Conlang relay [relocated] (aka "The Cursed Relay")

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 05, 2008 7:31 am

boy #12 wrote:Has anyone been IRC chatting? Should we schedule something?

That would be good. Zhen Lin seems to be online all the time, but I haven't met anyone else on #Akana for weeks. I can usually have IRC running from c. 10 to 18 and from 20 to 02 hrs CEST (the second period would be better because the first one is while I'm at work), and I could also arrange for 06 to 08 hrs CEST.

Corumayas · Post by **Corumayas** » Tue May 06, 2008 5:10 pm

I don't have my own computer right now, so no IRC for me (but I hope to change that soon).

Meanwhile, here's a summary of sound changes I currently have in the Eige-Isthmus family... these are largely tentative and definitely incomplete:

Proto-Eige-Isthmus > Proto-Isthmus
*pr, *tr, *kr > *ʈ
*br, *dr, *gr > *ɖ
*r > *w

*wa *waj *waw > *o *oj *ou
*we > ? *o or *ej
*wi > ? *uj or *ji
*wo > *ou
*aw *ew *ow > *au *eu *ou
*w > Ø

*ŋ > something else... *n or *j or Ø or...?

*pj *bj > *tl *dl

Proto-Eige-Isthmus > Proto-Eige Valley
these changes affect onsets only:
*b *d *dz *g > *bʱ *dʱ *dzʱ *gʱ
*bʱ *dʱ *dzʱ *gʱ > *pʰ *tʰ *tsʰ *kʰ + breathy voice on following vowel
*p *t *ts *k > *b *d *dz *g
*pʰ *tʰ *tsʰ *kʰ > *p *t *ts *k

Proto-Eige Valley > Proto-Miwan
*ts *dz > *t *d

*e *o > *i *u
*aj > *e
*aw > *a

tonogenesis

Proto-Miwan > Old Eastern Miwan
? some instances of *k *g > q χ

Proto-Eige Valley > Ngauro
*ts *dz > s z

*j *w > z v
(nz > z)
*tr *dr > tj dj

*t > ʔ /_$

some allophone-y changes:
*aj *aw > e o (or maybe ɛ ɔ) /_C$
*m > n /_l

cedh, thanks for updating the Proto-Isthmus page... if you could (at your convenience) upload the Miwan page too, all the Eige-Isthmus stuff will be back online.

Radius Solis · Post by **Radius Solis** » Thu May 08, 2008 5:22 am

1. If you want to get on IRC, Corumayas, use http://www.mibbit.com/ - it works from anywhere you can use the web.

2. Sometime soon we need to sit down and hash out more of the EI family diachronics. I suggest switching from "describing what we can already guess" to "describing everything we can without screwing up something else", because sooner or later this family needs to move forward. I will be happy to help all I can.

3. #12, I just happened upon the Ndok Aiso page again - it's got more to it now than there was last time I looked, despite the wikicrash and all. And... wow. I really look forward to seeing additional substantiation. N-A is a valuable language to know stuff about, and I'm glad we've finally got somebody working on it again. Let me know if you need/want help.

4. An initial, and very rough, draft of the Kascan Culture Test is now online and I greatly hope to get some constructive criticism here, because I can tell some of it just doesn't work. Substantial revisions and additions to the culture (And I don't just mean the text) are going to be needed.

5. Somewhere down the line I hope we can get culture tests up for many of the important groups of Akana. Huyfárah, Rathedan, Greater Tharas, maybe even the Ndak Empire.

schwhatever · Post by **schwhatever** » Sun May 11, 2008 8:24 pm

cedh audmanh wrote:- If you want to be able to work rather freely, but from a solid basis and in a region of relative historical significance, you could derive a northern descendant of Fáralo. It would probably have some Feråjin and/or Doroh influence, but there is currently not much info on these.

This is probably the best option for me. I'll get started on it, but I probably won't have anything of significance until much later in the week if not the next.

EDIT: I found this grammar and was wondering how up to date it was. Also, AFAICT, Fáralo's phonotactics are (C)(j/w)V(l, n, m, N, r)(other consonant), is this true?

