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Englese

 

English famously has a substantial amount of :Latinate words (either from Latin itself or through Romance languages like French). Englese takes this to its logical extreme: what if every word in English came from Latin?

 

Process:

If a word is already derived from Latin or a related language, congratulations, you don't need to do anything.

If it doesn't, then you just have to apply these simple steps:

  1. Look up the closest equivalent in your favourite Romance language (everyone has one).

  2. Roll a d6: if you roll a 1-2, copy the word as it is in that language. If you roll a 3-4, look up the etymology of that word and use that instead. If it's a 5-6, continue with the next steps.

  3. Go to the page for that word on Wiktionary and click on the etymology of the word until you get to the Latin word it's derived from (if it's not derived from Latin, act as if you rolled a 1-2).

  4. Look at the section for Descendants (if there's no such section or if it only has one item, act as if you rolled a 3-4).

  5. Using your own subjectivities, decide what an "average" of those words would look like, and use that.

For example, starting with <the>, I translate the word into Italian and get <la> and <il>. I prefer how the latter sounds, so I go with that one. I then roll a d6 and get a 6, so I look up the etymology of the word, and the word it's derived from, and so on until I get to <ollus>. There's no descendants table, so that's the end state of the word.

The pronunciation of the word is whatever it happens to be in its original language. If it happens to include anything that doesn't exist in English... too bad!

 

Result:

Here are the first 40 words in the English :Swadesh list, translated into Englese. :Click to expand.

 

Example:

The following text was modified from Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Tot human sedeō sone nacen lībera e equal in dignity e dīrēctus. Illa sone endowed de reason e conscience e deben actuar faciem ad ūnus alterum in un spirit de germānitās.

[tot ˈhjuːmən ˈsedeo sone ˈnasen ˈliːbera e ˈiːkwəl in ˈdɪɡnɪti e diːˈreːktus illa sone enˈdawd de ˈriːzən e ˈkɑːnʃəns e ˈdeben agˈtuar ˈfatʃiem ad ˈuːnus ˈalterum in un 'spɪrit de ɡerˈmaːnitas]

 

Conclusion:

This is by far the most cursed English in all of Cursed Englishes... for now!

 

:x Latinate

From Wiktionary: Of or derived from Latin.

:x Swadesh

No. Englese
1 ego
2 vus
3 él
4 noialtro
5 vósaltres
6 esse
7 iste
8 isse
9 echi
10 li
11 qui
12 quālis
13 u
14 quand
15 comment
16 no
17 tot
18 molt
19 quelques
20 pauc
21 alterum
22 ūnus
23 dos
24 trēs
25 cuatro
26 cinq
27 grandis
28 largus
29 anchle
30 gruixut
31 pesa
32 petit
33 curt
34 estret
35 prim
36 domina
37 hemō
38 persona
39 nen
40 sposa


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