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Let's Make a Language: Day 2, The Nomads

Today we will discuss the culture and appearance of the Nomads, the speakers of this conlang in universe. If you are following along this entry will mostly be covering my answers to questions posed by Quothalinguist on their "day 4" of conlangyear. Here are a few sporadic notes I've come up since the last post. All subject to change in future updates.

What do they look like? What basic body parts do they have?

The Nomads are unmodified humans. All the regular human body parts apply.

Do they have any unique markings or characteristics?

The Nomads often have long hair, pinned or tied up, regardless of gender. They wear many styles of clothes, but the one I've chosen to illustrate below is that which would be worn by the Nomad's "shaman" or spiritual leader.

The color red is special to this people, they wear it in the form of bracelets, face paint, and even tattoo it into their skin. It represents life in reference to blood.

Mothers have tattoos across their mouth counting the children they have birthed or parented. In this culture, the more markings on the skin, the more respected the person is.

Spiritual leaders wear animal masks. For no particular reason at the moment, other than I liked how it looked on the design.

How do they move about in their environment?

Mostly on foot with pack animals carrying all their stuff.

Returning then, to the conlang.You can already see how this step not only adds flavor, but also aids in future word creations. I know now that I need a word for "spiritual leader", "nomad", at the very least the color red as a distinct color, a common word for a ceremonial mask, pack animals, and a smattering of regular human body-part words.

Join me again next time as I work out the phonemic inventory for this language...




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