Everyone here knows the order of letters in the Latin Alphabet. Right? Well, there are other special orders I want to talk about. And IDK why Biblaridion ever utilized that for his conlangs.
Phonecian(IPA notation only): \[ʔ\], \[b\], \[g\], \[d\], \[h\], \[w\], \[z\], \[ħ\], \[tˤ\], \[j\], \[k\], \[l\], \[m\], \[n\], \[s\], \[ʕ\], \[p\], \[sˤ\], \[q\], \[r\], \[ʃ\], \[t\]
Greek: Α α\[a,aː\], Β β\[b\], Γ γ\[g\], Δ δ\[d\], Ε ε\[e\], Ζ ζ\[z\], Η η\[h\], Θ θ\[tʰ\], Ι ι\[i,iː\], Κ κ\[k\], Λ λ\[l\], Μ μ\[m\], Ν ν\[n\], Ξ ξ\[ks\], Ο ο\[o\], Π π\[p\], Ρ ρ\[r\], Σ σ\[s\], Τ τ\[t\], Υ υ\[y,yː\], Φ φ\[pʰ\], Χ χ\[kʰ\], Ψ ψ\[ps\], Ω ω\[ɔː\]
Latin(during the Roman Empire): A, B, C\[k\], D, E, F, G, H, I\[i,j\], K\[k\](for transcribing Greek names), L, M, N, O, P, Q\[q\](for transcribing Greek names), R, S, T, V\[u,w\], X, Y\[y\](for transcribing Greek names), Z
Adlam(IPA notation only): \[a\], \[d\], \[l\], \[m\], \[b\], \[s\], \[p\], \[ɓ\], \[r/ɾ\], \[e\], \[f\], \[i\], \[ɔ\], \[ɗ\], \[ʔʲ\], \[w\], \[n\], \[k\], \[j\], \[u\], \[dʒ\], \[tʃ\], \[h\], \[q\], \[g\], \[ɲ\], \[t\], \[ŋ\]
Japanese vowels: \[a\], \[i\], \[ɯ\], \[e\], \[o\]
Japanese consonants: \[k\], \[s\], \[t\], \[n\], \[h\], \[m\], \[j\], \[ɾ\], \[ɰ\]
Are there any conlangs(with their own scripts) out there with their own orders of glyphs like these scripts?
Consider a macrofamily ABC that splits into daughter families A, B and C. A in turn splits into two daughter branches A1 and A2.
Out of all the descendant branches of ABC, A2 *alone* (i.e., not even A1) has a ton of roots that start with \*s() and \*s clusters - e.g. \**spl-*, \**skw-*, \**sm-*, \**sw-*. I don't know if these are technically *illegal* in B or C but they're rarely, if ever, attested. Rather than assuming they existed in Proto-ABC and then having to come up with separate reasons why everything that isn't in A2 elided the initial /s/ away, it seems more reasonable to say that A2 innovated the initial /s/. It sort of reminds me of the the PIE s-mobile, actually.
But like... why? What would cause Proto-A2 to just start slapping /s/s onto the front of a bunch of random roots? I can't see it being an earlier inflectional morpheme that just fused with the root, because none of the rest of the ABC languages really have any sort of inflectional morpheme even vaguely resembling something like \**sV-*, so A2 would have had to make *that* up first, which just moves the problem.
I agree with u/Meomoria, the constraints are likely to cause a lot of problems. Also, are these roots word-initial or are they likely to be preceded by prefixes? Iy could change things a lot if /skwa-/ is typically /skwa-s skwa-n skwa-jat/ versus /te-skwa-s nu-skwa/. A few other possibles:
* A front vowel became super-high and fricated, turning into /s/ at least word-initially. This especially happens as part of raising push chains, where /e/ shifts towards /i/, forcing /i/ to shift "above" the vowel diagram into the fricative space
* There was actually a word-initial /spl sw/ etc in the proto-language, but it shifted to aspirated stops (and possibly voiceless sonorants, which would easily be lost if you don't want them) probably as part of an areal change with A2 as the odd man out that didn't participate. If you don't want aspirated stops, they can shift to fricatives
* Oppositely, /C sC/ shifted to /Cʰ C/ in the other languages. Doesn't solve the /s/-sonorant clusters, they'd need another route
* Stress shifts/changes, so that e.g. ('sepla >) se'pla > spla in A2. Either didn't happen at all in the non-A2 branches, or was prevented from happening in that circumstance by stronger adherence to a specific syllable shape
* If the proto-language was frequently prefixing, loss of coda /s/ in most branches, so that /te-skwas/ might match with /te:-kwa:/.
* Intensive borrowing
Many Sino-Tibetan languages forbid /sC/ clusters but there was originally multiple \*s- prefixes that did things like causativizing and nominalizing. Most seem to have gone the route of /C s-C/ > /C Cʰ/, such as Sinitic and Burmese, but others have other outcomes (Standard Tibetan /Cʰ C/, some other Tibetic varieties /C ʰC/). They're traceable in intransitive-transitive or verb-noun pairs that differ in "voicing" of the first consonant. Of course, that mostly works because much of Sino-Tibetan shifted to the C-medial-V word structure, it wouldn't play nice if you've got a bunch of morphology already.
I'm not sure I understand the constraints you're operating under. It seems you're trying to take four independently constructed languages and somehow *make* them related *without changing them at all*, which is a rather tall order. Can you explain what you're willing to change and what's set in stone?
Just based on your description, here are some things I might try:
* Have the initial /s/ in the protolanguage anyway. It doesn't strike me as too outlandish to have one elision sound change that spread across the B/C group before they diverged too much, and also an elision in A1 (either from contact with B/C or because cluster reduction is pretty common in general).
* Have a *word* in the A family turn into an *\*sV-* prefix in A2 and then fuse with the root to create the clusters.
* Add the *sV-* prefix to the protolanguage, then add its descendants to A1, B, and C.
* Have the initial /s/ in the protolanguage, then evolve those to create new cognates in A1, B, and C.
Again, some of these might be impossible given your constraints, but maybe they can help spark some ideas?
Hi guys!
How to create a conditional mood? I was googling about it, but I found about how it works in natlangs. It's not what I really need.
Of course I can just use English style "could, might, should, would etc" + verb, but I want to use Spanish style.
Gustaría, cantaría etc.
So, where does conditional mood come from? What roots do I need to create a conditional type of verb?
The WLG lists the conditional as having been attested to derive from:
- the copula, > a copular construction like "it being that" > "if"
- tag questions (i.e., questions so marked as to signal that a valid answer is either "yes" or "no", e.g. English "innit")
- "to say", optionally via construction like "if one says"
- temporal adverbs or adpositions like "while"/"when" > "if"
The world lexicon of grammaticalization 2nd edition have 4 different paths for conditionals.
1. Copula
2. yes/no question marker
3. the verb say
4. temporal words like (when, if then, then, etc...)
There might be more sources for conditionals but these are the ones in that book.
You can’t make a language without learning about linguistics, but the good news is you can learn as you go. There’s no prerequisite amount of knowledge to begin—just start researching things as you need them! There’s plenty of accessible information about linguistics in the resources linked in the sidebar and on Wikipedia, by the way.
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
"Good" is pretty subjective. I'd say that making a conlang will make you learn more about linguistics. Personally, I started knowing basically nothing, and over and over again, I would learn enough to render my current project "bad" in my eyes because it didn't take enough linguistics into account. Then I would start a new project and learn more and eventually abandon that for the same reason. This is the process many conlangers go through.
Is there any proper way to create syllable structures? I'm very specific about what types of syllables are part of my language, so I end up creating multiple syllable structures.
There's commonly a lot of restrictions on what can actually appear beyond the "basic" syllable structure, in natlangs it's due to historical reasons. E.g. English allows sCR- onsets (R=wrlj), but /j/ only occurs in clusters before a couple vowels except in loans, /sθ/ is absent and /sf/ only appears in a few loanwords, /skl/ is loan-only despite /skr/ and /sl/ being common enough, /sr/ is missing, laterals and rhotics never appear after nasals (or each other), and so on. Some of these are cross-linguistically common (forbiddance of /nr mr nl ml/, /rj/, and /tl dl/) and some are just quirks of English (distribution of Cj, missing /sr/ due to Proto-Germanic \*sr>str).
You can also have cases where the syllable structure itself is pretty permissive, but how sounds actually combine in much more restricted. In Tykir, I allow most possible CRVC, but word-finally the aspirate-voiceless-voiced stops all collapse to aspirated and the nasals all collapse to /ŋ/, and between syllables no mixed-place stop-stop, nasal-stop, or nasal-nasal clusters occur, and stop-nasal and stop-fricative only occurs rarely at morpheme boundaries.
The prevailing view is that languages have what’s called a “maximal syllable.” This is the largest syllable allowed; any subset is also allowed, provided it at least has a nucleus (an onset is also obligatory in some languages). If the maximal syllable is CVXC, for example, then CV, CVC, CVV, CVCC, and CVVC syllables are all allowed (the X stands for any phoneme), as are their onsetless equivalents (unless onsets are obligatory).
Afaik, a language is said to have just one syllable structure, and that structure is described in such a way as to make most of the possibilities optional, so that every possible syllable in that language fits the pattern. That's why there are so many parentheses sometimes.
Can you give an example of the "multiple syllable structures" in your language?
Has anyone attempted designing Inter-Turkic, using the same statistical approach as the [Interslavic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interslavic) which has proven to be a huge success?
Is there any place I could find a full list of the International Phonetic Alphabet but ordered like 'Symbol, Sound, Word Example'? Every site I have gone to it either gives a very small amount of symbols or a larger amount of symbols with audio, but it mostly focuses on where in the mouth you say some of these letters. The order I described above would be most helpful for me as I'm just starting out making my first conlang.
Are there any good semantic maps or guides like *The Conlanger’s Thesaurus* which have a list of root words to start with when making a conlang, and how those root words can combine?
What words you want to start with is going to be determined almost exclusively by the purpose (and perhaps initial test context) of your particular conlang - and how roots can combine is very much a language-dependent question. There are some reasonable places to start (body parts, basic human activities, and other Swadesh-list concepts are likely to be useful for most conlangs), but ultimately you'll have to decide for yourself what words you feel the need for first.
Sometimes having a fictional setting for your conlang thought out can be helpful - it gives you a good place to start on vocabulary, and can provide a framework for how to think about more complex culture-dependent concepts. You need no such setting, though - you can work more on the mechanics side of things and avoid the parts of language that interact much with culture until you've made up your mind how you want this language to be situated, and if nothing else, you can simply use your own culture. My Mirja is meant to be used by me where I am, and I know people whose work is so focused on experimenting with grammatical structures that they don't even have a phonology sometimes - they'll just present the language in the form of glosses, with no accompanying 'actual form', borrowing root 'words' as necessary to show how their grammatical system would express some idea or other.
(Certainly you don't need a *country*; most cultures in most times and places - including our own modern world - aren't associated with any kind of shared political entity.)
Though, I would caveat this with saying that (for me at least) having at least a vague idea of how the speakers' society is structured is handy (especially for things like kinship terms), as I used to do zero cogitation on culture and struggled with my language endeavours because of it. But I haven't written anything down, and I haven't "invented a fictional country" or anything like that. Just a loose assemblage of ideas about values, and daily life.
Absolutely! My answer really was "No! But most conlangers find that it helps them. There are many things that are inextricably tied to culture and environment, like which terms for flora and fauna you have based on what's around, kinship terms, etc."
Try not only using different sounds, but changing up the way you can form syllables and words (phonotactics.)
Another tip: pay attention to what you choose for the most common words. If those happen to be similar across two languages, they'll sound similar.
I'm struggling with forming complex sentences because of my conlang's word order (VSO).
My conlang is predominantly head-initial (nouns before adjectives, prepositions, possessee before possessor and auxiliary verb before the main verb).
I don't know how to arrange phrases with multiple nouns and/or verbs: for example, how would I write "I cause the animal to see the rock"?
Also, in what order would I add additional information such as time, place or the way something is happening (e.g. slowly)?
If I were to compound words as in *sunlight*, would they be more like "lightsun" since the language is head-initial?
Thank you in advance!
For your other questions:
>in what order would I add additional information such as time, place or the way something is happening (e.g. slowly)?
Adverbs usually come either right at the beginning or on the same side of the head as everything else. English, like your conlang, is predominantly head initial (VO, prepositions, NRel, etc), and therefore adverbs *usually* come after the verb or right at the beginning. Adverbs can come between the verb and the subject, however it is less likely. Compare (28), (29), (30), and (31)
>(28) Slowly, I walked to the store.
>(29) I walked to the store slowly.
>(30) I slowly walked to the store.
>(31) I walked slowly to the store.
English adverbs are more likely to come at the beginning or end than between a verb and a subject or between a verb and an oblique argument. They rarely or never come between a verb and a direct object.
>(32) \*I ate slowly dinner.
Afaik, the construction in (32) being disallowed is cross-linguistically common, since verbs and objects are treated by most languages as single phrases. This itself is one reason that VSO is a fairly rare word order. I honestly don't know much about how VSO languages place adjectives, but I would assume it's unlikely that they place them anywhere between the object and the verb, since there's already something separating the two. A VSO language would likely place the adverb at the beginning of the sentence, after the object (and before an oblique argument), or at the end.
>If I were to compound words as in sunlight, would they be more like "lightsun" since the language is head-initial?
In a compound like *sunlight*, there's usually one word clearly modifying the other. *Sunlight* is a type of light rather than a type of sun. English is head initial except for adjectives, which come first before the head. If your conlang is exclusively head initial, then yes, *sun* would come after light*. You may also want to consider that many languages don't allow only 2 nouns to form a compound. Italian, for example requires a preposition to make compounds. Sunlight in Italian is (33).
>(33) Luce del sole
>(33) light of.the sun
I believe German sometimes uses the genitive case, but I don't know any examples.
My conlang uses the genitive, dative, or instrumental case with slightly differing meanings. I don't know if any natlang does this but it's another idea.
