Ancient Shieldian

Overview

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Pronunciation

Ancient Shieldian uses the following letters: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, L, M, N, O, P, R, S, T, U and Y. A, E, I, O, U, and (always) Y are vowels. Most are pronounced similarly to their English equivalents. A circumflex (ˆ) is used to indicate changes to vowels. A chart follows:

Alphabet

• a = as in odd
• â = as in father
• b = as in boy
• c = as in cat (but never chase or face)
• d = as in dog
• e = as in net
• ê = as in pat
• f = as in fame
• g = as in George (but never God)
• h = at the start of a word, as in hut. Otherwise silent.
• i = as in cup
• î = as in leap
• l = as in lizard
• m = as in moon
• n = as in noxious
• o = as in oil
• ô = as in oat
• p = as in petard
• r = as in red
• s = as in short (‘Shield’ was spelt ‘Seld’ in Ancient Shieldian and pronounced ‘Sheld’)
• u = as in house
• û = as in sand dune
• y = as in fit
• ˆy = as in pie

NB: In ancient Shieldian, ‘y’ is a full vowel and takes circumflexes, acute accents, and grave accents. However, as I have not yet found a way to put on a y, they will be shown as the symbol preceding the letter, as seen above. The letter is not used very often outside of a diphthong, so it ought not to be a major problem.

Diphthongs

• oy = perhaps the most common. Pronounced as in the English we or the French oui.’ When oy is accented, the accent goes on the ‘o.’
• si = as in see. The only time where ‘s’ does not make a ‘sh’ sound.
• sh = not an original diphthong but imported from English. Pronounced like a Shieldian ‘s.’
• th = imported. As in the
• ây = as in eye

Accents

Ancient Shieldian uses both grave and acute accents in a manner similar to Spanish. An acute accent (´) is used to change the stress from syllable to syllable. A grave accent (`) is used both to change the stress and change the vowel form; grave accents work as both an acute accent and a circumflex. The stress defaults to the second syllable unless marked.

Examples

1. goytâtî (we go): jwe-TAH-tee
2. y dûnam (into the fortress): eh doon-AM
3. dûnây(as far as the fortress): doon-EYE
4. Adiê na'sùtrâp dûnan. (he gave the fortress to Adie): aw-DUH-ah nah-SHOO-trap doon-ON

Nouns

Ancient Shieldian is an extremely declined language with at least nine different major cases and four declensions. Most native Shieldian words fall into one of the first three declensions (masculine, feminine, and neuter, or first, second, and third), with the fourth being used for words of foreign or modern origin. Often these declensions involve something as minor as a location change for an accent or a new long mark, which is one reason Ancient Shieldian is now a dead language.

The gender of nouns is not as important as in modern languages because no articles are ever used, like in Latin, and adjectives follow declension. However, no native adjectives go into the fourth declension, meaning that knowing the gender of fourth declension words is quite important.

Case is indicated with a suffix. All nouns stems, except some fourth declension ones, end with a consonant.

Cases

1. Nominative: the subject or predicate
2. Prepositional: used for nearly all prepositions
3. Essive: used for a temporary state of being
4. Compositional: used for inalienable possession
5. Possessive: used to show alienable possession
6. Ergative: the subject of a transitive verb
7. Absolutave: the subject of an intransitive verb
8. Terminative: used instead of the phrase “as far as...”
9. Dative: used for the indirect object.

Plurals are made by adding ‘r’ to the end of a noun. If the declension used ends in a consonant, ‘ur’ is used.

1 = the first vowel is accented. If the first vowel is already accented, nothing changes.

The most common nouns now seen in Ancient Shieldian are Dûn Ádien, the King’s castle.

Dûn, which means ‘fortress’ or ‘castle’ and occasionally ‘palace,’ is actually an exception to the rule. At one time, it was properly ‘Dûna’ but common use dropped the last letter in the nominative case. All other cases decline with the first declension. Adie is a proper noun which was the name of the wife of a fisherman. He named the island upon which stood his hut after she died in childbirth. That island later came to hold the great fortress of the House of Callahan. 'Ádien' is the singular possessive of Adie; hence, ‘Dûn Ádien’ means ‘the Fortress of Adie’ or ‘Adie’s Fortress.’

For example, if we wished to say “the Adie of the Fortress,” Adie would be put in the nominative and Fortress in the possessive. This example would be “Dûnàoy Adie” (doon-AWE ah-DUH-eh).

If we wanted to say “I am going as far as Adie’s Fortress,” we would leave Adie in the possessive and put Dûn into the terminative. This example would be: “goytâg Dûnây Ádien” (jwe-TAJ doon-EYE AH-duh-ehn).

Verbs

Present Active Indicative

Ancient Shieldian uses both a simple present (he walks) and a present continious (he is walking) form. The present continious is formed by the present participle followed by the proper present conjugation of ‘pànû’ (PAH-noo; to be).

Points to remember when conjugating Ancient Shieldian verbs:

1. Ancient Shieldian does not differentiate between the second and third person in verb forms. A prefixed nominative pronoun is used instead, except when the subject has been clearly defined. IE: ‘na’palanâp’ (he walks) would need the prefix, but ‘Adie palanâp’ (Adie walks) would not.
2. The first person singular ends in ‘-g.’ Remember that a word ending with -g in Ancient Shieldian is pronounced similarily to the ‘j’ in the Hindi word ‘raja.’
3. Although Shieldian verbs fall into one of three major conjugations (those ending -ânû, -ênû, and -onû), there are several exceptions to the rules. Major ones will be listed below.
4. Verbs are conjugated in the present tenses by dropping the -nû and ending the personal ending to the stem.

Simple Present

Example: lanânû (lawn-BAH-noo; to walk)

Present Continious

The present participle of most verbs is formed by cutting off the ‘-nû’ and adding the suffix ‘bîta, -e, -oy.’ The participle declines to match its noun in case, number, and gender. pànû is also conjugated. Note the irregular conjugation of pànû; it does separate the third and second person and therefore never requires a pronoun.

Examples

1. Adie lanâbite pâp dûnarm. Adie was walking to the fortress.
   1. Note how fortress was put into the Absolutave and not the Daitive. lanânû is an intransitive verb.
2. na’lanâp Adiet’mân (or mân Adiet) dûnây. He walks with Adie as far as the fortress.
   1. Note use of the preposition ‘mân’ (with). For more information on the use of prepositions, see that section.