Also, one last question, which regions tended towards realizing original /eI) oU) e o/ as [e o E O]? Just so that I can know whether to steer away from that or include it.

dunomapuka · Post by **dunomapuka** » Sun May 11, 2008 10:36 pm

schwhatever wrote:
cedh audmanh wrote:- If you want to be able to work rather freely, but from a solid basis and in a region of relative historical significance, you could derive a northern descendant of Fáralo. It would probably have some Feråjin and/or Doroh influence, but there is currently not much info on these.
This is probably the best option for me. I'll get started on it, but I probably won't have anything of significance until much later in the week if not the next.

EDIT: I found this grammar and was wondering how up to date it was. Also, AFAICT, Fáralo's phonotactics are (C)(j/w)V(l, n, m, N, r)(other consonant), is this true?

Also, one last question, which regions tended towards realizing original /eI) oU) e o/ as [e o E O]? Just so that I can know whether to steer away from that or include it.

Yeah, that's the official Fáralo grammar. Dialectal variations within the language have not been determined yet. My descendant lang Namɨdu is spoken in the far south of Huyfárah; my starting point was that <ei> were /e o E O/, but later /e o/ became tensed to /je wo/ and thence to /j@ w@/. I'm guessing the monophthong-diphthong isogloss is much further north.

If you're doing the Fáralo spoken in the Oltu Valley, I've imposed a single constraint: the word Hagíbəl [ha'gi.b@l] ends up as Hajū which is [ha'dZu:] or something. If you're working anywhere further north than the Oltu, then you have a total blank slate.

schwhatever · Post by **schwhatever** » Sun May 11, 2008 11:19 pm

boy #12 wrote:Yeah, that's the official Fáralo grammar. Dialectal variations within the language have not been determined yet. My descendant lang Namɨdu is spoken in the far south of Huyfárah; my starting point was that <ei> were /e o E O/, but later /e o/ became tensed to /je wo/ and thence to /j@ w@/. I'm guessing the monophthong-diphthong isogloss is much further north.

That's what I was leaning towards doing, so that works really well.

If you're doing the Fáralo spoken in the Oltu Valley, I've imposed a single constraint: the word Hagíbəl [ha'gi.b@l] ends up as Hajū which is [ha'dZu:] or something. If you're working anywhere further north than the Oltu, then you have a total blank slate.

Since that meshes with most of the changes I had in mind, I'll probably be doing Oltu Valley Fáralo.

Basic Changes:

*tS{ *tSa *tSo *tSou) *tSu

tsV
*S{ *Sa *So *Sou) *Su

sV
*si *ki *gi *se *ke *ge

Si tSi dZi Se tSe dZe

S tS dZ S tS dZ [-accent]

*Vl

Vw
*r

R

*kw *gw *zw *sw

k_w g_w G\_w x_w
*wk *wg *wz *ws

k_w g_w G\_w x_w
G\_w x_w

G\ x
k_w g_w

p b

pf) bv)~bB)

*VP1P2V

VP1V (P= affricates and plosives)

*iu *io

jy j2

y 2 /[-accent]
*ei) *ou)

e: o:

i: u:
*i *u

I U
*@w *@j

u: i:

But I'm not sure how much time span we're talking about, so I'm not clear on whether this is enough for a fairly phonetically conservative branch or a drop in the bucket.

EDIT: I also can't seem to find anything on Doroh or Feråjin, so I'm not sure if this is precisely what we want to happen in that valley.

Radius Solis · Post by **Radius Solis** » Mon May 12, 2008 12:17 am

How much timespan you want to cover is completely up to you, save that going over, say, 2500 years, might be a bit much. If you don't want to do more sound changes than those, you might want to call it less than half that.

Your changes will definitely produce a conservative variety, because the things many of them change are already uncommon. For instance there isn't much kw/gw because those already changed to p/b, and the sequences ki/gi already changed to tSi/dZi. (counterexamples are mainly from loanwords).

Phonotactic constraints in Faralo are not explicitly given, so if you need a syllable definition rule like the one you proposed, it's up to you to work out what it is!

That one looks about right, but it's hard to be certain.

