Shkanshej

From Langmaker

Conlang	Shkanshej
Author	Pablo Flores
Year Began	1999
Language Type	fictional language
Lexicon Size	105
Etymologies	No
Grammar	Yes
Sample Texts	No
Primer	No

Shkanshej is for the winged people of an alternate Earth and was created by Pablo Flores. It is written with a unique script.

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Language sources

The languages of the Philipines, though I don't know them, where commented in the Conlang list (especially Tagalog) and these comments formed the basis of the trigger system. The hierarchy of genders was inspired from some other constructed language (don't know which), but the different pronouns for different genders were clearly inspired in Japanese. The language also has a 'construct state' for compounds and possession that was copied from Semitic languages and from what is known about Tolkien's Khuzdul.

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Design principles

It was to be as alien as I could make it, so I chose the trigger system, the weird genders, and an outlandish phonology with sublaminal linguolabial sounds and a couple of clicks, which are both totally unknown in European languages (and indeed in most languages of the world). This was because it had to be in the same fictional context as Draseléq and Curco, which sounded fairly Western, and I wanted them to be different, the language of a radically different culture.

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