Mehêla [MEH]
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Registered by
[Deactivated User] on 19 November 2016
Language type
A priori
Species
Human/humanoid
About Mehêla
Major revision ongoing! Don't trust anything!
Updated parts:
Summary page Phonology Pronunciation estimation All articles except 'Mehēla grammar'
Old summary:
Mehēla (full name: Mehēla le nonōa) is the language of a fictional people living on the island of Saint Helena that was colonised by Sweden at some point and then gained independence.
Some interesting features of Mehēla:
Updated parts:
Old summary:
Mehēla (full name: Mehēla le nonōa) is the language of a fictional people living on the island of Saint Helena that was colonised by Sweden at some point and then gained independence.
Some interesting features of Mehēla:
- Very simple, Polynesian-inspired phonology.
- Liberal use of reduplication, both full and partial.
- Very analytical
- Volition-based split ergative alignment in its case system. Otherwise mostly ergative.
- Adverbs are a closed class, but serial verb constructions can often be used instead.
- Very restricted relative clauses. Only S or O can be relativised. To relativise other things you have to use a change in voice.
- Negation is often formed by using a negative verb and a relative clause. 'I don't love you' would be said as 'I am not someone who loves you'
Sample of Mehêla[view] Kate ka le oda gālea, jo wadte ka gālea.
I love my dog, and it loves me.[view all texts]
I love my dog, and it loves me.[view all texts]
Language family relationships
Language treeMehêlic
⤷ Old Mehêla
⤷ Middle Mehêla
⤷ Mehêla
⤷ Old Mehêla
⤷ Middle Mehêla
⤷ Mehêla
Phonology
Consonants | Bilabial | Labio- dental | Alveolar | Palatal | Labio- velar | Velar | Glottal | |||||||
Nasal | m m: | n n: | ŋ ŋ: | |||||||||||
Plosive | p | ᵐb | t | ⁿd | k | ʔ | ||||||||
Lateral approximant | l | |||||||||||||
Lateral flap | [ɺ]1 | |||||||||||||
Approximant | [ʋ]2 | j | w | [ɰ]3 | ||||||||||
Flap | [ɾ]4 |
- in free variation, especially in casual speech, allophone of /l/
- in free variation, especially in casual speech, allophone of /w/
- in free variation, especially in casual speech, allophone of /j/
- in free variation, especially in casual speech, allophone of /l/
Vowels | Front | Central | Back | |||
Close | i i: î: ì: ì | u u: û: ù: ù | ||||
Close-mid | e e: ê: è: è | o o: ô: ò: ò | ||||
Near-open | ɐ ɐ̀ | |||||
Open | a: â: à: |
Orthography
Below is the orthography for Mehêla. This includes all graphemes as defined in the language's phonology settings - excluding the non-distinct graphemes/polygraphs.
MehêlaOrthography [edit] | |||||||||
Aa/ɐ/ | Bb/ᵐb/ | Dd/ⁿd/ | Ee/e/ | Gg/ŋ/ | GG gg/ŋ:/ | Hh/ʔ/ | Ii/i/ | Jj/j/, [ɰ]1 | Kk/k/ |
Ll/l/, [ɾ]2, [ɺ]3 | Mm/m/ | MM mm/m:/ | Nn/n/ | NN nn/n:/ | Oo/o/ | Pp/p/ | Tt/t/ | Uu/u/ | Ww/w/, [ʋ]4 |
✖ Unknown alphabetical order [change] |
- in free variation, especially in casual speech
- in free variation, especially in casual speech
- in free variation, especially in casual speech
- in free variation, especially in casual speech
Latest 8 related articles listed below.
From Proto-Mehêlic to Mehêla
List of sound changes
16-Feb-18 19:03Mehêla Morphology
Initial consonant mutation, reduplication, and sometimes bot...
26-Sep-17 21:12Mehêla Numbers
A mix of base-10 and base-20
17-Aug-17 21:13Mehêla Phonology
Allophony!
24-Jul-17 19:29Mehēla Grammar
Let's have fun with syntax!
19-Mar-17 16:16