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Substantial postings about constructed languages and constructed worlds in general. Good place to mention your own or evaluate someone else's. Put quick questions in C&C Quickies instead.
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Post by Cedh »

Thank you. Also, many thanks for your help with finding grammaticalisation paths a while ago!
Basilius wrote:Is linni 'country' an Affanonic loan? (If not, it's an interesting coincidence...)
Of course linni is a loan. ;) Apart from the vowel harmony, Cəssın is quite conservative phonologically, which it makes up for with innovative morphosyntax and a fairly divergent lexicon. Which means that I would very much welcome more information about derivation in Affanonic. It'd also be great if we could work out at least some detail about Doroh, which will be a fairly important contact language in the area. Maybe Lotoka too.

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Post by Zhen Lin »

The verbal complex is very nicely done. It's the sort of thing I've always wanted to do, but never worked hard on.
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Post by the duke of nuke »

Lovely! Good to see the Fáralo family getting some love. And a new source of loans for WF :P

As for the other languages, there was talk of making Doroh a collaborative project. I'm still interested, though I'll be a bit busy over the next month.
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Post by dunomapuka »

Cəssın looks beautiful, and it's spurred me to do a little more work on Namɨdu. Where did you get your word for "1000" from?

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Post by Cedh »

boy #12 wrote:Where did you get your word for "1000" from?
It's from Affanonic fumøn 'much, abundant, a lot'.

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Post by Corumayas »

Very cool! The vowel and consonant harmony is delicious. :)

What's needed for Doroh? I'll work on fixing up Proto-Isthmus a bit more...
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Post by Cedh »

Corumayas wrote:What's needed for Doroh? I'll work on fixing up Proto-Isthmus a bit more...
Most importantly, some morphological information about PEI and/or PI so that it becomes possible to test and finalize the Doroh sound changes (which need to be revised) with actual word forms instead of mere roots. The SC for Faraghin too, hopefully.

Also, I seem to recall we had almost finished back-projecting the reconstructed PI lexicon to PEI - I've just put up the latest revision.

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Post by Basilius »

cedh audmanh wrote:Which means that I would very much welcome more information about derivation in Affanonic.
A difficult thing, in fact :(

Part of my motivation for coping with Proto-Isles dialectology etc. is that more info on PI lexicon and derivation is badly needed; I felt that re-using the same items from the small canonical wordlist was not enough to design a natural-looking derivation system for Affanonic. So I don't know when this part will be finished...

However, there are some bits that can be used safely:

- innovative parts of the morphology: substantivized genitives and gerunds in the first place;
- all types of productive syntactic constructions as compounds (e. g. adjective + noun, genitive + noun);
- compounds from verb stem + noun (some older ones should reflect the PI form of verb stem, but newer ones can use the unmodified form; these are effectively relative clauses, so the verb can take an argument).

Noun+noun compounds are trickier: extracting the correct form of N1 stem is not trivial, and there are various processes active on stem boundaries (e. g. Ty-s-affai remains parseable, since hiatus fillers like -s- spread by analogy *depending on vowel combination*). However, there is a workaround: sometimes the first noun can be taken as counting form ( = plural stem without the nom. ending), and then no additional changes are applied.

Of the new suffixes coming from second components in noun+noun compounds, -tai for males and -ti for females are among the most productive ones (non 'person' :: nontai 'man' :: nonti 'woman'; this pattern is *not* restricted to sentient beings). The trick with counting form works here, too.

Also, the lexicon lists a few prefixes that can be attached to verbs (there should be more of them, eventually).
cedh audmanh wrote:
boy #12 wrote:Where did you get your word for "1000" from?
It's from Affanonic fumøn 'much, abundant, a lot'.
This can have happened, indeed; but I feel guilty for the incompleteness of my Affanonic lexicon which can lead to confusion.

I think the Affanons of the classical time (from -200 YP on) used a decimal system and could count in thousands; the trouble is, very little was preserved of the original PI system, and most numbers had been borrowed from a source which is still to be identified...
cedh audmanh wrote:It'd also be great if we could work out at least some detail about Doroh, which will be a fairly important contact language in the area. Maybe Lotoka too.
thedukeofnuke wrote:As for the other languages, there was talk of making Doroh a collaborative project. I'm still interested, though I'll be a bit busy over the next month.
I won't have much time to invest in another project, either, in a month or so. However, I'd like to participate in the discussion at the very least...

