pronunciation

Unlike English, NS words are pronounced the same way they are written. This is good news. It means that once you learn how to pronounce individual NS characters, you will be able to pronounce any NS word.

Stress is on the first syllable of short words. That syllable is only slightly emphasized, just like in the English words "table", "memory". Long words have stress at internal syllable finishing by three or more consonants just like in the English word "December".

However, Neoslavonic is an artificial language and therefore allows different kinds of stressing. Polish speakers, for example, will tend to put stress always on the second to last syllable of a word; Czechs will tend to put stress on the first syllable of a word.


alphabet

Neoslavonic actually uses two equivalent alphabets: Latin and Cyrillic. In addition, it also has a transcript available in ASCII and Greek alphabets, and it is possible to use the first-ever Slavic script: Glagolitic for your pleasure.

In this course we will use the Latin alphabet with a brief outline of its transcription in Cyrillic. Do take notice that Neoslavonic uses the English version of the Latin alphabet supplemented by three diacritically marked consonants č, š, ž and one diacritically marked vowel ě. These letters can be written using combinations of non-accented Latin letters as cz, sz, zh and ie (example: člověk = czloviek = a man).

There are no other accented letters or other "non-English" characters except those four. Neoslavonic Latin alphabet is derived from the international standard ISO 9 and the Russian state standard GOST and the United Nations standard UN 1987 made by the United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names (UNGEGN). Neoslavonic letters can be found in many Slavic languages (for example marked Latin letters č, š, ž, ě are in Slovenian, Croatian, Czech, Slovak, ... and Cyrillic letters are the same in Church Slavonic, Russian, Bulgarian, Serbian, ...). For your information, this system of Latin character diacritics has been introduced in the early 15th century by the Czech thinker, martyr and reformer Jan Hus.

Latin	Latin	Cyrillic	Greek	IPA	example	name
a	a	а	α	[a]	alphabet, but	a
b	b	б	μπ	[b]	beer, bird	be
c	c	ц	τσ	[ts]	cats	ce
č	cz	ц	τζ	[tʃ]	chimney, bench	če
d	d	д	δ	[d]	date, do, odd	de
dj	dj	дь	δι	[ɟ]	duty	dje
dž	dzh	дж	δζχ	[dʒ]	juice, gymnastics	dže
e	e	е	ε	[ɛ]	bed, yes	e
f	f	ф	φ	[f]	photo, leaf	ef
g	g	г	γ	[g]	go, get	ge
h	h	х	χ	[x]	loch (Scottish), José (Spanish)	ha
i	i	и	η	[i]	city, see, meat	i
ě	ie	ѣ (е)	ιε	[jɛ]	yes, bien (Spanish), piedra (Spanish)	jatj
j	j	ј (й)	ι	[j]	yes, you	je
ju	ju	ю	ιου	[jʊ]	you, cute	ju
k	k	к	κ	[k]	kill, skin	ka
l	l	л	λ	[l]	like, loop	el
lj	lj	ль	λι	[ʎ]	caballero (Spanish)	elj
m	m	м	μ	[m]	man, ham	em
n	n	н	ν	[n]	no, nose	en
nj	nj	нь	νι	[ɲ]	new, cognac, mañana (Spanish)	enj
o	o	о (ω)	ο (ω)	[ɔ]	law, talk, no (Spanish)	o
p	p	п	π	[p]	pen, spin	pe
q	q	к	κ	[k]	kill, skin	kve
r	r	р	ρ	[r]	sombrero (Spanish)	er
s	s	с	σ	[s]	see, city, pass	es
š	sz	ш	σχ	[ʃ]	she, shame	eš
št	szt	щ	σχτ	[ʃt]	š + t	šta
t	t	т	τ	[t]	to, motor	te
th	th	ѳ	θ	[θ]	thing, teeth	the
tj	tj	ть	τι	[c]	Tuesday, opportunity	tje
u	u	у	ου	[ʊ]	put, good	u
v	v	в	β	[v]	voice, have	ve
w	w	в	β	[v]	voice, have	dvojne ve
x	x	кс (ξ)	ξ	[ks]	sex, six	eks
y	y	ы (υ)	υ	[i]	city, see, meat	ypsilon
z	z	з	ζ	[z]	zoo, zombie, rose	zet
ž	zh	ж	ζχ	[ʒ]	pleasure, Jean (French)	žet
'	'	ъ	'	[ɜ̆]	very short sound from burn, earth, bird	jor

NS also has an auxiliary letter, which is actually a character without its own sound.  It is the letter "j" after consonants from the Latin alphabet and is called a "jer" or a "soft sign".   It has its own shape "ь" in the Cyrillic alphabet. This soft sign letter is used to represent a change in the pronunciation of an immediately preceding consonant - which in linguistics is called palatalization - by which the pronunciation of a consonant comes to be produced with the tongue in a position in the mouth near the palate.

Examples:  dj=дь, tj=ть, nj=нь, lj=ль

note:

1. There is no sound difference between characters i and y (as well as in modern Greek, for example). We use these two symbols of the same sound in order to express different grammatical information about gender and case in order to separate some homonyms only. In case of "simplified orthography", it is possible to write only one character i.
   
   
2. Letter ě=ѣ is pronounced in the same way as standard e and softens the preceding consonants from dě, tě, ně, lě to dj+e, tj+e, nj+e, lj+e. In other cases this character is pronounced as jotized e (eg. two sounds j+e). This character is often written in Cyrillic (and simplified Latin) as the standard e only.
   
   
3. Letter combination ch can be used instead of simple h also for the sound [x] but only in international words in order to keep original Greek/Latin orthography (archiv, chorus, for example).
   
   
4. Ligature ju=ю softens the preceding consonants from dju, tju, nju, lju to dj+u, tj+u, nj+u, lj+u. In other cases this character is pronounced as jotized u (e.g. two sounds j+u).
   
   
5. Some Slavic languages ​​(Slovak, Russian, ...) use vowels e and i for softening the preceding consonants in the same way as softening using ě and ju. NS language does not support softening using e and i, but only using ě and ju: The combination of the letters ne is pronounced only as n+e, and not as nj+e, or the combination of the letters ni is pronounced only as n+i, and not as nj+i, for example.
   
   
6. Neoslavonic has syllabic l and r, which behave in the same way as vowels when form syllables (the same situation is in Sanskrit, Croatian, Czech, Slovak, Slovenian, ...), but some modern national Slavic languages (Russian, Ukrainian, ...) lost this feature and therefore must combine r and l with standard vowels (ol and or, for example). Syllabic l and r typically stay between two consonants (e.g. p-r-st = a finger, sm-r-t = death, ...) and are written using preceding auxiliary character "jor" as 'l=ъл and 'r=ър in order to create syllable. In ordinary Latin alphabet application, it is not necessary to write "'" (e.g. p'rst  → prst, sm'rt  → smrt).
   
   
7. Old Church Slavonic (and similarly in modern Polish) has nasal vowels ę=ѧ=[æⁿ] and ǫ=ѫ=[oⁿ] plus their jotized versions. In accordance with the evolution of most Slavic languages, ​​we do not use nasals. There is simple application rule in order to nasal replacement: ę=ѧ → e and ǫ=ѫ → u.
   (e.g. język → jezyk = language, bǫdǫ → budu = I will be)
   
   

However, Neoslavonic is an artificial and auxiliary language and therefore allows different kinds of pronunciation. It will not be a big mistake, for example, if Russians or anybody else will pronounce e and i softly.