Lexicon:Modern/Jan

Jan
Stage	Modern CLT
Pronunciation	/ˈdʒan/
Part of speech	Noun
Etymology	from Middle Jugān, from Proto jugun variant
Related words	Jor, daes

Jan — free people, spoken of as a class. The everyday form.

Notes

Reference rather than address. A slave does not call anybody Jan; a slave says the Jan when speaking about free people generally, which means speaking to another slave.

Not an insult and not quite neutral either. Said within earshot of a free person it is a small impertinence, and everyone involved knows it.

Neutral as it stands. The Spraecha does not carry gender by default and marks it only when it matters, a habit inherited from a time when nobody could see who they were talking to. Add da- for a man or ma- for a woman where the distinction is doing work.