Giantish

Writing System

Writing Medium & Style

Primarily carved into stone or wood for durability.
Sometimes painted, likely for temporary markings.
Standalone pictographic symbols, meaning each represents a single word or idea without needing combinations.
Simplified to only convey key ideas; grammatical markers are omitted.

Symbol Characteristics

More pictographic than abstract, meaning they resemble real-world objects rather than arbitrary shapes.
Evenly spaced, so each symbol stands clearly apart.
Simple but effective, designed to be easily recognizable even when roughly carved.

Writing Arrangement

Bottom to top direction remains standard.

Writing Context

Used for simple messages: property markings, warnings, directions.
Giants do not write often, so the script remains minimalistic and practical.
Likely carved on large surfaces, making it bold and visible from a distance.

Phonology

Consonants

Giantish has a balanced inventory of stops, fricatives, nasals, liquids, and glides, with a distinct emphasis on fricatives over voiceless stops.

Category	Phonemes
Stops	/b, d, g/
Affricates	/dʒ/
Fricatives	/h, v, z, ʒ, ɬ/
Nasals	/m, n, ɲ, ŋ/
Liquids	/l, ʁ/
Glides	/w, j/

Phonotactic Rules for Consonants

Consonant Clusters:

Clusters are limited to two consonants (CC).
The first consonant in a cluster must be a stop or fricative.
The second consonant in a cluster must be a liquid or glide.

Phonological Alternations:

/z/ occurs in syllable onsets and codas but shifts to /ʒ/ before vowels when in the middle of a word.
/w/ does not appear in word-initial position.

Vowels

Giantish has a rich vowel system with a clear contrast between short and long vowels.

Short Vowels	/i, e, a, o, u, y/
Long Vowels	/iː, eː, aː, oː, uː/
Diphthongs	/au, ou/

Phonotactic Rules for Vowels

Vowel Length & Stress:

Stressed vowels are always long.
Unstressed vowels default to short, except for /y/, which can appear in both stressed and unstressed positions.

Word-Initial Vowel Reduction:

Vowels at the start of words often reduce to /ə/, except when stressed, in which case they remain long.

Syllable Structure

Giantish follows a (C)VC syllable structure.

Stress System

Stress is dynamic but follows predictable rules:

Default Rule: Stress typically falls on the penultimate syllable.
Suffixation Rule: When a suffix is added, stress moves to the new penultimate syllable.
Strong Prefix Rule: A strong prefix maintains its stress, even if it disrupts the normal penultimate stress pattern.

Morphology

Nouns

Giantish nouns remain unchanged except for plural marking. There are no grammatical cases.

Singular & Plural

Singular: -/u/ (gadu → "stone")
Plural: -/uɬ/ (gaduɬ → "stones")

There are no optional collective markers.

Adjectives & Comparison

Adjectives use doubling to indicate intensity.

Basic: ɬaru gadu → "A tall stone."
Comparative: ɬaruɬaru gadu → "A very tall stone."

Doubling stops at two (ɬaruɬaruɬaru is not allowed) and there is no negative doubling (e.g., "kind of tall" is not expressed via reduplication). Giants do not say "a very, very tall stone"—there is no need for further intensification.

Verbs & Aspect System

Giantish has no tense system, but verbs must take an aspect suffix.
Present tense can be habitual or progressive, depending on context.

Aspect Suffixes

Habitual (-ʁo): Gadu ba gaduʁo. → "A stone, I usually build."
Progressive (-dʒu): Gadu ba gadudʒu. → "A stone, I am building."
Perfective (-daɬ): Gadu ba gadudaɬ. → "A stone, I have built."

There is no neutral verb form—every verb must have an aspect suffix.

Syntax

Word Order

Basic Structure: OSV (Object-Subject-Verb)
Alternative Word Order for Emphasis: SVO

Adjective & Adverb Placement

Adjectives appear before the noun they modify.
Adverbs appear before the verb.

Prepositional Phrases

Prepositions always appear before the noun they modify.
Prepositional phrases follow OSV order.

Questions

Questions are formed using tonal shifts.
Instead of a question word or particle, the tone of the last syllable rises to indicate a question.
This means word order remains the same, and no extra words are needed to mark a question.
The final syllable always carries the tonal shift.

Negation

Emphasized negation: If SVO order is used for emphasis, negation follows the pronoun instead. /ɬo/
Placement: Normally appears at the end of the sentence, after aspect markers.
Emphasized negation: If SVO order is used for emphasis, and the user wishes to ad emphasis to negation, negation may follow the pronoun instead.

Subordinate Clauses

Dependent clauses are embedded before the verb.

Rather than using a relative pronoun (e.g., "that"), Giantish embeds clauses before the main verb.
This keeps OSV structure intact while allowing for relative clauses.

Pronouns

Giantish pronouns are simple and can be omitted (pro-drop language).
There are no formality distinctions in pronouns.
The only grammatical gender distinction exists in the third-person singular.

Person	Neutral	Masc.	Fem.	Plural
1st (I/we)	/ba/	---	---	/baɬ/
2nd (you)	/da/	---	---	/daɬ/
3rd (he/she/they)	/ga/	/gadu/	/gada/	/gaɬ/