Archaic Lizardman language

Archaic Lizardman was the language of the Lizardmen and their ancient empire in the first five millenia of the Ancestral Era. It is also the very first language to be ever attested and have written records, other than the ritual Massenpreost Despotanfras language, which was attested during the same period as Archaic Lizardman. Even though the language was eventually eclipsed by Classical Lizardman and its descendants, it still served an important purpose by fossilizing the various native toponyms in Artograch.

A lot of words from now-extinct languages spoken by now-extinct species or peoples were transcribed into Archaic Lizardman, being the only source of knowledge of those languages.

Phonotactics
Archaic Lizardman had a relatively simplistic syllable structure:
 * An optional initial
 * An optional medial /r j w/
 * A mandatory vowel, as part of the final
 * An optional coda, which may be either
 * a glottal stop /ʔ/
 * a glide /j/ or /w/
 * the rhotic /r/
 * the sibilant /s/
 * one of the three unreleased stops /p̚ t̚ k̚/

Initials

 * The dental series /tʰ t d l/ were denti-alveolar
 * The alveolar series /n t͡sʰ t͡s d͡z s z r/ were apico-alveolar
 * /r j w/ also appear as medials
 * Some analyze the null-initial as a glottal-stop /ʔ/ initial.
 * /g/ is rare. It may have appeared only in loanwords from Massenpreost Despotanfras language.

Medials
Old Lizardman medials were /r j w/. With a few exceptions, they could appear before all initials:
 * Syllables with /j w/ initials may never have medials of any sorts. Some analyze such syllables as having null-initials, and the "initial" /j w/ as medials instead.
 * /r/ medial can never appear after /l/ initial

Finals

 * The schwa /ə/ never appeared in open syllables.