Obviously, I am most interested in "Affalinnean Doroh" (influencing pre-classical Affanonic, and surviving as a bunch of "clan dialects" into later epochs); and this kinda sets a perspective for the following...

When massive Islesian immigration began around -1000 YP, the peninsula of Affalinnei was mostly occupied by tribes whose dialects were "Doroh" in broad sense (unless we invent a better name/attribution: the idea comes from the lack of other candidate autochthons in the first place).

The last mention of "Doroh" (to my knowledge) seems to be related to the establishment of Woldulaš somewhere after 800 YP.

Then, "Doroh" seems to be a cover term for a huge cluster of related dialects/languages. Given the time span (about 2000 years or more), the types of landscapes occupied (mostly hilly), and the variety of contacts with unrelated neighbors - the linguistic divergence among the "Doroh" tribes was probably considerable.

So, where do we start from? A "Proto-Doroh"? A "reference dialect" with a decently detailed timeline to branch the other dialects off at different points? Cedh, Duke, what will suit your sketches/ideas better?

Also, I seem to recall that there was a consensus that retro-stuffing Proto-Isthmus (etc.) from Doroh should be allowed; was there indeed such a discussion or was I seeing things?

I propose that we start a thread about Doroh on Akana Forum.
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Post by the duke of nuke »

How about running it a bit like the Lukpanic group? We could have a collaboration on Early Doroh (say, late 1st millenium BP) and maybe on one or two later dialects - the Late Doroh referred to by Cedh. Anyone that wants to create a divergent later dialect can do so starting from Early Doroh.

To be honest I don't really mind how it's done. Since WF and Woldulaš are unfinished projects I can change things so suit the end result :)
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Post by Basilius »

Late *2nd* millennium, I guess?

Otherwise, sounds fine.
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Post by Corumayas »

I'm pretty busy right now too, but a fuller description of PEI + PI morphology can be my next Akana project. I think the basic framework of inflectional morphology is pretty much there-- the details just need to be filled in. (One thing I'd like to add is some reduplication... but I'm not sure how that would interact with the ablaut and affix patterns.) Derivation is going to be more work, though... I want to have lots of derivational processes in this family, in multiple layers... but creating it all seems pretty daunting. Maybe this part can be a group project too...?


Also, it seems like it would help if the history of the coast between Huyfárah and Siixtaguna were filled in a bit more. I kind of imagine the region as having a relationship to the Aiwa sphere somewhat similar to that of Korea to China... so just as a suggestion to give us somewhere to start, here's a kind of tentative sketch timeline sort of based on that (every aspect of which can be changed!):

ca -1800 YP: bronze production begins on the Doroh-Lotoka coast
ca -1700 to -1400: small "walled-town" city-states develop (partly due to trade contacts with the Ndak)
ca -1300: possible iron-working?
ca -1100: fall of "walled-town" states (possibly destroyed by invading groups, such as Lotoka, Isles, and/or Isthmus peoples?)
ca -1000 (or after): new cultures emerge (Lotoka, Affanon, Doroh?)
ca -100: rise of new dominant kingdom(s) (e.g. Affalinnei)

Anyway, in addition to the Doroh, there are Lotokans there who probably arrive slightly before the Affanons; actually, I've been thinking that maybe the Affanons end up replacing the Lotokans along much of that coast-- or mixing with them, at least... so Lotoka may actually be more important than Doroh as an influence on Affanonic. And there could also be other groups, especially early on-- Takuña relatives maybe? Indigenous groups who haven't been described yet? We don't have to limit ourselves to just Isthmus people, anyway.
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Post by Basilius »

Corumayas wrote:ca -1100: fall of "walled-town" states (possibly destroyed by invading groups, such as Lotoka, Isles, and/or Isthmus peoples?)
What if we identify this with the spread of "Proto-Doroh" (and maybe shift if a couple centuries deeper)?

I mean, it seems that we need a relatively quick expansion of some linguistic group that wiped off the previous linguistic diversity in the whole "Doroh" area of later epochs.

