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

[zompist]

BTW, it seems that the wordlists you used may include items not attested otherwise. Do you have the wordlists themselves?

I just used the websites that existed at the time; looks like two of them have succumbed to linkrot.

The original links are here, in case you want to (say) try archive.org:

http://www.almeopedia.com/index.php/Ke% ... %BDn%C9%99

[Corumayas]

Things are moving really quickly at the moment, it's hard to keep up with it all-- but since the various parts increasingly seem to impinge on one another (esp. the Isles, Siixtaguna, & Isthmus areas) I feel like I need to keep abreast of everything...

How about we try to figure out the sound changes for the Isles languages, then see if the paradigm works? If we're going to design around the Isles languages we should probably figure out what we're working with.

I think we're a lot closer to that now that we have zompist's analysis.

The subgrouping Basilius suggests is pretty counterintuitive geographically, unless the Isles family originated near Tymytys. (Cf. the obvious real-world analogue... the direction of migration is clearly reflected in the subgrouping, especially at the largest scale.) But I suggest we try to formulate one based on sound changes and see where that takes us.

Tentatively, given Basilius's analysis, I'd suggest that instead of Proto-Tuysafan, Ran's PI represents something like "Core Proto-Isles": the dialect from which most of the languages of Sumarušuxi and nearby areas are descended. (I imagine that this could be the most densely-populated Isles-speaking region, and probably the most politically important later on.)

(Incidentally, Basilius, I'm still unsure about the Sumarušuxi scenario-- though I like the idea that increasing trade was important-- but it seems to me that the details of how the Isles people took over are ultimately less important than when, and on that I think we more or less agree.)


TzirTzi, I think I have some questions about the Siixtaguna culture, but I'll reread what you've written and try to post something about it later.


Also, to reiterate what Dewrad said about the Adata sound change list: I came up with that (two years ago now, oy) by comparing the Adata and Ndak Ta lexicons. I did the best I could, and (as I recall) at the time Dewrad said I'd pretty much got it right as far as he could remember. But obviously I may have missed some things, and there are certainly areas where I wasn't able to work out all the details-- irregular stress being a big one, thus I gave my best approximation of the rules, and listed exceptions.


And finally:

That is also true but what I was referring to is the fact that the plosive inventory of both Adata and old Agaf consists of p, b, ph, t, d, th, k, g and kh. I think it would be best to avoid this. Avoiding it can be done by taking the changes which apply to Ayasthi affricates from the new changes list instead of the old one. That way, we'd have palatal plosive added but not aspirates.

Oh, yeah. I think I agree there too. I've started working through the "Neo-Agaf" changes, and if I don't get busy with something else I should be able to get those results online later this week.

[Basilius]

Things are moving really quickly at the moment, it's hard to keep up with it all-- but since the various parts increasingly seem to impinge on one another (esp. the Isles, Siixtaguna, & Isthmus areas) I feel like I need to keep abreast of everything...

Actually, I perceive the pace we've taken as a bit too fast, too: we've been making large-scale decisions basing on rather fragmentary data.

(In fact, I can invest very little time in conlanging these days, so I mostly share what I understood earlier instead of coping with wordlists, sequences of SC's, etc.)

The subgrouping Basilius suggests is pretty counterintuitive geographically, unless the Isles family originated near Tymytys. (Cf. the obvious real-world analogue... the direction of migration is clearly reflected in the subgrouping, especially at the largest scale.)

I think the position of the two northern langs is better taken as parallel to that of Tocharian among the Indo-European languages. However, even this analogy is irrelevant if the deepest differences reflect dialectal splits that existed already in Tuysáfa.

Moreover, the picture becomes rather logical if it is taken as reflecting the *order* of migrations. Indeed, it looks quite natural that the groups that had to move first and migrated furthest spoke deviant peripheral dialects, while the next most deviant group (the ancestors of the Ppãrwak) lived originally on the opposite edge of the Isles-speaking area in Tuysáfa, was forced to migrate last, and thus remained in a region (Ttiruku) not too distant from the original homeland.

But I suggest we try to formulate one based on sound changes and see where that takes us.

I second this.

