Triparic Pronunciation
Appearance
THIS IS A DRAFT. Carrie and Shawn are revising things.
N.B. Both the digraph system and the accented-character system are acceptable native orthographies, but it's bad form to mix systems within one text.
Consonants
b, d, f, h, j, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w, z | as in English | |
---|---|---|
y | as in English when consonantal | |
g | always hard, as in English get | |
x | x as in axe, except z at beginning of words | |
q | Always part of a digraph "qu" for the cluster kw | |
c | Always "k" before a, o, u; always "s" before i, e | |
cz | č | ch as in church |
sz | š | sh as in shoe |
nz | ň | ny as in canyon |
dz | ð | "dh", or th as in that |
tz | þ | th as in think |
Vowels
a | as in father |
---|---|
e | as in romance languages |
i | as machine |
o | as in float |
u | as in pool |
as in out | |
as in aye | |
as in boy | |
as in hate | |
as in German mögen | |
as in German müssen | |
as in hat | |
nasal "i" | |
nasal "u" |
Shawn's thoughts on the vowel orthography
(To be discussed Sunday night 20 March or thereafter)
So the following sounds must be accounted for: AYE, bOY, hAtE, OUt, hAt, mÜssen, mÖgen, nasal I, nasal U.
Broken down phonetically we have:
- The three common i-final diphthongs (aye, hate, boy = ai, ei, oi)
- The most common of the u-final diphthongs (out = au)
- Rounded front vowels (ü = rounded i, ö = rounded e)
- Rounded and unrounded open-mid front vowels (nasal I, nasal U)
- The odd man out is the aesch vowel (hat, plåx)