Why not identify that group with "Proto-Doroh"?
Corumayas wrote:Anyway, in addition to the Doroh, there are Lotokans there who probably arrive slightly before the Affanons; actually, I've been thinking that maybe the Affanons end up replacing the Lotokans along much of that coast-- or mixing with them, at least... so Lotoka may actually be more important than Doroh as an influence on Affanonic.
That may have happened indeed. But I'm not sure whether the Lotokans had had enough time themselves to become the prevailing group in the area. The latter to be the case, they had to arrive, like, at least a half millennium earlier than the Isles speakers did; do you think such an early date is imaginable?
Corumayas wrote:And there could also be other groups, especially early on-- Takuña relatives maybe?
I thought of this WRT my suspended PNT-based scenarios. I associate PNT culture with fishery, so I though a group of PNT speakers could migrate to the south along the (unnamed?) river which I seem to notice right to the east of Affalinnei. PNT is currently dated "-2600 to -2200 YP", so they had enough time to root in the area.
Corumayas wrote:Indigenous groups who haven't been described yet?
I think homeless a priori projects are always welcome in Akana :)
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Post by Cedh »

Basilius wrote:
Corumayas wrote:ca -1100: fall of "walled-town" states (possibly destroyed by invading groups, such as Lotoka, Isles, and/or Isthmus peoples?)
What if we identify this with the spread of "Proto-Doroh" (and maybe shift if a couple centuries deeper)?

I mean, it seems that we need a relatively quick expansion of some linguistic group that wiped off the previous linguistic diversity in the whole "Doroh" area of later epochs.

Why not identify that group with "Proto-Doroh"?
Sounds good to me. This could happen at any time between -1500 and -1000; if we have it around -1300 it could be part of a larger population movement triggered by the expansion of the Faraghin into the Oltu valley (if the Feråjin push east at the same time and drive the Proto-Doroh out of the Čisse area).
Basilius wrote:
Corumayas wrote:Anyway, in addition to the Doroh, there are Lotokans there who probably arrive slightly before the Affanons; actually, I've been thinking that maybe the Affanons end up replacing the Lotokans along much of that coast-- or mixing with them, at least... so Lotoka may actually be more important than Doroh as an influence on Affanonic.
That may have happened indeed. But I'm not sure whether the Lotokans had had enough time themselves to become the prevailing group in the area. The latter to be the case, they had to arrive, like, at least a half millennium earlier than the Isles speakers did; do you think such an early date is imaginable?
Proto-Peninsular dates to -1500, when the Isles peoples are already on their way towards Peilaš, so I'm not sure that the Lotokans would actually arrive before the Affanons. In any case, I think the early 1st millennium BP would be a likely arrival time for both peoples. What's interesting is that they cross each other's route; this is definitely possible since both arrive by sea, but we'll have to see what kind of scenario fits best here. Any ideas?
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Corumayas wrote:And there could also be other groups, especially early on-- Takuña relatives maybe?
I thought of this WRT my suspended PNT-based scenarios. I associate PNT culture with fishery, so I though a group of PNT speakers could migrate to the south along the (unnamed?) river which I seem to notice right to the east of Affalinnei. PNT is currently dated "-2600 to -2200 YP", so they had enough time to root in the area.
I'm not sure if that river can remain where it is, because the latest tectonic scenario (which was not yet taken into account by Pocketful of Songs when he made the last version of the topographic map) pretty much requires a coastal mountain range (Mr. Pocketful, are you up for some mapping discussion on [url=irc://irc.sorcery.net/akana]IRC[/url] this weekend?). Also, I guess that any Takuña peoples would probably get to the region by sea. But they can play a role either way, of course.

I've started to work on a series of maps showing the major population groups in the area over the course of time. I'll probably post the results tomorrow.

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Post by Basilius »

cedh audmanh wrote:This could happen at any time between -1500 and -1000; if we have it around -1300 it could be part of a larger population movement triggered by the expansion of the Faraghin into the Oltu valley (if the Feråjin push east at the same time and drive the Proto-Doroh out of the Čisse area).
I think this type of synchronization looks particularly natural!
cedh audmanh wrote:Proto-Peninsular dates to -1500, when the Isles peoples are already on their way towards Peilaš, so I'm not sure that the Lotokans would actually arrive before the Affanons. In any case, I think the early 1st millennium BP would be a likely arrival time for both peoples.
That was my impression, too.
cedh audmanh wrote:What's interesting is that they cross each other's route; this is definitely possible since both arrive by sea, but we'll have to see what kind of scenario fits best here. Any ideas?
I'd propose that Lotokans arrived a bit earlier than the Isles speakers (maybe, less than a century earlier), and established themselves in a relatively broad area along the coast.