And yes, that grammar is up to date, to the best of my knowledge. Zomp has updated the lexicon on the page recently - the words in red have been added in the last month. There are a couple small errors in the grammar section to beware of: the phoneme /dZ/ is not listed on the consonant table, but you'll still see it as <j> in the wordlist. Also, the example given for use of the combined-form clitic pronouns uses the wrong one.

Doroh and Feråjin remain undescribed. The latter will not be too hard to work out, however, based on what we know of Faraghin and the family history. All it needs are some sound changes. It might be best to leave Doroh largely out of the picture for now, until somebody comes around who wants to develop it seriously as a full-ish conlang.

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 12, 2008 4:00 am

All the info we have on Feråjin and Doroh is here and here. You might also want to have a look at the Faraghin wordlist: Faraghin is the closest relative of Feråjin, spoken about -1000 YP (that is, a millennium before Fáralo). Also, you should have a close look at the history of the region as proposed so far. The Feråjin are supposed to conquer the Oltu Valley in the 8th century YP.

If you're doing Oltu Valley Fáralo, Doroh is largely irrelevant because it is spoken at the eastern edge of Huyfárah, more than 1000km away.

Legion · Post by **Legion** » Mon May 12, 2008 4:19 am

Question:

What would be the Doroh outcome of these proto-Isthmus words?

*BAlAn (iron)
*dAsJVm (hemp)
*dumAGZ (glass)
*DZusn-en (paint - color)
*s-gAnt-A(tJV/ʈ) (dragon)
*s-kLIt-TS (longsword)
*ʈALk(a) (king)
*TSAt (gold)

(I entend to have these words borrowed in Komeyech as a remaining Doroh substrate).

Radius Solis · Post by **Radius Solis** » Mon May 12, 2008 5:50 am

Legion, the Doroh sound changes are on the page Cedh just linked. Also: holy crap, when did that happen? I have no memory of anybody claiming Doroh...

If somebody has, please come forward and tell us whether you're working on a language that results from those changes.

But either way, without having a clearer idea about Isthmus proto-forms, it's really hard to say what the outcome of those would be in Doroh. So perhaps you should consider borrowing those from some other substrate, if you need them soon.

However, I've been wondering lately about another Faralo daughter, location unknown. But the eastern end of the Empire, out on the isthmus, would appear to be a good place... then we'd have three main Faralo daugthers covering most of the land area of Huyfarah, Namidu, schwatever's in the Oltu, and that one. In the process I'd need to have at least a sketch of Doroh, if someone has claimed it, or else I'd need to do it myself (in which case I would need to scrap those sound changes and do my own).

This is maybe the third or fourth time now I've played with a set of sound changes for Faralo - since Puoni. (I do this a lot, with all kinds of languages, Akana or otherwise.) Maybe it's time to develop one into an actual daughter? I haven't done any new conlangs for a while, hmmmmmm.....

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 12, 2008 9:31 am

Radius Solis wrote:Legion, the Doroh sound changes are on the page Cedh just linked. Also: holy crap, when did that happen? I have no memory of anybody claiming Doroh...

It's not "claimed", I only described some sound changes in order to make the Western Isthmus reconstruction appear possible from an in-world perspective, and to create "a starting point for anyone willing to describe Doroh or another of the Eastern Isthmus languages."

On April 1 2008, I wrote:I've been thinking a lot about the more peripheral language families recently. Just now I've added a section on Eastern Isthmus to the Proto-Isthmus wiki page, in case anyone is interested in describing Doroh or another of the Eastern Isthmus languages when Corumayas' work on the Eige-Isthmus family has progressed far enough to start with such a thing. I might do so myself eventually, but I leave this open to everyone for now, provided I'll be notified so we don't put in double work.

The sound changes I'm proposing for Easters Isthmus are designed to allow for the reconstruction Radius proposed, leaving all those phonemes more or less intact which were lost in the early stages of Western Isthmus.

