Volapük

Alternative forms

• Volapuk

Etymology

From Volapük Volapük.

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: Vo‧la‧pük

Proper noun

Volapük

1. An artificial language created in 1879 by Johann Martin Schleyer.
   • 1897 April 1, A. F. B. Crofton, “The Language of Crime”, in Popular Science Monthly‎, volume 50, ISSN 0161-7370, OCLC 488612811, page 834:

     ...some authors have claimed that the slang of the criminal was a kind of international language for thieves, a Volapük of crime.

   • 2004, Steven Roger Fischer, A history of language, Reaktion Books, →ISBN, page 180:

     The first practical constructed language was the south-west German Pastor Schleyer's Volapük from 1879; its complicated grammar and irregular vocabulary made learning difficult, however. The most successful has been Esperanto, devised by the Warsaw ophthalmologist Ludwig Zamenhof in 1887, that today can count some one million speakers.

Etymology

Borrowed from Volapük Volapük.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /voːlaːˈpyk/
• Rhymes: -yk

• Audio

  (file)

Proper noun

Volapük n

1. Volapük (definite article is often omitted)

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: Vo‧la‧pük

Proper noun

Volapük

1. (linguistics) Volapük

Alternative forms

• Vp (abbreviation)

Etymology

Compound of vola (“of the world / world's”), genitive singular of vol (“world”) + pük (“language”) (morpheme structure: vol (“world”) + -a (“genitive morpheme”) + pük (“language”) = volapük (“world language”) / Volapük (“World Language”), i.e., Johann Martin Schleyer's Weltsprache (“World Language / Universal Language”). Johann Martin Schleyer created the compound noun volapük (vol + -a + pük) by both simplifying and deforming the English words: world (world > wol > vol) and speak / speech (speak / speech > pik > pük), which produced (lowercase generic term) volapük (any "worldspeak" or "world language") versus (uppercase specific term) Volapük, "the" Worldspeak / World Language / Weltsprache.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /vo.laˈpyk/, [vo.laˈpyk]

Proper noun

Volapük

1. Volapük (rarely lowercase, compare the generic term volapük versus the specific language called Volapük)

Etymology

Borrowed form Volapük Volapük.

Proper noun

Volapük

1. Volapük