Old Daevite Language - SCP Foundation

LANGUAGE:

Old Daevite

L1 Population: 0
Language Class: Denaskulo1
Trigraphical Code: DAV

⠀

A Note on Daevite Linguistics

The study of the languages spoken by the Daevites is very much unique in the field of historical linguistics. Many aspects of Daevite culture, their language included, were seemingly developed completely independently from any other culture known to us. As such, the Old Daevite language is remarkably different from all of its neighbours, and is classified as a linguistic isolate2.

Regardless, many historical isolates are known and studied by modern linguistics. The most major difference between Daevite and other languages is the way in which the language evolved over time. Much like other aspects of Daevite culture, their language changed and diverged remarkably little over its long written history3.

Historical Daevite inscriptions are generally divided, somewhat arbitrarily, into the following four languages:

Old Daevite
Includes the earliest Daevite materials available to us,

and all inscriptions until the destruction and annexation

of the neighbouring Sarkic state at approximately 1000 BCE.

Middle Daevite
Includes Daevite materials written after 1000 BCE and before

the fracturing of the Daevite state at approximately 200 CE.

Late Daevite
Includes Daevite inscriptions dating after 200 CE and before

the end of Daevite independence at approximately 1300 CE.

Neo-Daevite
Includes Daevite-language materials produced after the end

of Daevite independence by remaining native speaker groups.

This document aims to constitute a modern introduction to the Old Daevite language specifically, which is of particular interest to the Foundation due to the many records written in it discussing early Sarkicism and the Xia Anomalous Culture Group.

Phonology

Due to the fact Old Daevite is an extinct language, its exact pronunciation remains unknown. However, a theoretical realization of the following phonemes has been inferred from transliterations of Daevite words into neighbouring languages.

Vowels

Front
Back

Close
i /i/
u /u/

Mid
e /e/
o /o/

Open
a /a/
á /ɒ/

The following diphthongs4 are attested:

Initial a
Initial e
Initial i

Final u
au /a͡u/
eu /e͡u/

Final o
ao /a͡o/

io /i͡o/

Final á

eá /e͡ɒ/
iá /i͡ɒ/

Final e
ae /a͡e/

Final i
ai /a͡i/

Consonants

Labial
Alveolar
Post-Alveolar
Velar
Pharyngeal

Nasal
m /m/
n /n/

Stop
p /p/ b /b/
t /t/ d /d/
k /k/ g /g/

Ejective Stop

ṭ /tʼ/
ḳ /kʼ/

Fricative
f /ɸ/
s /s/ z /z/
š /ʃ/
x /x/
h /ħ/

Approximant
v /ʋ/
r /ɹ/

Lateral

l /l/

Phonotactics

The following phonotactical rules apply in Old Daevite:

The maximum syllable is CVCC.

Gemination5 is only allowed for nasals and stops.

Ejective consonants are not allowed in consonant clusters. If a consonant clusters with an ejective, the consonant is deleted.

Voiceless non-ejective stops become aspirated when at the end of a word.

Grammar

Grammatical Gender

Quite unusually for a language of Siberia, Old Daevite possessed a thorough grammatical gender (or noun-class) system. This system affected pluralization as well as verb conjugation. When referring to groups containing multiple genders, a hierarchy was employed to determine which gender to use for the whole. The group was always referred to using the "highest" gender contained by it. The genders of the Daevite system are as follows, from highest to lowest in the hierarchy:

Leading / Open-Form
Conceptual / Coda-Form
Animate / A-Form
Inanimate / B-Form

Mostly used for rulers, leaders, driving forces in the material world, and occasionally other nouns when they are the subject of a sentence. These nouns usually, though not always, include an open vowel (á or a) in their final syllable.
Used for ideas, religious concepts, numbers, and other such things which cannot be physically interacted with. A large amount of these nouns end with nasals or stops.
Used for physical objects which are alive to some degree, such as humans, animals, and plants. These nouns rarely have unifying features that distinguish them from nouns with other genders.
Used for physical objects which are not alive, such as rocks, tools, and various materials. These nouns rarely have unifying features that distinguish them from nouns with other genders.

