ᑌᓀ ᔭᕱ — ᑌᓀ ᔭᕠ (Chipewyan) Syllabarium

Below is the complete Chipewyan Syllabarium, using only characters defined by Unicode. Please note that several characters may not display properly, as they have not been included in Unicode.

Dënesųłiné syllabics were introduced by two sets of missionaries, French Catholic, and English Anglican. Consequently, there exist the two quite different systems shown below. I have labeled these F-C (French Catholic) and E-A (English Anglican); I would appreciate it if anyone knew of better Dëne terms for these two orthographic traditions.

Each has advantages over the other: the F-C marks nasal vowels (ᐮ - ą) and ejectives (ᒈ - k'a), while the E-A differentiates the vowels /o/ and /u/, has fewer digraphs, and makes more economical use of ᗴ and ᘔ. However, both systems are insufficient in certain respects by combining different sounds into one letter, or by omitting certain sounds altogether. With a few minor adjustments, each system can accurately represent the phonology of the langauge.

Several of the E-A tradition /u/ vowel syllabics are not included as distinct characters in Unicode, therefore I have used the non-spacing dot accent to attempt to put the dot above the syllabic. Note that depending on the font you are using, the dot may instead be somewhere in the middle of the syllabic instead of on-top.

Some characters are missing altogether, and I have been left as Private Use Area characters, consequently you must use the fonts from this site to see them. These characters are 187? English tradition l-final and g-final.

These syllabaries did not differentiate all of the distinct sounds (phonemes) of the language, e.g. both systems write /ts/ and /ts'/ with the same symbol(s). In general, this likely causes little difficulty for fluent speakers who can infer the correct phoneme from context. Actual spelling in syllabics texts is on the whole, quite irregular.

The onsets in (round brackets) were not included in the charts, because the sound is written with two symbols (digraph). Digraphs are written with a “final” plus a syllabic. Symbols in {curly brackets} represent sounds which appear in the “finals” column of the F-C syllabic charts. No Roman values are given in the traditional syllabaria for the finals, nor do they line up with the syllabic series to their left.

Tone is not written, while /h/ at the end of a syllable very rarely, if ever, appears. Neither system differentiates /e/ from /ë/—its phonological status being only recently determined. Both traditions use the Roman period 〈.〉 instead of the syllabic version 〈᙮〉. Some F-C texts use the asterisk ᕯ to indicate a proper name.

E-C texts very often confuse the raised finals (which are diacritics to be combined with the following syllabic, like ᒢᕍ /ł/) and base-line finals (which represent a consonant sound at the end of a syllable, like ᖘᐣ “shin”–modern /shɛn/). This is probably due to the fact that such texts were printed in London, England, by printers who were reading hand-written texts in a language they didn’t understand.

The examples below were taken directly from syllabics texts, LeGoff’s Dictionnaire, or Elford’s dictionary. Elford, contrary to Cook and NWT’s standardised orthography, transcribes the two “e” sounds as /e/ and /ɛ/; this is how I have written them below.

Notes on F-C orthographies

1. Here the ogonek or “hook” accent (as in standard Roman orthography) 〈ą〉 stands for "nasal vowel". A nasal vowel (V̨) without a consonant onset gets unique characters in Unicode, but nasal vowel which is part of a consonant-vowel syllable (CV̨) does not, and must be, in Unicode, a combination of two glyphs.
2. In F-C books, there are two types of final, one being top line, the other being mid-line. Mid-line finals are fairly straightforward: writing a consonantal sound at the end of a syllable: e.g. ᑯᐣ /kón/ (fire), or combining with the proceeding syllabic to form a digraph: e.g. ᐟᘔ /dza/ (pigeon). Finals do not generally distinguish voicing, i.e. ᐊᑋ could be either /ath/ or /adh/.

   The three top-line finals are more difficult to analyse, and have been irregularly and inaccurately described in most syllabics charts.