The Isles speakers at first reached only a few places close to Sumarušuxi (including a few islands *and* the tip of the Affalinnei Peninsula).

Soon after the arrival of both groups, the hinterland of the peninsula was mostly occupied by Doroh-speaking tribes, while the coast was mostly inhabited by various maritime peoples (Isles-speaking, Lotokan, and maybe other). The centralization / state building was very close to zero level.

My original idea was that it was more-less accidental that the main language of the emerging state of Affalinnei happened to be an Isles dialect.

It was essential that some settlements of the various coastal groups started to grow into important seaports; but it was due to just casual circumstances that a couple of such emerging urban centers were in the territory of Isles-speaking clans.

Similarly, it was more-less fortuitous that some Isles-speaking clans got to the top of the forming clan hierarchy (first among the coastal clans, I think).

By -200 YP one of the Isles dialects (Standard Classical Affanonic) was understood (and spoken when necessary) throughout the country, but any number of related and unrelated idioms could be used in everyday life as "clan dialects".

The final number depends only on our motivation to describe them; it may be a factor that the colonies of Affalinnei established when the Affanons acted as vassals of Huyfárah were sometimes clan-level enterprises, allowing most bizarre things to happen to former "clan dialects" in another continent.
cedh audmanh wrote:Also, I guess that any Takuña peoples would probably get to the region by sea.
Takuña, or in fact any number of other maritime folks, could arrive later, establish themselves e. g. as diasporas, and then be integrated in the clan hierarchy. The trick is that at least in early times of the Affalinnei state the local clans were interested in having as many vassal clans as possible: this rather directly affected their status among peer clans, and their chances for promotion in the clan hierarchy. So any group recognizing a local clan as their new suzerains would be welcomed.
cedh audmanh wrote:I'm not sure if that river can remain where it is, because the latest tectonic scenario (which was not yet taken into account by Pocketful of Songs when he made the last version of the topographic map) pretty much requires a coastal mountain range [...]
My impression was that the whole SE coast of the subcontinent of Siixtaguna was occupied by the Takuña speakers or their very close relatives. My tentative PNT-based scenarios were about a bunch of typologically rather divergent (and much less conservative) languages, so I thought of a migration towards the opposite, NW coast.

The river might serve as a natural route bringing (e. g.) some second-generation dialects closer to Affalinnei; without a finalized map it is difficult to say if such southward migration was indeed possible.

But besides, I'm not sure I know the precise location of PNT...
cedh audmanh wrote:I've started to work on a series of maps showing the major population groups in the area over the course of time. I'll probably post the results tomorrow.
That's very good news! Maps are really needed.
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Post by Cedh »

Basilius wrote:
cedh audmanh wrote:I've started to work on a series of maps showing the major population groups in the area over the course of time. I'll probably post the results tomorrow.
That's very good news! Maps are really needed.
As promised, the maps are done. They're not necessarily final; for instance, there are some blank spots, and Corumayas just suggested a few possible modifications on IRC. One of them would be eventually merging the Affanonic and Lotoka cultures into kind of a single, multiethnic coastal culture:
Corumayas wrote:as one group or another assumes leadership, different languages become more prominent...?
Anyway, here are the maps I made:
http://tzirtzi.ipage.com/akana/index.ph ... mus_region

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Post by Zhen Lin »

Ah, Lotoka. Was anyone actually working on the language? I probably should do more for PPI first though... but I've been working this summer.
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Post by Basilius »

cedh audmanh wrote:[...] Corumayas just suggested a few possible modifications on IRC. One of them would be eventually merging the Affanonic and Lotoka cultures into kind of a single, multiethnic coastal culture:
Corumayas wrote:as one group or another assumes leadership, different languages become more prominent...?
Well, this is in fact similar to what I wrote above, only... I'd say that was the situation of early 1st millennium BP, and specifically in the coastal areas of what was going to become Affalinnei :)

As for the time when the Affanons become a regional power noticeable e. g. for Huyfárah (i. e. from about -200 YP on) - I think the hierarchy of clans was already rather stable, and vassality relations were centuries old in most cases (at least for the most influential clans). Also, I don't think that changing the leading clan meant a different dialect immediately becoming the lingua franca of the whole "kingdom"; in fact, I don't think the dominant dialect ever changed after the point where the clan hierarchy covering much of the country was first formed.

