I want to give (conjunction) You this sacrifice"
• Espøner ne person es fæsj "It is easy to kill (infinitive) a person"
• Is yve diju yser ju noue filme "He was on his way there to see (infinitive) the new film"
• Eg egje renner søll, ki acatte ne cur "I want to save (infinitive) money so that I may buy (conjunction) a horse"

Passive expressions have two forms, paralleling the two Lhedwinic forms. The most common involves the use of the verb manner with the past participle, which can be used in various tenses:

• Misse manne mist "The letter is (being) sent"
• Misse høy mås mist "The letter has been sent"
• Misse vol mås mist "The letter will be sent"

An alternative, which parallels the passive in -s of Lhedwinic, is the passive-impersonal in -ter. This form is unmarked for tense, but is usually nonpast (other tenses using the above construction): misse mister "the letter is/will be sent". Often there is an implication with this form that something must happen, ie. "the letter must be sent". This form can also be used as an impersonal, but this is a vanishing usage outside of gnomic constructions: diju iter søle ou crynæljes "only criminals go there", literally "to there is gone only by criminals". The alternative way to express this is diju søle crynæljes i or sol crynæljes i diju.

Vocabulary

The core vocabulary of Lilledic is inherited from Fiorentine, and covers a wide variety of semantic spheres. This set includes: basic terms for humans and animals such as oun "man", con "woman", can "dog" and catt "cat"; geographical terms such as fond "ground", isel "island", mont "mountain" and rival "river"; core verbs such as ir "to go", ouresker "to work", egjer "to want" and står "to stand"; grammatical words such as i(n) "in", a(n) "to", conter "against" and inter "between"; family terms such as patter "father", mætter "mother" and fii "son, daughter"; basic social relations such as mik "friend", rei "king" and ouratur "worker"; basic descriptive adjectives such as cordås "kind", cælje "blue", mænj "large" and lent "slow" and so on. An overall majority of the vocabulary of Lilledic is inherited directly, including the vast majority of the most-used words.

Reborrowings from Fiorentine are also numerous, though less so than the Fiorentine languages of mainland Asura. These are largely technical and learned words such as convent "business" from conventus, makin "machine" from machina, quæstor "financier" from quaestor and nomin "noun" from nomen but a number of basic words are also loaned from Fiorentine, such as fluve "river" from fluvium, space "outer space" from spacium, vision "vision" from vision or trib "clan" from tribus, which forms a doublet with try "one of the three peoples of Crylante".

Much of the learned vocabulary, especially in the fields of government and law, is borrowed from dialects of Lhedwinic, usually Rigjordic. Examples of such words include ting "legislature" from þing, einhed "unity" from enhed, vall "election" from valg and domstold "legal court" from domstol. Many basic words from Lhedwinic have also entered general use in Lilledic such as cropp "body" from krop and butik "shop" from butik, with eastern dialects possessing a greater number of loans. For example eastern dialects may use the word scamb "shame" from skam while the standard language uses the more widespread ørcond from Fiorentine verecundus.

During the period where Crylante was ruled by tir Lhaeraidd, the Lhaeraidd language supplanted Lhedwinic as the language of politics. As a result, numerous technological and political terms entered from that source, such as refel "rifle" from reiffl and penkennel "governor" from pencenedl.

A small proportion of vocabulary is borrowed from Nausikaan, primarily nautical terminology such as kirven "rowing boat" from kirkkovene and aar "oar" from airo. An even smaller proportion of nautical, especially fishing, terminology is derived from Vrnallian such as reckis "harpoon" from rekhipsó.

Through Aversi, which was formerly occupied by Newrey, a number of terms for modern and miscellaneous concepts have entered Lilledic from Newreyan. Examples of the former include åmbatt "semi-automatic weapon" from automatic, telle "television" from telly and tors "flashlight" from torch while examples of the latter include vikend "weekend" from weekend, lain "(a) delay" from line and the slang word sount "excellent" from sound.

Numerals

The numbers one, two and three are declined for case (but not gender) in Lilledic, but no higher numbers have any inflection. The genitive of un is une or less commonly unnes, the genitive of djås is dyr and the genitive of tris is tru.

In the table below, numbers with bracketed elements only pronounce those elements in certain environments; namely, bracketed consonants are pronounced before a vowel while bracketed vowels are pronounced before a consonant. When counting up, forms ending in a consonant are preferred, thus tris but kimp.

Three numbers have important variant forms. In strongly bilingual areas the number un seems to be undergoing replacement by the similar Rigjordic word en. A similar phenomenon can occur wherein sette is replaced by syv, perhaps to further differentiate it from sess, but this is rare. Note also that an older form sett has been abandoned in the modern language. Finally, there are three pronunciations in use for nov. The standard pronunciation is as written: [nʊv], this being the most distinctive. Very common however is a pronunciation [nɑu̯]. This seems to only be used in counting and not when preceding a noun, perhaps to avoid confusion with the adjective nou meaning "new" although this would never produce true ambiguity. A proscribed pronunciation mainly used in the west is [noː].

Lilledic	Pronunciation	Fiorentine	Translation
un	[ʔʉːn]	ūnus -a -um	one
djå(s)	[ɕjoː(s)]	duo	two
tri(s)	[tʰʁiː(s)]	trēs	three
cættjer	[ˈsɛɕjɑ]	quattuor	four
kimp(e)	[kʰɪm, ˈkʰɪmbə]	quīnque	five
sess	[sɛs]	sex	six
sette	[ˈsɛdə]	septem	seven
øt(e)	[ʔøːt̚, ˈʔøːdə]	octō	eight
nov(e)	[nʊv~nɑu̯~noː, ˈnʊvə]	novem	nine
des	[deːs]	decem	ten
åndes	[ˈʔɔnˀəs]	ūndecim	eleven
djødes	[ˈɕjøːð̙əs]	duodecim	twelve
treddes	[ˈtʰʁɛð̙əs]	tredecim	thirteen
cættjøddes	[səɕˈjœð̙əs]	quattuordecim	fourteen
kindes	[ˈkʰɪnˀəs]	quīndecim	fifteen
sedes	[ˈseːð̙əs]	sēdecim	sixteen
settendes	[səˈtʰɛnˀəs]	septendecim	seventeen
øtådes	[ʔəˈtʰoːð̙əs]	*octōdecim	eighteen
novendes	[nʊˈvɛnˀəs]	*novendecim	nineteen
ynt	[ʔyːn]	vīgintī	twenty
trint	[tʰʁiːn]	trīgintā	thirty
cædrant	[səð̙ˈʁɑːn]	quadrāgintā	forty
kimpant	[kʰəmˈpʰɑːn]	quīnquāgintā	fifty
sessant	[səˈsɑːn]	sexāgintā	sixty
settjænt	[səɕˈjɛːn]	septuāgintā	seventy
øtånt	[ʔətʰoːn]	octōgintā	eighty
novant	[nəˈvɑːn]	nōnāgintā	ninety
cent(e)	[sɛn, ˈsɛndə]	centum	hundred
djåcent	[ˈɕjoːˌsɛn]	N/A	two hundred
tricent	[ˈtʰʁiːˌsɛn]		three hundred etc
mii	[miː]	mīlle	thousand