Search found 159 matches

by con quesa
Wed Apr 25, 2018 1:35 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Paradigm-arrhea
Replies: 36
Views: 18153

Re: Paradigm-arrhea

Have a Saimiar noun declension paradigm. I'll go with sristula , an -a/i declension class noun meaning "petty chieftan, warlord" Absolutive: stristul-a Ergative: sristul-ad Adpositional: sristul-is Allative: so-sristul-i Locative: sristul-iath Ellative: tlê-sristul-i Instrumental: sristul-iar Relati...
by con quesa
Sun Aug 13, 2017 6:51 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Languages with optional person indexing on verbs
Replies: 4
Views: 2500

Languages with optional person indexing on verbs

Is anyone aware of any literature on languages that have non-obligatory person marking on verbs? By this I mean languages where you can use some kind of morphology to index an argument of the verb, but that is not required if an overt pronoun exists in the clause?
by con quesa
Thu May 19, 2016 9:36 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: noun adjective order cross-linguistically
Replies: 18
Views: 5167

noun adjective order cross-linguistically

In English, the normal syntactic pattern is for adjectives to come before the noun they modify: "green dog", "loud motorcycle", etc. occasionally English *does* allow noun-adjective word order, but it is very marked, and mostly restricted to poetic or legal usage: "punishment divine", "the light fan...
by con quesa
Sun Jan 05, 2014 2:13 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Mutant Spanish (Efañó)
Replies: 26
Views: 7573

Re: Mutant Spanish [Efa"JO]

Quite neat, Kode! I'm curious what happens with the limited set of adjectives in Spanish that can fall between the article and the noun, like la buena fortuna - does the lenition happen on the adjective, leaving the noun unchanged? Does this syntactic construction even survive? Also, what happens wi...
by con quesa
Sat Jan 04, 2014 7:47 pm
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Questions about habitable zones, star luminosity, etc.
Replies: 2
Views: 1267

Questions about habitable zones, star luminosity, etc.

In the interest of finally pinning down the exact orbital parameters of Arzhanø's orbit around its sun, and thus the length of its year, I want to calculate the distance from the sun that the planet would have to be to be roughly Earth-like. I've always imagined that Arzhanø's sun is a little bit co...
by con quesa
Mon Nov 05, 2012 1:38 am
Forum: Almea
Topic: Endangered languages on Almea
Replies: 5
Views: 5030

Re: Endangered languages on Almea

Cuezi is dead too! (as a native language anyway, and unlike Latin and Ancient Greek it seems to have left no descendants)
by con quesa
Sat Mar 10, 2012 10:15 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Sumimasen
Replies: 49
Views: 9658

Re: Sumimasen

I've never to my knowledge heard "skosh" used as an English word, and I don't think I would've connected it to 少し if I had.
by con quesa
Mon Nov 07, 2011 12:21 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Arka: an a priori conlang with 14,000 words from Japan
Replies: 197
Views: 44860

Re: Arka: an a priori conlang with 14,000 words from Japan

おはなしの中の異世界はどこだって日本語が通じる。でも、それって小説のご都合主義じゃない?
Heh, そうじゃない? けど、アメリカでそんな異世界の人はみんな英語が話せる!

I wonder why you're calling it the book of Xion in English. Xion isn't the traditional way of romanizing 紫苑.
by con quesa
Thu Oct 20, 2011 10:02 pm
Forum: Almea
Topic: Against Peace and Freedom out soon!
Replies: 47
Views: 38319

Re: Against Peace and Freedom out soon!

Out of curiosity, do you make more money off of the kindle version or the paperback one? I was going to buy the paperback copy of the book, but I intend to obtain a kindle shortly. On the other hand I don't think I'd mind owning a physical copy of APAF. Anyway, I am really looking forward to Babbler...
by con quesa
Thu Oct 20, 2011 6:37 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: program vs. program/programme
Replies: 22
Views: 3797

Re: program vs. program/programme

I pronounce them identically, as /pɹoʊɡɹæm/. Further I think that spelling it "programme" is a frightfully British thing to do and I wouldn't do it myself unless I was trying to pass myself off as frightfully British.
by con quesa
Wed Oct 12, 2011 2:52 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Words you love because of their sounds
Replies: 285
Views: 36391

Re: Words you love because of their sounds

I'm rather fond of German Ewigkeit, "eternity".
by con quesa
Wed Oct 12, 2011 2:49 pm
Forum: C&C Archive
Topic: Interesting things you've done/seen done in a Romlang...
Replies: 62
Views: 25464

Re: Interesting things you've done/seen done in a Romlang...

