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| Livonian | |
|---|---|
| Līvõ kēļ [li:və ke:ʎ] | |
| Spoken in | LivoniaLatvia |
| Total speakers | Less than 50 |
| Language family | Finno-Ugric Finno-Permic Finno-Volgaic Finno-Lappic Baltic-Finnic |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-1 | none |
| ISO 639-2 | fiu (other Finno-Ugric languages) |
| ISO 639-3 | liv |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-based pronunciation key. | |
Livonian is a highly-endangered Finno-Ugric Language closely related to Finnish and Estonian, and sharing a high degree of mutual inteligibility with them. Livonian is spoken in Livonia, which is a territory within Latvia.
Livonian has 8 vowels, and differentiates between long and short sounds by marking long vowels with a "¯".
| Letter | Phonetic Value | Letter | Phonetic Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| a | [ɑ] | o | [o] |
| ā | [ɑ:] | ō | [o:] |
| ä | [æ] | ȯ | [ʊ] |
| ǟ | [æ:] | ȱ | [ʊ:] |
| e | [ɛ] | õ | stressed: [ɨ] unstressed: [ə] |
| ē | [ɛ:] | ȭ | stressed: [ɨ:] unstressed: [ə:] |
| i | [i] | u | [u] |
| ī | [i:] | ū | [u:] |
Livonian has 23 consonants. They are as follows:
| Letter | Phonetic Value | Letter | Phonetic Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| b | [b] | ņ | [ɲ] |
| d | [d̪] | p | [p] |
| ḑ | [ɟ] | r | [r] |
| f | [f] | ŗ | [rʲ] |
| g | [ɡ] | s | [s] |
| h | [h] | š | [ʃ] |
| j | [j] | t | [t̪] |
| k | [k] | ț | [c] |
| l | [l] | v | [v] |
| ļ | [ʎ] | z | [z] |
| m | [m] | ž | [ʒ] |
| n | [n], but [ŋ] if preceding [k] or [g]. |