Examples:

Potniá "Slave-Owner"

Urdal "King"
Examples:

Tivik "One"

Heug "Spirit"
Examples:

Leux "Child"

Hiz "Tree"
Examples:

Hiázai "Tongue"6

Šeg "Rock"

Noun and adjective declension

Old Daevite possessed three grammatical numbers - a singular, a plural, and, interestingly, a null or "zero" number not found in any other language of the region. As an example:

Singular
Plural
Null

Ḳast
Ḳastau
Mazḳast

"One fruit"
"Many fruits"
"No fruits"

The singular number is always unmarked. However, nouns in the plural and null numbers are marked with an affix that denotes their number and gender, as is any adjective referring to them. These declensions are as follows:

Leading
Conceptual
Animate
Inanimate

Singular

Plural
-(t)7a
-(t)in
-(t)en
(t)au

Null
maz-

Possession is, in turn, managed by a completely separate set of suffixes which are marked on the possessee and change according to the gender and person of the possessor. If a plural noun is the possessee, these suffixes are added following the plural suffix.

1st Person
2nd Person
3rd Person

Singular
-fai
-lok
-sae

Plural
-feut
-láket
-saed

Null
-šu

In addition, there existed a simple adjectivizer prefix, á-, which may be used to transform any noun into an adjective. In case of the noun being adjectivized having adjectives itself, those adjectives are also marked with the prefix. For example:

Noun
Adjective

Kaes "mountain"
Ákaes "mountainous"

Tu "three"
Átu "third"

Diminutives

A rarely-attested system of diminutification existed in Old Daevite. From the few occurrences that exist of it, it seems to have operated by the reduplication of the last vowel and the last consonant in the root. This diminutive form could then be used either derogatorily (as in "urdalal", "little king", attested as a mocking title for an unknown foreign ruler) or endearingly (as in "xaofaof", "little flower", attested as a nickname of a mother to her daughter).

Stop Mutation

Old Daevite included a unique system of stop mutation, based on the relative social standing of the speaker and the listener. This system was not considered to be simple allophony, but rather a core and grammatical part of the language, as is evidenced by these mutations being reflected in the Daevite writing system.

Daevite stop mutation involved shifting all stops in speech to a differet set if the listener was of significantly higher or lower social rank. These two sets being referred to as the High Register and the Low Register respectively, and are contrasted by the neutral Base Register.

Base Register
High Register
Low Register

b
p
b

d
t
d

g
k
g

p
p
b

t
ṭ
d

k
ḳ
g

ṭ
ṭ
t

ḳ
ḳ
k

As an example, the sentence "the king closed the door":

Hios satoku urdal

Would be realized in the High Register as:

Hios saṭoḳu urtal

And in the Low Register as:

Hios sadogu urdal

Verb Conjugation

Verb conjugation in Old Daevite was somewhat complex, with each verb having 50 unique forms based on its number, tense, person, and gender.

The two tenses of Old Daevite were the Future and the Non-Future. The Non-Future was unmarked, while the Future was marked in the Animate, Conceptual, and Leading genders by the suffix -ge. In the Inanimate, this changed to -ke.

The Null number was marked, in both tenses, by the prefix maz-. No person or gender information was encoded in this number.

The person of the verb was encoded using the first consonant of a prefix attached to the verb. For the 1st Person, this consonant was a t, while for the 2nd and 3rd Persons, it was a x and a s respectively.

The vowel of this prefix was determined by both the person and the number of the verb. For the 1st and 2nd Persons, the vowel was i in the Singular and u in the Plural. For the 3rd Person, this vowel was a in the Singular and á in the Plural.

Finally, gender was encoded a few different ways. In the Animate, this was by not attaching any prefix in the Singular 1st Person, and attaching unmarked prefixes in the other conjugations. In the Inanimate, unmarked prefixes are added, and the first consonant of the base verb is geminated if possible.

In the Conceptual, a r is added to the end of the prefix. For verbs in the Leading gender, prefixes are unmarked, while the first vowel of the base verb undergoes a process of mutation wherein it is replaced by a more open vowel. As a and á are completely open vowels, they are unaffected, as are any diphthongs.