(Incidentally, Basilius, I'm still unsure about the Sumarušuxi scenario-- though I like the idea that increasing trade was important-- but it seems to me that the details of how the Isles people took over are ultimately less important than when, and on that I think we more or less agree.)

I think we do. My tentative timeline was invented as just an *example* of how a minority language could become dominant. The increased trade sort of makes it look less... arbitrary ;)

However, I like the picture drawn by Salmoneus. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine a big agricultural ethnos suddenly crossing the ocean on dugouts. But it is much easier if:

(1) A considerable part of the population lived on rafts and boats already in Tuysáfa, and such a lifestyle wasn't too alien to the rest.
(2) There were several waves of the migrations corresponding to the gradually worsening situation in the original homeland.

But this would also mean that at first the migrants looked more like refugees than like conquerors, did not claim for much land, preserved their coastal lifestyle (perhaps mixing with other coastal groups), etc.

[Rory]

Hi everyone,

Ran asked me if I still had the sound changes lying around for my end of the Isles family... I had a quick look, and I do - so here're the sound changes that created Mûtsipsa'. I've written a little around them to make them easier to understand.

The original phoneme inventory
Stops /p, t, d, k, g, ʔ/
Affricates /ts dz/
Fricatives /s, ɦ/
Nasals /m, n/
Approximants /w, j/
Vowels: /i, a, u/
(While /ɦ/ is a voiced glottal fricative, I think I was (erroneously) using the symbol for the voiceless pharyngeal fricative.)

Depharyngealization
ɦu, ɦa > hu, ha
ɦi > xi

Tone-dependent lengthening or raising
i > i: / first vowel in HH word
u > u: / first vowel in HH word
a > e / first vowel in HH word

Semi-vowel and diphthong shifts

Code: Select all

 a  i  u  aj  uj  aw  iw
wa wi wu waj wuj waw wiw
ja ji ju jaj juj jaw jiw

become:
 a  i  u   e   û   o   y
 o  y uu  we  wû  wo  yy
 e ii  û   e   û  jo  iy

(The above is in Mûtsipsa' orthography, so û = /M/, and a doubled vowel indicates lengthening)

The above also only shows what happens to semi-vowel combinations and diphthongs with the old vowels. What about those vowels that arose because of HH conditions (e.g. /e/ and /i:/)? Well:

Code: Select all

 e  ii  uu  ej  uuj  ew  iiw
we wii wuu wej wuuj wew wiiw
je jii juu jej juuj jew jiiw

become:
 e  ii  uu  ej   ûû   y  yy
we wii wuu  yj   ûû  yy  yy
je jii juu  ij   ûû  iy  iy

Lenition
unvoiced plosive > unvoiced fricative / intervocalic

Fortition
VgV, VdV > VkV, VtV

(Actually, this could be seen as more of a chain shift than a lenition followed by a fortition, and I think it's how I originally imagined it.)

Denasalisation
VmV > VwV
m# > Ø#

Loss or centralisation or shortening of final vowels
i, y, u, û, a# > Ø#
e, o# > a#
long vowel# > short vowel#

Vowel syncope
#1V2V > #12V
(Where 1 is less sonorous than 2, and where V is any short vowel (e.g. kexa > kxa, sûjo > sjo).)

Devoicing
voiced plosives and aspirates devoice when adjacent to voiceless consonants
dz > ts

Hiatus resolution
VV > V'V
(Again, here we're using Mûtsipsa' orthography, the apostrophe represents the glottal stop.)

Glottal cluster simplification
'C > C
C'# > C#

Hapology
any exactly reduplicated syllables collapse together (e.g. tatani > tani, xixitswa > xitswa)

More glottal cluster simplification
Ch# > C#
(only on roots, not suffixes)

So, some examples (in the old orthography, q is the glottal stop and acutes indicate high tone):
síkim húyqi huyqi hápaqi múmuytaq
becomes
siix hûûh hûh hefah muuwûsa'

háyqi múmuytziqya síqi tátatawsampawh
becomes
hej muuwûtsiha siih tsosampoh

As can be seen, tonal distinctions are neutralized. The difference between húyqi and huyqi, previously tonal, becomes one of vowel length.