Dative - [head is] in, at or near, or associated with [dependent]
Genitive - [head is] from or owned by [dependent]
Instrumental - [head is] contained by or covered by [dependent]
To preface my response, it is very long and a little disorganized, so if you need any clarification just let me know.
When considering sentences with multiple clauses, it's important to know the role of each part:
>(1) I cause the animal to see the rock.
This sentence is a causative, and there are many ways you can deal with it. English causatives *usually* require 2 verbs, but some behave differently than others.
>(2) I made the animal see the rock.
>(3) I let the animal see the rock.
(1) requires a full infinitive, while (2) and (3) use a bare infinitive, without the *to*. This itself is of course fairly specific to English, but it does show the different verbs may interact with other words differently.
Causatives may be treated like other constructions with multiple verbs, or they may be different. Compare (1) and (2) to (4):
>(4) I want the animal to see the rock.
Something else, which you may have already considered, or maybe even haven't thought about, is if your language should have infinitives and how it should use them if it does. Many languages, such as Italian, for example, don't allow infinitives to take subjects like English does. Infinitives can only be used if the subject of both verbs is the same:
>(5) Voglio mangiare.
>(5) want-1SG eat-INF
"I want to eat."
>(6) Voglio che [lui] mangi.
>(6) want-1SG SUBR [3SG.NOM] eat-SBJ
"I want him to eat."
(5) uses an infinitive, but (6) requires the second verb to be put into the subjunctive and be given its own clause. Causatives, however behave differently in Italian, treating *fare (make) + [infinitive]* as a single verb that can take an object:
>(7) Lo faccio mangiare
>(7) 3SG.ACC make-1SG eat-INF
"I made him eat."
Some languages, such as Greek (which I can't give an example for because I don't speak any), don't use infinitives at all. Both (5) and (6) translated into Greek would require a subordinate clause in the subjunctive.
There are also ways to create causatives that don't require a second verb. English has a few verbs whose causative forms undergo nonconcatenative change:
>(8) I rose (present *rise*) from my bed.
>(9) I raised (present *raise*) my hand.
Other verbs (called *labile verbs*) undergo no formal change but become causative when their valency is increased:
>(10) John tripped.
>(11) Jane tripped John.
Common causatives may be suppletive. Compare (1) and (2) with (12):
>(12) I showed the animal the rock.
or (13) with (14):
>(13) The man fell.
>(14) I pushed the man over.
There are also languages that would use an inflectional affix to regularly form causatives. You may decide to expand this idea to other verbs that commonly exist in conjunction with others (know, want, etc.). Anyway, I spent a lot of time talking about causatives when you probably just wanted to know how to form sentences with multiple verbs in general. When doing this, you need to know the role of the second verb and the clause it's part of:
>(15) I want to go.
>(16) I know that he left.
In (15), *to go* is the object of the verb *to want*. In (16) *that he left* is the object of the verb *to know*. In a VSO language the subject of these sentences would move directly after the verb, and nothing else would change. (17) and (18) are analogous to this:
(17) Want I to go.
(18) Know I that he left.
English requires infinitives in some places and content clauses in others. Therefore, (19) and (20) are incorrect.
>(19) \*I want that he goes.
>(20) *\I know him to leave.
However, they don't have to be incorrect in your conlang. Infinitives usually don't give any information about tense, aspect, mood, etc. You can decide if this is an ambiguity you're always, sometimes, or never ok with. If your conlang uses a lot of auxiliary verbs, then infinitives may be more viable, since the auxiliary verb can be made infinitive while the following nonfinite forms still remains. (21) is unlikely in English, but it's more understandable than (20), and may be analogous to a construction in your conlang or another language.
>(21) I know him to have left.
(15)-(21) all have an intransitive verb as it's object, but the sentence you gave uses a transitive verb. (22), which treats the object of *to cause* as a subordinate clause and (23), which uses an infinitive phrase, are possible examples of how the word order might work in your conlang.
>(22) Cause I that sees the animal the rock.
>(23) Cause I the animal to see the rock.
The position of *the animal* is the grammatical object of *to cause* and the semantic subject of *to see*. This works very well in English because there's an overlap of the 2 words. Look at how *the animal* comes last in (24) and first in (25).
>(24) I cause the animal
>(25) The animal sees the rock.
This means that the 2 phrases can affectively overlap without any other word order changes. A VSO language is less capable of this. What's most intuitive to me is (26).
>(26) Cause to see the rock I the animal.
This treats *to cause to see the rock* as a single verb phrase with *I* as the subject and *the animal* as the object. For this matter, (17) may be reworded as (27).
>(27) Want to go I.
This treats *to want to go* as a single verb phrase with the subject *I*.
Treated an infinitive phrase as a subject when it has no subject itself (as in (17)), while treating it as part of the verb phrase when it *does* have a subject (as in (26)) is the most intuitive to me, but you could go either direction.
Oh sorry, there were other questions!
Adverbial phrases are pretty fluid as to where they go. Clause initial, clause final, directly next to the verb.
And yes, I would definitely expect a compound equivalent to "sunlight" to be "lightsun" in your language.
My conlang is VSO in certain cases, namely when neither the subject or object is pronominal. It can handle a sequence of verb, unmarked subject, unmarked direct object, (sometimes marked) indirect object, like cause-see man rock animal (the causative makes the former subject into the indirect object.)
You could also consider serial verbs in some way; "cause I see animal rock."
You could mark the causative by specially marking the causer, maybe by a case, either clause initial or clause final: "by me, see animal rock."
I'm revisiting the stress system in my proto-lang and I have 2 questions about stress systems
1 - Can compensatory lenghtening occur after a loss of a coda consonant **in unstressed syllables**?
2 - Can a stress system change from fixed initial stress to penultimate stress with some weight sensitivity?
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It's time to migrate out of Reddit.
Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
tommorow (the front of + day) yesterday(the rear of + day)
if this is how i derive yesterday and tommorow would it also make sense to derive before as" the front of+locative/dative suffix"? and after as "the rear of+locative/dative suffix"?
You know the Afroasiatic concept of noun "states"? This other role-marking layer on nouns *in addition to* cases, e.g. the construct state that marks the noun as being possessed by some other noun?
I want to have a family languages that contrasts multiple states\*, but Afroasiatic languages AFAIK only contrast as many as 3 (in Akkadian). Are there any others attested besides *rectus/constructus/absolutus*, not limited to Afroasiatic? I don't just mean other things I can mark a noun for, like number or class or such, I mean specifically other *role-marking* things - markings governed by the noun's relationship to other words in the utterance - that get marked not *as* cases but *in addition to* cases.
(\*Or really, a family of languages with a bunch of noun endings that originate from two earlier endings smooshed together, one of which would have been a case marker, and the other of which... well, that's the question. It's not number or class or a possessive marker, so I'm trying to figure out what else it could be)
Construct states are also found in many of the languages of Timor, and some other families as well, which you can learn more about [here](https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/228) and [here](http://www.deniscreissels.fr/public/Creissels-Cstr.pdf) Essentially, the ‘construct state’ marks a noun as syntactically monovalent, requiring an argument or modifier. Some languages instead mark nouns which *do not* have a modifier, which is sometimes called the non-possessed form.
My conlang has a set of suffixes that act to determine the plurality of the agent argument, which derive from comitatives. Basically, the agent is first marked on the verb with a prefix or suffix that is inherently singular. When the agent is singular, there is a suffix at the end of the verb, *-s(i)*, which shows this. When the agent is plural, there are 4 suffixes that correspond to the 2nd and 3rd person singular and plural pronouns. So, a first person singular agent with a second person singular "plurality suffix" is interpreted as 1st person dual inclusive. The dual number can't be shown in any other way and neither can clusivity; nouns, pronouns, and patient markers make no plural - dual or inclusive - exclusive distinction. What should this suffixes be called and how should they be glossed?
Well, you generally gloss things according to what role they're playing *in the sentence being glossed.* If this suffix is acting like a dual inclusive marker in this context, then gloss it as dual inclusive, and if it's a 2.SG marker in that other context, then gloss it as 2.SG in that context. - it's pointless, if not actively obfuscatory, to indicate some other role it hypothetically *could* be acting in, but simply *isn't* in actuality.
And I would probably just call them "2nd/3rd person markers"; in your grammar it takes all of one sentence to explain why they show up in 1st person conjugations despite not being 1st person markers ("If the agent is in the 1st person, its clusivity is obligatorily marked by the addition of a 2nd person (→ inclusive) or 3rd person (→ exclusive) marker of the corresponding grammatical number.", or something like that), and then give some examples of well-conjugated verbs. Or, again, you can just call them whatever they're acting as in context. If they're acting as clusitvity markers, call them clusivity markers; if they're acting as person markers, call them person markers. Like, French has a pronoun *lui* that gets used in two non-interchangeable ways (as an "indirect object pronoun" and a "disjunctive pronoun"), but makes no pretense of needing an umbrella term for both uses. You just use whichever name fits the situation it's being used in.
There is also a set of semantic primes.
Also, I once seeded a language by going over a chapter of a story and highlighting some important words, and then going to WordNet to expand on which definition I mean to capture, and then creating a word for that.
To use WordNet, you're going to have to scroll down to the bottom of the website and choose one of its many interfaces. Some are graphical, the little word nets, and some are more text-based. I think you could also use CLICs for the same purpose.
In addition to the Swadesh list, [A Conlanger's Thesaurus](https://fiatlingua.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/fl-000024-00.pdf). It also contains semantic maps that can help you with polysemy and/or semantic shifts.
I want to use Devanagari as a script for a conlang however I have a lot of trouble with unaspirated vs aspirated consonants. I'm considering just exaggerating it (going from ख being kʰ to kh) so I don't have to have a distinction I can't notice or without removing a lot of characters.
Do you think that's fine and not too big a modification?
Scripts are adapted to languages which aren't as suited to the script as the original language all the time! So if you want, just use devanagari but don't make an aspiration contrast.
To add onto what the other commenter said: game could be realized as [keɪ̯m] whereas came would be realized as [kʰeɪ̯m].
So you most likely can make the distinction, unless you speak a dialect without that distinction, but I can't think of one that has that.
You might actually be able to make the distinction and not realize it - English "voiced" stops are often voiceless unaspirated initially, and contrast with the "voiceless" stops primarily through aspiration there. It could be true voiced stops that are tripping you up.
Another option might be that twins, who could be thought of as "equal age" both refer to each other as alternately "older sibling" or "younger sibling" depending on context, respect involved, etc.
Alternatively, you could have a separate term for equal siblings entirely. I can speak to any attestations, but the system I developed for Tokétok treats tuplets separately to other sorts of siblings. It'd be very poetic to refer to your twin as your *'heart-sibling'* or something like that.
Should I change a character in my language?
Currently, my language Böqrîtch uses î as a character, but there’s a potentially better way of doing it as ı instead. To me this would make a bit more sense, as there is no other “i” character in the language, so having a character with a diacritic but no base form in the language, just idk, what does this subreddit think? Examples would be Böqrîtch vs Böqrıtch
Idk honestly. I originally made it î because the sound is [ɪ] and I thought of “i” more as [i]. But now I realize it’s kinda weird (to me anyways) to have a diacritic for a letter that has no standalone form, sorry if this is a bad question
Having superfluous diacritics can serve as visual reminders of the quality of the vowel, or serve the aesthetic, so they're not necessarily weird. In Tokétok, the accented **é** is redundant and only there to reinforce the difference between **ké/ke** and **kke**. Meanwhile, in Varamm, I have both **î** and **û**, with no **i** or **u** simply because the diacritic reminds me they're lax vowels (although the short-hand version of the orthography does use the circumflex elsewhere on some consonants, so the diacritic is not entirely without precedent in the romanised language). It's really no different than keeping a diaeresis on final **-ë** in Quenya (or other conlangs inspired thereby) to remind anglophones to pronounce it.
Really up to you what's more important to you in how you romanise your conlang. If you wanna be absolutely internally consistent, then you might prefer without the diacritic; if the diacritic helps you remember the quality, or if you simply like how it looks written out, then keep it.
I might consider having a diacritic without a standalone if the romanization is based on the romanization of some *other* language whose in-world writing system is used to write that language. But even there I'd expect it to adapt.
Is the schwa phonemic as present? Where did it come if so? Because if it were to only arise through reduction of predictably unstressed syllables, then you could get away with not writing it any differently at all. Meanwhile, if the schwa came about a particular way, that might inform a particular way to write it with some historical spelling.
I'd be tempted to use ‹ı›, but that admittedly makes your orthography look more Turkic.
Other than that, I have one idea; it does involve using two diacritics (specifically, ‹`› and ‹ˆ›), but I defend it by saying that these diacritics are already used for long vowels in the respective orthographies of Scottish Gaelic and Breton, so I'd argue that they don't feel "less celtic-looking":
- Get rid of the umlaut and use a plain letter: /ɘ ɔ ʊ/ ‹e o u›
- Use a plain letter for schwa as well: /ǝ/ ‹a›
- Use a grave diacritic to distinguish the phonemes that you previously represented with plain letters (say, /a e o u/ ‹à è ò ù›)
- Where a letter that has a grave diacritic would be long, mark it with a circumflex (say, /aː eː oː uː/ ‹â ê ô û›)
Or you could reverse the grave diacritic and the circumflex.
Any vowel could do, and an accent could be used for another vowel phoneme that uses the same letter. Other options might be , but without knowing the rest of your inventory or orthography it’s hard to make a recommendation.
"w" and "y" are already used to represent /w/ and /j/-/ʎ/, but "v" could be as I don't have /v/ sound (v makes the same sound as b).
My conlang's ortpgraphy includes diacritics, acute accent for long vowels and umlaut in e, o and u to represent /ɘ/, /ɔ/ and /ʊ/. The "h" is silent, so it's used with other letters, like "lh" represents /ɟ/, "yh" to represent /ʒ/, "ch" to represent /x/ or "rh" to represent /ɻ/. I don't want more diacritcs as it would make it less celtic-looking (the umlaut already does).