I've never created a Romlang per se because vulgar latin bores me. I did toy with creating a descendant of Classical Latin (i.e. keeping the case system), whose main feature was the development of lexical tone. For instance the nasalization of the accusative -m became low tone and that eventually go...
by con quesa
Sat Sep 17, 2011 4:41 am
Forum: C&C Archive
Topic: Con-mathematical systems
Replies: 58
Views: 26034

Re: Math in Conworlds

Kingdom of Magic-Era Saimi use polish notation for basic arithmatic (instead of, say, 4+5 you'd write + 4 5, essentially). This comes naturally from the Saimiar language, where you'd say i trêsec xoike soi xil , "IMP add four and five" or i karøpec xil ŋês , IMP-empty-CAUS five one-PREP, "lessen fiv...
by con quesa
Sat Aug 27, 2011 1:57 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Writing English in Hanzi
Replies: 8
Views: 3957

Re: Writing English in Hanzi

Onyomi/Kunyomi There is also the problem that the same character can have multiple readings depending on the etymology of the word. For example, the word "succeed" (used above) derives from Latin, and is written with the characters 下譲, which alone would be read "under" and "yield" (the Native readi...
by con quesa
Thu Jul 28, 2011 3:02 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: In search of isolating conlangs
Replies: 158
Views: 40742

Re: In search of isolating conlangs

Elviš is a rather an isolating conlang of mine. I'm actually aiming for something akin to the morphological complexity of English. Is this name meant to sound just like Elvish , and if yes, why? /ɛlvɪʂ/ just seemed like the "right" name for my somewhat-west-african-influenced tonal largely isolatin...
by con quesa
Thu Jul 28, 2011 2:58 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Arka: an a priori conlang with 14,000 words from Japan
Replies: 197
Views: 44860

Re: Arka: an a priori conlang with 14,000 words from Japan

Oh, man, I completely forgot about this thread and that long text that I was going to translate, didn't I? For, uh, half a year. Sumimasen. 月が泉に映る街アシェルフィ かつてここに悪魔を封印した少女がいた 少女は神々の力を以て世界を救った それはこの世界の物語のひとつ "A town where the moon is reflected in the fountain - Asherufi. There once was a girl here, who...
by con quesa
Mon Jul 25, 2011 3:36 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: In search of isolating conlangs
Replies: 158
Views: 40742

Re: In search of isolating conlangs

Elviš is a rather an isolating conlang of mine. I'm actually aiming for something akin to the morphological complexity of English.
by con quesa
Sat Jul 16, 2011 5:22 pm
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Some greek alphabet questions
Replies: 40
Views: 6582

Some greek alphabet questions

First off, why are there separate letters for /ks/ and /ps/, and for no other clusters? What privileges those two? Secondly, how do you write ν and υ such that they are easily disambiguable? Even with a computer font those two letters look really similar, and I'm not sure how you'd consistently writ...
by con quesa
Sat Jul 09, 2011 1:55 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: Word order in ergative languages
Replies: 23
Views: 5295

Re: Word order in ergative languages

Georgian is split-ergative by tense (certain past tense forms trigger ergative alignment, and there's also an odd thing going on with other past/irrealis verb forms where basically the nominative and accusative cases switch), and SVO is definitely a permissible order. Georgian in general has pragmat...
by con quesa
Sat Jul 09, 2011 1:40 am
Forum: Almea
Topic: What's the tallest Almean mountain?
Replies: 15
Views: 7084

What's the tallest Almean mountain?

The Almean Everest. Is it anywhere that Verdurians would know about? If not, what is the absolute highest mountain that a verdurian could persumably have access to. While on the subject of mountains, Almean humans are obviously not as physiologically capable of climbing mountains as Earth humans are...
by con quesa
Thu Jul 07, 2011 4:58 am
Forum: Almea
Topic: Kiel ab Diďnirum: Elnoresa Almeisë
Replies: 8
Views: 3971

Re: Kiel ab Diďnirum: Elnoresa Almeisë

Go back to -22,000 Z.E. and convince the Ilii that it was their duty to recivilize the human and elcari remnants in the wake of the ilii-ktuvok wars.
by con quesa
Wed Jul 06, 2011 1:55 am
Forum: Conlangery & Conworlds
Topic: Invent an Idiom
Replies: 362
Views: 78802

Re: Invent an Idiom

rémenih ma tlecuáqan yáumatl ná Lizards bite him in his sleep. Next: to walk with a limp. You know, I'm going to be daring and different; instead of creating a particular idiom for this, I'm going to make it a fully independent root. śkalo , "to limp, walk with a limp, be crippled". From the root ś...
by con quesa
Wed Jul 06, 2011 1:45 am
Forum: Languages & Linguistics
Topic: PIE feminine agreement genesis
Replies: 15
Views: 3326

Re: PIE feminine agreement genesis

Some ancient Greek adjectives use the masculine form for feminine nouns, suggesting that the analogy might not have happened in PIE but rather happened independently in the various daughter languages, and that it was not yet complete even as recently as 500 BC in Athens. That's interesting, I didn'...
by con quesa
Tue Jul 05, 2011 1:30 am
Forum: Almea
Topic: New Ktuvok picture in the Almeopedia
Replies: 12
Views: 4825

Re: New Ktuvok picture in the Almeopedia

You know, I would really be interested to read about the personal experiences of a Cadhinorian or Carhinnoi doing the actual ground work of the occupation of Munkhash during Cadhinas's golden age. I'd like to know how Ktuvoki acted when they were at their weakest, and what kind of society would be b...