If you have any questions, please ask, and I'll try and look it up or remember. I think there are a few inconsistencies, in that some words did not undergo particular sound changes, and some words had a few extra ones, but historical phonology is not a hard and fast science

[Basilius]

Hi Rory! It is really timely that you appear :)

Thank you for the sound changes - we needed them badly :)

Could you please add a few comments?

(1) Could you please look at the lexicon? Some items in it lack etymologies, and some could be analyzed incorrectly. For example, is the stem of 'knee'vowelless?

(2) It would be really helpful if you could also comment on these "issues" (what relates to Mûtsipsa'). For example, what was your original vision of how the agreement of attributes developed?

Thank you so much again!

[Ran]

Rory --- thank you so much for your help!

[TzirTzi]

To be able to do the Kozado lexicon I was going to have to spend a lot of time playing with the Adata lexicon, so I thought that I'd create a new version of the Adata lexicon with irregular stress, part of speech, and missing items added so that this work wouldn't have to be repeated for any different future work.

It has taken a very, very long time. But, at last, here it is. It still lacks etymology on the new items added from this .csv, part of speech on ambiguous words in the Adata lexicon not from Ndak Ta, and I haven't yet looked at the .csv of Faralo loans into Adata.

[Dewrad]

To be able to do the Kozado lexicon I was going to have to spend a lot of time playing with the Adata lexicon, so I thought that I'd create a new version of the Adata lexicon with irregular stress, part of speech, and missing items added so that this work wouldn't have to be repeated for any different future work.

It has taken a very, very long time. But, at last, here it is. It still lacks etymology on the new items added from this .csv, part of speech on ambiguous words in the Adata lexicon not from Ndak Ta, and I haven't yet looked at the .csv of Faralo loans into Adata.

I've gone through and added the missing parts of speech. Any reason for disposing of the original Romanisation?

[TzirTzi]

I've gone through and added the missing parts of speech. Any reason for disposing of the original Romanisation?

Thanks I hadn't dropped the romanisation in a very intentional way - I needed it in IPA, so that's the first format I did it in. Adding the romanisation back in is on my to-do list...

[Dewrad]

I've gone through and added the missing parts of speech. Any reason for disposing of the original Romanisation?

Thanks I hadn't dropped the romanisation in a very intentional way - I needed it in IPA, so that's the first format I did it in. Adding the romanisation back in is on my to-do list...

With regard to the etymologies, a two remarks:

Rathedan-internal place names have no defined etymologies (extratextually, most are derived from the names of several ZBBers- "Radias" probably being the most transparent). Adāta is from Ndak Ta (I thought that at least was obvious?)

I'll add those etyma that I know later.

[Corumayas]

Wow, thanks Rory! That's a huge help! And thanks for consolidating the Adata lexicon, TzirTzi!

Actually, I perceive the pace we've taken as a bit too fast, too: we've been making large-scale decisions basing on rather fragmentary data.

I agree-- I think any permanent decisions about the Isles family in particular should wait until we're at least able to make sense of the sound changes. And in general too, I think we all need some time to digest new ideas before we can decide how well they fit.


(Dewrad-- working on the sound changes I discovered Zophīs < zompist; I can't figure out any others though.)

[Radius Solis]

At least a dozen ZBBer's names are encoded in distorted form in the NT lexicon too. Among them merkat, sompís, miasko, dasi, peras, ospák, eptág, and in the extended lexicon dutko. (Mercator, Zompist, Miekko, Dazi, Pharazon, Spack, Pthag, Dudicon.) A couple other whimsically derived terms: mbop "music", from the song Mmmbop, and pupibat, "to refuse", from the time I asked #almea if anyone would invent new NT words for me and the only response I got was Dudicon saying "poopybutt" - essentially a refusal. Various others have similar sources (though a majority of the initial wordlist came from a generator).

[Corumayas]

Legion, I have lots of questions about your Neo-Agaf sound changes!

1.

[+voc] > [+rhotacised] / _[ɹ]
[ɹ] > 0 / _#

So I should treat all vowels before [ɹ] as rhoticized, even when there's a syllable break in between? And does the second line mean that word-final geminate [ɹɹ] becomes [ɹ]?

