Appendix:Kinuk'aaz orthography
Zaduusel is an alphabet created by David J. Peterson and used to write Kinuk'aaz, the language of the Omec from Syfy's Defiance.
Design concept
Peterson made Zaduusel suited for writing with an edged pen. Unlike the other Votan scripts, Zaduusel is alphabetic, first in order to highlight the distinctiveness of the Omec, second because of time constraints. Although its letters share a noticeable horizontal line on top, they do not connect.
Interestingly, Zaduusel is partly featural, as many of its phonemes are represented by adding strokes to letters standing for phonemes with similar articulation, for instance the letters ts' (/ts’/) and dz (/dz/) are both derived from ts (/ts/) by adding a glottalization marker to the former and a voicing marker to the latter.
Orthography
With the exception of some irregularly-spelt words, the pronunciation of a Kinuk'aaz word can generally be deduced from its Zaduusel spelling, but the opposite is not true due to various sound changes that created multiple ways to spell some phonemes. Most notably, many former diphthongs have merged with others or become monophthongs but retain their original spellings, the former implosive consonants are still distinguished from their plain counterparts in writing even though they are no longer pronounced differently, and consonants are spelt differently depending on whether they are underlying or the result of mutation.
Direction of writing
Zaduusel is usually written horizontally from left to right but may also be written vertically.
Characters
The table below follows Zaduusel's alphabetical order. Importantly, each consonant exhibits four distinct forms: plain, imperfect, perfect and geminate. These forms are typically represented distinctly in writing, even though they may not always result in different pronunciation.
| Orthography | IPA | Romanization | Notes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plain | Imperfect | Perfect | Geminate | Proto-Kinuk'aaz | Modern Kinuk'aaz | ||
| h | nh | =h | hh | /h/ | h | ||
| ' | n' | =' | '' | /ʔ/ | ' | ||
| o | /o/ | o | |||||
| oo | */oː/ | /uː/ | uu | ||||
| a | /a/ | a | |||||
| aa | /aː/ | aa | |||||
| ae | */ae/ | /ai/ | ai | ||||
| r | nr | =r | rr | /ʀ/ | r | ||
| b' | mb' | =b' | bb' | */ɓ/ | /b/ | b | |
| p | mp | =p | pp | /p/ | p | ||
| b | mb | =b | bb | /b/ | b | ||
| e | /e/ | e | |||||
| ee | */eː/ | /iː/ | ii | ||||
| m | (µ) | =m | mm | /m/ | m | The imperfect form is reserved for formal writing, the geminate form is usually used instead. | |
| n | (ñ) | =n | nn | /n/ | n | The imperfect form is reserved for formal writing, the geminate form is usually used instead. | |
| i | /i/ | i | |||||
| ii | /iː/ | ii | |||||
| q' | nq' | =q' | qq' | /q’/ | q' | ||
| k' | nk' | =k' | kk' | /k’/ | k' | ||
| k | nk | =k | kk | /k/ | k | ||
| g | ng | =g | gg | /g/ | g | ||
| u | /u/ | u | |||||
| uu | */uː/ | /yː/ | üü | ||||
| v | nv | =v | vv | /v/ | v | ||
| s | ns | =s | ss | /s/ | s | ||
| d' | nd' | =d' | dd' | */ɗ/ | /d/ | d | |
| t' | nt' | =t' | tt' | /t’/ | t' | ||
| t | nt | =t | tt | /t/ | t | ||
| d | nd | =d | dd | /d/ | d | ||
| ts' | nts' | =ts' | tts' | /ts’/ | ts' | ||
| ts | nts | =ts | tts | /ts/ | ts | ||
| dz | ndz | =dz | ddz | /dz/ | dz | ||
| z | nz | =z | zz | /z/ | z | ||
| l | nl | =l | ll | /l/ | l | ||
| ö | /ø/ | ö | |||||
| ü | /y/ | ü | |||||
Numerals
The number system, which uses base-10, is described in the following table:
| # | Initial | Plain |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0 | 00 |
| 1 | 1 | 01 |
| 2 | 2 | 02 |
| 3 | 3 | 03 |
| 4 | 4 | 04 |
| 5 | 5 | 05 |
| 6 | 6 | 06 |
| 7 | 7 | 07 |
| 8 | 8 | 08 |
| 9 | 9 | 09 |
The plain forms are all shown here with a leading zero. Numbers are written in three number segments with a comma separating each segment. The first number in a segment is receives a type of diacritical mark in the form of a curl on the left, and the following two numbers are written in their plain form.
Punctuation
In the table below the punctuation marks of Zaduusel can be seen:
| English | Orthography |
|---|---|
| Beginning of paragraph | .. |
| Colon | . |
| Comma | , |
| Hyphen | - |
| Parentheses | (...) |
| Stroke | — |
| Quotation marks | "..." |
| Brackets | [...] |
| Colon/Semicolon | : |
Note: Peterson has stated that he has forgotten his intended purpose for the stroke.