Base Vowel
Replaced With

i
e

u
o

e
a

o
á

a
a

á
á

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Leading
Conceptual
Animate
Inanimate

Singular
Future
1st Person
ti-[mutation]-ge
tir- -ge
-ge
tiC- -ke

2nd Person
xi-[mutation]-ge
xir- -ge
xi- -ge
xiC- -ke

3rd Person
sa-[mutation]-ge
sar- -ge
sa- -ge
saC- -ke

Non-Future
1st Person
ti-[mutation]
tir-
[unmarked]
tiC-

2nd Person
xi-[mutation]
xir-
xi-
xiC-

3rd Person
sa-[mutation]
sar-
sa-
saC-

Plural
Future
1st Person
tu-[mutation]-ge
tur- -ge
tu- -ge
tuC- -ke

2nd Person
xu-[mutation]-ge
xur- -ge
xu- -ge
xuC- -ke

3rd Person
so-[mutation]-ge
sor- -ge
so- -ge
soC- -ke

Non-Future
1st Person
tu-[mutation]
tur-
tu-
tuC-

2nd Person
xu-[mutation]
xur-
xu-
xuC-

3rd Person
sá-[mutation]
sár-
sá-
sáC-

Null
Future
maz- -ge

Non-Future
maz-

To illustrate, various conjugations of the verb nuxe "to eat" and their translations are presented below.

Nuxe
"She/He ate", or "She/He is eating"

Nuxege
"She/He will eat"

Tinnuxeke
"It will eat"

Maznuxe
"Nobody ate" or "Nobody is eating"

Maznuxege
"Nobody will eat"

Syntax

The general order of sentences and verb phrases in Old Daevite was Object-Verb-Subject. Adjectives were always placed before the nouns they refer to. Somewhat due to the complete lack of any noun cases, this word order was extremely rigid, and materials deviating from it are rare and tend to be much shorter works produced by the lower classes.

It is notable that whenever one is talking of a noun belonging to the Leading gender, it was considered disrespectful to place it in any position in the sentence bar the Subject, in order to maintain their agency. This is reflected in how the Daevites describe both Leading-gender persons or forces they approve of, and those they disapprove of.

Old Daevite completely lacked any form of copula8. In order to state equivalence between two nouns, a speaker simply placed one as the object and one as the subject of the sentence. As this carries no tense information, any change of this relationship over time must be specified using an additional sentence.

Old Daevite employed postpositions. Positional phrases were generally placed before their subject, much like adjectives.

Vocabulary

Pronouns

Leading
Conceptual
Animate
Inanimate

1st Person Singular
tai
nau
tau

2nd Person Singular
ṭaḳá
namḳa
tuza

3rd Person Singular
tintau
naxiá
taniá
surau

1st Person Plural
taiai
xunau
xutá

2nd Person Plural
ḳuṭa
xunma
xuxe

3rd Person Plural
tixtiá
naxau
taosa
suxrau

Null
mazšu

The Null pronoun was primarily used to refer to the nouns the speaker was unaware of. This was particularly useful for forming questions, although the restrictive nature of the pronoun meant Old Daevite questions only accepted nouns as answers, and questions were always phrased appropriately for that restriction. As an example:

Mazšu xinuxe tuza?

What did you eat?9

Demonstrative pronouns10 were formed by adding a demonstrative suffix, -ne, to the end of any existing pronoun.