2.

[k͜x] > [çː] / V_V
[p͜f] > [fː] / V_V

How do the new geminates get syllabified-- [Vf.fV], or [V.f:V]?

3.

[+fri] > [+voiced] > V_V

Does this rule apply to geminate fricatives as well, or only single ones? And does it affect [h]?

4.

[+voc +stressed] > [+long] > _$

Does "stressed" mean the primary accent only, or secondary ones too?

5.

> [j w] / _V

Does this rule apply only to short ? And what happens to the syllable boundaries-- if a word has [V.Ci.V], does it become [VC.jV], or [V.CjV]? Finally, what about the tone of that syllable-- does it vanish, or does the next (or previous) syllable acquire it as part of a contour, or what?

6.

C > [+long] / {V[+long],[ɹ]}_V

Same question as for 2.

7.

[vː ðː zː lː ɹː ʒː jː ɣː ɰː wː] > [b d r ɬ ʝ ɟ ɟ g ɣ gʷ]

I assume this affects inherited geminates as well as the new ones?

8.

[+voc +long] > [+stress] / _#

And this only applies to a word-final vowel with no coda consonant, right? (Ok, that's obviously what that says, it just seems like a strange rule to me.)

9.

[+long] > [-long]

Does this affect geminate consonants as well as long vowels?

10.

V[-low -stressed] > 0 / VC0_C0V

By "low" do you mean "open"?

11. For the various tone changes at the end: what about complex contour tones? Ayasthi has trimoraic syllables, which can have something like 11 possible tone contours; eliminating the mid-tone still leaves you with 6.

12. Your changes say nothing about the word-final ultra-short vowel (or its syllabic-sibilant allophones). What should happen to them?

[Legion]

Legion > I still suggest that you make Thokyunèhotà public - we are already warned that you consider it "noobish"

Well, okay, here it is:

http://thelegion.free.fr/thokyu.htm
http://thelegion.free.fr/thokyu_sound_changes.htm

It could probably be resurected, the sound changes are silly but not the point of insanity. It just needs better phonemic analysis, better romanization, better morpho-syntactic alignment analysis...

And, if Thokyunèhotà is not completely abandoned, what if we still use the old name for the archipelago, Thumapahìthì? It's been used nobody knows how many times in discussions...

I find it ugly and difficult to type, personnally, but that's me.

As for 'do' -> imperfective marker, wouldn't it be better to use the imperfective of 'do', níni?

It probably did developped that way, but after reduplication ceased to be productive in Naxuutayi, haplology kicked in severely and generally destroyed rows of identical syllables (this also explains why alternative ways to mark aspect were developped).

1.

[+voc] > [+rhotacised] / _[ɹ]
[ɹ] > 0 / _#

So I should treat all vowels before [ɹ] as rhoticized, even when there's a syllable break in between? And does the second line mean that word-final geminate [ɹɹ] becomes [ɹ]?

Yes and not really > geminated final [ɹ] stays as it is.

2.

[k͜x] > [çː] / V_V
[p͜f] > [fː] / V_V

How do the new geminates get syllabified-- [Vf.fV], or [V.f:V]?

[Vf.fV]

3.

[+fri] > [+voiced] > V_V

Does this rule apply to geminate fricatives as well, or only single ones? And does it affect [h]?

Geminate and /h/ as well.

4.

[+voc +stressed] > [+long] > _$

Does "stressed" mean the primary accent only, or secondary ones too?

Primary accent only.

5.

> [j w] / _V

Does this rule apply only to short ? And what happens to the syllable boundaries-- if a word has [V.Ci.V], does it become [VC.jV], or [V.CjV]? Finally, what about the tone of that syllable-- does it vanish, or does the next (or previous) syllable acquire it as part of a contour, or what?

Yes, [V.CjV], the tone is transfered on the following vowel, so if we got like iHoL it becomes joHL.

6.

C > [+long] / {V[+long],[ɹ]}_V

Same question as for 2.

Same answer :p

7.

[vː ðː zː lː ɹː ʒː jː ɣː ɰː wː] > [b d r ɬ ʝ ɟ ɟ g ɣ gʷ]

I assume this affects inherited geminates as well as the new ones?

