Nellestensivo

Nellestensivo is a fictional constructed language developed for speculative fiction and conlang communities as part of the Nellest world-building project. Within its fictional universe, Nellestensivo serves as the official lingua franca of the island nation of Nellesta, and a vehicle for exploring sociolinguistic ideas such as contact-induced change and language shift.

Phonology and morphology: The language features 24 consonants and 7 vowels, with vowel harmony that affects suffix vowels. Syllable structure is typically CV or CVC, and stress falls on the penultimate syllable. Nellestensivo is mainly agglutinative, encoding grammatical relations and evidential stance through mounting suffix chains on nouns and verbs.

Syntax and grammar: The basic word order is subject–verb–object, with adjectives preceding nouns and modifiers often following the noun phrase in certain registers. Nouns mark case and number; verbs incorporate tense, aspect, mood, voice, and evidentiality via affixes. The language also employs a limited set of particles to indicate negation and question formation.

Writing and usage: In-world texts are usually rendered in a Latin-based alphabet with diacritics to reflect vowel harmony and stress. In the narrative, Nellestensivo is taught in schools and used in official discourse, ceremonial speech, and literature, though it coexists with a global lingua franca in informal settings. In fan materials, it is described as endangered by language replacement and rapid dialect leveling.