Nouns

Ṭao
A Human Sacrifice

Giáh
A Person

Raex
A Religious Sacrifice

Teá
Beast, Predatory Animal

Reg
Bird

Mašai
Blood

Kae
Body

Adv
Book

Xiábbeá
Border

Peuv
Bronze

Laohor
Cause, Fact, Reason

Leux
Child

Neuh
Citizen

Pádn
City

Deáṭ
A Command, an Order

Daev
A Daeva

Hezhum
Desolation, Destruction

Vaduk
Dominion, Sovereignty

Hios
Door

Aiktue
Large State, Empire11

Xaehn
End

Faiḳae
Enemy

Hiála
Family

Bá
Father

Kueše
Fellowship, Alliance, Many-Membered Companionship

Dauhk
Fire

Xaof
Flower

Eṭail
Fool

Ḳast
Fruit

Peá
God, Deity

Zeu
Grass

Ṭaulo
Grave

Imai
Guest

Botiáks
A Harvest

Teán
Head

Taef
Heart

Vaon
Home

Kiázai
Honor, Respect

Kiáth
Horse

Urdal
King, Monarch

Gaiḳixel
Knife, Dagger

Ner
Lack

Maopt
Leaf

Fiáb
Life

Kifenn
Longing

Vam
Mother

Kaes
Mountain

Saro
Moon

Tivik
One

Aidr
Palace

Aok
Place

Kao
River

Baox
Royal/Paved Road

Iohk
Road

Xioṭo
Saliva

Nelk
Sarkite

Ḳun
Slave

Unseg
Snake

Deág
Soldier

Heug
Spirit, Lesser Deity

Gai
(Water) Spring, Fountain, the Font

Geát
Stone

Daošre
Thief, Intruder

Uṭu
Thing, Product12

Hiázai
Tongue

Hisp
Tree

Tiálḳ
War

Xokau
Wave

Ṭeukm
Weapon

Ḳioti
A Weight (in the inanimate), Weight (in the conceptual)

Aint
Wound

Ba
Wrath

Verbs

Dará
To Arrive

Tiḳá
To Battle

Tema
To Be Able to

Paba
To Be Wroth

Derá
To Bring

Pove
To Call, to Term

Bohu
To Capture

Toku
To Close

Piri
To Conceal, to Cover

Dáṭe
To Command

Hiorda
To Commend, to Praise

Mauš
To Cover In Blood

Hele
To Cool

Tuṭá
To Cut

Ṭaši
To Dance

Hezu
To Destroy

Musu
To Die

Tiha
To Do

Nuxe
To Eat

Ḳofá
To Enslave

Zexa
To Find

Fikue
To Greet

Pevá
To Grow

Vepe
To Ingest (something that is not food, drink, or air), to Intake

Viro
To Join

Teḳe
To Kill

Pone
To Know

Duhau
To Light On Fire

Táki
To List

Xáṭe
To March (an armed force)

Giho
To Force, to Make (a thing do something)

Báli
To Open

Ḳefe
To Place

Daku
To Retreat

Naḳa
To Rule

Feve
To Serve, to Care For or Treat Someone

Ganu
To Set, to Mark

Raxka
To Sacrifice

Lági
To See

Gusá
To Send

Daepá
To Sing

Gosa
To Sneeze, to Huff13

Hizá
To Speak

Ṭofi
To Stab, to Strike

Zafá
To Take

Hihe
To Travel

Šozu
To Quieten, to Bleach (in color)

Ḳito
To Weigh

Adjectives and Adverbs

Miá
Whole, Entire, All

Iárx
Black

Tairx
Blue

Liomao
Far

Murx
Green

Beulae
Old, Ancient

Ḳuešae
Real, True

Sau
Red

Vihe
Shining

Aifš
High, Great

Baih
Weak

Taiš
White

Laot
Now

Function Words

Ṭá
In, At

Mašeza
But, However

Aen
For, Because Of

Iob
More

Šue
Most

Meš
No, None, Not

Eá
Towards

Maixe
Here

Kut
With

The Writing System

The writing system of Old Daevite was an abugida14, written top to bottom, left to right. This is due to the script originally developing as a method of writing on trees, although due to their organic nature, few inscriptions in this medium are available for modern study.

Consonant Notation

Consonants are marked in a downwards line within each word. Words are then separated by a designated word separator.

Word Separator

A list of the different consonant letters is available below, next to their romanization.

Vowel Notation

Vowels were marked using three different symbols, each corresponding to a degree of vowel openness, which could be placed on either side of the consonant line based on frontness. This featural system provided an easy way to mark all 6 base vowels of Old Daevite.

In case of a word beginning with a vowel, vowel markings were placed on the word separator that preceded it.

Finally, in order to mark diphthongs, two vowel marks were graphically joined to each other. This was done without significant modification when the two marks are on the same side of the consonantal line. However, when they were on opposite sides, a horizontal connector extended between them.

If the following consonant was a coda of the syllable, then the second vowel mark took the place normally taken by the vowel of an onset consonant. In case of the following consonant being an onset of a separate syllable, it is pushed downwards.

