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The Fardelshufflesteinian Language
IntroductionFardelshufflesteinian is an Indo-European language spoken in the South Polynesian nation of Western Fardelshufflestein, where it is the official language. It is official classified as a West Germanic Creole that combines elements from Early Modern High German and Early Modern English, and has several loanwords from Māori as well as Modern German and Modern English.
When emigrants from Fardelshufflestein settled on the South Pacific island, they became isolated for many generations; this led to the creation with a distinct language that retained several characteristics from its predecessors.
The Fardelshufflesteinian alphabet has 24 letters, containing all letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet except for Q and X. It has additional monopthongs and dipthongs formed from the pairings of two or more letters, such as /aɪ/ from <ei> and /kx/ from <ch>.
Orthography and Phonography
The Fardelshufflesteinian alphabet employs 24 Latin letters, omitting Q and X despite their usage in both German and English. Like English, it contains no diacritics or special characters. Exceptions to this rule are in surnames of German and foreign origin and for some borrowed words.
The alphabet contains 6 vowels and 18 consonants. However, several of these letters have more than one phonetic pronunciation, and many letters phonetically overlap one another. The phonetic alterations are largely dependent on the properties of the surrounding letters as well as which language the word was borrowed from.
Uppercase Letter | Lowercase Letter | Sounds (IPA) | Name | Name (IPA) |
A | a | /æ/, /a/, /ɑ/, /ə/ | Ah | /'æ:/ |
B | b | /b/ | Beh | /'bɛ/ |
C | c | /k/ | Ceh | /'t͡sɛ/ |
D | d | /d/ | Deh | /'dɛ/ |
E | e | /ɛ/, /j/, /∅/ | Eh | /'ɛ/ |
F | f | /f/ | Ef | /'ɛf/ |
G | g | /g/ | Geh | /'gɛ/ |
H | h | silent, /h/ | Etsch | /'ɛtʃ/ |
I | i | /i/, /ɪ/ | I | /'i/ |
J | j | /j/ | Jeh | /'jɛ/ |
K | k | /k/ | Kah | /'kɑ/ |
L | l | /l/ | El | /'ɛl/ |
M | m | /m/ | Em | /'ɛm/ |
N | n | /n/ | En | /'ɛn/ |
O | o | /ɑ/, /o/ | Oh | /'ɑ:/ |
P | p | /p/ | Peh | /'pɛ/ |
R | r | /r/ | Rah | /'ɹɑ/ |
S | s | /s/, /z/ | Es | /'ɛs/ |
T | t | /t/ | Teh | /'tɛ/ |
U | u | /u/, /ʊ/ | U | /'u:/ |
V | v | /v/ | Veh | /'vɛ:/ |
W | w | /w/ | Doppelveh | /'dɑplvɛ/ |
Y | y | /ɪ/ | Jih | /'jɪ:/ |
Z | z | /t͡s/ | Zett | /t͡sɛt/ |
There are several digraphs and trigraphs in Fardelshufflesteinian that produce sounds distinguishable from the individual letters from which they were formed. Some of these groupings are pronounced similarly or identically in either English or German, while other groupings are pronounced in ways that are unique to the Fardelshufflesteiner language.
Digraph | IPA | Word Example | Digraph | IPA | Word Example |
ah | /ɑ/ | Jahn | ai | /aɪ/ | Impaiser |
air | /ɛɹ/ | Alastair* | ar | /aɹ/ | Fardel |
au | /aʊ/ | Aut | ch | /kx/ | Impeich |
ck | /k/ | Wrack | dg | /dʒ/ | Fudge |
dr | /dr/ | Drachen | ds | /dz/ | Aids |
ea | /eɪ/, /ɛ/ | Sea | ear | /ɛɹ/ | Bear |
ed | /d̥/ | Besmirtched | ei | /aɪ/ | Eigg |
el | /ɫ/ | Fardel | en | ɛn | Flammen |
er | /ɛɹ/, /ɝ/, /ɚ/ | Fater, Berg, Fardelshufflesteiner | es | /ɛs/ | rest |
et | /ɛt/ | Pet | eu | /ɔɪ̯/ | Feu | l
ew | /oo/ , /joo/ | New**, Few | ey | /eɪ/ | Hey |
gh | /f/ , /∅/ | Raugh, Threugh | gr | /gr/ | Greun*** |
**"New" and "Neu" are used interchangeably in WFian, with both being pronounced the same way.
***The direct translation of this word is "green" despite its being pronounced like the English word "groin."