Spreading this clan organization onto Lotoka Coast would be too much, IMHO; it looks right as an early state thing, not an emerging empire. And at any rate I know too little about the Lotokans and their history.

I believe the idea that both the Isles speakers and the Lotokans first appeared in the region around -1000 YP or soon after that date (as we discussed earlier) agrees with the subsequent development better.

Accordingly, I think the dates for some maps are better moved deeper into the past. (EDIT: for example, the map labeled "c. -800 YP" would be OK for, say, -1100 YP, and "c. -400 YP" would be rather -800 YP; I mean only Affalinnei and its vicinities, of course.)

Can "Siixtaguna Culture" be identified with PNT? I rather like the idea that at some point it spread to the islands between Sumarušuxi and the mainland, or maybe to Sumarušuxi proper. At any rate, this would help identify at least some early influences on pre-Affanonic :)

EDIT-2: what are Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna?
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Post by Cedh »

Basilius wrote:
cedh audmanh wrote:[...] Corumayas just suggested a few possible modifications on IRC. One of them would be eventually merging the Affanonic and Lotoka cultures into kind of a single, multiethnic coastal culture:
Corumayas wrote:as one group or another assumes leadership, different languages become more prominent...?
Well, this is in fact similar to what I wrote above, only... I'd say that was the situation of early 1st millennium BP, and specifically in the coastal areas of what was going to become Affalinnei :)

[...]

Spreading this clan organization onto Lotoka Coast would be too much, IMHO; it looks right as an early state thing, not an emerging empire.
You're right in this. Corumayas actually wasn't disputing this; rather, the idea was that the Affanonic and Lotoka peninsulae kind of look like "a single ecosystem" whose cultures would not easily remain fully distinct for several millennia. In the pirate age at the latest (i.e. from 400 YP on), one of these cultures would probably try to expand its influence to the other area.
Basilius wrote:Accordingly, I think the dates for some maps are better moved deeper into the past. (EDIT: for example, the map labeled "c. -800 YP" would be OK for, say, -1100 YP, and "c. -400 YP" would be rather -800 YP; I mean only Affalinnei and its vicinities, of course.)
The dates are approximations, and they're mostly selected such that significant developments in the Huyfárah area can be shown, for which an established history already exists. Also, the maps don't show population movements directly, but situations. What happens between two maps can in principle happen at any point in the interval. (It's mainly that I didn't want to do maps for every single century.) So actually the situations shown for Affalinnei & Lotoka on the -800 and -400 maps could equally well date to -900 and -799 respectively. :)
Basilius wrote:Can "Siixtaguna Culture" be identified with PNT? I rather like the idea that at some point it spread to the islands between Sumarušuxi and the mainland, or maybe to Sumarušuxi proper. At any rate, this would help identify at least some early influences on pre-Affanonic :)

EDIT-2: what are Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna?
Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna are groups mentioned in TzirTzi's Siixtaguna culture article, both "located some way to the south of the Takuña and Núalís heartlands." Given that Núalís is spoken quite far to the north, PNT itself was probably located near the eastern tip of the subcontinent, i.e. on the mainland right across Tymytỳs. The idea of the Siixtaguna culture is basically that NuTak groups were constantly moving southwest between -2500 and -1500, eventually occupying almost all of the coast between Tymytỳs and Sumarušuxi. Basically what you wrote above:
Basilius wrote:My impression was that the whole SE coast of the subcontinent of Siixtaguna was occupied by the Takuña speakers or their very close relatives.

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Post by Basilius »

cedh audmanh wrote:Corumayas actually wasn't disputing this; rather, the idea was that the Affanonic and Lotoka peninsulae kind of look like "a single ecosystem" whose cultures would not easily remain fully distinct for several millennia.
Hmmm... in my view, we have less than *one* millennium, and that may turn out to be rather dense in events :)

Also, I think the term "culture" is a bit too fuzzy in this context.

Indeed, the Affanons paid little attention to the origin of various groups getting involved in their clan system; a lot of cultural difference was tolerated on the level of individual clans.

But the political system of the state of Affalinnei was rather rigid and traditionalist, and very important for self-identification on the individual level, since it all revolved around clan honor.

