Reimagining Volapük

A review of "Dictionary of the Neutral Language (Idiom Neutral)" 

Idiom Neutral is a conlang (constructed language) published in 1902. The “academy” behind the language consisted of disgruntled former supporters of Volapük, the peculiar “universal language” invented by Johann Martin Schleyer in 1879. While Volapük had an absolutely regular grammar, both the vocabulary and the rules for creating new words left much to be asked for. Here's a typical sentence in Volapük: “Blod olik li-emilagom glügabumis lejönik in Flent, Deut i Lusän, ven ätävom us?”. You grok? Schleyer was too proud of his brain-child to permit any changes, something that probably proved fatal to his “world speak” in the end.

Idiom Neutral was an attempt to reimagine Volapük on an entirely new basis, with a vocabulary more strictly based on the existing European languages, usually of the Romance language group. While still sounding somewhat artificial, Idiom Neutral is more immidiately comprehensible to educated Romance-speakers. Here's a sample: “Pro to on donin al cite le nome Babel, pro quei ti le Domino ha konfuzigati le lingue del toti monde e de iti il ha dispersata le homes adsur le toti tere.” Yes, it's from the Biblical story about the confusion of languages at the Tower of Babel, something of a cult text among conlang enthusiasts.

This particular product is a Idiom Neutral-English dictionary, also available free on the web. Since “the Neutral Language” is stone dead, although a couple of nerds have attempted to revive it, the book is of historical interest only. Like most other attempts at creating an international auxillary language, Idiom Neutral was swiftly outflanked by Esperanto and the Esperantist movement. And, I suppose, by English... :P