Numeral System

Daevite reverence of prime numbers, particularly seven, extended into the numeral system used in their language. While it is the opinion of most researchers in the field that the system described here was not the one used by the majority of the Empire's population15, it was likely the system used in documentation and high-class speech, and hence is the only Old Daevite numeral system a record of which still exists.

The Old Daevite numeral system was capable of describing any natural number except 1, and was based on prime factorization16. This makes the Daevites the earliest known discoverers of the fundamental theorem of arithmetic, preceding Euclid's Elements by at least 1,300 years.

As there is an infinite amount of prime numbers, a subsystem existed within Old Daevite in order to describe the position of a prime within the list of prime numbers. This subsystem was heptimal17, although 4 and 6 were represented using their prime factors rather than unique digits, and the last number was always a digit, rather than any heptimal number. The general Old Daevite numerical system used 7 digits to represent the first 7 prime numbers, with the rest being formed using the heptimal subsystem. Prime numbers not within the first 7 are distinguished by being written left-to-right, rather than up-to-down like the rest of Daevite writing.

The Daevites likely did not consider 1 to be a number - while a word for it did exist, there existed no digit with its value. Rather, on the rare occasions where 1 is used in surviving Daevite mathematics, the word is spelled out using the usual orthography rather than being represented numerically.

A list of Daevite digits is provided below.

The following are examples of various attested numbers written using the system. Note: due to numbers being expressed through multiplication of prime factors, the order in which the digits are written up-to-down is meaningless18. Order matters only where prime numbers are written using the heptimal subsystem.

Number (Arabic numerals)
Number (Daevite numerals)
Daevite pronunciation
Literal translation

55

Lok kafšan kut
Five with eleven

141

Tu átu mán kut
Three with third two

9032

Mán mán kut mán kut átu tu kut tu kut xafak kut
Two with two with two with three-with-three-with-three-with seventeen

Sample Text

Text found on the empty Tomb of Duvtaen, thought to be a Daevonian general from a fragmented period in Daevite civilization.

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Ádaevavaon deág tai. Ṭeukmsae tai. Duvtaen tai. Ápádnfeut leux xipove tai.

Tiálḳ eá tai sagosá pádnfeut. Teátenen tihazu19. Komitenen tiḳáfá.

Tiálḳ ṭá timosu tai. Maixe ṭaulofai sákefe deágenfai. Daošre saṭáfige ápádnfeut ba.

I am a soldier of Daevon. I am its weapon. I am Duvtaen. I am called (by you) Child of our City.

Our city sent me to war. I destroyed many20 beasts. I enslaved many Komis21.

I died in war. My soldiers set my grave here. The wrath of our city will strike at any intruder.

Footnotes

1. The language is entirely non-anomalous.

2. A language which shares no confirmed connection to any other language, e.g. Basque, Sumerian, and Elamite.

3. Approximately 3000 years as of the writing of this document.

4. Glides from one vowel to another.

5. Pronunciation of a consonant for longer than normal. In Old Daevite, roughly twice as long.

6. Root of Hiázaifeut, literally "Our Tongue", which the Daevites used to refer to their own language.

7. The t is inserted only if the affix is being added after a vowel.

8. The "to be" verb of English.

9. More literally: "You ate null?".

10. English "that", "this", "those", etc.

11. As opposed to small, decentralized states such as the many city-states that existed during periods of Daevite fragmentation. Does not necessarily refer to all states that are considered empires in the modern sense.

12. Used as a prefix on verb roots to derive the meaning "Thing created as a result of [verb]."

13. More generally - to exhale involuntarily.

14. A system in which consonants and vowels are written as a unit, with vowel notation being secondary. E.g. Ethiopic script, Brahmic script.

15. This view is based on the system's unfeasible complexity, as well as multiple basic numeration mistakes found in lower-class works that hint at writers being not completely familiar with the system.

16. The process by which any composite number may be described as the product of a unique set of prime numbers.

17. Base 7.

18. Despite this, there existed a general trend of writing the factors in increasing order, with the top being the smallest and the bottom being the largest.

19. Due to the verb being first-person, the first-person pronoun is dropped in this sentence. This is a feature that occasionally occurs in Old Daevite writing.

20. "Many" is used here to reflect the reduplication of the plural suffix, which presumably had the same meaning.

21. Presumably referring to Adytites.