List of constructed languages
The following list of notable constructed languages is divided into auxiliary, ritual, engineered, and artistic languages, and their respective subgenres. All entries on this list have further information on separate Wikipedia articles.
Auxiliary languages
are languages constructed to provide easy, fast, and/or improved communication among all human beings, or a significant portion, without necessarily replacing native languages.| Name | ISO | Origin | Creator | Description |
| Solresol | 1827 | Based on pitch levels sounded with their solfege syllables although no knowledge of music is required to learn it. | ||
| Communicationssprache | 1839 | Based on French. | ||
| Universalglot | 1868 | An early a posteriori language, predating even Volapük. | ||
| Volapük | vo, vol | 1879–1880 | First to generate international interest in IALs. | |
| Esperanto | eo, epo | 1887 | The most popular auxiliary language ever invented, including, possibly, up to two million speakers, the highest ever for a constructed language and the only one to date to have its own native speakers. | |
| Spokil | 1887 or 1890 | An a priori language by a former Volapük advocate. | ||
| Mundolinco | 1888 | The first Esperantido. | ||
| Bolak, "Blue Language" | 1899 | Prospered fairly well in its initial years; now almost forgotten. | ||
| Idiom Neutral | 1902 | A naturalistic IAL by a former advocate of Volapük. | ||
| Latino sine Flexione | 1903 | "Latin without inflection", it replaced Idiom Neutral in 1908. | ||
| Ro | 1904 | An a priori language using categories of knowledge. | ||
| Ido | io, ido | 1907 | The most successful offspring of Esperanto. | |
| Adjuvilo | 1910 | An Esperantido some believe was created to cause dissent among Idoists. | ||
| Interlingue | ie, ile | 1922 | A sophisticated naturalistic IAL, also known as Occidental. | |
| Novial | nov | 1928 | Another sophisticated naturalistic IAL by a famous Danish linguist. | |
| Sona | 1935 | Agglutinative language with universal vocabulary. Its 360 radicals can be combined to form new words. | ||
| Esperanto II | 1937 | Last of linguist Saussure's many Esperantidos. | ||
| Mondial | 1940s | Naturalistic European language. | ||
| Glosa | igs | 1943 | Originally called Interglossa, has a strong Greco-Latin vocabulary. | |
| Blissymbols | zbl | 1949 | An ideographic writing system, with its own grammar and syntax. | |
| Interlingua | ia, ina | 1951 | A major effort to systematize the international scientific vocabulary. It aims to be immediately comprehensible by Romance language speakers and to some extent English speakers. | |
| Intal | 1956 | An effort to unite the most common systems of constructed languages. | ||
| Romanid | 1956 | A zonal constructed language based on the Romance languages. | ||
| Lingua sistemfrater | 1957 | Pham Xuan Thai | Greco-Latin vocabulary with southeast Asian grammar. | |
| Neo | neu | 1961 | A very terse Esperantido. | |
| Babm | 1962 | Notable for using Latin letters as a syllabary. | ||
| Guosa | 1965 | Made for use in West Africa. | ||
| Arcaicam Esperantom | 1969 | 'Archaic Esperanto', developed to produce an archaic effect in Esperanto literature. | ||
| Afrihili | afh | 1970 | A pan-African language. | |
| Kotava | avk | 1978 | A sophisticated a priori IAL focused on cultural neutrality. | |
| Uropi | 1986 | Based on the common Indo-European roots and the common grammatical points of the IE languages. | ||
| Poliespo | 1990s? | Esperanto grammar with significant Cherokee vocabulary. | ||
| Romániço | 1991 | Vocabulary is derived from common Romance roots. | ||
| Europanto | 1996 | A "linguistic jest" by a European diplomat. | ||
| Unish | 1996 | Vocabulary from fifteen representative languages. | ||
| Lingua Franca Nova | lfn | 1998 | Romance vocabulary with creole-like grammar. | |
| Slovio | 1999 | A constructed language based on the Slavic languages and Esperanto grammar. | ||
| Interslavic | 2006 | A naturalistic language based on the Slavic languages. | ||
| Sambahsa-Mundialect | 2007 | Mixture of simplified Proto-Indo-European and other languages. | ||
| Lingwa de planeta | 2010 | Worldlang based on Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Hindi, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish. |
Controlled languages
s are natural languages that have been altered to make them simpler, easier to use, or more acceptable in certain circumstances, such as for use by people who do not speak the original language well. The following projects are examples of controlled English:| Name | Origin | Creator | Comments |
| Basic English | 1925 | Charles Kay Ogden | Seek to limit the language to a given list of common-use words and terms in order to make it simpler to foreign learners or other people who may have difficulties. |