Yes.

8.

[+voc +long] > [+stress] / _#

And this only applies to a word-final vowel with no coda consonant, right? (Ok, that's obviously what that says, it just seems like a strange rule to me.)

It just means that stress shift on word final long vowels (which are necessarily in open syllables, since this is preceded by the rule [+voc] > [-long] / _C$)

9.

[+long] > [-long]

Does this affect geminate consonants as well as long vowels?

Yes.

10.

V[-low -stressed] > 0 / VC0_C0V

By "low" do you mean "open"?

Yes. Basically, all unstressed vowels are ellided in intertonic (neither initial nor final) except /a/.

11. For the various tone changes at the end: what about complex contour tones? Ayasthi has trimoraic syllables, which can have something like 11 possible tone contours; eliminating the mid-tone still leaves you with 6.

Indeed, this require additional rule. The simplest would be to simply reduce those syllables (after the middle tone elimination but before other tonal changes) to a single tone, the one that dominates, so:
[HLH] > [H]
[LLH] > [L]
[LHH] > [H]
etc. (though if you've got a better idea, go with it).

Also, I was assuming that identical tones following each other in a syllable would just merge if the number of mora is reduced. So.
[LLH], 3 mora, loses a mora and thus becomes [LH].

Depends. I hadn't properly planed this, so it's up to you, whichever you find more logical/elegant.

12. Your changes say nothing about the word-final ultra-short vowel (or its syllabic-sibilant allophones). What should happen to them?

I probably missed those, I can't even find where they were mentionned in the grammar… I guess we could either elide them or simply merge them with the closest short vowels avalaible, it's up to you.

[Cedh]

http://thelegion.free.fr/thokyu.htm
http://thelegion.free.fr/thokyu_sound_changes.htm

withìne - inside.DAT

Is this borrowed from English?

[Corumayas]

Thanks Legion!

11. For the various tone changes at the end: what about complex contour tones? Ayasthi has trimoraic syllables, which can have something like 11 possible tone contours; eliminating the mid-tone still leaves you with 6.

Indeed, this require additional rule. The simplest would be to simply reduce those syllables (after the middle tone elimination but before other tonal changes) to a single tone, the one that dominates, so:
[HLH] > [H]
[LLH] > [L]
[LHH] > [H]
etc. (though if you've got a better idea, go with it).

Also, I was assuming that identical tones following each other in a syllable would just merge if the number of mora is reduced. So.
[LLH], 3 mora, loses a mora and thus becomes [LH].

Depends. I hadn't properly planed this, so it's up to you, whichever you find more logical/elegant.

Let's see... after losing the mid tone the possible tone contours for 2 and 3-mora syllables are as follows--

initial pretonic: LH, LHH
medial pretonic: HH, HHH
initial acute: LH, LHL
medial acute: HH, HHL
circumflex: HL, HLL
posttonic: LL, LLL

So another possibility might be to merge the 3-mora tones with the corresponding 2-mora ones. The only ones that are significantly different are the acutes where a third mora falls to L; since the next syllable is going to be L anyway losing that is probably not a big deal. On the other hand, there aren't many circumflexes, so maybe the 3-mora acutes could merge with them to even it out more... Hmm.


EDIT:

3.

[+fri] > [+voiced] > V_V

Does this rule apply to geminate fricatives as well, or only single ones? And does it affect [h]?

Geminate and /h/ as well.

So [f.f] > [v.v], and [h] > [h\]. What about [s.T] (which patterns with geminates in Ayasthi)? And then there's [s.sz=] and [S.SZ=], where the syllabic fricatives are allophones of [1_X]...

[Legion]

Geminate and /h/ as well.

So [f.f] > [v.v], and [h] > [h\]. What about [s.T] (which patterns with geminates in Ayasthi)? And then there's [s.sz=] and [S.SZ=], where the syllabic fricatives are allophones of [1_X]...

I suggest these sound changes (before the voicing of fricatives):

[s.T] > [s.S]
[s.sz=] > [z.z1]
[S.SZ=] > [Z.Z1]

[Corumayas]

Ok. Does [s.S] then remain unvoiced?

