Leslie’s Comments (group member since Jun 12, 2025)

Leslie’s comments from the Conlangs! Constructed languages in literature group.

My conlang is the tip of a cosmologically deep linguistic triptych.

Each cosmic language reveals a psychological theme for each society.

Language name, cosmic alignment, societal name, grammar structure... short description.

Horozhi Seleshia, The Surge (Chaos), Seleshia, is VSO — actions before subject or object. Much along the lines of act before thinking, but that is a bit of an oversimplification. Free-flowing, independent thought. Individual scripts: each person creates their own flowing script and is taught how to create, not what to create. Scripting is undecipherable because every person's script varies, and when that person dies, the understanding of the script dies with them. Scroll-like, flowing alphabetic structure — right to left, left to right, right to left, etc., as it continues back and forth, snaking its way up the page.

Hoatak Urtakan, The Hold (Control), Urtakan, is SOV — the doer before all else. Focus on structure and hierarchy, much as the king and his subjects. Strict and constrained, solidly defined and hidden from the populace, reserved for religious and political documents or discussions. Never publicized or released into the wild, this secret script is guarded fanatically. Logographic structure. Originally, it was a growing spiral format that started with the first glyph and built each subsequent one in ever-outward spirals.

Hadokai Tubatonona, The Dance (Balance), Tubatonona, is OSV — it focuses on the outcome above the action or the agent. The language and scripting are never hidden or ever-changing, and serve as the bridge between the other cosmic forces, having been created from a full one-third of each's power. Focuses on making sure that the purpose is paramount. Syllabic scripting structure, and reaches a subtle compromise between the above two languages. The Dance was formed from the Hold and the Surge and seeks to find the middle ground in everything.

First, I am a little disappointed to find that this discussion is not active, but I suppose it is very very hard to find people that are truly interested in conlangs.


On to Two... my first conlang
The Heater and The Hack

Hadokai Tubatonona is a language born not of dialogue, but of divinity—etched first as glyphs surrounding ancient artifacts in my novel The Heater and The Hack.

It began as script, unknowable, carved into relics humming with balance and mystery. But as the artifacts gained lore, they demanded origin. And thus, a people emerged: the Tubatonona, tasked by cosmic forces to forge the instruments that hold the universe in check. They would need a language as precise and profound as their purpose.

What makes Hadokai Tubatonona unique is its philosophical architecture. It follows an OSV structure—Object, Subject, Verb—because for the Tubatonona, outcomes matter more than agents. In their worldview, it is the thing created, not who created it, that carries cosmic weight.

Phonologically, it is a pure syllabary: one glyph, one sound—no exceptions. This simplicity in sound contrasts with the complexity in syntax, and mirrors the race’s belief that while the universe is fundamentally simple, its expressions can be infinitely layered.

Grammatically, the language has no verb tense—only explicit temporal indicators—because the Tubatonona did not “conjugate time.” They located it. They marked it. They respected it.

Perhaps most beautiful to me is that the language is dead within the world of the novel. Misunderstood by scholars. Ritualized, echoed, half-remembered. Like Latin, or Sumerian, it becomes a mirror through which modern characters glimpse forgotten truths—while inadvertently distorting them.

Hadokai Tubatonona is not meant to be spoken fluently. It's meant to be unearthed. Slowly. Reverently. It is not just a conlang. It is a cipher for myth, memory, and the mythmakers who left behind their fire-forged words.

Three, a deeper dive:
Hadokai Tubatonona is a constructed language I built to support the world of my novel,
The Heater and The Hack. It started as visual glyphs carved into artifacts, but once
those artifacts became central to the plot, I needed a working language behind them.

I structured the language around several design principles:

1. One glyph = one sound. This is a strict syllabary. No diphthongs, no clusters.
Each syllable fits one of these formats: V, CV, VC, CVC, or standalone 'h'.
The following syllable forms are explicitly disallowed: CCC, CCV, VCC, CVV, VVC, VVV.

2. Glyph Count. With strict phonotactic limits and no consonant clusters or diphthongs,
the total number of usable syllables (and thus glyphs) falls around ~160, including
all valid CVC, CV, VC, V forms. I created a custom font using FontForge and exported
it as a TTF. It's mapped into the Unicode Private Use Area for compatibility, and
can be typed directly in Windows.

3. Phoneme Inventory:
Consonants: /b d f g h ʤ k l m n p r s ʃ t v z ʒ/
Vowels: /a e i o u ʌ ɪ/
Special: h functions alone as a syllable (glottal 'air' consonant)

4. Word Order: OSV (Object–Subject–Verb). This was chosen to emphasize results or
outcomes over actors. The subject is structurally minimized and verbs are
heavily suffix-based. There is no conjugation for tense. Instead, temporal
context is supplied with dedicated time indicators like 'zubava' (the past).

5. Morphology is suffix-driven. Words are formed from compound morphemes, using
a root + suffix structure. Plurality, negation, possession, and modifiers are
all expressed through ordered suffixes. For example:
-na = singular/plural indicator
-ku = negation
-va / -val = nounizing: object / agent

6. Lexicon size: ~550+ defined entries across three curated dictionaries.
These include parts of speech, root identification, pronunciation, and usage context.
Many Common Tongue words in my world are evolved or misused forms of original HT roots.

7. Syntax & Parsing: Verbs appear at the end of clauses. Suffix chains encode
plurality, subject match, and negation. Sentence formation follows this model:
[Object Phrase] [Subject Phrase] [Time Marker, optional] [Verb Phrase] [Punctuation]

8. In-world status: Hadokai Tubatonona is a dead language. Its script appears on
ancient artifacts, monuments, and a few trilingual cliffside inscriptions alongside
the world’s “Common” and “Draconic” languages. Most modern scholars misinterpret
its structure, believing it to be poetic or symbolic rather than literal and rule-based.

9. Example sentence (literal & interlinear):
zubava bana zufova pensam
past write future know
"Inscribe the past and know the future."

This is not just narrative prose; it's valid multi-clause OSV grammar:
[zubava] (object: "the past") [bana] (verb: "to inscribe") –
[zufova] (object: "the future") [pensam] (verb: "to know")

Each clause independently follows the OSV pattern, joined as parallel statements.

10. Tools and Materials:
- Font: Custom HT syllabary, built with FontForge
- Lexicons: 500+ entries
- Grammar: Modeled using Chomsky hierarchy notation with derivational recursion
- Orthography: Dot-based syllable separation for parsing in latin and romanized text; strict 1:1 glyph:sound ratio
- Writing style: Suitable for inscriptions, formal texts, and ritualistic statements
(not meant for modern spoken fluency, but fully writable and translatable)

Overall, Hadokai Tubatonona was built to be a fully-structured, rule-driven conlang.
It’s designed for literary and archaeological use within the narrative, but all rules
are internally consistent and complete. It's not decorative—it is a functioning system
that underpins the identity and cosmology of a lost people.