| Special English | 1959 | Voice of America | Seek to limit the language to a given list of common-use words and terms in order to make it simpler to foreign learners or other people who may have difficulties. |
| Globish | 2004 | Jean-Paul Nerrière | Seek to limit the language to a given list of common-use words and terms in order to make it simpler to foreign learners or other people who may have difficulties. |
| E-Prime | 1940s | D. David Bourland Jr. | Eliminates the verb to be with the intent of making writing more expressive and accurate. |
| Simplified Technical English | 1983 | European Association of Aerospace Industries | Seeks to largely reduce the complexity and ambiguity of technical texts such as manuals. |
| Parallel English | 1998 | Madhukar Gogate | A constructed language, which is based on, but independent of, English. |
| Plain English | Various | Proposes a more direct, short, clear language by avoiding many idioms, jargon and foreign words. |
Visual languages
Visual languages use symbols or movements in place of the spoken word. Constructed sign languages also fall in this category.| Name | ISO | Origin | Creator | Comments |
| Blissymbols | zbl | 1949 | Charles K. Bliss | Based on an ideographic writing system. |
| Gestuno | ils | 1970s | Jasin Maloku | International sign language. |
Ritual languages
These are languages in actual religious use by their communities or congregations.| Name | ISO | Origin | Creator | Comments |
| Eskayan | esy | c. 1920–1940 | Mariano Datahan | Grammatically based on the Boholano dialect of Cebuano. |
| Medefaidrin | 1930s | Obɛri Ɔkaimɛ church | Used by this Nigerian Christian church; said to be of sacred origin. | |
| Damin | unknown | the Lardil people | Created by native speakers of Lardil; only click language outside Africa. |
Engineered languages
s are devised to test a hypothesis or experiment with innovative linguistic features. They may fall into one or more of three categories: philosophical, experimental and logical.| Name | ISO | Origin | Creator | Description |
| Logopandecteision | 1653 | Sir Thomas Urquhart | Suggestions toward a taxonomic language of great complexity. | |
| Unnamed language | 1668 | John Wilkins | Detailed suggestions for a symbolic language capable of philosophical precision. | |
| Isotype | 1925–1934 | Otto Neurath et al. | A pictographic language. | |
| Loglan | 1955 | James Cooke Brown | Created to test the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis; the inspiration for Lojban. | |
| aUI | 1962 | W. John Weilgart | Each phoneme is also a morpheme and a sememe, so that a single word can express a complex idea. | |
| Ithkuil | 1978–2011 | John Quijada | Complex language designed to express deeper meanings briefly and clearly. | |
| Láadan | ldn | 1982 | Suzette Haden Elgin | A tonal language oriented towards women; created to test if natural languages are biased towards men. |
| Lojban | jbo | 1987 | Logical Language Group | Logical and syntactically unambiguous language; successor of Loglan. |
| Toki Pona | 2001 | Sonja Lang | Minimalist language with small vocabulary which reflects Taoist philosophy. | |
| Kēlen | 2009 | Sylvia Sotomayor | An alien language that attempts to eliminate verbs, which would violate a universal feature among natural human languages. |
Others
Artistic/fictional languages
Languages used in fiction
J. R. R. Tolkien
''Star Wars''
Other literature
Comic books
Film
Television
Music
Games
[Toy]s
Other
- Spocanian, language of Spocania, developed by Rolandt Tweehuysen starting from 1962.
- Bartonian, conlang from Austria, similar to polish and german.
Alternative languages
| Name | Origin | Creator | Description |
| Brithenig | 1996 | Andrew Smith | A Romance language that replaced native Celtic languages in Great Britain instead of the Germanic Anglo-Saxon. |
| Wenedyk | 2002 | Jan van Steenbergen | Polish as a Romance language. A language with Polish phonetics and orthography but with Romance instead of Slavic vocabulary. |
Micronational languages
- Talossan, by R. Ben Madison
Personal languages
| Name | Origin | Creator | Description |
| Lingua Ignota | 12th century | Hildegard of Bingen | Latin-influenced mystical language. |
| Balaibalan | c. 14th to 16th century | Muhyî-i Gülşenî | Language with mostly a priori vocabulary and written in Arabic script; influenced by Persian, Turkish and Arabic. |
| Enochian | late 16th century | John Dee, Edward Kelley | Purported Angelic language, possibly used in magic and occultism. |
| Vendergood | early 20th century | William James Sidis | Based mainly on Latin and Greek, with influence from German, English and Romance languages. Contains eight moods, including Sidis's own strongeable, and has a base twelve number system. |