Ill Bethisad

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Version of the logo created in 2006 for use by members of the project. This or variants of it has been used on various websites over the years Logo of the Ill bethisad project.png
Version of the logo created in 2006 for use by members of the project. This or variants of it has been used on various websites over the years

Ill Bethisad is a collaborative alternate history project which had 58 active participants as of March 2021. [1] Originally created by Andrew Smith from New Zealand, [2] it was initiated in 1997 as the Brithenig Project. It can be characterized as an instance of the subgenre of steampunk. Ill Bethisad has a largely encyclopedic character, consisting of constructed languages, written histories, timelines, news items, maps, flags and other images, short movies, descriptions of cultures, religions and technologies, as well as short stories.

Contents

Constructed languages

Constructed languages play an important role in Ill Bethisad, and it can be said that Ill Bethisad is the central meeting point, if not the cradle, of an entire subgenre of conlangs, namely alternative languages. To date there are over thirty languages at varying levels of construction that play part. [3] Among the languages spoken in Ill Bethisad are Brithenig (a Romance language with strong Celtic substrate influences, based on Welsh), [4] [5] [6] Wenedyk (Polish as a Romance language), [7] [8] [9] Bohemian (Pémišna: Germanized Czech), [10] Dalmatian (a Romance language similar to Romanian, based on the actual extinct language of the same name), Xliponian (another Romance language with a superficial resemblance to Albanian, spoken in our world's Epirus) and several Finnish-like "North Slavic" languages, including Nassian (spoken in our world's Karelia). [11] [12]

The name Ill Bethisad itself is Brithenig for the universe, a calque from Welsh bydysawd or Latin baptizatum. [13]

In addition, many other languages from our world have been changed in some way, although some, like German, Italian, or Russian, appear to be exactly the same. In many cases, as with Spanish, English, or Japanese, the changes are relatively slight and mainly affect orthography or Romanizations. One example is the language of Galicia, which is called Ruthenian (rather than Ukrainian) and is written with Polish orthography (rather than Cyrillic; see Ukrainian Latin Alphabet for real-world examples). [14] Others are more drastic; Ill Bethisad Croatian, for example, is an invented Slavic language that in many respects is closer to Czech than our world's Croatian, [15] and the Dalmatian of Ill Bethisad seems to be influenced by Slavic languages more than its real world counterpart.[ original research? ]

Points of divergence

The central point of divergence of Ill Bethisad is a stronger Roman Empire. Nevertheless, history runs mostly parallel to the history of the real world, so that many countries and regions have their own separate points of divergence: [16]

In general, there are more independent countries than there are in the real world, and constitutional monarchies, federations, colonies, and condominia are far more numerous. [10] The history of Ill Bethisad, on the whole, often sees extinct or minority languages such as Catalan, Low Saxon, Crimean Gothic as well as others remaining more widely spoken in their respective regions than they have become in real-world history. Also, technologies that have either fallen out of favor or failed to develop in our world are explored and broadly used. [12] For example, zeppelins and ekranoplans or ground-effect vehicles are still in use for both military and civil purposes. Computers are not highly developed, and there is no 'Silicon Valley' of North America, but information technology centres are instead found in Ireland.[ citation needed ]

Related Research Articles

Most languages of Europe belong to the Indo-European language family. Out of a total European population of 744 million as of 2018, some 94% are native speakers of an Indo-European language. Within Indo-European, the three largest phyla in Europe are Romance, Germanic, and Slavic; they have more than 200 million speakers each and together account for close to 90% of Europeans. Smaller phyla of Indo-European found in Europe include Hellenic, Baltic, Albanian, Celtic, and Armenian ; Indo-Aryan, though a large subfamily of Indo-European, has a relatively small number of speakers in Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fictional language</span> Constructed languages created for a fictional setting

Fictional languages are the subset of constructed languages (conlangs) that have been created as part of a fictional setting. Typically they are the creation of one individual, while natural languages evolve out of a particular culture or people group, and other conlangs may have group involvement. Fictional languages are also distinct from natural languages in that they have no native speakers. By contrast, the constructed language of Esperanto now has native speakers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Slavic languages</span> Subfamily of Indo-European languages

