Ledzib language
| Ledzib | |
|---|---|
| Izialo Ledzibec’lo īzialo ledzībeclo | |
| Pronunciation | /iˈzʲaɫo lʲedzʲiˈbʲet͡sʼɫo/ |
| Region | Ekuosia |
| Native speakers | Around 46 million (2020) |
| Language family | Ekuo-Lahiri
|
| Early forms: | Proto-Neviric
|
| Writing system | Adzamic script |
| Official status | |
| Official language in | Cimseje,  Povan Union |
| CWS code | OPV |
The Ledzib language ([Ledzib language]: izialo Ledzibec’lo [iˈzʲaɫo lʲedzʲiˈbʲet͡sʼɫo]) is an Neviric language spoken natively by 46 million people in the Povan republic of Cimseje.
Classification
Ledzib is classified as a Neviric language, which is itself part of the broader Ekuo-Lahiri family. Within the Neviric branch itself, Ledzib is far away from its sister Nevesh, although its vocabulary is easily reconciliable with cognates in Nevesh, which has also excerpted major influences in Ledzib due to Nevira's influence in the Povan region. However, despite this, it is not considered mutually intelligible with Nevesh, mostly due to semantic drift of cognate words.
History
Proto-Neviric
Proto-Neviric speakers reached the lower kuos region around the year 0 CE. While most other Neviric groups settled around the coast of Nevira, the Ledzib migrated upstream the Ekuos delta into modern Cimseje by the 3rd century CE the latest.
The name Ledzib is theorised to come from Proto-Neviric *laide- "coast" and *-dībe-, whose meaning is commonly reconstructed as "eat", the combination having the meaning of those who ate the coast. It is thought this could have been the name given to the Ledzib by other Neviric groups, as Proto-Neviric *laidedībe regularly develops into *laideɟībe in Neviran varieties, which could have been loaned into the variants the Ledzib spoke. The name would've come from the fact that most Neviric groups lived across the coast, so when they met with Ledzibeth people, it stood out their lack of seacoast, and a popular and humorous explanation was that they simply ate their coast.
However, Ekuo-Lahirists point out that the PEKl root that gave *dībe is reconstructed with the meaning "put away, store", which could have remained in Neviric, taking on the meaning "to abandon" in Ledzib, as such the name would have the more serious meaning of those who abandoned the coast. As there are no written records of this era, it is difficult to totally confirm which version is correct, although the latter is the one most commonly heard in popular culture across the Povan Union
Old Ledzib
Proto-Neviric developed into Old Ledzib, dated in the same time period as Classical Neviran. The Adzamic script had been introduced into the region, although, most members of the upper class wrote in either Classical Neviran or Old Adzamian, as such there are few records of Old Ledzib, however there are some features that make the language different from modern Ledzib that can be extrapolated. These include a distinction of length in all 5 vowels, a lack of the palatalisation and labialisatiom found in modern Ledzib, /sʼ/ and /t͡sʼ/ being different phonemes, and a lack of most recognisable clusters of the modern language.
Modern Ledzib
An effort for more standardisation of Ledzib came in the aftermath of the collapse of the Saruan Empire, to emphasize the independence of Ledzib from Nevesh.
Phonology
Phonemes
| Bilabial | Dental | Alveolar | Post-alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m mʲ | n nʲ | ||||||
| Oral Plosive | p pʲ b bʲ | t tʲ d dʲ | kʲ ɡʲ | k kʷ ɡ ɡʷ | q (ɢ)¹ | ʔ | ||
| Ejective Plosive | (pʼ pʲʼ)³ | tʼ tʲʼ | kʲʼ | kʼ kʷʼ | qʼ | |||
| Affricate | t͡s t͡sʼ | t͡ʃ~t͡ʂ t͡ʃʼ~t͡ʂʼ d͡ʒ~d͡ʐ | t͡sʲ~t͡ɕ t͡sʲʼ~t͡ɕʼ | |||||
| Fricative | (f fʲ)¹ v vʲ | θ (θʲ)² | s sʲ z zʲ | ʃ~ʂ z~ʐ | (xʲ)² | x xʷ (ɣ)¹ | h | |
| Approximant | ɫ lʲ r rʲ | j |
Notes:
• /ʔ h/ are marginal phonemes, occuring only word initially.
