UKLO 2022

An abugida

HintMost of the scripts of India and South-East Asia work this way.

The whyHalf-way between an alphabet and a syllabary: the basic sign is a consonant, but you read it as consonant-plus-'a' unless a mark says otherwise. A small mark — above, below or beside the sign, depending on the script — switches the vowel to i, u, e or o. Spot the marks first and the vowels fall into place.

inherent

HintThe vowel you get for free.

The whyBecause the default vowel is invisible, the transliteration will have more letters than the script has signs. When a puzzle gives you the number of letters in a missing word, count the signs and add one vowel for every consonant sign; the totals should match — a quick check that you have read the marks correctly.

Locate the known words

HintLandmarks first, gaps second.

The whyMany scripts run words together, so the words you have been given are your only fixed points. Find each one in the script by matching its signs, mark where it starts and ends, and the unknown words are whatever is left between the landmarks. Each one you place narrows the next.

Gender and number

HintLook at which nouns take 'mo' and which take 'ma', then at the endings of each group.

The whyWhere English has one 'the', many languages have four or more, and the choice tells you two things about the noun at once. Sort the nouns by which form they take, then look at their endings: a language that marks gender on the article usually marks it on the noun as well, and the two must agree.

The consonants

HintWrite the three words without their vowels.

The whyArabic and its relatives build families of words on a skeleton of three consonants and vary the vowels around them. A puzzle in such a language can ask you to match words to meanings from nothing but that: strip out the vowels, find the skeleton you already know from the sentences, and the meaning follows.

Copying the next consonant

HintListen to what the following word begins with.

The whyOnly some consonants trigger the copy — the so-called sun letters — while the rest leave 'al-' alone. A puzzle that shows 'the' in several spellings is usually this rule in disguise: list which first letters change the article and which do not, and the two groups are your answer. Some marking schemes count the article as its own word — 2022's did — so its form can be worth a mark.

assimilation

HintCompare the last letter of the prefix with the first letter of what follows.

The why'In-' before 'l' becomes 'il-' (illegal); before 'r' it becomes 'ir-' (irregular); before 'p' it becomes 'im-' (impossible). When a puzzle prefix or article keeps changing its last consonant, check whether it is copying the first consonant of the word that follows.

Its shape

HintA rolled-up newspaper and a stick take the same verb.

The whyVerbs of placing in some languages sort objects the way English sorts them with 'a sheet of', 'a stick of', 'a lump of'. To translate a new noun, decide which class it belongs to — a ruler goes with sticks, a tray with sheets — and borrow the verb from a known noun of that class.

owner

HintWhich noun has moved compared with English?

The whyTrack two things when a puzzle uses an 'of' word: which noun comes first, and whether the 'of' word fuses with the article after it. Copy the pattern from a line you can already translate.

adjective

HintLook at what 'dirty' is telling you about the dog.

The whySpanish and French mostly do this too. In a puzzle, once you see a describing word after its noun in one line, keep that order in every translation you write — 'the dog dirty', 'the book small' — even though it feels backwards.

A determiner

HintThe word class that 'the' and 'my' both belong to.

The why'The' and 'a' are the articles, and with 'this', 'that', 'my', 'some' they form the determiner class. In puzzles a determiner may have several forms (by gender, number or the next sound), may be missing altogether, or may be glued to the noun — so always ask what the little word before each noun is doing.

spaces; vowel; position

HintThree things to check before translating a single line: the writing, the little words, the verb.

The whyEach is a check to run early. No gaps in the script? Use the words you are given as landmarks. A word for 'the' that sometimes loses a letter? Look at the sound before it. A verb that ignores an object's shape? Ask whether the object is lying flat or standing up. None is hard once noticed; all three are easy to miss.