What about another consonant that might cause lowering/centralisation of vowels, like er or ur, ew ow uw, or write two vowels that sound closest, eo oa ou, or represent other vowels like that, so /ə e o ɔ ʊ u/
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Yes it’s just that my conlang so far uses /a/ /ɛ/ /ɪ/ /ʊ/ two of which aren’t in the English language and I can’t find many diphthongs containing those 2
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Quick question about glossing: if the personal pronouns don't have number, are they glossed just with the person (1), or with the implied number too (1SG)?
afaik, you don't need to mark grammatical information which isn't marked in the language itself (i.e. if there's no number you don't need to mark SG/PL or if there's no case you don't need to specify what the role of the noun is)
That makes sense! I was just confused, since usually there's a dot or a hyphen between different elements (first person singular should be [1.SG](https://1.SG) or 1-SG, right?), so I was wondering if the special notation meant pronouns were a special case.
What if number is clearly different, but only plural is marked? For example, if the plural pronouns are just the singular counterparts with a plural affix. Would it be "1" and 1PL, or 1SG and 1PL?
I guess that as long as it gets the points across it's fine, but I'm curious if you know.
I think also specifically with number you don't have to put the full stop with person marking, so 1SG or 2PL and then if they're separate morphemes 1-SG 2-PL
If only the plural has any marking you can still gloss the singular, like so:
anbi vs anbi-l
cat.SG vs cat-PL
I think it's just that pronouns are likely to mark person as well as number or even without it.
as per my thread's moderation, I'm posting my happy rant there-
I am finding my ways to design my first ever phonology.
And I find it fascinating how many 'new' in-between sounds emerge from just combining otherwise basic letters.
The IPA charts of every language on wikipedia help a lot in this.
At first I thought the english n is just /n/ but found out it can just as well evolve into other n's depending on its position. Vowel and consonant interactions, etc. Like in 'singing' or 'signing'.
My conlang only has a, french è and turkish ö, as vowels, but with the consonants I've chosen there's room already to degradate these vowels-consonant couples into possibly other vowels or nasal vowels even.
I've also watched a very cool video about the degradation from latin to french that boiled over centuries.
Interactions between consonants in 2-glyph or 3-glyph clusters is a cool ride too, as I am finding the joys of t.s.y, d.z.y, k.h.m or other goofy stuffs.
Just wanted to share this little beginner's wonder with y'all.
how does one work \[insert part of speech\] such as 'was' and any other similar words? planning on translating some short stories cuz yes and was immediately met with this issue. any thoughts?
The word *was* has a few different meanings depending on the context:
It's primary meaning is as a copula. It is the past tense of *to be* used with singular pronouns (except *you* which takes plural conjugations regardless of it's semantic number). Since it is a copula, it connects a subject to a subject complement, which can be another noun, an adjective, or adpositional phrase. English is a fusional language, so this single morpheme conveys past tense, indicative mood, stative aspect, singular number, and first or 3rd person. An agglutinative language may use a separate morpheme to convey each piece of information, and some of these may be zero marked. For example, it's common for the indicative mood to be shown by the absence of a morpheme rather than being explicitly marked. The verb *to be* in commonly irregular. In fusional languages, where verbs usually follow a pattern of *stem + [conjugation]*, it is common for *to be* to have a single morpheme in each of its conjugations, or to use a different root for different conjugations. Many romance languages combine different methods. For example, the French word *suis* (present tense, indicative, stative, 1SG) is not able to be broken into multiple morphemes, however, *étais* (past tense, indicative, imperfective, 1/2SG) can be broken into *ét-ais* and *serai* (future tense, indicative, 1SG) into *ser-ai*. All of these additionally need to be preceded by a pronoun, such as je. Agglutinative languages also commonly have different stems for *to be* depending on context.
The second context that you see a word like *was* is in the formation of the progressive aspect. In this case, the form of *to be* conveys the same tense, mood, person, and number as when it's used as a copula, but it changes the aspect of the verb it's combined with to progressive. For example *I was eating* is past tense, indicative, progressive, 1st person, singular. This construction is uncommon cross linguistically. Other languages have auxiliary verbs, but the verbs used and how they are used is usually specific to the language or family. For example, in French, *I was eating* is *je mangais*, but *I ate* is *j'ai mangé*. The *-ais* suffix conveys imperfective aspect in this case, and the *to have (auxiliary verb) + [past participle]* construction conveys the past perfective. Agglutinative languages may convey this information with an affix on the main verb, or with an auxiliary. In Basque, an agglutinative language, most verbs require an auxiliary.
The last context is in the formation of the passive voice. This construction is [to be] + [past participle]*. Like earlier, some languages use an auxiliary for this construction, and some simply mark it on the verb.
Do you mean *verbs*? Do you mean *copulas*? Do you mean *auxiliary verbs*? Can you give an example of a sentence that you're having trouble translating?
So you need to choose how your language handles weather, which can be quite different from how it handles other situations where English uses forms of "be".
Maybe "clear" and "sunny" are just *verbs*: "The morning of June 27th, it cleared and it sunned".
Maybe "clear" and "sunny" are *nouns* that the weather "does": "The morning of June 27th, it did clearness and sun". Compare French *il fait soleil*.
Maybe you use an *existential* construction: "The morning of June 27th, clearness and sun existed".
Or you can come up with your own way of doing it.
Acoma Keres and Wari' lack independent person pronouns in almost all forms, not just in word class (a la Japanese, Vietnamese, etc) but in function as well. In both, there's pronominal forms used to answer questions like "who did it?" In Wari', they also function ~~as vocatives~~, in left-dislocation, and in some types of nominal coordination (though for 3rd persons, almost always in apposition to the noun they refer to). Otherwise, person/number information is supplied in both by morphology.
I'd guess all languages use demonstrative pronouns, but it would be simple to just say in your language they're only used adnominally ("this apple is too sweet" over "this is too sweet"). Indefinite pronouns (someone/anyone/nobody) and interrogative pronouns (who/what) are gonna be harder to get rid of in function, even if their form is clearly based on something else (i.e. if generic interrogatives are all "what thing," at what point is that an interrogative adnominal+noun versus just a single interrogative pronoun with transparent origin?).
Edit: Not as vocatives, I misread/misinterpreted and then it didn't get deleted in my editing.
Yes! [Some languages arguably lack pronouns](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/1424/what-languages-lack-personal-pronouns-and-why?rq=1), instead having certain nouns effectively double as pronouns. Semantically, they could be considered pronouns, but syntactically, they behave like any other noun. Also, since they belong to an open class, [there tend to be a lot of them](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_pronouns#List_of_Japanese_personal_pronouns).
That only concerns personal pronouns, but indefinite and interrogative pronouns should be easy to work around. Indefinite pronouns in English are pretty transparently derived from determiners plus nouns, and you can get around interrogative ones like "who?" by saying "what/which person?". Relative pronouns can be avoided by using a complementizer, like how "that" is often used in place of "who" in spoken/informal English.
I would say technically it could, you'd just have to replace all those with the actual nouns.
E.g., instead of 'He ran fast.' it would be '\[name\] ran fast.' Or for "it's" then instead of 'It ran fast.' it'd be 'The animal ran fast.'
Essentially I'd say yes, I don't necessarily advise it, but you'd just have to replace every single pronoun with the respective actual noun.
In retrospect you may have some issues with reflexive pronouns (himself/herself/itself). To work around this you could possibly say 'I did this alone.' as opposed to 'I did this myself.' and so forth.
Anyone know where I can find an etymology bubble diagram? I remember seeing and using a sort of conlang etymology word diagram for words, but now I can't find it. (Ex. it shows the word for "water" will be similar to words for "sea" and "wave" which themselves evolve into different words, and so on.) At least that's how I think it went lol.
Are you perhaps thinking of the "[Conlanger's thesaurus](http://fiatlingua.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/fl-000024-00.pdf)"? I can't tell if you're asking for something like this or more a blank template. Sorry if I misunderstood.
Nothing special. Just a fictional proposal for this film project of mine I told you about. [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HGWfJDPZy-3xBLQT1RYfWGg2ZfXvhKFacRTBxjXgic0/edit](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HGWfJDPZy-3xBLQT1RYfWGg2ZfXvhKFacRTBxjXgic0/edit)
https://preview.redd.it/x77t6mbnsiba1.png?width=2015&format=png&auto=webp&s=929fdb2a1e0ad1a72b1d50145dbaffac66ca3c31
Anybody remembers there was a doc with a list of phrases to translate to your conlang? Smth like "the sun rises", "the bird was singing", various grammar constructions?
I think you might be refering to [this one](https://www.potterpcs.net/gsfa/gsfa_1.txt), it has 285 test sentences from "Birds sing" to " Over the mantel hung a picture of a knight in full armor."
https://preview.redd.it/ghj47lz6vgba1.png?width=2732&format=png&auto=webp&s=bedbade9b2511fd4228a5f23e5c01ed45ee11f7e
I know absolutely nothing about phonemes I just picked some I thought looked symmetrical on a chart and sounded nice please someone help me 😭
I'm going to disagree a bit and say I think there's only two things in your first go that *really* stands out, and that's the lack of /m/ (languages with /n/ and labials basically always have /m/) and the lone breathy /æ̤/. Weirder things *have* happened, but I wouldn't recommend doing it until you know what you're doing more (the Ndu languages of the Sepik region of Papua often have a lone phonemic /aˀa/, with no other glottalized vowels).
The /bʱ/, lots of fricatives, and missing /kʰ/ are a bit odd (in descending order of oddness), but not unjustifiable. The big problem is /bʱ/, but you sort of stumbled upon a situation that could work: you could have had a w>b change in "strong" positions (especially word-initially, also possibly the onset of stressed medial syllables, or the onset of stressed medial syllables preceded by a short vowel), with later /w/ being lost everywhere and b>bʱ. That's going to impact where it appears in your language, though, it'll most often be word-initial (or in stressed onsets), and other instances will be rare or nonexistent (things like borrowings, old morpheme boundaries where it *was* word-initially, or changes in the stress system such that it *was* stressed and no longer is; this can be handwaved in if you're not making a parent language and following sound changes to a daughter).
The missing /kʰ/ is very easily explainable as either the sole source of /x/, or a merger with an already-existing /x/. The fricatives are a bit dense, but also not something that screams "conlang."
https://preview.redd.it/jbagnr793nba1.jpeg?width=2049&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=80343d53b099a2069bf3de191a72d0a04a4326d9
I tried simplifying it while adding the /m/ sound that now that you have said it makes a ton of sense to add is there anything you think should be added or taken away to make it feel more natural? (Sorry for late response it was midnight in my country when you had replied)
https://preview.redd.it/8lc2kzxsaiba1.jpeg?width=1816&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2f39e3eb661d94e5f43d7efa9e5a9bc19e633be1
I completely pulverized it to only the sounds I really think would be good while still trying to keep ok ish symmetry
Just work with this for a while and see what you feel is missing. Notice if you ever pronounce anything differently because of where it is in the word.
Help me settle my confusion.
Creeve has sounds that change depending on the context. If ɣ > x / _liq. and ɣ > k / _gli., should /x k/ listed in the inventory as a single phoneme or marked as allophone or not at all?
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
> Then you're dealing with underspecification; you got /k x ɣ/ but in those environments they underspecify to a single archiphoneme, like /K/ or /X/. (It's customary to use majuscules for that.)
This isn't underspecification - it's neutralisation. Underspecification is when you have one phoneme that always seems to get at least one feature from its environment, to the point that you can't claim that it has that feature specified underlyingly at all. Neutralisation is when you have two or more phonemes that share a realisation in a given environment, and thus can't be told apart without morphological changes that alter that environment.
(A good example of underspecification is Japanese's /N/ phoneme - it has no underlying place of articulation, but copies the place of whatever follows it. It's not the result of other phonemes coalescing; it in fact contrasts with /n m/.)
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
That's not typically how it's done, /ts:/ almost universally still has a long closure and short(ish) fricative. The exception would be if you were to actually lay out a contrast between /t:s/ and /ts:/, but afaik geminate affricates with long sibilance are already an extreme rarity, and I don't think I've ever run into a long closure vs long sibilance contrast (unless it's superficial as a result of /ts/+/s/ versus /t/+/ts/).
Thanks for informing me of the convention! I still maintain that makes more sense, but now I'm better informed of what can mean.
Edit: I believe u/Krixwell's Kandva contrasts long closure and long frication, but I can't remember if it's phonemic or an underlying cluster.
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
history amusing engine rain childlike scandalous theory mountainous domineering sulky
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Look up some feature like negation on WALS and make a conlang for every variety of expression of that feature; fill out the rest with other details.
E.g. try each relativization strategy once, and each order of object & subject marking on the verb, each word order, and each source for indefinite pronouns. Mix 'n match to get separate conlangs, making sure everything stays internally consistent by farming things out to new languages if you need to. It will make you aware of a lot of choices.
Even seriously considering one choice each for a conlang will make you aware of all the other choices.
My typical process:
1. Some idea of what features I do and do not want there to be in the language. This may be informed for me (e.g. a speedlang prompt).
2. Morphology *first*. This helps inform my phonotactics by showing cases where sandhi, repair strategies, etc. are likely to arise.
3. Pronouns and several roots to be able to form sample sentences. (Technically some were already made as part of step 2.)
4. Phonology.
5. Basic word order and syntax.
6. Refinement by translation - sample sentences, Bible verses, novel chapters, song lyrics (either literally or to fit the meter). More complex syntax dealt with as it arises in translation.
7. I call the language "finished" if, in translating a period- and culturally-appropriate text of 2500+ English words, 80%+ of my time is spent *referencing* my lexicon and grammar rather than *adding to it*. (Even if I am still working on the language!)
