Language of Tetril

Hi everybody,

I have been reading and posting on this list for a while, but I have never
really posted anything about any of my conlangs. As a matter of fact, I am
more of a conculturalist than a conlanger per se, so my need to create
languages comes forth from adding flavor and consistency to my world.

On the world of Almaran, on one of the southern continents, there lives a
seafaring elven people. They live in small towns near the shores, which are
build like a roomy version of Venice, Italy, with canals and waterways being
more numerous than streets. Their entire cultural background is founded on
the principle of worshipping the air and water deities.

The language used by these elves comes one of the most important religious
rituals known to these elves: the Rite of the Waterbowl. During this rite,
water is poured in shallow metal bowls. Using various techniques, including
calling gusts of wind, these bowls are struck so that they produce different
sounds. This is said to be a way to communicate with the gods.

The sound produced by a waterbowl is determined by the type of bowl used,
the amount of water in it and the way in which the bowl is struck. Expert
priests can read the meaning of the waterbowl by watching the shape and
pattern of the waves in the bowl. Since all the sounds are sonorants, most
of the phonemic inventory of the language of these elves, in an attempt to
mimic the sounds of the waterbowl, consists of vowels and semi-vowels, and a
few non-obstruent consonants. Most sounds are nasalized, mimicking the
sounds of the ringing metal bowls.

The elven script features all kinds of wave-shaped symbols, which when spun
together form wavy lines that are hard to read for outsiders. An example of
the writing can be found in a PDF file at this location:

http://www.almaran.net/world/language/scriptexample.pdf

I haven't worked out the language yet, so I don't even know the phonetic
inventory etc., except for the limits described above (many vocalic sounds),
let alone words or grammar.

Maarten

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