The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Early Middle Ages, which in turn is thought to have descended from the earlier Proto-Balto-Slavic language, linking the Slavic languages to the Baltic languages in a Balto-Slavic group within the Indo-European family.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ukrainian language</span> East Slavic language

Ukrainian is an East Slavic language of the Indo-European language family, spoken primarily in Ukraine. It is the native language of Ukrainians.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dalmatian language</span> Extinct Romance language of the Adriatic

Dalmatian or Dalmatic was a Romance language that was spoken in the Dalmatia region of present-day Croatia, and as far south as Kotor in Montenegro. The name refers to a tribe of the Illyrian linguistic group, Dalmatae. The Ragusan dialect of Dalmatian, the most studied prestige dialect, was the official language of the Republic of Ragusa for much of its medieval history until it was gradually supplanted by other local languages.

The Istriot language is a Romance language of the Italo-Dalmatian branch spoken by about 400 people in the southwestern part of the Istrian peninsula in Croatia, particularly in Rovinj and Vodnjan. It should not be confused with the Istrian dialect of the Venetian language or the more distantly related Eastern Romance Istro-Romanian.

Venedic is a naturalistic constructed language, created by the Dutch translator Jan van Steenbergen. It is used in the fictional Republic of the Two Crowns, based on the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, in the alternate timeline of Ill Bethisad. Officially, Venedic is a descendant of Vulgar Latin with a strong Slavic admixture, based on the premise that the Roman Empire incorporated the ancestors of the Poles in their territory. Less officially, it tries to show what Polish would have looked like if it had been a Romance instead of a Slavic language. On the Internet, it is well-recognized as an example of the altlang genre, much like Brithenig and Breathanach.

A constructed writing system is a writing system specifically created by an individual or group, rather than having evolved as part of a language or culture like a natural script. Some are designed for use with constructed languages, although several of them are used in linguistic experimentation or for other more practical ends in existing languages. Prominent examples of constructed scripts include Korean Hangul and the International Phonetic Alphabet.

Brithenig, or also known as Comroig, is an invented language, or constructed language ("conlang"). It was created as a hobby in 1996 by Andrew Smith from New Zealand, who also invented the alternate history of Ill Bethisad to "explain" it. Officially according to the Ill Bethisad Wiki, Brithenig is classified as a Britanno-Romance language, along with other Romance languages that displaced Celtic.

An artistic language, or artlang, is a constructed language designed for aesthetic and phonetic pleasure. Language can be artistic to the extent that artists use it as a source of creativity in art, poetry, calligraphy or as a metaphor to address themes such as cultural diversity and the vulnerability of the individual in a globalizing world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mutual intelligibility</span> Closeness of linguistic varieties

In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. It is used as an important criterion for distinguishing languages from dialects, although sociolinguistic factors are often also used.

The History of Dalmatia concerns the history of the area that covers eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea and its inland regions, from the 2nd century BC up to the present day.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">South Slavs</span> Subgroup of Slavic peoples who speak the South Slavic languages

South Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak South Slavic languages and inhabit a contiguous region of Southeast Europe comprising the eastern Alps and the Balkan Peninsula. Geographically separated from the West Slavs and East Slavs by Austria, Hungary, Romania, and the Black Sea, the South Slavs today include Bosniaks, Bulgarians, Croats, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Serbs, and Slovenes, respectively the main populations of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Italian language in Croatia</span>

The Italian language is an official minority language in Croatia, with many schools and public announcements published in both languages. Croatia's proximity and cultural connections to Italy have led to a relatively large presence of Italians in Croatia. Italians were recognized as a state minority in the Croatian Constitution in two sections: Istrian Italians and Dalmatian Italians. Although only 0.43% of the total population is Italian by citizenship, many more are ethnically Italian and a large percentage of Croatians speak Italian, in addition to Croatian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Constructed language</span> Consciously devised language