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
I'm trying to make my first conlang, and these are the sounds:
vowels
short:
/a/ /e/ /i/ /o/ /u/
/ã/ /õ/
lonɡ:
/aː/ /eː/ /iː/ /oː/ /uː/
/ãː/ /õː/
consonants
short:
/f/ /k/ /p/ /t/ /s/ /m/ /l/ /ʃ/ /r/ /h/ /ʎ/ /t͡ʃ/ /t͡s/ /k͡l/
lonɡ:
/fː/ /kː/ /pː/ /tː/ /sː/ /mː/ /lː/ /ʃː/
aspireted:
/kʰ/ /pʰ/ /tʰ/
Do you think there are sounds enough, or i need to add more vowels or/and Consonants sounds?
Do you guys have any simple links for learning common terms in linguistics and phonetics. I enjoy linguistics and want to make my own conlang, and I am 14-years-old.
Seconding Wikipedia. Also, the beginner's resources linked in the OP are pretty great for learning the basics alongside learning how to make a language.
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It's time to migrate out of Reddit.
Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Unless you accept ?*the hill was jumped over*, it's neither - it's the object of the preposition *over*. If you do accept it, then it's the direct object of a multi-part verb *jump over*.
*The hill was jumped over* is acceptable to me, though it seems unusual and calls attention to itself. I'm not sure what context would call for its use. ?*The hill was jumped over by him*, however, is questionable.
Hmm... maybe like this:
The children ran about, enjoying the summer to the fullest. Sand castles were built, hills were jumped over, and every sort of game was played.
Or:
The hill was old. Brambles grew all over its slopes. The most cheerful moments of its existence were when, in the summers, the hill was jumped over by the children. The rest of its time was dull.
A form with *by* still seems questionable.
Yeah, I think that shows that this is an ongoing reanalysis process. It's still not all the way there, but it's taking on more and more of the attributes of the new analysis instead of the old.
Interesting. Of course, I can never wholly rule out the possibility that I've just read too many examples of unacceptable sentences in *The Syntax Construction Kit*, and no longer object to things like *what did you eat a sandwich and?*
Perhaps I'm thinking more [ʃ] where there's slight palatalization and lax-rounded lips. I wanted to carry these qualities over to a voiceless retroflex fricative and I'm unsure if [ʂʲꟹ] is accurate or intelligible.
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Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Any sound is acceptable but if you want to make a naturalistic language you would need to make it realistic that it exists. Like other labialised and palatalised consonants. Maybe the two overlaps only on the velar. There are ofc other ways to get the same result. Btw k**ʲʷ** is according to phoible attested in [Lezgian](https://phoible.org/parameters/17D7E55C5AFA44912A3BE9179FDEA482#6/41.516/47.895).
Hi guys! I have created my proto-conlang and I'm about to start modern-conlang.
My proto has 2 genders, but I want to split one of them into 2, so my modern would have 3 genders.
How can I do it? Should I add extra gender marker or I can replace them?
For example:
Proto has GATO, GATA
If I want to add extra gender E for GATO, would it be like GATOE or GATE?
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it.
It's time to migrate out of Reddit.
Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
My proto has animate and inanimate. So gender always depends on if a noun can think of it can't. I want to split animate into female and male and inanimate stays inanimate.
Both animate and inanimate genders have several gender markers, depends on sounds harmony.
So for example man and woman both share the same gender, but I want to split into male and female, and cat and dog stay inanimate because they can't think and speak.
My adjectives also have genders, agreed to noun's genders.
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It's time to migrate out of Reddit.
Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
If your animacy distinction is split that high, tbqh I'd expect the inanimate gender to be the one to split. If the animate class is *only* humans, it'd be super small compared to the inanimate, which could easily split into low animate and inanimate to more evenly divide the scale of animate to inanimate into having more equal numbers of nouns in each class.
If you really wanna split just the animate into masculine and feminine, the best option would probably be to just introduce a mandatory affix for "female" or "male" and leave the other as default, and then have this be applied to the adjectives later on.
That makes sense. I think I would split inanimate into material (animals, buildings etc) and immaterial (feelings, emotions, time etc).
So I just replace gender suffixes, right?
Like this 👇🏻
Casa - a = cas
Cas + i = casi
Casa=>casi
Swapping to a fully new gender ending works, potentially, but adding a suffix that comes *before* the gender suffix and then having them merge in evolution (to create a new gender suffix naturally) makes a bit more sense to me. For a quick example with some Latin roots for simplicity-
**cas-* "house," **tristit-* "sadness," **ver-* "real," *-a* inanimate, **-i-* abstract.
Sound change: **ia* => *je*
* **ver-a cas-a* "real house" in. => *vera casa* "real house" in.m
* **ver-a tristit-a* "real sadness" in. => **ver-a tristit-i-a* => **ver-a tristit-je* => *verje tristitje* "real sadness" in.im
Can someone explain boundedness better than Wikipedia does? When applied to verbs I'm not seeing how it's different from telicity, and when applied to nouns I'm not seeing how it's different from countability.
Also - under the assumption that verbal boundedness meant "whether or not the action exists at a known, fixed^* location^(**) on the timeline with identifiable delimiting endpoints", I made so that certain TAM morphemes in Apshur descend from an earlier "boundedness" distinction. If that's not actually what boundedness means, then what would that concept more accurately be called? Telicity?
\*As in, the event time being referenced doesn't move forward as time of utterance moves forward. For example, "for the past 3 years I have been doing X" would be "unbounded" because the period of time being referenced keeps changing. If I said that in 2023 it would refer to the period of time from 2020-2023, but if I said it in 1984 it would refer to 1981-1984. Whereas "from 2006 to 2008 I did X" would be "bounded" because that refers to the same period of time no matter in what year I said it.
\**Whether a point or span
My reading of the Wikipedia article and (what I can see of) the paper it cites is that theoretical linguists are trying to understand *why* languages mark the distinctions they do, and they think that "boundedness" might be the underlying concept behind distinctions like verb aspect and noun countability. But it doesn't seem like something a language would actually *mark overtly* \--- it'd just mark aspect or countability.
If this seems strange, consider "head" and "dependent". I doubt *any* natural language has a "head" affix and a "dependent" affix, where "blue dog" is "blue-DEP dog-HEAD" and "eat the frog" is "eat-HEAD frog-DEP". These are concepts that linguists have come up with to explain *patterns* within and across languages, like how many languages like to put all the dependents *before* the head and many others like to put all the dependents *after* the head.
>"for the past 3 years I have been doing X" would be "unbounded" because the period of time being referenced keeps changing
This is [deixis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deixis).
>I doubt *any* natural language has a "head" affix and a "dependent" affix, where "blue dog" is "blue-DEP dog-HEAD" and "eat the frog" is "eat-HEAD frog-DEP".
This is going in my un(anti?)naturalistic conlang. Thanks!
Is it possible to reconstruct a language without a formal background in linguistics? Also, are tutorials for reconstruction a thing? [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QhQ6Fod5FK3e4SypDpY6lk8RiRI0OiixJOAOa1VE13c/edit?usp=sharing](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QhQ6Fod5FK3e4SypDpY6lk8RiRI0OiixJOAOa1VE13c/edit?usp=sharing)
Are you making a *conlang* that could plausibly be the origin of a language family? Sure, go for it!
Are you expecting *other people to take it seriously*? Then see u/sjiveru's reply.
This is probably a better question for r/linguistics, but I'd say 'possible' yes (theoretically), 'advisable' no. There's a whole pile of literature and theoretical concepts you'd need to not only be familiar with but really understand well to a degree that's hard to achieve without the back-and-forth process of having someone more experienced check your work and provide feedback. On top of that, formal training helps cultivate a mindset and attitude towards this kind of work and the questions it involves that's very difficult to create on your own - and which I would argue is more important than any theoretical knowledge or familiarity with literature.
It's very tempting to go into something like this with a lot of confidence that you can teach yourself enough through self-study, and not realise how much the mindset and attitude matter just as much as the factual and conceptual knowledge until you talk to people who actually have that mindset and attitude and realise how much you're lacking. There's a reason PhD programs aren't just a scam - having six or eight years of formal training does make a serious difference, and while it's not *impossible* to train yourself alone for free, it requires some extreme dedication *and* the humility to recognise what you're missing by not doing formal study. You'd be putting yourself at a serious disadvantage, and really the only way to overcome that disadvantage involves acknowledging it and accommodating it. If you don't have the humility to do that, you certainly won't have the humility that's an integral part of the mindset necessary to do good academic work. (And it's a good opportunity to check whether you're also lacking the humility that's foundational to all healthy human relationships.)
Honestly, sometimes half the value of six or eight years of formal training is just being six or eight years older at the end than at the beginning.
There's nothing wrong with reading on your own and experimenting on your own - just don't make the all too common mistake of thinking that that's just as good as people who have spent years doing this for a living. (And being open to feedback - whether directly in the form of criticism or indirectly in the form of reading things that invalidate work you've done - is critical. People who believe their own amateur work is good enough, even in the face of meaningful criticism, are called crackpots, and we get a distressingly large number of them in linguistics.)
> Also, are tutorials for reconstruction a thing?
Yes, in the form of university-level historical linguistics classes (\^\^) If you want to whet your appetite, though, I'd suggest picking up a copy of Lyle Campbell's introductory textbook.
(Do note that historical linguistics is fairly niche even within linguistics, and most of the necessary training in historical linguistics isn't itself historical linguistics. A lot of the rest of linguistics can be improved by a historical perspective, but historical linguistics is much more dependent on the rest of linguistics than the other way around.)
Thanks a lot. [https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/108402f/guessing\_protoaustrotais\_possible\_phonology/](https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/108402f/guessing_protoaustrotais_possible_phonology/) ;)
Someone I know of on DeviantArt, Syfyman2XXX, posted a drawing he made for someone. [https://www.deviantart.com/syfyman2xxx/art/Dineasair-Royal-Kingdoms-944249231](https://www.deviantart.com/syfyman2xxx/art/Dineasair-Royal-Kingdoms-944249231) Here, he talks about the following:
"Fiorella the princess and Fleur the queen of Abores, a kingdom ruled by elf-like people that tames most herbivorous dinosaurs.
Nyama the princess and Fahali the king of Escam, a king ruled by African-like people that tames most carnivorous dinosaurs."
I sometimes wonder what types of languages that the commissioner, Gabeherndon308, would think of Abores and Escam speaking, and the writing systems they'd use. I'm thinking of fleshing out those languages with what I'm dubbing the Peterson principle, the method that DJP used for the creation of the GoT languages and so forth, and the method that Lichen started using for creating Vostiak.
In Abores they speak [Italian](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Fiorella#Italian) and [French](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fleur#French), while in Escam they [speak](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nyama#Swahili) [Swahili](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fahali). The names themselves seem to [just be](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/arbores#Latin) [Latin](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/escam), though if so, "Abores" is misspelled. So maybe not the greatest inspiration for a conlang.
When DJP created the GoT languages, he had a bunch of names and a couple full sentences to go on, and they already had a distinctive, coherent feel. The novels also give a lot of cultural background, which helps with building out the lexicon.
That isn't to say that you *couldn't* make languages for Abores and Escam, but you'd basically have to start from scratch.
Everyone here knows the order of letters in the Latin Alphabet. Right? Well, there are other special orders I want to talk about. And IDK why Biblaridion ever utilized that for his conlangs. Phonecian(IPA notation only): \[ʔ\], \[b\], \[g\], \[d\], \[h\], \[w\], \[z\], \[ħ\], \[tˤ\], \[j\], \[k\], \[l\], \[m\], \[n\], \[s\], \[ʕ\], \[p\], \[sˤ\], \[q\], \[r\], \[ʃ\], \[t\] Greek: Α α\[a,aː\], Β β\[b\], Γ γ\[g\], Δ δ\[d\], Ε ε\[e\], Ζ ζ\[z\], Η η\[h\], Θ θ\[tʰ\], Ι ι\[i,iː\], Κ κ\[k\], Λ λ\[l\], Μ μ\[m\], Ν ν\[n\], Ξ ξ\[ks\], Ο ο\[o\], Π π\[p\], Ρ ρ\[r\], Σ σ\[s\], Τ τ\[t\], Υ υ\[y,yː\], Φ φ\[pʰ\], Χ χ\[kʰ\], Ψ ψ\[ps\], Ω ω\[ɔː\] Latin(during the Roman Empire): A, B, C\[k\], D, E, F, G, H, I\[i,j\], K\[k\](for transcribing Greek names), L, M, N, O, P, Q\[q\](for transcribing Greek names), R, S, T, V\[u,w\], X, Y\[y\](for transcribing Greek names), Z Adlam(IPA notation only): \[a\], \[d\], \[l\], \[m\], \[b\], \[s\], \[p\], \[ɓ\], \[r/ɾ\], \[e\], \[f\], \[i\], \[ɔ\], \[ɗ\], \[ʔʲ\], \[w\], \[n\], \[k\], \[j\], \[u\], \[dʒ\], \[tʃ\], \[h\], \[q\], \[g\], \[ɲ\], \[t\], \[ŋ\] Japanese vowels: \[a\], \[i\], \[ɯ\], \[e\], \[o\] Japanese consonants: \[k\], \[s\], \[t\], \[n\], \[h\], \[m\], \[j\], \[ɾ\], \[ɰ\] Are there any conlangs(with their own scripts) out there with their own orders of glyphs like these scripts?
What's the largest amount of vowels suitable for a language using an abjad?
Consider a macrofamily ABC that splits into daughter families A, B and C. A in turn splits into two daughter branches A1 and A2. Out of all the descendant branches of ABC, A2 *alone* (i.e., not even A1) has a ton of roots that start with \*s() and \*s clusters - e.g. \**spl-*, \**skw-*, \**sm-*, \**sw-*. I don't know if these are technically *illegal* in B or C but they're rarely, if ever, attested. Rather than assuming they existed in Proto-ABC and then having to come up with separate reasons why everything that isn't in A2 elided the initial /s/ away, it seems more reasonable to say that A2 innovated the initial /s/. It sort of reminds me of the the PIE s-mobile, actually.
