conlang by
Viktor Medrano
vmed@hotmail.com
Lilipu is a conlang or "constructed language." Like the miniature Japanese bonsai tree, Lilipu exemplifies "Small is beautiful." It is designed as a language in which to create haiku, a Japanese poetic style, usually about nature, which generally has three lines with 5 syllables on the first, 7 on the second, and 5 on the last. Lilipu is a "tropicalistic" language.
In Lilipu, my ambition was to beat Rotokas in being even smaller. I wanted only 9 phonemes: 3 vowels, 6 consonants. The whole Lilipu alphabet is: a, i, k, l, m, p, u, v, '. (The names of these letters in Lilipu are: 'a, 'i, ka, la, ma, pa, 'u, va, 'iki.)
The three vowels are:
a as in father
i as in machine
u as in lunar
The six consonants are:
k as in skin
l as in love
m as in moo
p as in spin
v as in victory
' is a glottal stop, which is like the catch in the throat between the two o's in "co-ordinate."
The stress in Lilipu is always the last syllable of a polysyllabic word like vuluLU or mimaVU. The syllable structure is always consonant+vowel. There are no consonant clusters or diphthongs.
vima vululu
valuki va mimavu
vu pi'ili la
in a volcano
the dragon hides
the ring