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<html><head><title>The languages of the Ilii and Flaidish</title></head> <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF"> <center><h1><!--title-->The languages of the Ilii and Flaidish </h1></center> <hr size=7 width=75> <p>Posted by <b><!--poster-->Panu Höglund</b> on <!--date-->6:44 6/29/01 <p>In reply to: (none) <p>What languages do the Ilii speak, and have you already written grammars or dictionaries for them? What about Flaidish? How do we pronounce Syxesteer? <hr> <i>Mark responds: Only one ilian language is known; it's said to be called <b>Eteodäole</b>, but it isn't even certain that this is an ilian word. The ilii have a great facility for languages-- they easily learn human languages-- and it is very possible that there <b>is</b> only one ilian language, because human rules of sound change don't apply to them. The ilii say that no human can learn Eteodäole; humans who have heard it say that it sounds more like singing than speaking. <p>I haven't ventured on a grammar, mostly because I want something <b>very</b> alien... something literally unlearnable and unpronounceable by human beings. Much as I admire Klingon, it's <b>not</b> a very alien language; it's simply as un-English-like as Okrand could make it; but that mostly meant borrowing from exotic human languages. I want something such that the very categories of terrestrial grammar don't apply. Lojban, in a way, attempts to meet that description; its adherents say that it's an attempt to defy Universal Grammar. I'm not sure about that; I looked at its pronoun system once, and decided that the odd category names only obscure a not-terribly-exotic pronoun system. <p>I don't have a grammar of Flaidish either, but there, I just haven't got to it. I've recorded only a few words, like <b>flaid</b> itself, or <b>ubeer</b> 'vampire', as well as city names such as Syxesteer, Pickapo, and Ledley. It should be pronounced as English. This isn't as much of a cheat as it sounds: the Great Vowel Shift is not at all unprecedented. So <b>Syxesteer</b> is pronounced (using Verdurian equivalents) </i> <tt>SÎks ê stir</tt>. <hr><center> <i>To make a reply, or see replies, see <a href="../">the index page</a>.</i> </center> <hr> <!-- For index page: <li><a href="messages/84.html">The languages of the Ilii and Flaidish</a> - <b>Panu Höglund</b> <i>6:44 6/29/01</i> --> </body></html>