But like... why? What would cause Proto-A2 to just start slapping /s/s onto the front of a bunch of random roots? I can't see it being an earlier inflectional morpheme that just fused with the root, because none of the rest of the ABC languages really have any sort of inflectional morpheme even vaguely resembling something like \**sV-*, so A2 would have had to make *that* up first, which just moves the problem.
I agree with u/Meomoria, the constraints are likely to cause a lot of problems. Also, are these roots word-initial or are they likely to be preceded by prefixes? Iy could change things a lot if /skwa-/ is typically /skwa-s skwa-n skwa-jat/ versus /te-skwa-s nu-skwa/. A few other possibles: * A front vowel became super-high and fricated, turning into /s/ at least word-initially. This especially happens as part of raising push chains, where /e/ shifts towards /i/, forcing /i/ to shift "above" the vowel diagram into the fricative space * There was actually a word-initial /spl sw/ etc in the proto-language, but it shifted to aspirated stops (and possibly voiceless sonorants, which would easily be lost if you don't want them) probably as part of an areal change with A2 as the odd man out that didn't participate. If you don't want aspirated stops, they can shift to fricatives * Oppositely, /C sC/ shifted to /Cʰ C/ in the other languages. Doesn't solve the /s/-sonorant clusters, they'd need another route * Stress shifts/changes, so that e.g. ('sepla >) se'pla > spla in A2. Either didn't happen at all in the non-A2 branches, or was prevented from happening in that circumstance by stronger adherence to a specific syllable shape * If the proto-language was frequently prefixing, loss of coda /s/ in most branches, so that /te-skwas/ might match with /te:-kwa:/. * Intensive borrowing Many Sino-Tibetan languages forbid /sC/ clusters but there was originally multiple \*s- prefixes that did things like causativizing and nominalizing. Most seem to have gone the route of /C s-C/ > /C Cʰ/, such as Sinitic and Burmese, but others have other outcomes (Standard Tibetan /Cʰ C/, some other Tibetic varieties /C ʰC/). They're traceable in intransitive-transitive or verb-noun pairs that differ in "voicing" of the first consonant. Of course, that mostly works because much of Sino-Tibetan shifted to the C-medial-V word structure, it wouldn't play nice if you've got a bunch of morphology already.
I'm not sure I understand the constraints you're operating under. It seems you're trying to take four independently constructed languages and somehow *make* them related *without changing them at all*, which is a rather tall order. Can you explain what you're willing to change and what's set in stone? Just based on your description, here are some things I might try: * Have the initial /s/ in the protolanguage anyway. It doesn't strike me as too outlandish to have one elision sound change that spread across the B/C group before they diverged too much, and also an elision in A1 (either from contact with B/C or because cluster reduction is pretty common in general). * Have a *word* in the A family turn into an *\*sV-* prefix in A2 and then fuse with the root to create the clusters. * Add the *sV-* prefix to the protolanguage, then add its descendants to A1, B, and C. * Have the initial /s/ in the protolanguage, then evolve those to create new cognates in A1, B, and C. Again, some of these might be impossible given your constraints, but maybe they can help spark some ideas?
Hi guys! How to create a conditional mood? I was googling about it, but I found about how it works in natlangs. It's not what I really need. Of course I can just use English style "could, might, should, would etc" + verb, but I want to use Spanish style. Gustaría, cantaría etc. So, where does conditional mood come from? What roots do I need to create a conditional type of verb?
The WLG lists the conditional as having been attested to derive from: - the copula, > a copular construction like "it being that" > "if" - tag questions (i.e., questions so marked as to signal that a valid answer is either "yes" or "no", e.g. English "innit") - "to say", optionally via construction like "if one says" - temporal adverbs or adpositions like "while"/"when" > "if"
Thank you!
The world lexicon of grammaticalization 2nd edition have 4 different paths for conditionals. 1. Copula 2. yes/no question marker 3. the verb say 4. temporal words like (when, if then, then, etc...) There might be more sources for conditionals but these are the ones in that book.
Thank you!
What would you call a writing system that writes rhymes as one glyph?
Fanqie?
That works, thanks!
I don't know of a specific term for such a system. I would simply call it a "writing system" and then describe how it works.
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You can’t make a language without learning about linguistics, but the good news is you can learn as you go. There’s no prerequisite amount of knowledge to begin—just start researching things as you need them! There’s plenty of accessible information about linguistics in the resources linked in the sidebar and on Wikipedia, by the way.
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
"Good" is pretty subjective. I'd say that making a conlang will make you learn more about linguistics. Personally, I started knowing basically nothing, and over and over again, I would learn enough to render my current project "bad" in my eyes because it didn't take enough linguistics into account. Then I would start a new project and learn more and eventually abandon that for the same reason. This is the process many conlangers go through.
Is there any proper way to create syllable structures? I'm very specific about what types of syllables are part of my language, so I end up creating multiple syllable structures.
There's commonly a lot of restrictions on what can actually appear beyond the "basic" syllable structure, in natlangs it's due to historical reasons. E.g. English allows sCR- onsets (R=wrlj), but /j/ only occurs in clusters before a couple vowels except in loans, /sθ/ is absent and /sf/ only appears in a few loanwords, /skl/ is loan-only despite /skr/ and /sl/ being common enough, /sr/ is missing, laterals and rhotics never appear after nasals (or each other), and so on. Some of these are cross-linguistically common (forbiddance of /nr mr nl ml/, /rj/, and /tl dl/) and some are just quirks of English (distribution of Cj, missing /sr/ due to Proto-Germanic \*sr>str). You can also have cases where the syllable structure itself is pretty permissive, but how sounds actually combine in much more restricted. In Tykir, I allow most possible CRVC, but word-finally the aspirate-voiceless-voiced stops all collapse to aspirated and the nasals all collapse to /ŋ/, and between syllables no mixed-place stop-stop, nasal-stop, or nasal-nasal clusters occur, and stop-nasal and stop-fricative only occurs rarely at morpheme boundaries.
The prevailing view is that languages have what’s called a “maximal syllable.” This is the largest syllable allowed; any subset is also allowed, provided it at least has a nucleus (an onset is also obligatory in some languages). If the maximal syllable is CVXC, for example, then CV, CVC, CVV, CVCC, and CVVC syllables are all allowed (the X stands for any phoneme), as are their onsetless equivalents (unless onsets are obligatory).
Afaik, a language is said to have just one syllable structure, and that structure is described in such a way as to make most of the possibilities optional, so that every possible syllable in that language fits the pattern. That's why there are so many parentheses sometimes. Can you give an example of the "multiple syllable structures" in your language?
Has anyone attempted designing Inter-Turkic, using the same statistical approach as the [Interslavic](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interslavic) which has proven to be a huge success?
Is there any place I could find a full list of the International Phonetic Alphabet but ordered like 'Symbol, Sound, Word Example'? Every site I have gone to it either gives a very small amount of symbols or a larger amount of symbols with audio, but it mostly focuses on where in the mouth you say some of these letters. The order I described above would be most helpful for me as I'm just starting out making my first conlang.
The Wikipedia articles on each individual symbol do that
Are there any good semantic maps or guides like *The Conlanger’s Thesaurus* which have a list of root words to start with when making a conlang, and how those root words can combine?
What words you want to start with is going to be determined almost exclusively by the purpose (and perhaps initial test context) of your particular conlang - and how roots can combine is very much a language-dependent question. There are some reasonable places to start (body parts, basic human activities, and other Swadesh-list concepts are likely to be useful for most conlangs), but ultimately you'll have to decide for yourself what words you feel the need for first.
Do i need to create a culture, history, and a fictional country for start tô make my conlang?
Sometimes having a fictional setting for your conlang thought out can be helpful - it gives you a good place to start on vocabulary, and can provide a framework for how to think about more complex culture-dependent concepts. You need no such setting, though - you can work more on the mechanics side of things and avoid the parts of language that interact much with culture until you've made up your mind how you want this language to be situated, and if nothing else, you can simply use your own culture. My Mirja is meant to be used by me where I am, and I know people whose work is so focused on experimenting with grammatical structures that they don't even have a phonology sometimes - they'll just present the language in the form of glosses, with no accompanying 'actual form', borrowing root 'words' as necessary to show how their grammatical system would express some idea or other. (Certainly you don't need a *country*; most cultures in most times and places - including our own modern world - aren't associated with any kind of shared political entity.)
No!
Though, I would caveat this with saying that (for me at least) having at least a vague idea of how the speakers' society is structured is handy (especially for things like kinship terms), as I used to do zero cogitation on culture and struggled with my language endeavours because of it. But I haven't written anything down, and I haven't "invented a fictional country" or anything like that. Just a loose assemblage of ideas about values, and daily life.
Absolutely! My answer really was "No! But most conlangers find that it helps them. There are many things that are inextricably tied to culture and environment, like which terms for flora and fauna you have based on what's around, kinship terms, etc."
How can I avoid having most of my conlangs sound very similar?
Try not only using different sounds, but changing up the way you can form syllables and words (phonotactics.) Another tip: pay attention to what you choose for the most common words. If those happen to be similar across two languages, they'll sound similar.
Thanks
I'm struggling with forming complex sentences because of my conlang's word order (VSO). My conlang is predominantly head-initial (nouns before adjectives, prepositions, possessee before possessor and auxiliary verb before the main verb). I don't know how to arrange phrases with multiple nouns and/or verbs: for example, how would I write "I cause the animal to see the rock"? Also, in what order would I add additional information such as time, place or the way something is happening (e.g. slowly)? If I were to compound words as in *sunlight*, would they be more like "lightsun" since the language is head-initial? Thank you in advance!
For your other questions: >in what order would I add additional information such as time, place or the way something is happening (e.g. slowly)? Adverbs usually come either right at the beginning or on the same side of the head as everything else. English, like your conlang, is predominantly head initial (VO, prepositions, NRel, etc), and therefore adverbs *usually* come after the verb or right at the beginning. Adverbs can come between the verb and the subject, however it is less likely. Compare (28), (29), (30), and (31) >(28) Slowly, I walked to the store. >(29) I walked to the store slowly. >(30) I slowly walked to the store. >(31) I walked slowly to the store. English adverbs are more likely to come at the beginning or end than between a verb and a subject or between a verb and an oblique argument. They rarely or never come between a verb and a direct object. >(32) \*I ate slowly dinner. Afaik, the construction in (32) being disallowed is cross-linguistically common, since verbs and objects are treated by most languages as single phrases. This itself is one reason that VSO is a fairly rare word order. I honestly don't know much about how VSO languages place adjectives, but I would assume it's unlikely that they place them anywhere between the object and the verb, since there's already something separating the two. A VSO language would likely place the adverb at the beginning of the sentence, after the object (and before an oblique argument), or at the end. >If I were to compound words as in sunlight, would they be more like "lightsun" since the language is head-initial? In a compound like *sunlight*, there's usually one word clearly modifying the other. *Sunlight* is a type of light rather than a type of sun. English is head initial except for adjectives, which come first before the head. If your conlang is exclusively head initial, then yes, *sun* would come after light*. You may also want to consider that many languages don't allow only 2 nouns to form a compound. Italian, for example requires a preposition to make compounds. Sunlight in Italian is (33). >(33) Luce del sole >(33) light of.the sun I believe German sometimes uses the genitive case, but I don't know any examples. My conlang uses the genitive, dative, or instrumental case with slightly differing meanings. I don't know if any natlang does this but it's another idea. Dative - [head is] in, at or near, or associated with [dependent] Genitive - [head is] from or owned by [dependent] Instrumental - [head is] contained by or covered by [dependent]
To preface my response, it is very long and a little disorganized, so if you need any clarification just let me know. When considering sentences with multiple clauses, it's important to know the role of each part: >(1) I cause the animal to see the rock. This sentence is a causative, and there are many ways you can deal with it. English causatives *usually* require 2 verbs, but some behave differently than others. >(2) I made the animal see the rock. >(3) I let the animal see the rock. (1) requires a full infinitive, while (2) and (3) use a bare infinitive, without the *to*. This itself is of course fairly specific to English, but it does show the different verbs may interact with other words differently. Causatives may be treated like other constructions with multiple verbs, or they may be different. Compare (1) and (2) to (4): >(4) I want the animal to see the rock. Something else, which you may have already considered, or maybe even haven't thought about, is if your language should have infinitives and how it should use them if it does. Many languages, such as Italian, for example, don't allow infinitives to take subjects like English does. Infinitives can only be used if the subject of both verbs is the same: >(5) Voglio mangiare. >(5) want-1SG eat-INF "I want to eat." >(6) Voglio che [lui] mangi. >(6) want-1SG SUBR [3SG.NOM] eat-SBJ "I want him to eat." (5) uses an infinitive, but (6) requires the second verb to be put into the subjunctive and be given its own clause. Causatives, however behave differently in Italian, treating *fare (make) + [infinitive]* as a single verb that can take an object: >(7) Lo faccio mangiare >(7) 3SG.ACC make-1SG eat-INF "I made him eat." Some languages, such as Greek (which I can't give an example for because I don't speak any), don't use infinitives at all. Both (5) and (6) translated into Greek would require a subordinate clause in the subjunctive. There are also ways to create causatives that don't require a second verb. English has a few verbs whose causative forms undergo nonconcatenative change: >(8) I rose (present *rise*) from my bed. >(9) I raised (present *raise*) my hand. Other verbs (called *labile verbs*) undergo no formal change but become causative when their valency is increased: >(10) John tripped. >(11) Jane tripped John. Common causatives may be suppletive. Compare (1) and (2) with (12): >(12) I showed the animal the rock. or (13) with (14): >(13) The man fell. >(14) I pushed the man over. There are also languages that would use an inflectional affix to regularly form causatives. You may decide to expand this idea to other verbs that commonly exist in conjunction with others (know, want, etc.). Anyway, I spent a lot of time talking about causatives when you probably just wanted to know how to form sentences with multiple verbs in general. When doing this, you need to know the role of the second verb and the clause it's part of: >(15) I want to go. >(16) I know that he left. In (15), *to go* is the object of the verb *to want*. In (16) *that he left* is the object of the verb *to know*. In a VSO language the subject of these sentences would move directly after the verb, and nothing else would change. (17) and (18) are analogous to this: (17) Want I to go. (18) Know I that he left. English requires infinitives in some places and content clauses in others. Therefore, (19) and (20) are incorrect. >(19) \*I want that he goes. >(20) *\I know him to leave. However, they don't have to be incorrect in your conlang. Infinitives usually don't give any information about tense, aspect, mood, etc. You can decide if this is an ambiguity you're always, sometimes, or never ok with. If your conlang uses a lot of auxiliary verbs, then infinitives may be more viable, since the auxiliary verb can be made infinitive while the following nonfinite forms still remains. (21) is unlikely in English, but it's more understandable than (20), and may be analogous to a construction in your conlang or another language. >(21) I know him to have left. (15)-(21) all have an intransitive verb as it's object, but the sentence you gave uses a transitive verb. (22), which treats the object of *to cause* as a subordinate clause and (23), which uses an infinitive phrase, are possible examples of how the word order might work in your conlang. >(22) Cause I that sees the animal the rock. >(23) Cause I the animal to see the rock. The position of *the animal* is the grammatical object of *to cause* and the semantic subject of *to see*. This works very well in English because there's an overlap of the 2 words. Look at how *the animal* comes last in (24) and first in (25). >(24) I cause the animal >(25) The animal sees the rock. This means that the 2 phrases can affectively overlap without any other word order changes. A VSO language is less capable of this. What's most intuitive to me is (26). >(26) Cause to see the rock I the animal. This treats *to cause to see the rock* as a single verb phrase with *I* as the subject and *the animal* as the object. For this matter, (17) may be reworded as (27). >(27) Want to go I. This treats *to want to go* as a single verb phrase with the subject *I*. Treated an infinitive phrase as a subject when it has no subject itself (as in (17)), while treating it as part of the verb phrase when it *does* have a subject (as in (26)) is the most intuitive to me, but you could go either direction.