A constructed language is a language whose phonology, grammar, and vocabulary, instead of having developed naturally, are consciously devised for some purpose, which may include being devised for a work of fiction. A constructed language may also be referred to as an artificial, planned or invented language, or a fictional language. Planned languages are languages that have been purposefully designed; they are the result of deliberate, controlling intervention and are thus of a form of language planning.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Croatian language</span> South Slavic language

Croatian is the standardized variety of the Serbo-Croatian pluricentric language mainly used by Croats. It is the national official language and literary standard of Croatia, one of official languages of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, the Serbian province of Vojvodina, the European Union and a recognized minority language elsewhere in Serbia and other neighbouring countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pan-Slavic language</span> Type of constructed language

A pan-Slavic language is a zonal auxiliary language for communication among the Slavic peoples.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dalmatian city-states</span> Dalmatian localities where the local Romance population survived the Barbarian invasions

Dalmatian city-states were the Dalmatian localities where the local Romance population survived the Barbarian invasions after the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 400s CE. Eight little cities were created by those autochthonous inhabitants that maintained political links with the Eastern Roman Empire. The original names of these cities were Jadera, Spalatum, Crespa, Arba, Tragurium, Vecla, Ragusium, and Cattarum. The language and the laws were initially Latin, but after a few centuries, they developed their own Neo-Latin language, Dalmatico, which lasted until the 19th century. The cities were maritime centres with huge commerce, mainly with the Italian peninsula and with the growing Republic of Venice.

References

  1. ↑ "The List". IBWiki. Retrieved 18 April 2022.
  2. ↑ Rogers, Stephen D. (15 October 2011). The Dictionary of Made-Up Languages: From Elvish to Klingon, The Anwa, Reella, Ealray, Yeht (Real) Origins of Invented Lexicons. ISBN   9781440530395.
  3. ↑ "IB Languages". IBWiki. Ib.frath.net. 12 April 2012. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  4. ↑ Sarah L. Higley. Audience, Uglossia, and CONLANG: Inventing Languages on the Internet. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 3.1 (2000).
  5. ↑ Arika Okrent, In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers, and the Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build a Perfect Language, 2009, str. 321.
  6. ↑ Mikael Parkvall, Limits of Language. Almost Everything You Didn't Know You Didn't Know about Language and Languages, 2008, p. 131.
  7. ↑ Dorota Gut, : Now@ Mow@ ("New Language"), in: Wiedza i Życie, February 2004.
  8. 1 2 Ziemowit Szczerek, Świat, gdzie Polska nie jest Polską Archived 19 October 2008 at the Wayback Machine , on: Interia.pl , 26 September 2008.
  9. ↑ Anna-Maria Meyer, Wiederbelebung einer Utopie: Probleme und Perspektiven slavischer Plansprachen im Zeitalter des Internets, p. 266, 2014, ISBN   9783863092337
  10. 1 2 3 Jan Oliva, Virtuální vlasnictví (diplomová práce), Hradec Králové 2006, p. 6.
  11. ↑ Tilman Berger, Vom Erfinden Slavischer Sprachen, in: M. Okuka & U. Schweier, eds., Germano-Slavistische Beiträge. Festschrift für P. Rehder zum 65. Geburtstag, München 2004, pp. 24-25.
  12. 1 2 Jan Havliš, "Výlet do Conlangey", in: Interkom, 2008/3 (243), pp. 17-21.
  13. ↑ "Ill Bethisad". IBWiki. 26 August 2009. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  14. ↑ "Hołowna Storinka". IBWiki. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  15. ↑ "Croatian". IBWiki. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  16. ↑ "Ytterbion's Rules of Creation". Archived from the original on 20 May 2010. Retrieved 16 October 2010.
  17. ↑ "Republic of the Two Crowns". Steen.free.fr. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  18. ↑ "RUSSIA in Ill Bethisad". Steen.free.fr. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  19. ↑ "History of Castile and Leon". IBWiki. Retrieved 21 December 2013.
  20. ↑ Jakub Kowalski, Wymyślone języki Archived 7 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine , on: Relaz.pl, 2 March 2007.
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