The idea of "clan hierarchy" came as an answer to the question, how a relatively small community managed to become something worth being aware of (so e. g. names of continents were borrowed from their language rather than from some other source) for their much more powerful neighbors. I needed some simple consolidating principle, which would prevent too rapid assimilation by the surrounding cultures, would have some assimilatory potential itself (so a robust state could emerge out of nothing in less than a millennium), and would occasionally turn the group in question into a real thorn in one or another powerful nation's side.

The system could emerge in an area of great ethnic diversity and no certralized government; no organization other than kinship-based existed, and every conflict created the threat of long-lasting bloodshed. Treaties between kinship groups were invented as a way to moderate bloodshed in the first place, and it was primarily in this context that a clan's obligations were originally viewed by its members.

When an early state formed on this fundament, the attitudes haven't changed much. In the historical times, whenever individual Affanons dealt with people who weren't of the same clan, they perceived themselves primarily as their clan's representatives. The honor of one's clan, including the projections from the obligations between clans, was still taken dead seriously; every offense and every promise was seen from that perspective. The whole system was rather centralized and did not allow for manipulation by external agents. Basically, it made the Affanons amazingly faithful allies and reliable partners - but also madly stubborn opponents, if you weren't their ally or partner. Also, it was the right organization for people easily involved in risky enterprises, like piracy or oversea trade.

* * *

I think the clan organization had to do with the way Affalinnei contributed to the fall of Huyfárah. One can imagine that vassality to Huyfárah was a difficult decision, and the Affanons viewed it from their customary perspective: they expected from their new suzerains the same irreproachable faithfulness to obligations as was the norm among their own clans.

At the moment when the treaty was concluded, the Fáralo rulers were well aware of this attitude; but later on, the logic of a centralized empire demanded more unification. At some point, new rulers attempted to apply their standard legislation and govern Affalinnei as just another remote province; special privileges stipulated in the original treaty were withdrawn unilaterally - an unforgivable sin in the eyes of the Affanons. This immediately mobilized the clans for a full-scale war which effectively blocked maritime trade in the whole region, and contributed a lot to centrifugal tendencies in neighboring provinces of Huyfárah (especially in those whose economics depended on such trade, and especially because the Affanons were open to separate negotiations with individual communities and trade houses - from the clan hierarchy perspective, the traitors were primarily the ruling dynasty).

* * *

One problem with the clan system was lack of scalability. I think it was the ascension of Affalinnei soon after the disintegration of Huyfárah that created a serious crisis of the former political system: when the kingdom subdued some adjacent areas, it turned out that the Affanons have little experience in governing peoples that knew no clan honor and could not be easily integrated in the traditional hierarchy. During a subsequent millennium the clan system was eroding, new methods of government replaced it, and Affalinnei evolved into a more familiar type of monarchy. Nominally the clans were still there, but more as a type of territorial government; membership in a clan could be a matter of buying some real estate in the clan's domain. And the special vigor of this small nation faded away together with clan system and clan honor. Without the cementing factor of clan organization, Affalinnei quickly became just another small kingdom in a strategically important region; I am not sure if it survived 1500 YP as an independent political entity.

* * *

Even though not easily scalable, the clan system - while it was alive - was easily exportable, e. g. to colonies. I am particularly interested in exploring the various bizarre ways it could influence state building on Ttiruku; the extreme ethnic diversity of the latter might create a good soil for its imitation and spreading.
cedh audmanh wrote:In the pirate age at the latest (i.e. from 400 YP on), one of these cultures would probably try to expand its influence to the other area.
I think piracy was most topical *before* the Affanons became vassals of Huyfárah. That is, before the heyday of the empire.
cedh audmanh wrote:So actually the situations shown for Affalinnei & Lotoka on the -800 and -400 maps could equally well date to -900 and -799 respectively. :)
And that would be closer to my vision :)

But let's feel the extremes...

The political organization of Affalinnei was traditionalist - that is, something that had existed "always", in people's perception. To be so perceived, it needed centuries of previous relative stability - as many as possible. Plus a prolonged period when it was being born in pain (while the coastal culture might indeed represent the type of "mixed ecosystem" you discussed with Corumayas). That is, the earlier the (pre-)Affanons arrive, the better; the general timing of Isles migrations might allow for a date as early as -1000 YP.

However, the (pre-)Lotokans had to arrive still earlier, and split from their parent group no earlier than around -1500 YP (probably later).