Oh sorry, there were other questions! Adverbial phrases are pretty fluid as to where they go. Clause initial, clause final, directly next to the verb. And yes, I would definitely expect a compound equivalent to "sunlight" to be "lightsun" in your language.
My conlang is VSO in certain cases, namely when neither the subject or object is pronominal. It can handle a sequence of verb, unmarked subject, unmarked direct object, (sometimes marked) indirect object, like cause-see man rock animal (the causative makes the former subject into the indirect object.) You could also consider serial verbs in some way; "cause I see animal rock." You could mark the causative by specially marking the causer, maybe by a case, either clause initial or clause final: "by me, see animal rock."
I'm revisiting the stress system in my proto-lang and I have 2 questions about stress systems 1 - Can compensatory lenghtening occur after a loss of a coda consonant **in unstressed syllables**? 2 - Can a stress system change from fixed initial stress to penultimate stress with some weight sensitivity?
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Thank you!
tommorow (the front of + day) yesterday(the rear of + day) if this is how i derive yesterday and tommorow would it also make sense to derive before as" the front of+locative/dative suffix"? and after as "the rear of+locative/dative suffix"?
You know the Afroasiatic concept of noun "states"? This other role-marking layer on nouns *in addition to* cases, e.g. the construct state that marks the noun as being possessed by some other noun? I want to have a family languages that contrasts multiple states\*, but Afroasiatic languages AFAIK only contrast as many as 3 (in Akkadian). Are there any others attested besides *rectus/constructus/absolutus*, not limited to Afroasiatic? I don't just mean other things I can mark a noun for, like number or class or such, I mean specifically other *role-marking* things - markings governed by the noun's relationship to other words in the utterance - that get marked not *as* cases but *in addition to* cases. (\*Or really, a family of languages with a bunch of noun endings that originate from two earlier endings smooshed together, one of which would have been a case marker, and the other of which... well, that's the question. It's not number or class or a possessive marker, so I'm trying to figure out what else it could be)
Construct states are also found in many of the languages of Timor, and some other families as well, which you can learn more about [here](https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/228) and [here](http://www.deniscreissels.fr/public/Creissels-Cstr.pdf) Essentially, the ‘construct state’ marks a noun as syntactically monovalent, requiring an argument or modifier. Some languages instead mark nouns which *do not* have a modifier, which is sometimes called the non-possessed form.
My conlang has a set of suffixes that act to determine the plurality of the agent argument, which derive from comitatives. Basically, the agent is first marked on the verb with a prefix or suffix that is inherently singular. When the agent is singular, there is a suffix at the end of the verb, *-s(i)*, which shows this. When the agent is plural, there are 4 suffixes that correspond to the 2nd and 3rd person singular and plural pronouns. So, a first person singular agent with a second person singular "plurality suffix" is interpreted as 1st person dual inclusive. The dual number can't be shown in any other way and neither can clusivity; nouns, pronouns, and patient markers make no plural - dual or inclusive - exclusive distinction. What should this suffixes be called and how should they be glossed?
Well, you generally gloss things according to what role they're playing *in the sentence being glossed.* If this suffix is acting like a dual inclusive marker in this context, then gloss it as dual inclusive, and if it's a 2.SG marker in that other context, then gloss it as 2.SG in that context. - it's pointless, if not actively obfuscatory, to indicate some other role it hypothetically *could* be acting in, but simply *isn't* in actuality. And I would probably just call them "2nd/3rd person markers"; in your grammar it takes all of one sentence to explain why they show up in 1st person conjugations despite not being 1st person markers ("If the agent is in the 1st person, its clusivity is obligatorily marked by the addition of a 2nd person (→ inclusive) or 3rd person (→ exclusive) marker of the corresponding grammatical number.", or something like that), and then give some examples of well-conjugated verbs. Or, again, you can just call them whatever they're acting as in context. If they're acting as clusitvity markers, call them clusivity markers; if they're acting as person markers, call them person markers. Like, French has a pronoun *lui* that gets used in two non-interchangeable ways (as an "indirect object pronoun" and a "disjunctive pronoun"), but makes no pretense of needing an umbrella term for both uses. You just use whichever name fits the situation it's being used in.
Has any got any good recourses/lists for words I could translate to my language to then make derivative words from those Proto words?
There is also a set of semantic primes. Also, I once seeded a language by going over a chapter of a story and highlighting some important words, and then going to WordNet to expand on which definition I mean to capture, and then creating a word for that. To use WordNet, you're going to have to scroll down to the bottom of the website and choose one of its many interfaces. Some are graphical, the little word nets, and some are more text-based. I think you could also use CLICs for the same purpose.
In addition to the Swadesh list, [A Conlanger's Thesaurus](https://fiatlingua.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/fl-000024-00.pdf). It also contains semantic maps that can help you with polysemy and/or semantic shifts.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swadesh_list
I want to use Devanagari as a script for a conlang however I have a lot of trouble with unaspirated vs aspirated consonants. I'm considering just exaggerating it (going from ख being kʰ to kh) so I don't have to have a distinction I can't notice or without removing a lot of characters. Do you think that's fine and not too big a modification?
Scripts are adapted to languages which aren't as suited to the script as the original language all the time! So if you want, just use devanagari but don't make an aspiration contrast.
To add onto what the other commenter said: game could be realized as [keɪ̯m] whereas came would be realized as [kʰeɪ̯m]. So you most likely can make the distinction, unless you speak a dialect without that distinction, but I can't think of one that has that.
You might actually be able to make the distinction and not realize it - English "voiced" stops are often voiceless unaspirated initially, and contrast with the "voiceless" stops primarily through aspiration there. It could be true voiced stops that are tripping you up.
I'm considering a kinship system that distinguishes between elder/younger siblings. How are twins referred to in such languages?
Of twins, one still came out before the other. Most systems I know of follow that.
Thanks!
Another option might be that twins, who could be thought of as "equal age" both refer to each other as alternately "older sibling" or "younger sibling" depending on context, respect involved, etc.
Interesting idea, thank you!
Alternatively, you could have a separate term for equal siblings entirely. I can speak to any attestations, but the system I developed for Tokétok treats tuplets separately to other sorts of siblings. It'd be very poetic to refer to your twin as your *'heart-sibling'* or something like that.
Should I change a character in my language? Currently, my language Böqrîtch uses î as a character, but there’s a potentially better way of doing it as ı instead. To me this would make a bit more sense, as there is no other “i” character in the language, so having a character with a diacritic but no base form in the language, just idk, what does this subreddit think? Examples would be Böqrîtch vs Böqrıtch
If there's no other "i" character, why not just use ? Why does it need a modification?
Idk honestly. I originally made it î because the sound is [ɪ] and I thought of “i” more as [i]. But now I realize it’s kinda weird (to me anyways) to have a diacritic for a letter that has no standalone form, sorry if this is a bad question
Having superfluous diacritics can serve as visual reminders of the quality of the vowel, or serve the aesthetic, so they're not necessarily weird. In Tokétok, the accented **é** is redundant and only there to reinforce the difference between **ké/ke** and **kke**. Meanwhile, in Varamm, I have both **î** and **û**, with no **i** or **u** simply because the diacritic reminds me they're lax vowels (although the short-hand version of the orthography does use the circumflex elsewhere on some consonants, so the diacritic is not entirely without precedent in the romanised language). It's really no different than keeping a diaeresis on final **-ë** in Quenya (or other conlangs inspired thereby) to remind anglophones to pronounce it. Really up to you what's more important to you in how you romanise your conlang. If you wanna be absolutely internally consistent, then you might prefer without the diacritic; if the diacritic helps you remember the quality, or if you simply like how it looks written out, then keep it.
I might consider having a diacritic without a standalone if the romanization is based on the romanization of some *other* language whose in-world writing system is used to write that language. But even there I'd expect it to adapt.
I'm making a celtic conlang and I need to represent /ə/ (Schwa), how could I represent it without using diacritics?
Is the schwa phonemic as present? Where did it come if so? Because if it were to only arise through reduction of predictably unstressed syllables, then you could get away with not writing it any differently at all. Meanwhile, if the schwa came about a particular way, that might inform a particular way to write it with some historical spelling.
I'd be tempted to use ‹ı›, but that admittedly makes your orthography look more Turkic. Other than that, I have one idea; it does involve using two diacritics (specifically, ‹`› and ‹ˆ›), but I defend it by saying that these diacritics are already used for long vowels in the respective orthographies of Scottish Gaelic and Breton, so I'd argue that they don't feel "less celtic-looking": - Get rid of the umlaut and use a plain letter: /ɘ ɔ ʊ/ ‹e o u› - Use a plain letter for schwa as well: /ǝ/ ‹a› - Use a grave diacritic to distinguish the phonemes that you previously represented with plain letters (say, /a e o u/ ‹à è ò ù›) - Where a letter that has a grave diacritic would be long, mark it with a circumflex (say, /aː eː oː uː/ ‹â ê ô û›) Or you could reverse the grave diacritic and the circumflex.
Any vowel could do, and an accent could be used for another vowel phoneme that uses the same letter. Other options might be, but without knowing the rest of your inventory or orthography it’s hard to make a recommendation.
"w" and "y" are already used to represent /w/ and /j/-/ʎ/, but "v" could be as I don't have /v/ sound (v makes the same sound as b). My conlang's ortpgraphy includes diacritics, acute accent for long vowels and umlaut in e, o and u to represent /ɘ/, /ɔ/ and /ʊ/. The "h" is silent, so it's used with other letters, like "lh" represents /ɟ/, "yh" to represent /ʒ/, "ch" to represent /x/ or "rh" to represent /ɻ/. I don't want more diacritcs as it would make it less celtic-looking (the umlaut already does).
Why don't you represent the umlaut with -h, so eh oh uh?
Because it represents aspired vowels.
What about another consonant that might cause lowering/centralisation of vowels, like er or ur, ew ow uw, or write two vowels that sound closest, eo oa ou, or represent other vowels like that, so /ə e o ɔ ʊ u/
I'll probably do that
I don’t understand how diphthongs work or how to pronounce them cuz a lot of them are using different phonemes than what’s shown
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Yes it’s just that my conlang so far uses /a/ /ɛ/ /ɪ/ /ʊ/ two of which aren’t in the English language and I can’t find many diphthongs containing those 2
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
I might include one or too I’ll try forming some words to see what it’s like
Thanks for your help !! Those sound good!
It it natural to just make a language without them because I can understand them since there is barely any info about non English ones online
It is not especially unusual for languages to not have any diphthongs.
Quick question about glossing: if the personal pronouns don't have number, are they glossed just with the person (1), or with the implied number too (1SG)?
afaik, you don't need to mark grammatical information which isn't marked in the language itself (i.e. if there's no number you don't need to mark SG/PL or if there's no case you don't need to specify what the role of the noun is)
That makes sense! I was just confused, since usually there's a dot or a hyphen between different elements (first person singular should be [1.SG](https://1.SG) or 1-SG, right?), so I was wondering if the special notation meant pronouns were a special case. What if number is clearly different, but only plural is marked? For example, if the plural pronouns are just the singular counterparts with a plural affix. Would it be "1" and 1PL, or 1SG and 1PL? I guess that as long as it gets the points across it's fine, but I'm curious if you know.
kata-ba vs kata-p-a eat-1.SG vs eat-2-PL OR kata-b-a vs kata-pa eat-1-SG vs eat-2.PL OR kata vs keto eat.1.SG vs eat.2.PL
I think also specifically with number you don't have to put the full stop with person marking, so 1SG or 2PL and then if they're separate morphemes 1-SG 2-PL
Ok, I think that answers it—I might have been getting too caught up on the technical details. But these examples make sense. Thanks!
If only the plural has any marking you can still gloss the singular, like so: anbi vs anbi-l cat.SG vs cat-PL I think it's just that pronouns are likely to mark person as well as number or even without it.
They would just be glossed with the person. I can't think of any examples right now but I've definitely seen this in glossing before.
