Appendix:Veda orthography

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Welqor is an abjad created by David J. Peterson which is used to write the Veda language from Tencent Games' Arena of Valor. It is the progenitor of the scripts of Veda's daughter languages: Thala (Afata), Oz (G'Vunna), and Shul (Gandal).

Orthography

Though Welqor is an abjad which does not indicate all vowels, Veda's vowels are either marked with matres lectionis or unwritten but usually predictable. [a] is often written with the glyph that used to stand for [ʔ], the glyphs for [w] and [j] double as matres lectionis for [u] and [wǝ] and [i] and [jǝ] respectively in most nuclei, and [e] and [o] are often written as the former sequences [ʔj] and [ʔw], which have become digraphs. [ǝ] is never written, as it used to be an epenthetic vowel, but it can often be predicted for the same reason, as Veda's syllables follow a CGVC structure.

A complication is that [q], [x] and [ɣ] trigger retraction of the following vowel and turn [i], [u] and [ǝ] into [e], [o] and [a]. After these consonants, [e] is therefore spelt with [j] or [ʔj], [o] with [w] or [ʔw], and [a] is either spelt with [ʔ] or unwritten. The Welqor spelling of a Veda root word beginning with [q], [x] or [ɣ] therefore depends on its etymology. Another complication is that the pronunciations of word-initial [w] and [j] without a written following vowel are unpredictable, the consonants sometimes stand for [u] and [i] respectively, or sometimes for [wǝ] and [jǝ] respectively instead.

Veda does not have letters to write the palatal consonants [tʃ], [dʒ], [ʃ] and [ʒ], they are spelt as [tsj], [dzj], [sj] and [zj] since they are former palatalized alveolars.

The script can be written with or without spaces between characters. In practice, there is no need to use spaces, but Peterson prefers to include them for clarity.

Glyphs

The glyphs of Welqor have their origin in pictographs that over time developed into an abjad. There is also a ligature of y followed by w in the script, as this combination is quite common in Veda. They are summarized along with their pictographic source in this table:

Welqor	Romanization	IPA	Origin	Notes
None	ə	ə	None	Unwritten.
a	a	ʔa, a	ang, "shield"	Used to stand for [ʔ], now stands for [ʔa] word-initially and [a] elsewhere.
e	e	ʔe, e	ang + yun	Used to stand for [ʔj], now stands for [ʔe] word-initially and [e] elsewhere.
o	o	ʔo, o	ang + wang	Used to stand for [ʔw], now stands for [ʔo] word-initially and [o] elsewhere.
b	b	b	bǝm, "mouth"
d	d	d	dǝl, "tongue"
dz	dz	dz	dzǝr, "head"
j	j	dʒ	dzǝr + yun	Used to stand for [dzj], now stands for [dʒ] before other vowels.
ju	ju	dʒu	dzǝr + yun + wang
f	f	f	fe, "sun"
g	g	g	gǝng, "horn"
gh	gh	ɣ	ghez, "mountain"
k	k	k	ken, "moon"
kh	kh	x	khos, "river"
l	l	l	lud, "foot, leg"
m	m	m	maq, "eagle"
n	n	n	nǝn, "nose"
ng	ng (or n before a velar)	ŋ	ngingi, "rabbit"
p	p	p	pǝkh, "claw"
q	q	q	qel, "bowl"
r	r	ɾ	rap, "hand, arm"
s	s	s	sum, "star"
sh	sh	ʃ	sum + yun	Used to stand for [sj], now stands for [ʃ] before other vowels.
shu	shu	ʃu	sum + yun + wang
t	t	t	tagh, "land"
ts	ts	ts	tsuk, "spear"
ch	ch	tʃ	tsuk + yun	Used to stand for [tsj], now stands for [tʃ] before other vowels.
chu	chu	tʃu	tsuk + yun + wang
v	v	v	vu, "cat"
u	w, o, u or wə	w, o, u, wə	wang, "house"	Stands for [w] before another vowel, [o] as a nucleus after gh, kh or q, and [u] or [wə] as a nucleus elsewhere.
i	y, e, i or yə	j, e, i, jə	yun, "eye"	Stands for [j] before another vowel, [e] as a nucleus after gh, kh or q, and [i] or [jə] as a nucleus elsewhere.
yu	yu	ju	yun + wang	Ligature.
z	z	z	zuv, "fish"
zh	zh	ʒ	zuv + yun	Used to stand for [zj], now stands for [ʒ] before other vowels.
zhu	zhu	ʒu	zuv + yun + wang

Punctuation

Welqor	Usage
,	Pause
.	End of sentence
?	Question mark

Numerals

Welqor	#	Romanization
0	0	unknown
1	1	ing
2	2	kan
3	3	zu
4	4	fin
5	5	ingrep
6	6	ping
7	7	zuyunen
8	8	kanyunen
9	9	inyunen
10	10	nen