   1. ᐥᐊ is not on LeGoff’s chart, but appears in the body of the text. In the K'áshogot'ine (Hare) French missionary text, the symbol ᐥ is explained as “indique une forte aspiration” (indicates a strong aspiration), whereas in LeGoff’s Dictionnaire, he describes the sound as “signifier que la syllabe, qui le suit, doit toujours s’attaquer brusquement” (signifies that the syllable that follows, has an abrupt attack). The sound is in fact the glottal stop /ʔ/, as verified by the Dictionnaire’s example “beʺinʺaë - son serviteur” (his servant) which is “dɛnɛ ʔįʔahɛ” in Elford’s dictionary.
   2. For the ᐊᑊ-series, LeGoff—like other French writers— puts the ᑊ-symbol before the vowel in his text, but, oddly, after the vowel on his chart, it’s phonetic value being [h]. In LeGoff’s Grammaire, /h/ is simply described as toujours aspiré (always aspirated); he does not differentiate between /h/ and /x/ in finals. There is no unique /h/-final. LeGoff’s analysis of final /h/ is interesting because it corresponds in some ways to Cook’s assertion that—in some dialects—what has been written by some linguists as final /h/, is in fact a [ç] sound (the “ch” sound in German ich), which Cook classifies as /sh/. The [ç] sound is most certainly a soufflement du palais (see note iii). When the raised diacritic ᑊ is written after a ᑕ- or ᑲ-series symbol—as in ᑕᑊ and ᑲᑊ, the result is the ejective /t’/ and /k’/ respectively.
   3. Most interesting is the raised ᒼ symbol: e.g. ᒼᐊ, ᒼᑲ. Both the K'áshogot'ine text and LeGoff's Grammaire explain that it représente un soufflement du palais (represents a palatal rasping). Comparisons with modern Roman orthography and E-A texts show that French-tradition ᒼᑕ (later merged into ᕳ) is E-A ᕦ /t/, ᒼᑲ is ᑲ /k/, and ᒼᕍ is ᒢᕍ /ł/. As /h/ was not written by English-tradition authors, one cannot compare ᒼᐊ. In most modern linguistic sources, ᕳ is given as “tya”, a phoneme that does not exist independently in Dënesųłiné, or simply “tᒼa” with no explanation of what this should sound like. This is a misinterpretation of the French word palais, which can be either the hard palate or soft palate (palatal and velar in linguistics jargon respectively). Dene languages have a fairly noticeable velar affrication after voiceless stops, i.e. /ta/ can be pronounced /txa/. French ears do not expect any aspiration after voiceless stops (/t/, /k/), so when they hear the strong /x/ sound, they single the sound out as remarkable and phonemic. The English missionaries did not do so, as English also aspirates voiceless stops anyway.
      • So the ᕳ series does not represent [ty], but /t/ [t, tx]: ᕳᖊ “ᒼtaρe”–“three” is modern /taghε/.
      • The ᒼᑲ series is /k/ [k, kx]: ᒼᑲᖊ “ᒼkaρe”–“wound” is modern /εkaghέ/
      • ᒼᕍ is /ł/, as in ᒼᕊᐁ “ᒼloue”–fish in the current orthography is /łuε/.
      •  A combination such as ᒼᐁ indicates the sound /x/ as in ᒼᐁᒼᔆ “ᒼiᒼl”–“darkness”, modern /xił/. At the end of a syllable, ᒼ can also be pronounced as /gh/, as in ᒼᕊᐁ ᗱᒼ “ᒼlouè tchoᒼ”–“whale”, written today as /łuεcogh/.
3. LeGoff (1890) alone among French missionary writers uses ᒼᔆ as a final for /ł/, other writers do not distinguish between /ł/ and /l/.
4. In the book ᑌᓀᔭᑎᐟᔦ (whose syllabics are based on the French system), there are two distinct series given: ᗃ and ᖍ, where the other Chipewyan syllabaria only have one—written either ᖍ or ᗃ (depending on the font). ᑌᓀᔭᑎᐟᔦ published in Saskatchewan, is not terribly modern (or accurate) in its Roman transliteration of the syllabics. According to ᑌᓀᔭᑎᐟᔦ, the ᖍ-series represents “ra”, while ᗃ is “ra, qua”. In comparing the vocabulary of this work with others with a more consistent and up-to-date phonological analysis: ᗃ is /gh/, as in ᕳᗁ /taghe/, given as “tᒼa qi” (three). ᖍ is /r/, as in ᓴᖋᐊᘚ /sáreaze/, given as “se re a ze” ([my] granddaughter).
5. The Dene /r/ is like the Spanish (tapping the tongue behind the teeth, or alveolar tap) or the North American English's “d” in “ladder”. Both E-A and F-C traditions equate /r/ with /d/, so the Dene word “this” ᑎᑎ /didi/ which is in today’s roman orthography /diri/. At the end of a word though, the F-C system uses the r-final ᐁᔦᙆ for /eyer/ “that”. Treating /r/ as a /d/ is historically justified.
   
