This chapter will provide a cursory overview of Ithkuil’s phonology, orthography, and morphology.
A phonology is the system in which a language classifies its vocal sounds, or phonemes, that are then used to construct words.
=
Ithkuil’s 31 consonants are pbkgtdfvh’ţdszšžçxlļcżčjmnňrřwy.
Ithkuil's 9 vowels are aäeëioöuü.
The vowel combinations that are considered as one single syllable are ai, ei, ëi, oi, ui, au, eu, ëu, ou, and iu. All other vocalic combinations (e.g., ia, oe) are considered disyllabic, or as two syllables. This is important to consider when marking syllabic stress.
=
Because some typefaces and fonts do not recognize the character d, đ may be used instead.
Penultimate (second–to–last) stress is considered default and therefore unmarked. Otherwise, the stressed vowel is marked with an acute ´ accent; if the vowel has a diaeresis ¨, stress is instead marked with a circumflex accent ˆ.
Periods are the only absolutely necessary form of punctuation.
=
A language’s phonotactics are its rules regarding the permitted combinations of phonemes when building a syllable or word. These rules are why English permits hypothetical words like sprelch or phlarkle but not words like gvadp or nguhd.
The phonotactic rules of Ithkuil are described here (it is not yet necessary to review it).
A morphology, in respect to phonology, is the system in which languages use its phonemes to form morphemes, or minimal units with meaning, and how these morphemes grammatically synthesize into words.
=
Ithkuil is an agglutinative language. This means that words are formed mainly by gluing ("agglutinating") various affixes onto a main "root" word, like building blocks.
English has some agglutinative aspects; for example, the word "uncharacteristically" is a complex word that is derived from the attachment of affixes "un-", "-istic", and "-(al)ly" to a less specific main root, "character", in order to give it a deeper meaning. Ithkuil operates similarly, but to a much more extreme extent, which will be demonstrated in the following chapters.
=
Ithkuil has 3 parts of speech:
| 1) | Formatives, which are the main types of words in Ithkuil |
| 2) | Adjuncts, which provide supplemental information to the adjoining formative |
| 3) | Referentials, which operate similarly to pronouns but to a much more dynamic extent |
That being said, the majority of this document hereafter will focus on formatives, as they are the most common word in Ithkuil.