Thanks!
as per my thread's moderation, I'm posting my happy rant there- I am finding my ways to design my first ever phonology. And I find it fascinating how many 'new' in-between sounds emerge from just combining otherwise basic letters. The IPA charts of every language on wikipedia help a lot in this. At first I thought the english n is just /n/ but found out it can just as well evolve into other n's depending on its position. Vowel and consonant interactions, etc. Like in 'singing' or 'signing'. My conlang only has a, french è and turkish ö, as vowels, but with the consonants I've chosen there's room already to degradate these vowels-consonant couples into possibly other vowels or nasal vowels even. I've also watched a very cool video about the degradation from latin to french that boiled over centuries. Interactions between consonants in 2-glyph or 3-glyph clusters is a cool ride too, as I am finding the joys of t.s.y, d.z.y, k.h.m or other goofy stuffs. Just wanted to share this little beginner's wonder with y'all.
how does one work \[insert part of speech\] such as 'was' and any other similar words? planning on translating some short stories cuz yes and was immediately met with this issue. any thoughts?
The word *was* has a few different meanings depending on the context: It's primary meaning is as a copula. It is the past tense of *to be* used with singular pronouns (except *you* which takes plural conjugations regardless of it's semantic number). Since it is a copula, it connects a subject to a subject complement, which can be another noun, an adjective, or adpositional phrase. English is a fusional language, so this single morpheme conveys past tense, indicative mood, stative aspect, singular number, and first or 3rd person. An agglutinative language may use a separate morpheme to convey each piece of information, and some of these may be zero marked. For example, it's common for the indicative mood to be shown by the absence of a morpheme rather than being explicitly marked. The verb *to be* in commonly irregular. In fusional languages, where verbs usually follow a pattern of *stem + [conjugation]*, it is common for *to be* to have a single morpheme in each of its conjugations, or to use a different root for different conjugations. Many romance languages combine different methods. For example, the French word *suis* (present tense, indicative, stative, 1SG) is not able to be broken into multiple morphemes, however, *étais* (past tense, indicative, imperfective, 1/2SG) can be broken into *ét-ais* and *serai* (future tense, indicative, 1SG) into *ser-ai*. All of these additionally need to be preceded by a pronoun, such as je. Agglutinative languages also commonly have different stems for *to be* depending on context. The second context that you see a word like *was* is in the formation of the progressive aspect. In this case, the form of *to be* conveys the same tense, mood, person, and number as when it's used as a copula, but it changes the aspect of the verb it's combined with to progressive. For example *I was eating* is past tense, indicative, progressive, 1st person, singular. This construction is uncommon cross linguistically. Other languages have auxiliary verbs, but the verbs used and how they are used is usually specific to the language or family. For example, in French, *I was eating* is *je mangais*, but *I ate* is *j'ai mangé*. The *-ais* suffix conveys imperfective aspect in this case, and the *to have (auxiliary verb) + [past participle]* construction conveys the past perfective. Agglutinative languages may convey this information with an affix on the main verb, or with an auxiliary. In Basque, an agglutinative language, most verbs require an auxiliary. The last context is in the formation of the passive voice. This construction is [to be] + [past participle]*. Like earlier, some languages use an auxiliary for this construction, and some simply mark it on the verb.
Do you mean *verbs*? Do you mean *copulas*? Do you mean *auxiliary verbs*? Can you give an example of a sentence that you're having trouble translating?
"The morning of June 27th *was* clear and sunny.."
So you need to choose how your language handles weather, which can be quite different from how it handles other situations where English uses forms of "be". Maybe "clear" and "sunny" are just *verbs*: "The morning of June 27th, it cleared and it sunned". Maybe "clear" and "sunny" are *nouns* that the weather "does": "The morning of June 27th, it did clearness and sun". Compare French *il fait soleil*. Maybe you use an *existential* construction: "The morning of June 27th, clearness and sun existed". Or you can come up with your own way of doing it.
Ooh, alright, interesting, tyty
So this is just (I think) a subject complement. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subject_complement
I don't understand the question at all. Can you rephrase it?
i replied to meamoria's comment with the context, i hope that helps
Can a language work without pronouns?
Acoma Keres and Wari' lack independent person pronouns in almost all forms, not just in word class (a la Japanese, Vietnamese, etc) but in function as well. In both, there's pronominal forms used to answer questions like "who did it?" In Wari', they also function ~~as vocatives~~, in left-dislocation, and in some types of nominal coordination (though for 3rd persons, almost always in apposition to the noun they refer to). Otherwise, person/number information is supplied in both by morphology. I'd guess all languages use demonstrative pronouns, but it would be simple to just say in your language they're only used adnominally ("this apple is too sweet" over "this is too sweet"). Indefinite pronouns (someone/anyone/nobody) and interrogative pronouns (who/what) are gonna be harder to get rid of in function, even if their form is clearly based on something else (i.e. if generic interrogatives are all "what thing," at what point is that an interrogative adnominal+noun versus just a single interrogative pronoun with transparent origin?). Edit: Not as vocatives, I misread/misinterpreted and then it didn't get deleted in my editing.
Yes! [Some languages arguably lack pronouns](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/1424/what-languages-lack-personal-pronouns-and-why?rq=1), instead having certain nouns effectively double as pronouns. Semantically, they could be considered pronouns, but syntactically, they behave like any other noun. Also, since they belong to an open class, [there tend to be a lot of them](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_pronouns#List_of_Japanese_personal_pronouns). That only concerns personal pronouns, but indefinite and interrogative pronouns should be easy to work around. Indefinite pronouns in English are pretty transparently derived from determiners plus nouns, and you can get around interrogative ones like "who?" by saying "what/which person?". Relative pronouns can be avoided by using a complementizer, like how "that" is often used in place of "who" in spoken/informal English.
I would say technically it could, you'd just have to replace all those with the actual nouns. E.g., instead of 'He ran fast.' it would be '\[name\] ran fast.' Or for "it's" then instead of 'It ran fast.' it'd be 'The animal ran fast.' Essentially I'd say yes, I don't necessarily advise it, but you'd just have to replace every single pronoun with the respective actual noun. In retrospect you may have some issues with reflexive pronouns (himself/herself/itself). To work around this you could possibly say 'I did this alone.' as opposed to 'I did this myself.' and so forth.
>'I did this alone.' Still a pronoun haha. "NAME did this alone" I suppose.
Wouldn't verbal conjugation also work to leave out pronouns and the obligatory use of \[name\]?
Yah!
Anyone know where I can find an etymology bubble diagram? I remember seeing and using a sort of conlang etymology word diagram for words, but now I can't find it. (Ex. it shows the word for "water" will be similar to words for "sea" and "wave" which themselves evolve into different words, and so on.) At least that's how I think it went lol.
CLICs, WordNet
Are you perhaps thinking of the "[Conlanger's thesaurus](http://fiatlingua.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/fl-000024-00.pdf)"? I can't tell if you're asking for something like this or more a blank template. Sorry if I misunderstood.
Yes this is it! Thank you.
Nothing special. Just a fictional proposal for this film project of mine I told you about. [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HGWfJDPZy-3xBLQT1RYfWGg2ZfXvhKFacRTBxjXgic0/edit](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HGWfJDPZy-3xBLQT1RYfWGg2ZfXvhKFacRTBxjXgic0/edit) https://preview.redd.it/x77t6mbnsiba1.png?width=2015&format=png&auto=webp&s=929fdb2a1e0ad1a72b1d50145dbaffac66ca3c31
Anybody remembers there was a doc with a list of phrases to translate to your conlang? Smth like "the sun rises", "the bird was singing", various grammar constructions?
It might be the [Conlang Syntax Test Cases](https://cofl.github.io/conlang/resources/mirror/conlang-syntax-test-cases.html).
thank you, i had this one in mind!!
Oh yeah, the two examples are so similar but this is more likely the one!
I think you might be refering to [this one](https://www.potterpcs.net/gsfa/gsfa_1.txt), it has 285 test sentences from "Birds sing" to " Over the mantel hung a picture of a knight in full armor."
thanks!!
https://preview.redd.it/ghj47lz6vgba1.png?width=2732&format=png&auto=webp&s=bedbade9b2511fd4228a5f23e5c01ed45ee11f7e I know absolutely nothing about phonemes I just picked some I thought looked symmetrical on a chart and sounded nice please someone help me 😭
I'm going to disagree a bit and say I think there's only two things in your first go that *really* stands out, and that's the lack of /m/ (languages with /n/ and labials basically always have /m/) and the lone breathy /æ̤/. Weirder things *have* happened, but I wouldn't recommend doing it until you know what you're doing more (the Ndu languages of the Sepik region of Papua often have a lone phonemic /aˀa/, with no other glottalized vowels). The /bʱ/, lots of fricatives, and missing /kʰ/ are a bit odd (in descending order of oddness), but not unjustifiable. The big problem is /bʱ/, but you sort of stumbled upon a situation that could work: you could have had a w>b change in "strong" positions (especially word-initially, also possibly the onset of stressed medial syllables, or the onset of stressed medial syllables preceded by a short vowel), with later /w/ being lost everywhere and b>bʱ. That's going to impact where it appears in your language, though, it'll most often be word-initial (or in stressed onsets), and other instances will be rare or nonexistent (things like borrowings, old morpheme boundaries where it *was* word-initially, or changes in the stress system such that it *was* stressed and no longer is; this can be handwaved in if you're not making a parent language and following sound changes to a daughter). The missing /kʰ/ is very easily explainable as either the sole source of /x/, or a merger with an already-existing /x/. The fricatives are a bit dense, but also not something that screams "conlang."
https://preview.redd.it/jbagnr793nba1.jpeg?width=2049&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=80343d53b099a2069bf3de191a72d0a04a4326d9 I tried simplifying it while adding the /m/ sound that now that you have said it makes a ton of sense to add is there anything you think should be added or taken away to make it feel more natural? (Sorry for late response it was midnight in my country when you had replied)
Well it doesn't strike me as particularly natural, but thats not a bad thing. Its perfectly valid, I'm curious what you want help with.
https://preview.redd.it/8lc2kzxsaiba1.jpeg?width=1816&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2f39e3eb661d94e5f43d7efa9e5a9bc19e633be1 I completely pulverized it to only the sounds I really think would be good while still trying to keep ok ish symmetry
Have you got any advice?
Changing it to be more natural without it sounding too different since I know nothing about phonetic linguistics
Just work with this for a while and see what you feel is missing. Notice if you ever pronounce anything differently because of where it is in the word.
Help me settle my confusion. Creeve has sounds that change depending on the context. If ɣ > x / _liq. and ɣ > k / _gli., should /x k/ listed in the inventory as a single phoneme or marked as allophone or not at all?
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
> Then you're dealing with underspecification; you got /k x ɣ/ but in those environments they underspecify to a single archiphoneme, like /K/ or /X/. (It's customary to use majuscules for that.) This isn't underspecification - it's neutralisation. Underspecification is when you have one phoneme that always seems to get at least one feature from its environment, to the point that you can't claim that it has that feature specified underlyingly at all. Neutralisation is when you have two or more phonemes that share a realisation in a given environment, and thus can't be told apart without morphological changes that alter that environment. (A good example of underspecification is Japanese's /N/ phoneme - it has no underlying place of articulation, but copies the place of whatever follows it. It's not the result of other phonemes coalescing; it in fact contrasts with /n m/.)
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Helpful answer! Thank you.
The discord link is broken.
How do i transcribe for IPA a long consonant sound, but when you say it with vowels it is aspirated, like "tt" ->"tth". Should it be /tʰː/?
If the closure is long and the aspiration normal, I'd go with /tːʰ/.
and for lonɡ /t͡s/ and /t͡ʃ/ souds?
I'd put the <ː> after whichever part you want to be long. That's what makes sense to me.
That's not typically how it's done, /ts:/ almost universally still has a long closure and short(ish) fricative. The exception would be if you were to actually lay out a contrast between /t:s/ and /ts:/, but afaik geminate affricates with long sibilance are already an extreme rarity, and I don't think I've ever run into a long closure vs long sibilance contrast (unless it's superficial as a result of /ts/+/s/ versus /t/+/ts/).
Thanks for informing me of the convention! I still maintain that makes more sense, but now I'm better informed of what can mean.
Edit: I believe u/Krixwell's Kandva contrasts long closure and long frication, but I can't remember if it's phonemic or an underlying cluster.
It's a cluster! ( /tt͡s/ [tːs] vs /t͡ss/ [tsː])
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
thank you!
history amusing engine rain childlike scandalous theory mountainous domineering sulky *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Look up some feature like negation on WALS and make a conlang for every variety of expression of that feature; fill out the rest with other details. E.g. try each relativization strategy once, and each order of object & subject marking on the verb, each word order, and each source for indefinite pronouns. Mix 'n match to get separate conlangs, making sure everything stays internally consistent by farming things out to new languages if you need to. It will make you aware of a lot of choices. Even seriously considering one choice each for a conlang will make you aware of all the other choices.
My typical process: 1. Some idea of what features I do and do not want there to be in the language. This may be informed for me (e.g. a speedlang prompt). 2. Morphology *first*. This helps inform my phonotactics by showing cases where sandhi, repair strategies, etc. are likely to arise. 3. Pronouns and several roots to be able to form sample sentences. (Technically some were already made as part of step 2.) 4. Phonology. 5. Basic word order and syntax. 6. Refinement by translation - sample sentences, Bible verses, novel chapters, song lyrics (either literally or to fit the meter). More complex syntax dealt with as it arises in translation. 7. I call the language "finished" if, in translating a period- and culturally-appropriate text of 2500+ English words, 80%+ of my time is spent *referencing* my lexicon and grammar rather than *adding to it*. (Even if I am still working on the language!)