It seems that this is the limit: when could the (pre-)Lotokans reallistically reach Affanillei and the Lotoka Coast? -1200 YP? -1000?
cedh audmanh wrote:
Basilius wrote:Can "Siixtaguna Culture" be identified with PNT? I rather like the idea that at some point it spread to the islands between Sumarušuxi and the mainland, or maybe to Sumarušuxi proper. At any rate, this would help identify at least some early influences on pre-Affanonic :)

EDIT-2: what are Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna?
Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna are groups mentioned in TzirTzi's Siixtaguna culture article, both "located some way to the south of the Takuña and Núalís heartlands." Given that Núalís is spoken quite far to the north, PNT itself was probably located near the eastern tip of the subcontinent, i.e. on the mainland right across Tymytỳs. The idea of the Siixtaguna culture is basically that NuTak groups were constantly moving southwest between -2500 and -1500, eventually occupying almost all of the coast between Tymytỳs and Sumarušuxi. Basically what you wrote above:
Basilius wrote:My impression was that the whole SE coast of the subcontinent of Siixtaguna was occupied by the Takuña speakers or their very close relatives.
Thank you! I could not locate that page via wiki search for some reason :(

It would be interesting to consult with Tzirtzi on possible linguistic divergence of these groups. PNT is really fascinating protolanguage to work from; I'd try to sketch their languages, especially since they may be important sources of early cultural loans in Affanonic.
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Post by Corumayas »

Cool, Basilius! I think those details add a lot to the story.

As for my suggestion earlier:
cedh audmanh wrote:the idea was that the Affanonic and Lotoka peninsulae kind of look like "a single ecosystem" whose cultures would not easily remain fully distinct for several millennia.
Essentially what I was suggesting is that the Affanonic homeland itself could be somewhat bigger than we've been thinking, extending across both peninsulas.

If we were to go with this idea, maybe the Lotoka could become part of the Affanonic clan system as it develops; or alternatively, maybe they could be established somewhere else nearby (say, along the coast a little further east). In my opinion, the key fact about the Lotoka is that their language is a source of several loans into Thokyunèhòta; this has to happen during the first half of the first millenium BP (since Thok. dies out after that), and I don't think they need to remain an important group later on.
Basilius wrote:I could not locate that page via wiki search for some reason :(
Yeah, that's because it's part of the user pages rather than a wiki article.
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Post by the duke of nuke »

I really like the look of this :) Basilius, your last post indeed adds a lot to the details and "flavour" of the area, particularly in the case of Fáralo - Affanon relations and the fall of Huyfárah.

One comment on the Lotoka - if they weren't a unified faction, maybe some of them were part of Affalinnei's clan system and some were independent. It doesn't have to be one way or the other...
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Post by Zhen Lin »

After more than a year of inactivity, here's yet another tweak of Vylessa:
árro phī́nī, thuirerá lerysthó hynā́nī phī́ne hyméōn tothyriscḗchō de títiri mē fixên mē thyrithélesco.

fíxe ictṓ catérisco. "thuirerá lē, mýrēs hýmē títiri mē fixethé áveri mē. výon fernēsḗmē, cērembrílō machḗ? térilo, oumernḗga agýsse!"

thuirerás hymē rhāínen mīradiscḗcho ictṓ catérisco. "mē mē, fíxe lē. nḗrēs hýmē imónī tengaphári. oumernassḗmē lâno onthyrílē mē. térilo, nḗrēs hyómmē fernēî mē."
arːo pʰiːniː | tʰyrera lerʉstʰo hʉnaːniː pʰiːne hʉmeɔːn totʰʉriskɛːkʰɔː de titiri mɛː ʍiksɛːn mɛː tʰʉritʰelesko ‖

ʍikse iktɔː katerisko ‖ tʰyrera lɛː | mʉrɛːs hʉmɛː titiri mɛː ʍiksetʰe aweri mɛː ‖ ɦʉon ʍernɛːsɛːmɛː | kɛːrembrilɔː makʰɛː ‖ terilo | oːmeɹnɛːɡa aɡʉsːe ‖

tʰyreras hʉmɛː r̥aːɪnen miːradiskɛːkʰo katerisko ‖ mɛː mɛː | ʍikse lɛː ‖ nɛːrɛːs hʉmɛː imoniː teŋɡapʰari. oːmeɹnasːɛːmɛː laːno ontʰʉrilɛː mɛː ‖ terilo | nɛːrɛːs hʉomːɛː feɹnɛːɪ mɛː ‖
ἄρρο φίνι, θυιρερά λερυσθό ὑνάνι φίνε ὑμέων τοθυρισκήχω δε τίτιρι μη ἰξῆν μη θυριθέλεσκο.

