Apupiwe

Senary vocabulary§

Apupiwe's own numbers are base 10, and everyday measurement uses today's units with borrowed names (language.md, rules 9–10). Since 2026-10-09 senary is a topic the language can talk about, for the author's worldbuilding among other things, not a system built into it (author's ruling). This file holds the words for it. From 2026-10-08 to 2026-10-09 senary was the language's own measurement system; the sections below were written then and still describe how senary is said.

Numbers in this file are senary. In speech, put senali before a senary number whenever it isn't obvious (senali sa po = 20₆ = 12). The base-6 place and scale words (nobi 6, miko 36, niyu 216, yiyo 6⁴ …) are used only for senary.

How the two repos divide the work§

Repo Owns Source of truth
senary (its own repo, to be published) the quantities: unit definitions, exact values, constants, the calendar's arithmetic src/senary_tables.py
this repo the words: unit names, number words, how measurements are said data/units.tsv, data/numbers.tsv, this file

Neither repo copies the other's job. If senary changes a definition, nothing here changes unless a unit is added or removed. If this repo renames a word, senary's numbers are unaffected. Since senary r22 (2026-10-09) senary itself uses this language's words for every unit and prefix, and derives its written symbols from them (first two letters: ago → Ag; sigi takes Sg so it can't be read as SI). Its old working labels (Kena, Nira…) survive only in its pre-r22 history.

Unit words§

Each senary name was kept only if, after adapting sounds the language lacks (r → l, v → w, z → s), it was no more confusable than the 90th percentile of ordinary words, and passed the drift and juncture rules. One name survived: Wela. The rest were re-picked by the optimizer. The worst original was fuka "pressure", about 270 times as confusable as a typical word, mostly with futa "woman". Built by tools/units.py (removed 2026-10-09 as single-use; in git history).

Quantity Word Senary's working label before r22 Size
time nane Kena 0.3086 s (a day is 6⁷ of them)
length ago Nira 1.530 m
mass fomi Woba 1.513 kg
charge yoke Vema 0.7592 C
temperature interval sigi Buda 2.031 K
angle meno Faga 1 turn
frequency kanwi Beva 1 cycle per Kena (3.24 Hz)
force sandu Wida 24.30 N
pressure ogen Fuka 10.38 Pa
energy kisu Koda 37.19 J
power geye Noza 120.5 W
voltage kewen Kiwa 48.99 V
resistance gansu Nawa 19.92 Ω
capacitance wela Wela 0.01550 F
inductance kokan Fiba 6.147 H
magnetic flux density sobon Bora 6.457 T
temperature scale tilo Vona reading = T/Buda − 134.5
information noyon Vuta one senary digit (ln 6 natural units)
count of entities senan Kuza 6³⁴ entities (the mole's role)
particle mass masin Neta 6⁻³⁴ of the mass unit

Unnamed quantities are compounds of unit words, following the usual head-first rule: velocity = length per time.

Saying a measurement§

The unit comes first and the number follows, like any counted noun: - ago te = 5 length units. - fomi sa nobi = 2·6 = 12 mass units (senary place words).

Scale words are number words. There are no separate prefixes: - 6⁴ yiyo, 6⁸ gife, 6¹² yuli - 6⁻⁴ kufe, 6⁻⁸ bafo, 6⁻¹² genwi (coined 2026-10-09 so the set is symmetric)

So ago te yiyo = 5 × 1296 length units (about 9.9 km). Senary writes the same words as prefixes: yiyoAg.

One generative rule, six shortcuts. Any power at all is unun "power" + exponent: ago te unun guti nobi = 5 × 6⁻⁶ length units. The six scale words are shortcuts for the range where a wrong scale still looks believable; past 6^±12 a slip is absurd and gets noticed, so the plain rule is enough there (senary writes 6ⁿ). This replaced senary's generative prefix ladder in r22, agreed with the author on 2026-10-09: it needed no second set of digits, and direction is carried by a whole word instead of one vowel. Add more named steps if 6^±16 to 6^±24 keep coming up.

Protecting against plausible wrong values§

A misheard digit gives a wrong number. A misheard scale word gives a wrong number of the right shape, off by 6⁴ or more, which is the error most likely to go unnoticed (senary's error-size principle). So each down-scale word was built as an "antonym" of its up-scale partner (yiyo / kufe, gife / bafo, yuli / genwi), which gives those pairs the strongest confusion weighting the optimizer has.

Time and calendar§

Senary's r20/r21 rework (2026-10-09) supplies the concepts: one continuous count of standard days from an epoch, local time as a view of it, an Earth calendar whose date is the number of days elapsed in the year, body time for anything about a body. Senary owns the arithmetic (src/senary_tables.py, Specification §11). The words below are this repo's alone; senary's names (Bana and the rest) are not used.

The one idea speakers need: every time point is an amount elapsed since the start of the thing that contains it. The clock is the part of the day that has passed; the date is the days of the year that have passed; the year is the years since year 0. So all three are said with the label rule (noun + pi + digits, digit reading), and a zero is a real value: the first day of the year is dili pi po po po po.

Concept Said Notes
day (standard or local) dili one word; on Earth they are the same length to 1 part in 10⁸
clock time mon mimi ka da ka "at .343" = 15:00 the fraction of the day; speakers give as many digits as they need
date dili pi po te ka sa "day 0532" always four digits, zeros kept; first two digits are the block
date and clock together dili pi po te ka sa mimi da "day 0532.4" the clock is the fraction of the date, so it is one number
year fawu pi fi ka ka "year 133" counted from the Moon-landing year; year 133 began March 2026
week nelon (new root) six local days; which are for rest is local custom
day of the week dili pi ka "day 3" one digit, 0–5; a date always has four, so the two can't be confused
block boyo (new root) 36 days, the first two digits of the date: boyo pi te "block 05"
watch aya 6⁶ nane, a sixth of a day (4 h); aya pi ka = the watch from noon to 16:00
leap year fawu netu "long year" senary's 314/1296 rule
local time / local day muyi pi kemu / dili pi kemu "time / day of the place" the default; nobody says it unless comparing places
the count sunbu pi muyi "the count of time" for records and machines; rarely spoken
body time muyi pi gawo "time of the body"
age nume "live" + a duration: to nume fawu te nobi "I have lived 30 years" an age is lived body time, which is what the verb says
seasons muyi + quality: muyi tikun "hot time", muyi weki "cold time", muyi pi gegi "time of rain" local, as senary says; each place names its own

Relative time uses the existing anchor-plus-offset rule; with no anchor, the anchor is now: wo nelon fi "after one week" = next week, ya boyo fi "a block ago", nelon tan "this week".

Durations are counts of any unit: nin aya sa "for two watches", nane yiyo te "5 × 6⁴ nane" (about 33 minutes), dili nobi fi "seven days".

Why two new roots and no more. Week and block name calendar-aligned periods that modern life is organised around (rest days, rent, wages, billing), and every language that has such periods has a short word for them. A phrase like dili nobi "six days" can't say "this week" as opposed to "the next six days". Everything else is a phrase built from existing words.

Deliberately without words (concept is senary's; add a word if texts keep needing it): the epoch (say "year 0" or describe the Moon landing), the zero meridian, the traveller's view, solar longitude, lunar month (there is none; the Moon's phase is just dunan's look). Body time and the count are phrases, and stay phrases unless they turn out to be frequent.

Not carried over§