Vusperian language

Vusperian is the southernmost member of the Telodio-Chyrtaenese languages of Caro-Valdic language family. Vusperian is the native language of the canine people that inhabit the temperate forests of Vusperia, and is also the official language and lingua franca of the Kingdom of Vusperia.

The Vusperian language developed away from Telodio-Chyrtaenese during the Canid Migrations over 1800 years ago during the tenth century when slowly displaced the native Talingian languages (a Cixo-Noxorean language), driving many of its languages to extinction. Vusperian today features vocabulary and areal features found in Talingian languages.

Phonology

Vusperian features a fairly modest consonant inventory, influenced by areal features from Talingian languages, most notably, the voiced and voiceless lateral fricatives. Uvular and glottal consonants merged with velars, and all labialised verbs (from West Caric) have lenited to long vowels.

Consonants

		Labial	Dental		Palatal	Velar
Nasal		m	n		ɲ	ŋ
Stop	Voiceless	p	t		(c)	k
Stop	Voiced	b	d		(ɟ)	ɡ
Fricatives	Voiceless	f	θ	s	ç	x
Fricatives	Voiced	v	ð	z	ʝ	ɣ
Laterals	Voiceless		ɬ
Laterals	Voiced		ɮ
Trill			r

Vowels

	Front				Central		Back
	Rounded		Unrounded		Central		Back
	Short	Long	Short	Long	Short	Long	Short	Long
High	i	iː	ʏ	yː	ʉ	ʉː	ʊ	uː
Mid	ɛ	eː	œ	øː	ə	ɵː	ɔ	oː
Open	æ	æː					ɑ	ɑː
Open	a	aː					ɑ	ɑː

Tones

Vusperian features a simple high, low and neutral tone system. The high tone originates from denasalised West Caric nasalised vowels, while the low tone developed from long vowels by the time Telodio-Chyrtaenese speakers began migrating into the Vusperian forests. Interestingly, contact with Talingian languages have revived long vowels independently.

	Tone marker
High	á
Low	à
Neutral	a