ἴξε ἰκτώ κατέρισκο. «θυιρερά λη, μύρης ὕμη τίτιρι μη ἰξεθέ ἆρι μη. ὔον ἐρνησήμη, κηρεμβρίλω μαχή; τέριλο, οὐμερνήγα αγύσσε!»

θυιρεράς ὕμη ῥᾴνεν μιραδισκήχο ἰκτώ κατέρισκο. «μη μη, ἴξε λη. νήρης ὕμη ἰμόνι τεγγαφάρι. οὐμερνασσήμη λᾶνο ονθυρίλη μη. τέριλο, νήρης ὑόμμη ἐρνῇ μη.»
(The two "orthographies" are not in perfect correspondence with each other, i.e. they don't represent the same sounds.)

I still haven't given much thought to the grammar though, but I think this is how it's going to sound like, at least.
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Post by Cedh »

Vylessa is shaping up nicely! It really captures the flavor of Ancient Greek (I'd probably romanize /k kʰ/ as <k> though), and I'm looking forward to see how the grammar turns out.

In the meantime...
Zhen Lin wrote:Ah, Lotoka. Was anyone actually working on the language?
At the time you wrote this I believe noone was, but for some reason I felt like working out some basics for Lotoka when I read your comment. It's not finished yet, and currently it's not meant to be more than a sketch, but before I go on holiday tomorrow I'd like to show you what I have so far. The Fisherman sample text will presumably be my next project when I return...

Interestingly, with the way that the sound changes have turned out (designed to give the correct outcome of all the sample words here), we get a nice areal grammar feature: the partitive case in *-hŋ and the singulative in *-rix regularly merge as -je, giving something that is semantically and syntactically quite close to the substantivized genitive in Affanonic. :) Another nice coincidence is that I can actually derive two of the words in the list linked to above from already existing PPI roots: dalø 'panda' now comes from *(ŋu)tax-lu-ua 'man from the forest' (with the first syllable truncated somehow), and the name Lotoka is now a derivative of *xltar- 'other' which even fits the historical scenario; specifically *xltar-ktaha meaning 'new land'.

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Post by Corumayas »

Cool stuff! It's good to see the Peninsular family getting some more attention.

It's kind of tangential, but this caught my eye:
cedh audmanh wrote:dalø 'panda' now comes from *(ŋu)tax-lu-ua 'man from the forest' (with the first syllable truncated somehow)
This is the same meaning as orangutan, isn't it? And it makes me wonder whether this 'panda' might not be the Akanaran equivalent of an ape. Could Akana's humans be close relatives to panda-like animals? (As far as I know no Akana lang currently has words for apes or monkeys.)

[edit: apparently this is the 1800th reply in this thread!]
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Post by Zhen Lin »

cedh audmanh wrote:Vylessa is shaping up nicely! It really captures the flavor of Ancient Greek (I'd probably romanize /k kʰ/ as <k> though), and I'm looking forward to see how the grammar turns out.
Thanks! I'm slightly annoyed by how long the words are though. cateretasséloi to be "will be talking" seems a bit much, and this is before any applicative prefixes, voices or moods!
In the meantime...
Zhen Lin wrote:Ah, Lotoka. Was anyone actually working on the language?
At the time you wrote this I believe noone was, but for some reason I felt like working out some basics for Lotoka when I read your comment. It's not finished yet, and currently it's not meant to be more than a sketch, but before I go on holiday tomorrow I'd like to show you what I have so far. The Fisherman sample text will presumably be my next project when I return...
Nicely done! I haven't had a chance to study it more closely yet, but it seems to fit in with its sisters.
Corumayas wrote:
cedh audmanh wrote:dalø 'panda' now comes from *(ŋu)tax-lu-ua 'man from the forest' (with the first syllable truncated somehow)
This is the same meaning as orangutan, isn't it?
Indeed - orangutan is plausibly from orang hutan, meaning forest-man (except Malay is head-first).
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