• ¹ /ɣ ɢ f fʲ/ are modern loaned phonemes from Nevesh (and Adzamic, in the case of /f fʲ/). They are pronounced consistently in educated speech, where /ɣ/ is also never palatalised nor labialised. Colloquially, /ɢ ɣ/ are often merged if they are pronounced, into either of the sounds, /g/, /q/ or less commonly /h/. /f fʲ/ may be substituted by p or v.
• ² /θʲ xʲ/ merged with their respective plain versions in the standard dialect, and as such they are not written any differently, and pronouncing them can come off as antiquated. However, they can still be found in dialects.
• ³ /pʼ pʲʼ/ are both inherited and loaned, but in modern times it's becoming less common to pronounce it as ejective. Some speakers merge them with /p pʲ/, while others have a chain shift pʼ > p > f, especially those closer to the Neviran border. In educated speech, it is expected to differentiate them.
As is common in the region, Ledzib has a complex consonant inventory, which consists of 39 consonants, 19 of which have phonemic palatalisation, for a total of 58 consonants.
Some consonants are not present in native words, those being /f fʲ ʃ ʒ t͡ʃ t͡ʃʼ d͡ʒ q qʼ ɢ ɣ/, which come from mainly Adzamic and Nevesh loans. Ledzib stands out in the region for not developing uvular consonants on its own, although due to loanwords those consonants are used oftenly on day-to-day conversation, appearing in words such as zleq "to leave" and iq’at "to buy".
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | U | |
| Mid | e | o | |
| Open | a |
In contrast to the consonant inventory, the vowel inventory consists of the cardinal 5 vowels.
Phonotactics
Morphology and syntax
Ledzib, like other Neviric languages, is a nominative-accusative, direct-inverse marking language. Morphologically, it is considered one of the most conservative Neviric languages.
Nouns
All nouns in Ledzib belong to one of 6 classes: sentient, sacred, animate, instrumental, inanimate and abstract. In this order, they form an animacy hierarchy (from most to least animate). Each class if marked by it's own set of suffices which encode one of three numbers (singular, plural and collective) and states (indefinite, definite and construct).
Number
Number is intrinsically related to the suffix itself, with no general phonetic markings to indicate plural or collective.
The collective is still widely used in Ledzib, unlike Nevesh, where it has been lost outside certain words. The collective is used to refer to the entirety of said noun in a specific place.
tanithi Vevle "Some of the peoples of Povania" (using the plural).
tanisiu Vevle "The peoples of Povania" (using the collective).
State
There are three states: indefinite, definite and construct.
The definite state is generally marked by a -s or -t suffix.
The construct state is used when the noun is possessed in a genitive construction. It has disappeared in modern Neviran, but has remained in Ledzib, marked by a vowel alternation:
itexak "state", itexo "state"
Adjectives
Adjectives agree with nouns in class, number and state.
Zero-derivation of adjectives inflected for class is extremely common and productive.
Verbs
Verbs follow an agglutinative pattern, with it's most salient feature being the mandatory locative deixis common in Adzo-Neviric languages. Verbs inflect for 5 categories: location, aspect, tense, mood and voice.
Morphophonology
There are several phonetic changes applied to words when inflected.
Palatalization
When a suffix is added to a word ending in -i, the first consonant becomes palatalised. tanith /ˈtanʲiθ/ + -suk -> tanisiuk /ˈtanʲisʲuk/
Vocabulary
The vast majority of Ledzib vocabulary is inherited from Proto-Neviric. However, during its history it has received a large amount of loanwords of prestige languages around it, namely Old Adzamian and Classical Neviran.
Old Adzamian loanwords mainly include honorifics (šaq’a "great"), abstract concepts (diaraq "trust"), government terms (dukturiak "republic"), but also include every day words like iqath "to buy".
Classical Neviran gave several doublets (crk’asak / čekasak for "name")