Newt's Languages

[ObsequiousNewt]

I've decided to let my old "Newtlang scratchpad" die and start a dedicated thread for my languages. This one will be more organized than the scratchpad. In fact, all I'm going to do is link to documents regarding my languages.

So, without further ado:

Proto* Phonology and Grammar

(others to follow)

[ObsequiousNewt]

Years ago, I drew a map of Elmincár, my conworld (also my D&D world). I've decided to take out that map and examine those words and place names, and use their phonology to construct a descendant of Proto*. But I'm not just using the orthography to determine the phonology, oh no; I'm using my own memory of how I pronounced those place names.

The map (apologies for poor quality; I'm not an image whiz)

The title of the map, "Phato in Elmincár", appears to have been cut off.

While the names are very European, some things are apparent:

• First, there is an abundance of ao, which I recall pronouncing as /æɒ/ (not unlike OE ēa.) This probably resulted from a breaking (maybe of /ɑ/?) into something like /ao/, which then equalized in height.
• There are two other diphthongs: ue (in Cuerol and Duerol), and ai (in Etkai), although the latter is probably a loan-sound. The áe in Coláera is definitely /a.e/.
• The accented vowels á é í ó ú did not have a different pronunciation than unaccented a e i o u. They were probably initially long vowels that lost their length distinction.
• a á was definitely /a/, or /ə/ when unstressed. However, there are a couple cases of a/á as /e/: Mádrós and Barith. The latter I can chalk up to being taken from "baritone" (compare "Alto"), but I'm not sure about the former. There is also one case of /æ/: ash "sea", which is a loanword (it is also the only instance of sh.)
• The other vowels were /e i o u/ when stressed, and /ɛ ɪ ɔ ʊ/ when unstressed, although for some odd reason Urol is pronounced /juɹɔl/.
• Final x /ks/ appears in several words, and is probably a nominative case ending of one declension. Medial x appears only in Exol, but the letter's existence is justified for being a case ending.
• There is a c and a k, both of which are pronounced /k/ (interestingly, there is no c before e é i í, so I don't need to worry about affrication/palatalization.) These were probably distinct sounds that merged.
• There exist both p t (c) k b d g and ph th kh. Ergo, aspiration. I don't know what Dzao is; it might just need a change, unless anyone has suggestions. The only other grapheme unaccounted for is sh, which only appears in ash (and ashen), so those are definitely loanwords.

That's all for tonight; I'm going to bed.