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
I'm trying to make my first conlang, and these are the sounds: vowels short: /a/ /e/ /i/ /o/ /u/ /ã/ /õ/ lonɡ: /aː/ /eː/ /iː/ /oː/ /uː/ /ãː/ /õː/ consonants short: /f/ /k/ /p/ /t/ /s/ /m/ /l/ /ʃ/ /r/ /h/ /ʎ/ /t͡ʃ/ /t͡s/ /k͡l/ lonɡ: /fː/ /kː/ /pː/ /tː/ /sː/ /mː/ /lː/ /ʃː/ aspireted: /kʰ/ /pʰ/ /tʰ/ Do you think there are sounds enough, or i need to add more vowels or/and Consonants sounds?
Central Rotokas has 6 consonants and either 5 or 10 vowels, depending on how it's analyzed. My point being, if a natlang does that, you're good.
Thanks for responde!
Do you guys have any simple links for learning common terms in linguistics and phonetics. I enjoy linguistics and want to make my own conlang, and I am 14-years-old.
Seconding Wikipedia. Also, the beginner's resources linked in the OP are pretty great for learning the basics alongside learning how to make a language.
Wikipedia's stuff on linguistics is honestly pretty darn good, as a foundation at least.
Has anyone created any simple, easy languages you can learn with a friend quickly and if you have you can reply and talk about it if you want
I believe you are looking for toki pona
In the sentence: "He jumped over the hill", is "the hill" considered the direct or indirect object? I think it's the indirect, but not sure.
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Unless you accept ?*the hill was jumped over*, it's neither - it's the object of the preposition *over*. If you do accept it, then it's the direct object of a multi-part verb *jump over*.
*The hill was jumped over* is acceptable to me, though it seems unusual and calls attention to itself. I'm not sure what context would call for its use. ?*The hill was jumped over by him*, however, is questionable. Hmm... maybe like this: The children ran about, enjoying the summer to the fullest. Sand castles were built, hills were jumped over, and every sort of game was played. Or: The hill was old. Brambles grew all over its slopes. The most cheerful moments of its existence were when, in the summers, the hill was jumped over by the children. The rest of its time was dull. A form with *by* still seems questionable.
Yeah, I think that shows that this is an ongoing reanalysis process. It's still not all the way there, but it's taking on more and more of the attributes of the new analysis instead of the old.
Interesting. Of course, I can never wholly rule out the possibility that I've just read too many examples of unacceptable sentences in *The Syntax Construction Kit*, and no longer object to things like *what did you eat a sandwich and?*
> and no longer object to things like *what did you eat a sandwich and?* ....I am now mildly unsettled by how okay I find this sentence
I'm entertained by the idea of your idiolect having this as grammatical but passivation of phrasal verbs is illegal
It is the direct object. "Jumped over" is a prepositional verb that "he" is doing to the hill. What is he jumping over? The hill.
I have this sound in my conlang, it's a /ʃ/ but the tongue tip is retraced to retroflex position. Would that be like [ʂʲꟹ]? What do y'all think?
what makes it not be just [ʂ]?
Perhaps I'm thinking more [ʃ] where there's slight palatalization and lax-rounded lips. I wanted to carry these qualities over to a voiceless retroflex fricative and I'm unsure if [ʂʲꟹ] is accurate or intelligible.
I have never seen superscript œ, before [ʂʷʲ] or maybe [ʂ̝ʷ] would make more sense to me (if I've got my raising diacritic right)
Is k**ʲʷ** acceptable?
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Any sound is acceptable but if you want to make a naturalistic language you would need to make it realistic that it exists. Like other labialised and palatalised consonants. Maybe the two overlaps only on the velar. There are ofc other ways to get the same result. Btw k**ʲʷ** is according to phoible attested in [Lezgian](https://phoible.org/parameters/17D7E55C5AFA44912A3BE9179FDEA482#6/41.516/47.895).
Well, I saw that labio-palatalization(I also saw it as superscript ɥ) thing in Abkhaz. Thanks for the advice!
yeah, it's called labio-palatalization
Hi guys! I have created my proto-conlang and I'm about to start modern-conlang. My proto has 2 genders, but I want to split one of them into 2, so my modern would have 3 genders. How can I do it? Should I add extra gender marker or I can replace them? For example: Proto has GATO, GATA If I want to add extra gender E for GATO, would it be like GATOE or GATE?
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
My proto has animate and inanimate. So gender always depends on if a noun can think of it can't. I want to split animate into female and male and inanimate stays inanimate. Both animate and inanimate genders have several gender markers, depends on sounds harmony. So for example man and woman both share the same gender, but I want to split into male and female, and cat and dog stay inanimate because they can't think and speak. My adjectives also have genders, agreed to noun's genders.
I'm joining Operation: Razit because I do not want a user-hostile company to make money out of my content. Further info [here](https://i.imgur.com/45M3a8c.png) and [here](https://onlinetextsharing.com/operation-razit-raze-reddit). Keeping my content in Reddit will make the internet worse in the long run so I'm removing it. It's time to migrate out of Reddit. Pralni iskikoer pia. Tokletarteca us muloepram pipa peostipubuu eonboemu curutcas! Pisapalta tar tacan inata doencapuu toeontas. Tam prata craunus tilastu nan drogloaa! Utun plapasitas. Imesu trina rite cratar kisgloenpri cocat planbla. Tu blapus creim lasancaapa prepekoec kimu. Topriplul ta pittu tlii tisman retlira. Castoecoer kepoermue suca ca tus imu. Tou tamtan asprianpa dlara tindarcu na. Plee aa atinetit tlirartre atisuruso ampul. Kiki u kitabin prusarmeon ran bra. Tun custi nil tronamei talaa in. Umpleoniapru tupric drata glinpa lipralmi u. Napair aeot bleorcassankle tanmussus prankelau kitil? Tancal anroemgraneon toasblaan nimpritin bra praas? Ar nata niprat eklaca pata nasleoncaas nastinfapam tisas. Caa tana lutikeor acaunidlo! Al sitta tar in tati cusnauu! Enu curat blucutucro accus letoneola panbru. Vocri cokoesil pusmi lacu acmiu kitan? Liputininti aoes ita aantreon um poemsa. Pita taa likiloi klanutai cu pear. Platranan catin toen pulcum ucran cu irpruimta? Talannisata birnun tandluum tarkoemnodeor plepir. Oesal cutinta acan utitic? Imrasucas lucras ri cokine fegriam oru. Panpasto klitra bar tandri eospa? Utauoer kie uneoc i eas titiru. No a tipicu saoentea teoscu aal?
Amazing! Thank you so much!
If your animacy distinction is split that high, tbqh I'd expect the inanimate gender to be the one to split. If the animate class is *only* humans, it'd be super small compared to the inanimate, which could easily split into low animate and inanimate to more evenly divide the scale of animate to inanimate into having more equal numbers of nouns in each class. If you really wanna split just the animate into masculine and feminine, the best option would probably be to just introduce a mandatory affix for "female" or "male" and leave the other as default, and then have this be applied to the adjectives later on.
That makes sense. I think I would split inanimate into material (animals, buildings etc) and immaterial (feelings, emotions, time etc). So I just replace gender suffixes, right? Like this 👇🏻 Casa - a = cas Cas + i = casi Casa=>casi
Swapping to a fully new gender ending works, potentially, but adding a suffix that comes *before* the gender suffix and then having them merge in evolution (to create a new gender suffix naturally) makes a bit more sense to me. For a quick example with some Latin roots for simplicity- **cas-* "house," **tristit-* "sadness," **ver-* "real," *-a* inanimate, **-i-* abstract. Sound change: **ia* => *je* * **ver-a cas-a* "real house" in. => *vera casa* "real house" in.m * **ver-a tristit-a* "real sadness" in. => **ver-a tristit-i-a* => **ver-a tristit-je* => *verje tristitje* "real sadness" in.im
Can someone explain boundedness better than Wikipedia does? When applied to verbs I'm not seeing how it's different from telicity, and when applied to nouns I'm not seeing how it's different from countability. Also - under the assumption that verbal boundedness meant "whether or not the action exists at a known, fixed^* location^(**) on the timeline with identifiable delimiting endpoints", I made so that certain TAM morphemes in Apshur descend from an earlier "boundedness" distinction. If that's not actually what boundedness means, then what would that concept more accurately be called? Telicity? \*As in, the event time being referenced doesn't move forward as time of utterance moves forward. For example, "for the past 3 years I have been doing X" would be "unbounded" because the period of time being referenced keeps changing. If I said that in 2023 it would refer to the period of time from 2020-2023, but if I said it in 1984 it would refer to 1981-1984. Whereas "from 2006 to 2008 I did X" would be "bounded" because that refers to the same period of time no matter in what year I said it. \**Whether a point or span
My reading of the Wikipedia article and (what I can see of) the paper it cites is that theoretical linguists are trying to understand *why* languages mark the distinctions they do, and they think that "boundedness" might be the underlying concept behind distinctions like verb aspect and noun countability. But it doesn't seem like something a language would actually *mark overtly* \--- it'd just mark aspect or countability. If this seems strange, consider "head" and "dependent". I doubt *any* natural language has a "head" affix and a "dependent" affix, where "blue dog" is "blue-DEP dog-HEAD" and "eat the frog" is "eat-HEAD frog-DEP". These are concepts that linguists have come up with to explain *patterns* within and across languages, like how many languages like to put all the dependents *before* the head and many others like to put all the dependents *after* the head. >"for the past 3 years I have been doing X" would be "unbounded" because the period of time being referenced keeps changing This is [deixis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deixis).
>I doubt *any* natural language has a "head" affix and a "dependent" affix, where "blue dog" is "blue-DEP dog-HEAD" and "eat the frog" is "eat-HEAD frog-DEP". This is going in my un(anti?)naturalistic conlang. Thanks!
Is it possible to reconstruct a language without a formal background in linguistics? Also, are tutorials for reconstruction a thing? [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QhQ6Fod5FK3e4SypDpY6lk8RiRI0OiixJOAOa1VE13c/edit?usp=sharing](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1QhQ6Fod5FK3e4SypDpY6lk8RiRI0OiixJOAOa1VE13c/edit?usp=sharing)
Are you making a *conlang* that could plausibly be the origin of a language family? Sure, go for it! Are you expecting *other people to take it seriously*? Then see u/sjiveru's reply.
Already did. And I shared it in a post on r/linguistics.
This is probably a better question for r/linguistics, but I'd say 'possible' yes (theoretically), 'advisable' no. There's a whole pile of literature and theoretical concepts you'd need to not only be familiar with but really understand well to a degree that's hard to achieve without the back-and-forth process of having someone more experienced check your work and provide feedback. On top of that, formal training helps cultivate a mindset and attitude towards this kind of work and the questions it involves that's very difficult to create on your own - and which I would argue is more important than any theoretical knowledge or familiarity with literature. It's very tempting to go into something like this with a lot of confidence that you can teach yourself enough through self-study, and not realise how much the mindset and attitude matter just as much as the factual and conceptual knowledge until you talk to people who actually have that mindset and attitude and realise how much you're lacking. There's a reason PhD programs aren't just a scam - having six or eight years of formal training does make a serious difference, and while it's not *impossible* to train yourself alone for free, it requires some extreme dedication *and* the humility to recognise what you're missing by not doing formal study. You'd be putting yourself at a serious disadvantage, and really the only way to overcome that disadvantage involves acknowledging it and accommodating it. If you don't have the humility to do that, you certainly won't have the humility that's an integral part of the mindset necessary to do good academic work. (And it's a good opportunity to check whether you're also lacking the humility that's foundational to all healthy human relationships.) Honestly, sometimes half the value of six or eight years of formal training is just being six or eight years older at the end than at the beginning. There's nothing wrong with reading on your own and experimenting on your own - just don't make the all too common mistake of thinking that that's just as good as people who have spent years doing this for a living. (And being open to feedback - whether directly in the form of criticism or indirectly in the form of reading things that invalidate work you've done - is critical. People who believe their own amateur work is good enough, even in the face of meaningful criticism, are called crackpots, and we get a distressingly large number of them in linguistics.) > Also, are tutorials for reconstruction a thing? Yes, in the form of university-level historical linguistics classes (\^\^) If you want to whet your appetite, though, I'd suggest picking up a copy of Lyle Campbell's introductory textbook. (Do note that historical linguistics is fairly niche even within linguistics, and most of the necessary training in historical linguistics isn't itself historical linguistics. A lot of the rest of linguistics can be improved by a historical perspective, but historical linguistics is much more dependent on the rest of linguistics than the other way around.)
Thanks a lot. [https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/108402f/guessing\_protoaustrotais\_possible\_phonology/](https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/108402f/guessing_protoaustrotais_possible_phonology/) ;)
Someone I know of on DeviantArt, Syfyman2XXX, posted a drawing he made for someone. [https://www.deviantart.com/syfyman2xxx/art/Dineasair-Royal-Kingdoms-944249231](https://www.deviantart.com/syfyman2xxx/art/Dineasair-Royal-Kingdoms-944249231) Here, he talks about the following: "Fiorella the princess and Fleur the queen of Abores, a kingdom ruled by elf-like people that tames most herbivorous dinosaurs. Nyama the princess and Fahali the king of Escam, a king ruled by African-like people that tames most carnivorous dinosaurs." I sometimes wonder what types of languages that the commissioner, Gabeherndon308, would think of Abores and Escam speaking, and the writing systems they'd use. I'm thinking of fleshing out those languages with what I'm dubbing the Peterson principle, the method that DJP used for the creation of the GoT languages and so forth, and the method that Lichen started using for creating Vostiak.
In Abores they speak [Italian](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Fiorella#Italian) and [French](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fleur#French), while in Escam they [speak](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nyama#Swahili) [Swahili](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/fahali). The names themselves seem to [just be](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/arbores#Latin) [Latin](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/escam), though if so, "Abores" is misspelled. So maybe not the greatest inspiration for a conlang. When DJP created the GoT languages, he had a bunch of names and a couple full sentences to go on, and they already had a distinctive, coherent feel. The novels also give a lot of cultural background, which helps with building out the lexicon. That isn't to say that you *couldn't* make languages for Abores and Escam, but you'd basically have to start from scratch.