copyright © 2026 Dennis Paul Himes
Darmisan has sixteen consonants and five vowels. Each syllable consists of one of 41 possible onsets (including the null one) and twenty possible rhymes, for 820 possible syllables. In Darmisan orthography there's a letter for each non-null onset and one for each rhyme, so each syllable is written with one or two letters.
A syllable rarely starts with the same consonant that the previous syllable ends with, nor starts with m or ng if the previous syllable ends with n. Exceptions to this are all borrowings from other languages. (E.g. Stennari Province)
Darmisan does not have diphthongs. When a vowel follows another vowel in a word (which is rare, but happens), they are pronounced as two separate vowels.
Here is the Romanized version of Darmisan with the pronunciations in IPA and the Darmisan letters.
| r | /r/ | |
| m | /m/ | |
| n | /n/ | |
| ng | /ŋ/ | |
| p | /p/ | |
| t | /t/ | |
| k | /k/ | |
| pr | /pr/ | |
| tr | /tr/ | |
| kr | /kr/ | |
| b | /b/ | |
| d | /d/ | |
| g | /g/ | |
| br | /br/ | |
| dr | /dr/ | |
| gr | /gr/ | |
| f | /f/ | |
| s | /s/ | |
| sh | /ʃ/ | |
| fr | /fr/ | |
| sr | /sr/ | |
| shr | /ʃr/ | |
| st | /st/ | |
| sht | /ʃt/ | |
| str | /str/ | |
| shtr | /ʃtr/ | |
| sp | /sp/ | |
| shp | /ʃp/ | |
| spr | /spr/ | |
| shpr | /ʃpr/ | |
| sk | /sk/ | |
| shk | /ʃk/ | |
| skr | /skr/ | |
| shkr | /ʃkr/ | |
| v | /v/ | |
| z | /z/ | |
| zh | /ʒ/ | |
| vr | /vr/ | |
| zr | /zr/ | |
| zhr | /ʒr/ | |
| u | /u/ |  |
| o | /o/ |  |
| a | /a/ |  |
| e | /e/ |  |
| i | /i/ |  |
| un | /un/ |  |
| on | /on/ |  |
| an | /an/ |  |
| en | /en/ |  |
| in | /in/ |  |
| us | /us/ |  |
| os | /os/ |  |
| as | /as/ |  |
| es | /es/ |  |
| is | /is/ |  |
| ur | /ur/ |  |
| or | /or/ |  |
| ar | /ar/ |  |
| er | /er/ |  |
| ir | /ir/ |  |
An R, N, or S between two vowels, or an S after a vowel, and at the beginning of what is a legitimate consonant cluster, will usually be part of the following syllable. Most exceptions are in borrowings from other languages, but there are a few native exceptions.
The Vowels A, E, and I are often pronounced laxly, as /ɑ/, /ɛ/, and /ɪ/, in unstressed nonfinal syllables and in syllables ending in S or N, depending on dialect (and ideolect). Word final A is also often lax, or reduced to a schwa, /ə/. So the name Shensta is usually pronounced /'ʃɛn stɑ/ or /'ʃɛn stə/. In some dialects syllable final /s/ becomes /z/ before voiced consonants. Syllable final /n/ becomes /m/ before /p/, /b/, /f/, /v/, and /m/, and it becomes /ŋ/ before /k/, /g/, and /ŋ/. In some dialects syllable final /n/ becomes the nasalization of the preceeding vowel.
The only punctuation in Darmisan is a raised dot in between words. The end of a sentence is not usually indicated, although writers will sometimes start a new sentence on a new line.
Darmisan words are usually stressed on the first syllable, except for nouns which are pluralized by repeating all or part of the first syllable. Those plurals are stressed on the second syllable. A few words, mostly recent borrowings from other languages, have nonstandard stress. This is not marked in the orthography, however.
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