Orthography and Phonology

Nordsippisk uses a deliberately small vowel inventory and a mostly familiar Latin consonant inventory, with þ and ð retained for the two English-like “th” sounds.

The letters:

c q x y

are not used.

Spelling is intended to carry useful pronunciation information rather than preserve historical accidents.

General principles:

• written consonants are pronounced;
• there are no silent consonants;
• fixed digraphs represent defined consonant units;
• consonant clusters are pronounced literally;
• vowel length is predictable from spelling;
• diphthongs are disallowed unless explicitly introduced later;
• stress is predictable;
• affixation does not rewrite roots.