Appendix:Zemeni orthography
Isunuche Zemen is an abugida created by David J. Peterson that is used to write the Zemeni language from the Netflix series Shadow and Bone.
Orthography
The script used to write Zemeni is an abugida, meaning that the script consists of base consonant characters which are modified in order to represent vowel qualities. The inherent vowel reading of each consonant is a. In order to cancel out this inherent vowel and produce the plain consonant sound, a diacritic must be added below the character, for instance ka stands for ka while k stands for k. The strokes added to mark non-inherent vowels are more or less predictable.
Some palatalized consonants are written with a ligature of the glyphs standing for their plain counterparts and the one for y. Some consonants do not have their own glyph and are written by adding a modifier before glyphs standing for other consonants, for instance g (g) is written with a modified glyph for k (k). If a consonant with a modifier is geminated, the base glyph is written twice but the modifier is only written once, so g is spelt (gg).
Although the script does not indicate stressed syllables, it closely matches Zemeni's phonemes, a word's correct pronunciation can therefore usually be guessed from its spelling. However, there are multiple ways to write some palatalized consonants because of mergers, so a word's correct spelling cannot always be guessed from its pronunciation.
Vowels
When they do not follow a consonant, vowels are marked with standalone glyphs. The basic glyph is the one for a, the others are obtained by adding strokes to it.
| Isunuche Zemen | Romanization | IPA |
|---|---|---|
| a | a | /a/ |
| e | e | /e/ |
| i | i | /i/ |
| o | o | /o/ |
| u | u | /u/ |
Consonants
The following table lists the consonants' vowelless forms:
| Isunuche Zemen | Romanization | IPA | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| b | b | /b/ | |
| ty | ch | /tʃ/ | Ligature of t and y, used to stand for /tʲ/. |
| tsy | ch | /tʃ/ | Ligature of t, s and y, used to stand for /tsʲ/. |
| d | d | /d/ | |
| dz | dz | /dz/ | Ligature of d and z |
| f | f | /f/ | |
| g | g | /g/ | Modification of k. |
| h | h | /h/ | |
| j | j | /dʒ/ | Modification of y. |
| dy | j | /dʒ/ | Ligature of d and y, used to stand for /dʲ/. |
| dzy | j | /dʒ/ | Ligature of d, z and y, used to stand for /dzʲ/. |
| k | k | /k/ | |
| kh | kh | /x/ | Modification of h, used in loanwords. |
| ky | ky | /kʲ/ | Ligature of k and y. |
| l | l | /l/ | |
| ly | ly | /ʎ/ | Ligature of l and y. |
| m | m | /m/ | |
| n | n | /n/ | |
| ny | ny | /ɲ/ | Ligature of n and y. |
| p | p | /p/ | Modification of f. |
| r | r | /ɾ/ | |
| ry | ry | /ɾʲ/ | Ligature of r and y. |
| s | s | /s/ | |
| sy | sh | /ʃ/ | Ligature of s and y, used to stand for /sʲ/. |
| t | t | /t/ | |
| ts | ts | /ts/ | Ligature of t and s |
| v | v | /v/ | Modification of w. |
| w | w | /w/ | |
| y | y | /j/ | |
| z | z | /z/ | |
| zy | zh | /ʒ/ | Ligature of z and y, used to stand for /zʲ/. |
Syllabograms
The following table lists every consonant-vowel combination:
| Nucleus → Onset ↓ |
a | e | i | o | u |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| b | ba | be | bi | bo | bu |
| ch (*ty) | tya | tye | tyi | tyo | tyu |
| ch (*tsy) | tsya | tsye | tsyi | tsyo | tsyu |
| d | da | de | di | do | du |
| dz | dza | dze | dzi | dzo | dzu |
| f | fa | fe | fi | fo | fu |
| g | ga | ge | gi | go | gu |
| h | ha | he | hi | ho | hu |
| j | ja | je | ji | jo | ju |
| j (*dy) | dya | dye | dyi | dyo | dyu |
| j (*dzy) | dzya | dzye | dzyi | dzyo | dzyu |
| k | ka | ke | ki | ko | ku |
| ky | kya | kye | kyi | kyo | kyu |
| l | la | le | li | lo | lu |
| ly | lya | lye | lyi | lyo | lyu |
| m | ma | me | mi | mo | mu |
| n | na | ne | ni | no | nu |
| ny | nya | nye | nyi | nyo | nyu |
| p | pa | pe | pi | po | pu |
| r | ra | re | ri | ro | ru |
| ry | rya | rye | ryi | ryo | ryu |
| s | sa | se | si | so | su |
| sh | sya | sye | syi | syo | syu |
| t | ta | te | ti | to | tu |
| ts | tsa | tse | tsi | tso | tsu |
| v | va | ve | vi | vo | vu |
| w | wa | we | wi | wo | wu |
| y | ya | ye | yi | yo | yu |
| z | za | ze | zi | zo | zu |
| zh | zya | zye | zyi | zyo | zyu |
Numerals
Zemeni has a base-10 numeral system, which is summarized below:
| Isunuche Zemen | Latin |
|---|---|
| 0 | 0 |
| 1 | 1 |
| 2 | 2 |
| 3 | 3 |
| 4 | 4 |
| 5 | 5 |
| 6 | 6 |
| 7 | 7 |
| 8 | 8 |
| 9 | 9 |
Punctuation
The Zemeni punctuation marks are given in the following table:
| Isunuche Zemen | Latin |
|---|---|
| . | Full stop |
| ? | Question mark |
| , | Comma/dash |
| : | Colon/semi-colon |
| ( | Parenthesis |
| $ | Currency mark |