Origins of sanokí
In the early part of the Era of the Kingdom, before Ebisédian gained widespread acceptance as the universal language, various other languages were in use. Some of these languages had elaborate writing systems; it was from these existing writing systems that the Kingdom Era scribes, who invented sanokí, got their letter-forms. These borrowed letter-forms were then adapted, modified, and fitted into the system of ligatures and diacritics that comprises sanokí.
The scribes trace the origins of these letter-forms to pictographs in the earliest known writings, which depicted objects and concepts the Ebisédi encountered in their everyday lives. Some of the sanokí letters are still quite pictographic. For example, the medial glyph for v is:
This is quite obviously a pictograph of the výi, a swirling, whirlpool-like phenomenon in the Ferochromon.
When the scribes borrowed these pictographs, they did not use them for the same sound(s) they may have represented in their original languages. Instead, they assigned to them the sound of the Ebisédian word for the depicted objects. Hence, the pictograph for v, which represented the výi, was adopted to represent the the Ebisédian v sound, although this was probably not its original pronunciation.
Below, we describe the origins of other pictographs that made it into sanokí.
Origins of the Glyphs
The vowel w
The medial glyph for the vowel w is:
By itself, it is not immediately clear what this symbol might be a pictograph of. However, the Kingdom Era scribes stated that this medial form of w was a simplification of its sentence-final form, which is:
This, the scribes explained, was a depiction of what one sees when journeying through a teleportal. The Theory of the Portals links teleportals with the “ether”, which in Ebisédian is wri—hence, the use of this symbol to represent the sound w.
The vowel u
The medial glyph for u, like the medial form of w, does not immediately give a clue as to what its original pictograph might have been:
But, as is the case with w, the sentence-final form is more suggestive:
This glyph looks like a simplified pictograph of a rectangular tablet with an inscribed triangle. The word for “inscribe” is úke—hence the use of this glyph for the sound u. The medial form is just a further-simplified form of this glyph.
In general, the sentence- and paragraph-final forms of many of the sanokí glyphs are the older, less-simplified forms of the corresponding medial forms, as we shall see in the next few examples.
The vowel ø
The medial form of ø is:
According to Kingdom Era scribes, this is a pictogram depicting the chogroním, a jellyfish-like creature known for its extremely pungent smell. The pronunciation of this glyph is based on the word øghaí, meaning “unpleasant smell”. The sentence-final form of this glyph is even more pictograph-like:
One can see the hanging tentacles of the chogroním in this glyph. The diacritical form of this vowel also resembles a twisty tentacle of the chogroním.
The consonant g
The medial and final forms of g are, respectively:
These glyphs developed from the pictograph of a hand, with the fingers poised to scratch an itch. The word for “itch” is gikí; hence the use of these glyphs to represent the sound g.
A funny consonant
The following two glyphs are the medial and sentence-final forms of the letter k, respectively.
The Kingdom Era scribes describe these glyphs as originating from pictographs representing the “kígɜtɜri”, a very unusual plant in the Ferochromon which walks on its lower branches as though they were feet. These bizarre feet-branches also double as roots for drinking liquids from the ground. The top circle in the glyphs is a simplification from the cluster of three circles in the original pictograph, depicting this plant's spherical “leaves”.
The Ebisédi were very amused by the kígɜtɜri, and so gave it its name, which means “funny plant”. The medial glyph depicts its whimsical walking gait, while the sentence-final glyph depicts it standing still. The scribes who adopted these glyphs had quite a sense of humour, as the letter k in Ebisédian was associated with one of the three “color essences” of the universe in Ebisédi philosophy, and thus was a highly-significant letter. Or at least, it was highly significant to the philosophers—the scribes obviously didn't think so.
The Erupting Consonant
The medial and sentence-final forms of the letter T are:
These two letters came from pictographs depicting volcanic eruptions. The corresponding word is Táva, which means “to vomit” or “to erupt”. The second glyph is particularly suggestive of a volcanic plume reaching to the clouds, with ash falling out from the sides.
The Consonant n
The two forms of the letter n are:
These glyphs are interesting because they both depict the same thing, the neck (nusí, which gives the pronunciation n), but from two different angles. The medial form shows a bit of the shoulders, whereas the sentence-final form shows the chin. The rationale behind this, however, is not known.
The Hungry Consonant
The glyphs for the letter c came from pictographs depicting eating. The corresponding Ebisédian words are cugrí (food), and cugáre (to eat). The medial, word-final, and sentence-final forms are shown below:
As can be seen, the sentence-final form is the most pictographic, depicting a mouth with food in it; whereas in the medial form, the food is missing. This may be just a natural process of glyph simplification; but one does suspect some scribe humour here, in that one gets no food in the middle of a word, a little bit of food at the end of a word, but a full bite only at the end of a sentence.
(The resemblance of this letter to the English letter C is purely coincidental.)
If there was a Choice
The two forms of the letter a are related to questions:
The medial form, according to the scribes, represents the subjunctive particle ana (meaning “if” or “suppose”). The pictograph is one of a raised forearm, with the palm upwards in a questioning manner. The sentence-final form depicts both arms raised in this manner, representing the interrogative particle áne (“is it so?” or “is it true?”)—the pictograph depicts the choice between “yes” and “no”.
A Tall Consonant
The medial and sentence-final forms of th are:
These were developed from pictographs depicting a tall person. The word for “tall” in Ebisédian is thøtai. The sentence-final form still retains the feet, which have been elided in the medial form.
As should be obvious by now, when the scribes borrowed the pictographs from the writing systems of the time, they often used a late (and hence more simplified) version of the pictograph as a medial form in sanokí, and an earlier, more elaborated form (hence more pictograph-like) as the sentence-final form. This was not always the case, however, as the next example shows.
Sleeping in the Hut
The medial form of jh is:
This glyph came from a pictograph depicting someone curled up in sleep. The corresponding word is jhumīn, “sleep”. Although it has been greatly modified from the original pictograph, one can still see a head curled up against a body.
The sentence-final form of jh, however, doesn't have very much to do with sleeping:
This glyph comes from a pictograph of a hut. The Ebisédian word for “hut” is jhíli. Ironically, this glyph is never used for the word jhíli itself, since the initial jh is always medial.