That's it basically. I don't mind at all if anyone takes on Doroh as I have enough projects already, but for a coherent reconstruction it wouldn't be wise to change the earliest sound changes too drastically. In particular, stop-fricative clusters, retroflexes, and unstressed initial vowels should be preserved at least until the split of Eastern Isthmus because all languages of the western branch have lost them. Some of the later SC towards Doroh are based more on aesthetic choice on my part; these would be debatable. But since there's Lotoka nearby, with a lot of rounded front vowels, I thought it would be nice to have this as a sprachbund feature. Also, having VsC sequences become VhC > VFC > VCC seems interesting in comparison with the western languages; it turns out that Late Doroh with these changes has [voiced stop] vs. [unvoiced geminate] alternations in the pronoun system where the Ferogh languages have [voiced stop] vs. [voiced fricative], e.g. Faraghin gotʃes, ɣotʃom vs. Late Doroh goʔ, ɔkkoʔ.

Legion wrote:What would be the Doroh outcome of these proto-Isthmus words?

*BAlAn (iron)
*dAsJVm (hemp)
*dumAGZ (glass)
*DZusn-en (paint - color)
*s-gAnt-A(tJV/ʈ) (dragon)
*s-kLIt-TS (longsword)
*ʈALk(a) (king)
*TSAt (gold)

Tentatively:

b[a,ɛ,ɔ]ln, sp[a,ɛ,ɔ]ln, ps[a,ɛ,ɔ]ln
d[a,e,o]ʃ[a,e]m, d[e,o]ʃ[œ,y]m, d[e,o]sœm
dum[a,ɛ,ɔ]k[k,x], duŋkx
[st,z,ɖ]unnɛn
sk[a,ɛ]ntet[a,e], sk[ɛ,ɔ]ntot[ø,y], sk[a,ɛ]nt[a,e]dɔj, sk[ɛ,ɔ]ntodɔj, sk[a,ɛ]nt[a,ɛ]ʔ, sk[ɛ,ɔ]ntɔʔ
skliʧ, sklɛtt
ʈ[a,ɛ,ɔ]lk, ʈ[a,ɛ,ɔ]lka, ʈ[a,ɛ,ɔ]kka
[ts,st][a,ɛ,ɔ]ʔ

I realized in doing these words that the changes I gave for Doroh definitely have gaps in them; I had not taken into account that PI had so many clusters...

Legion · Post by **Legion** » Mon May 12, 2008 9:45 am

Well, never mind, I managed to do something - given than those are just loans, and that surely Doroh had dialects, and that Komeyech sound changes are quite mangling anyway, it doesn't really matter if the outcomes I came with are not fully accurate.

So, here's the final list (with Komeyech sound changes applied as well!)

*BAlAn (iron) > poulu (iron)
*dAsJVm (hemp) > tezei (clothe)
*dumAGZ (glass) > tukou (glass)
*DZusn-en (paint - color) > zu (ink)
*s-gAnt-A(tJV/ʈ) (dragon) > chotai (snake)
*s-kLIt-TS (longsword) > chitei (sword)
*ʈALk(a) (king) > tsekai (chief, ruler)
*TSAt (gold) > zos (gold)

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 12, 2008 9:55 am

Legion wrote:*BAlAn (iron) > poulu (iron)
*dAsJVm (hemp) > tezei (clothe)
*dumAGZ (glass) > tukou (glass)
*DZusn-en (paint - color) > zu (ink)
*s-gAnt-A(tJV/ʈ) (dragon) > chotai (snake)
*s-kLIt-TS (longsword) > chitei (sword)
*ʈALk(a) (king) > tsekai (chief, ruler)
*TSAt (gold) > zos (gold)

Could you list your assumed PI forms as well, with variables resolved? This would be good for the PI lexicon...

Zhen Lin · Post by **Zhen Lin** » Mon May 12, 2008 10:30 am

Radius Solis wrote:(I do this a lot, with all kinds of languages, Akana or otherwise.)

So do I. It takes a lot less effort than deriving a whole new daughter, let alone creating a whole new language...

Legion · Post by **Legion** » Mon May 12, 2008 11:32 am

cedh audmanh wrote:
Legion wrote:*BAlAn (iron) > poulu (iron)
*dAsJVm (hemp) > tezei (clothe)
*dumAGZ (glass) > tukou (glass)
*DZusn-en (paint - color) > zu (ink)
*s-gAnt-A(tJV/ʈ) (dragon) > chotai (snake)
*s-kLIt-TS (longsword) > chitei (sword)
*ʈALk(a) (king) > tsekai (chief, ruler)
*TSAt (gold) > zos (gold)
Could you list your assumed PI forms as well, with variables resolved? This would be good for the PI lexicon...

