Volapük

Volapük is an international auxiliary language created by Johann Martin Schleyer in the 19th century. Its deliberately regular grammar and heavily altered vocabulary were designed for communication across language communities.

Volapük grammar: The rules governing word formation, inflection, syntax, and pronunciation in Volapük. Its regular inflections and word order show how the language structures sentences.
Johann Martin Schleyer: A German Catholic priest who created Volapük and promoted it as an international auxiliary language. His linguistic design and organizing efforts launched the Volapük movement.
Auguste Kerckhoffs: A Dutch-French linguist and cryptographer who led the Volapük movement in France and advocated language reform. His reform efforts challenged Schleyer's control and helped divide Volapük's supporters.
Esperanto: A planned international auxiliary language introduced by L. L. Zamenhof in 1887. Its clearer vocabulary and growing community overtook Volapük in influence.
World language: A language used widely across national or linguistic boundaries for communication. Volapük's movement tested whether a deliberately created language could gain this role.
Volapük vocabulary: The lexicon of Volapük, built largely from altered forms of words drawn from European languages. Schleyer reshaped familiar roots so extensively that their sources can be difficult to recognize.
Volapük movement: The late nineteenth-century network of clubs, publications, and congresses devoted to promoting Volapük. Its rapid growth turned an individual language project into an international community.
Louis Couturat: A French philosopher and logician who advocated international auxiliary languages and helped organize the Delegation for the Adoption of an International Auxiliary Language. His later work brought institutional scrutiny to the competing designs that followed Volapük.
Interlingua: A planned language introduced in 1951, using vocabulary designed to be recognizable to speakers of major Western European languages. Its recognizable roots contrast with Volapük's extensive alteration of source words.
Language planning: Deliberate efforts to shape a language's structure, status, or use. Volapük made language design and governance practical questions for an international community.

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