   In his Roman orthography, LeGoff differentiated the French “r” (a voiced uvular fricative or trill made way at the back of the throat) from the Dene /gh/: he wrote French “r” as “r”, and /gh/ as “ρ” (the Greek letter rho). In Syllabics, the “ρ” /gh/ sound was written using the ᗃ series (final ᐊᙆᑋ), while the French “r” had a final only: ᐊᙆ. Works by other writers treat “ρ” and French “r” as the same, written with the ᖍ-series (final ᐊᙆ). French words, especially names like Marie and Pierre, are thus written as ᒪᖋ “maghi” and ᐱᔦᙆ “biyegh”.
6. There is some variation between ᐠᕍ and ᐟᕍ for the /tl/ sound .
7. LeGoff (1890) gives an additional final ᐊ^F.
8. Unlike in Hare, the Chipewyan final ᐊᑋ represents a /th/ or /dh/ sound, as in ᗯᑋ /shɛ́th/ “hill”.

Notes on E-A Orthographies

1. The acute accent ᐊ́ (or tilde is ᐊ̃) is very uncommon, and seems to appear only over ᕦ: ᕦ́. The syllabary tables in the Anglican texts do not explain the significance of the accent, but the Roman texts transliterate ᕦ́ as “tah”. In the pages of text that I have, the only words containing the accent are ᓭᕦ́, ᐯᕦ́, ᐅᕦ́, and ᓅᕦ́. These must be /sεtá/ “my father”, /bεtá/ “his/her father”, /hotá/ “?”, and perhaps /nutá/ “our father”. For example, the first word in the 1881 Lord’s Prayer is ᓄ̇ᕦ́́. Therefore the accent does not seem to have a sound at all, but functions as an identifier for the word “father”. In Slavey (1890), the accent also occurs over the name “John” ᗱ́ᐣ.
2. In some texts, ᒡᕍ /tla/ can be found. One can also very rarely find the syllabic ᒡᗴ , which is /cha/; yet most of the time, /ch/ is written without the ᒡ raised final (e.g. the word ᗱ̇ is /chu/).
3. A raised d-final ᐊᐨ appears before certain syllabics
   • ᐨᕦ — Sayisi /t’/ as in ᐨᕦᐣᐨᕤ
   • ᐨᘔ — /dz/
   • ᐨᕍ — /dl/
   • ᐨᒐ — /ddh/ /tth/
4. Confusingly, the French tradition and English tradition write /ze/ /zi/ or /tse/ /tsi/ using opposite forms of the syllabics ᘚ and ᘛ.
5. The Sayisi final ᕁ is variously given as /ye/ or /yi/. Yet there are many words ending in /-ye/ which do not use the final: ᐯᘚᔦ /bedzie/ “his/her heart”. From what little Sayisi material I have, it seems that the ᕁ is related to the benefactive particle /ha/.