Sure:
*balon
*dasjem
*dumasg
*dsusnen
*sgonta
*sklitst
*telka
*tsot

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 12, 2008 12:43 pm

That makes the Doroh reflexes the following, if the changes are not changed:

*balon > baln
*dasjem > daʃɛm
*dumasg > dumakk
*dsusnen > zunnɛn
*sgonta > skɔnta
*sklitst > skliʧ
*ʈelka > ʈɛlka
*tsot > ʦɔʔ

Corumayas · Post by **Corumayas** » Mon May 12, 2008 2:15 pm

Radius Solis wrote:2. Sometime soon we need to sit down and hash out more of the EI family diachronics. I suggest switching from "describing what we can already guess" to "describing everything we can without screwing up something else", because sooner or later this family needs to move forward. I will be happy to help all I can.

I agree; it's been stagnant for quite a while, and I could use some help. It'd be great if we could revise the Proto-Isthmus reconstructions and resolve all the variables, for a start (keeping in mind the handful of proposed Miwan and Ngauro cognates, of course).

Cedh · Post by **Cedh** » Mon May 12, 2008 5:11 pm

Corumayas wrote:It'd be great if we could revise the Proto-Isthmus reconstructions and resolve all the variables, for a start (keeping in mind the handful of proposed Miwan and Ngauro cognates, of course).

Drawing on the established changes, I'd like to posit the following etymologies:

PEI *njadz-ga "war" > PI *njadsga > Far. nirgha; PNg. **nzatska > Ng. *zaska. PEI *-ga is a suffix of some sort, maybe a verbal noun, in which case the root *njadz- might mean "to fight".
PEI *dzus-n "red" > PI *dzusn- > Far. rušn-en "color"; PEV **tsun > EMiw tun (possibly with a lengthened vowel due to the loss of coda s). PEI *-n might be an adjectivizing suffix.
PEI *dim- "to give" > PI *dim > Far. dem-en; PEV **tim- > EMiw timpi:za "necklace"
PEI *gwent-a-ts "bird" > PI *s-gont-a-ts > Far. ghantač "dragon"; PEV **kwentats > FMiw kwintas. From this we can surmise that the voicing change for EV plosives is blocked medially after nasals. The change of coda ts > s might be a common EV phenomenon; here it is attested for Miwan, but the same thing happens in PEI *njadzga > Ngauro *zaska. If *-a is an agentive suffix, the root might mean something like "to fly". I don't know how to interpret *-ts.
PEI *nag-a > PI *naga-t > Far. nagat "lord, chief"; Ng. **naka, hence NT naka "god". The *-a suffix might be a honorific, or maybe a case ending, possibly agentive (see above). The meaning of the PEI word could be something like "father", but it appears to have had a fairly wide semantic range.
PEI *trelk-a "leader, chief" > PI *ʈelka > Far. čark "king"; PEV **djelka > Ng. **diaka, hence NT diàka "king".
PEI *dzant- "to decide, to judge" > PI *dzant > Far. rant-an "to test; to verify; to prove"; PEV **tsant > Ng. **santa "legal", **santau "illegal", **san-lena "public" (all borrowed into NT).
PEI *gejm- "to know, to understand" > PEV **kejm- > FMiw ki:mat "comprehension"; Ng. **kajme "to study" (hence NT kaime). Here we have a new change for Ngauro: ej > aj.

From these words it appears the root structure of PEI should be extended to C(r,l,j,w)V(n,r,l,j,w)C.

Radius Solis · Post by **Radius Solis** » Mon May 12, 2008 6:27 pm

That looks excellent and I see no problems with any of those etymologies.

For *gwent-a-ts, perhaps the -ts is an augmentative suffix in Isthmus that is responsible for turning "bird" into "dragon". Then the EV version might have lost its meaning over the years, or augmented forms came to be seen as default, or the -s could even be another morpheme entirely.

