luvutaan

Luvutaan is a constructed language (conlang) developed for the fictional world of Luvutia by linguist Mara Jansen in the late 1990s. It is designed to be plausible and expressive, with a focus on agglutinative morphology, vowel harmony, and a flexible word order. The language is used in literature, role-playing games, and fan productions. It has a documented grammar and a small but active community of learners.

Phonology features a moderately sized consonant inventory, including voiceless stops, sonorants, fricatives, and a set of palatal and velar sounds. There are eight vowels with harmony influenced by rounding. Syllable structure is typically CV or CVC, with stress on the penultimate syllable in most words. The orthography uses a Latin-based script with diacritics to indicate vowel quality.

Morphology is primarily agglutinative, adding suffixes for case, number, and mood. The noun system has five cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, and locative. Verbs are conjugated for aspect and mood rather than tense, with participles forming relative clauses. Pronouns distinguish inclusive and exclusive first-person plural.

Syntax follows a neutral subject–object–verb (SOV) order in simple clauses but allows flexibility for emphasis or poetry. Numerals and adjectives typically precede nouns, and adjectives do not inflect for agreement. The language supports both pre-nominal and post-nominal modifiers via clitic particles.

In-world, Luvutaan is spoken by the inhabitants of the Luvutan Islands, with regional dialects reflecting trade, migration, and cultural exchange. The language features in novels, games, and linguistic studies, and it continues to develop through community contributions and official rulings by the language authority in the fictional setting.