Urianian is the language spoken mainly in the northeastern corner of Uriania, inherited from the descendants of Uttrediay, once masters of the whole island. It is an Indoeuropean language, but does not belong to any of the other main families of Indoeuropean. Rather it's a family of its own. Its closest relatives are Germanic and Celtic.
Uriania and the Urianians are mentioned in classical Greek and Latin literature. The earliest knowledge we have of their language is from names of places and persons mentioned in that literature. Soon after the beginning of the Common Era however, and a few of them predating it, we have inscriptions in Mait, the so-called Urianian runes, which are not really runes, but similar to them because they were meant to be carved on wood or stone. The language in these inscriptions is what we call Old Urianian.
From the 2nd century CE, inscriptions in Latin letters appear, and these compete successfully with the runes when the first real literature appears in the 4th century, although, for a while, a cursive version of the runes exists side by side with the Latin letters. After the 6th century, significant changes take place and we are talking of Late Old Urianian.
The decline of the Urianian civilisation becomes sharp after the 10th century and we have a phase of limited literary production in what we call Middle Urianian. Literature grows increasingly scarce and we have no basis for further subdivisions until the revival starts in the 17th century.
With the revival, a new phase called Modern or New Urianian begins. By this time, the highlands with their distinctive dialects had taken over as the cultural focus of the Urianians, and the new literature represents a marked contrast to the older phases. An early modern phase exists until the standardisations of the 19th century.
Timeline:
- Proto Urianian: until 200 BCE:
Onomastic data from classical sources.
- Early Old Urianian: 200 BCE - 200 CE: Inscriptions.
- Literary Old Urianian: 200 - 600 CE: Inscriptions and literature.
- Late Old Urianian: 600 - 1000.
- Middle Urianian: 1000 - 1600.
- Early Modern Urianian: 1600-1850.
- Modern Urianian: from 1850.