Corumayas · Post by **Corumayas** » Mon May 12, 2008 7:53 pm

I agree, it looks great overall. Thanks! Some detaily comments:

PEI *njadz-ga "war" > PI *njadsga > Far. nirgha; PNg. **nzatska > Ng. *zaska. PEI *-ga is a suffix of some sort, maybe a verbal noun, in which case the root *njadz- might mean "to fight".

PEI *gwent-a-ts "bird" > PI *s-gont-a-ts > Far. ghantač "dragon"; PEV **kwentats > FMiw kwintas. From this we can surmise that the voicing change for EV plosives is blocked medially after nasals.

I'd been thinking that the EV voicing change only occurred in onsets, so the PNg. form ancestral to FMiw za:ska: might be *nza(d)zka, with *z assimilating to the voicelessness of the *k. Similarly, if my version is true the *t in FMiw kwintas isn't voiced because it's originally the coda of PEI *gwent-, and the *t in Far nagat might go back to PEI and be preserved as a final glottal stop in Ngauro (which wouldn't be reflected in the Ndak Ta loan).

The change of coda ts > s might be a common EV phenomenon; here it is attested for Miwan, but the same thing happens in PEI *njadzga > Ngauro *zaska. If *-a is an agentive suffix, the root might mean something like "to fly". I don't know how to interpret *-ts.

Radius Solis wrote:For *gwent-a-ts, perhaps the -ts is an augmentative suffix in Isthmus that is responsible for turning "bird" into "dragon". Then the EV version might have lost its meaning over the years, or augmented forms came to be seen as default, or the -s could even be another morpheme entirely.

I like that idea, Radius. *-TS is an attested nominalizer in Isthmus, which was still productive in Faraghin (where it's glossed as "quality"), so it might well be the same suffix as that. It's also possible that the suffixes were added independently in both daughters rather than going all the way back to PEI, and are either different morphemes or acquired different meanings in each branch.

[*]PEI *dzus-n "red" > PI *dzusn- > Far. rušn-en "color"; PEV **tsun > EMiw tun (possibly with a lengthened vowel due to the loss of coda s). PEI *-n might be an adjectivizing suffix.

EMiw tun doesn't have a long vowel though. I'm skeptical of explaining Miwan long vowels as due to compensatory lengthening anyway... the correspondences are complex and difficult to predict, and I think the reason is that length is actually part of the tonal system (which we should probably work out at some point). (Of course, deleted coda consonants are highly likely to affect tone, so they are relevant; it's just more complicated than *deleted coda > long vowel.)

[*]PEI *nag-a > PI *naga-t > Far. nagat "lord, chief"; Ng. **naka, hence NT naka "god". The *-a suffix might be a honorific, or maybe a case ending, possibly agentive (see above). The meaning of the PEI word could be something like "father", but it appears to have had a fairly wide semantic range.

I don't think "lord" and "god" are actually too distant semantically, and neither need invoke the concept "father" (for which we have a perfectly good PI root already in *BAdAu). (Also see above about the final *t: the Ngauro word might be *naka?).

[*]PEI *trelk-a "leader, chief" > PI *ʈelka > Far. čark "king"; PEV **djelka > Ng. **diaka, hence NT diàka "king".

This has become the most troubling correspondence for me. Firstly, I'm not sure if Faraghin /r/ should come from *l at all (though if Radius approves of it I'll leave it alone). More bothersome, the *k looks like it should become /g/ in Ngauro. Maybe the final /a/ was added in the NT loan by analogy with naka, which would explain both its absence in Faraghin and the non-voicing of the /k/.

[*]PEI *gejm- "to know, to understand" > PEV **kejm- > FMiw ki:mat "comprehension"; Ng. **kajme "to study" (hence NT kaime). Here we have a new change for Ngauro: ej > aj.[/list]

I was thinking PEI *gajm-, with *aj > PM *e > FM /i/ (FM lacks /e/). In fact, I've been thinking about reducing the PEI diphthongs to just *aj *aw, since I think the others attested in PI could all potentially be derived from those plus the various vowel changes induced by prevocallic *w. On the other hand, if *j *w can occur as coda consonants then there seems to be no good reason not to allow them to follow any vowel. (Incidentally, note that the ken- in NT kenla is the same Ngauro morpheme as the kaim- in kaime.)

From these words it appears the root structure of PEI should be extended to C(r,l,j,w)V(n,r,l,j,w)C.

I'm amenable to that, except that the coda consonant is definitely optional (cf. PI pronouns *da "I", *fe "you[PL]", *njo "he/she"). Also, it seems like *s can show up in several places in the syllable... so maybe something like *(s)C(r,l,j,w)V(n,s,r,l,j,w)(C)...?

dunomapuka · Post by **dunomapuka** » Tue May 13, 2008 3:17 am

Just for the hell of it: I sketched up a draft of sound changes from Ndak Ta to the dialect of Naidda spoken in Buruya (until it is replaced by Fáralo).

I have no intention of doing the grammar, so anybody is welcome to do run with it, if they want. The main intention is so people can borrow words. Especially cedh if he's doing that Daiadak language spoken there.

The general organization of the changes is similar to NT > Delta Naidda, including a variation of what I term the "Naidda Vowel Shift," but like Ndok Aisô upriver, this dialect preserves the initial nasal + obstruent clusters.

1. Medial
mb mbw nd Ng > bb bbw dd ñ
mp nt Nk Nkw > pp tt ñ m
b bw d g > v w 4 M\ (intervocalic)
p t k kw > b d g gw (intervocalic)
p t k > f s j (in medial clusters, exc. after /s/)
C > 0 / _j
dg > gg
br > vr

2. Initial
mb mbw nd Ng > mv mv nz NG
NG > G
V > 0 /#_sC

3. Final
k g > h
other obstruents > 0
pm tn kN tsn > p t k ts
bm dn gN > b d g
nasals > 0

4. Naidda Vowel Shift
i e a o u ai au > e E a O o i u (open non-nasalized in NT)
i e a o u ai au > @ @ a o u E O (closed or nasalized in NT)

The shift only affects original /ai au/, not any new /ai au/ created by preceding changes.

5. Misc. consonant changes
coda /r/ is lost.
g G > x
b > w / V_V
pp tt > ps ts
N > ñ (except in initial cluster /Nk/
gg gw bw bbw > g
bb > b
dd > d
any /w/ after consonants is deleted, but k_w remains as is
4 > ?
As in Ndok Aisô, a glottal stop is inserted to break up any vowel hiatus.

Familiar words run through the sound changes. <e o> are mid-open; <è ò> are mid-close.
Ndak Ta > nzaysa
Aiwa > iwa
Tsinakan > ts@naxa
ombási > òbásè
Kasadgad > Kasaga
ntâug (forest) > ntoh (probably borrowed into Namidu as the word for the Ici Forest)
Ngkeladadn > ñkela'ad
diáka (ruler) > dè'áxa
mpaiswa (fish) > mpesa
ntêwâ (tail/penis) > nt@wa
dempi (child) d@psè
gaibra (sheep) > xevra

Radius Solis · Post by **Radius Solis** » Tue May 13, 2008 9:17 am

Oooohhhh.

I like that a lot! I think the shoe fits, and I suddenly feel the need to borrow a bunch of Buruyan words into Delta.

Semantic changes are greatly to be desired as well, for this purpose, but I have learned before that applying them hundreds at a time doesn't only get old, it turns out uncreative too. So instead, I suggest that those who want words from Buruyan Naidda apply their own, as desired, and post the results so that the rest of us can know what's in the Buruyan lexicon. As a general guideline, words should be more likely to reflect Naidda meanings than NT ones wherever those differ (Buruya remained culturally tied to Kasca for longer than it did to Lasomo), but really the sky's the limit for any individual word.

If there is desire from others, I will be happy to put together a list of raw sound-changed words covering the main NT sources.

Corumayas · Post by **Corumayas** » Tue May 13, 2008 3:49 pm

Nice, boy#12!

I noticed a nitpicky thing I missed in my last post:

Corumayas wrote:
[*]PEI *trelk-a "leader, chief" > PI *ʈelka > Far. čark "king"; PEV **djelka > Ng. **diaka, hence NT diàka "king".
This has become the most troubling correspondence for me. Firstly, I'm not sure if Faraghin /r/ should come from *l at all (though if Radius approves of it I'll leave it alone). More bothersome, the *k looks like it should become /g/ in Ngauro. Maybe the final /a/ was added in the NT loan by analogy with naka, which would explain both its absence in Faraghin and the non-voicing of the /k/.

The PEV form should be *drelk(a), and the Ngauro word djak(a); the change *Cr > Cj occurs in Ngauro but not Miwan. I've been a little worried about what happens to the *l in the Ngauro word, but *elk > /ak/ is not unreasonable. The Proto-Miwan cognate might be **drilk(a).

schwhatever · Post by **schwhatever** » Wed May 14, 2008 12:07 am

Radius Solis wrote:How much timespan you want to cover is completely up to you, save that going over, say, 2500 years, might be a bit much. If you don't want to do more sound changes than those, you might want to call it less than half that.

I'm probably going to shoot for around 1500 years after main colonization/conquest is complete. Although that is a tentative answer.

Your changes will definitely produce a conservative variety, because the things many of them change are already uncommon. For instance there isn't much kw/gw because those already changed to p/b, and the sequences ki/gi already changed to tSi/dZi. (counterexamples are mainly from loanwords).

I have been thinking about having /ei) ou)/ be reanalyzed as /ei ou/ and then having all remaining /i u/ in vowel clusters become /j w/ respectively, only for contact with either of those to promote the palatizing and labialising sound changes.

Phonotactic constraints in Faralo are not explicitly given, so if you need a syllable definition rule like the one you proposed, it's up to you to work out what it is! That one looks about right, but it's hard to be certain.

Ok, cool.

And yes, that grammar is up to date, to the best of my knowledge. Zomp has updated the lexicon on the page recently - the words in red have been added in the last month. There are a couple small errors in the grammar section to beware of: the phoneme /dZ/ is not listed on the consonant table, but you'll still see it as <j> in the wordlist. Also, the example given for use of the combined-form clitic pronouns uses the wrong one.

Ah, I had been wondering about all of those things. Thanks.

Doroh and Feråjin remain undescribed. The latter will not be too hard to work out, however, based on what we know of Faraghin and the family history. All it needs are some sound changes. It might be best to leave Doroh largely out of the picture for now, until somebody comes around who wants to develop it seriously as a full-ish conlang.

Ok, given later posts Doroh seems to be a bit removed from my situation, but should there be a significant Feråjin substratum? I'm unclear on when they conquered the Oltu Valley and for how long the language was spoken there. Also, I'm guessing an Edák substratum goes without saying?

EDIT:

Almeopedia wrote:The people of Huyfárah call themselves the Fáralo— essentially a form of ‘Faraghin’— and think of themselves as descendents of this warrior nation. Nonetheless their language descends from that of the Edák (that is, Ndak Ta), though with heavy Faraghin influence.

So, am I making a minority language (the descendent of Fáralo that survived in the upper Oltu Valley where the origina Edák didn't have as many advantages) or something else? Or is this out of date?

dunomapuka · Post by **dunomapuka** » Wed May 14, 2008 1:52 am

schwhatever wrote:EDIT:
Almeopedia wrote:The people of Huyfárah call themselves the Fáralo— essentially a form of ‘Faraghin’— and think of themselves as descendents of this warrior nation. Nonetheless their language descends from that of the Edák (that is, Ndak Ta), though with heavy Faraghin influence.
So, am I making a minority language (the descendent of Fáralo that survived in the upper Oltu Valley where the origina Edák didn't have as many advantages) or something else? Or is this out of date?

I think you're confusing Fáralo with Faraghin. Fáralo is the descendant of Ndak Ta (Ndak in Fáralo is <i>Edák</i>) spoken in Huyfárah. Historically, it was heavily influenced by the the Faraghin language which belongs to a different family. Fáralo is what you're doing a descendant of. Unless you'd like to do something else.

Take a look here: http://wiki.frath.net/Huyfárah

The initial Faraghin conquest of the Oltu is in -1400, and the Fáralo grammar dates to the year 130. My descendant language is about 1000 years after that (after Huyfárah ceases being a unified political entity, so the breakup of the language is already recognized).