[Legion]

Ok. Does [s.S] then remain unvoiced?

Wait, I meant [s.s], not [s.S], sorry :/ (so it get normally voiced)

[Corumayas]

Ah, ok then. One more question-- should I change all [sT] > [ss], or only when it's intervocallic? (It also occurs word-finally.)

[Basilius]

Legion > Thank you!

It could probably be resurected, the sound changes are silly but not the point of insanity. It just needs better phonemic analysis, better romanization, better morpho-syntactic alignment analysis...

There's a lot of valuable lexical material in the description. Some words seem to have been used in other projects... I think this means that any revisions of the SC's must have mostly the same target state, but the intermediary stages can indeed be made more natural-looking.

The grammar looks OK - only... as if translated into English a bit hastily :)

Also, I don't see any really strange developments - that is, beyond those already known from the related langs.

By what time do you think Thokyunèhotà must become silent (or marginalized)?

[Legion]

Ah, ok then. One more question-- should I change all [sT] > [ss], or only when it's intervocallic? (It also occurs word-finally.)

Also word finally then, that seems logical.


Basilius > I don't think Thokyunehota needs a revision, just a better description of the existing system (the phoneme inventory probably list distinctions that are only phonetic, the way the case system is presented is silly, and so on).

By what time do you think Thokyunèhotà must become silent (or marginalized)?

I don't know. It could have gone the way Latin did, effectively dead in speech for a long time but still used as a lingua franca until it was replaced by Naxuutayi.

[Rory]

(1) Could you please look at the lexicon? Some items in it lack etymologies, and some could be analyzed incorrectly. For example, is the stem of 'knee'vowelless?

Yes, it is vowelless.

(2) It would be really helpful if you could also comment on these "issues" (what relates to Mûtsipsa'). For example, what was your original vision of how the agreement of attributes developed?

A lot of these "issues" are just quirky ways the language works. A lot of it I took from real-world languages - for example, the ordering of "and" in nominal coordination ("horse cart and") was calqued from Sanskrit.

I don't have my notes with me at the moment, but next week I'll take a good look at the etymologies and the issues and try to draw things together. (Bear in mind that it was over 3 years ago that I made this language.)

[Basilius]

Rory, thank you!

A lot of these "issues" are just quirky ways the language works. A lot of it I took from real-world languages - for example, the ordering of "and" in nominal coordination ("horse cart and") was calqued from Sanskrit.

No, my "issues" are not meant to question the plausibility of the features themselves. It would be a pity to alter the rules for coordination in Mûtsipsa', they do add individual flavor to the language :)

But the diachronical scenarios behind those features can be too complicated, so a more lazy way to analyze them could be to treat them as archaisms not retained in the "standard dialect" of PI. (See, for example, my recent lamentations on the subject.)

Thus, seeing constructions like 'A and B' in some languages but 'A B-and' in others, I'd instinctively suppose that in the protolanguage the 'and' was an optional word (maybe meaning properly 'also' or somesuch) while the default way to construe coordinated phrases was simply 'A, B'. However, this is clearly not the way they are construed in the "standard dialect" described by Ran.

Therefore, ultimately we'll have either to find a detailed explanation (with intermediary stages and a timeline for them) of how the Mûtsipsa' construction evolved from "Ran's PI", or to re-interprete the Mûtsipsa' construction as evolving from an earlier stage, some "Ultimate PI", which differed from "Ran's PI" in this point. Right now the latter option looks much easier (for the Mûtsipsa' conjunctions as well as all the other "issues"), but this can be changed by finding a plausible diachronical scenario for the other option (or rediscovering it, if you already had one).

I don't have my notes with me at the moment, but next week I'll take a good look at the etymologies and the issues and try to draw things together. (Bear in mind that it was over 3 years ago that I made this language.)

That would be enormously helpful! Thank you.

Basilius > I don't think Thokyunehota needs a revision, just a better description of the existing system (the phoneme inventory probably list distinctions that are only phonetic, the way the case system is presented is silly, and so on).

OK, OK :)

By what time do you think Thokyunèhotà must become silent (or marginalized)?

I don't know. It could have gone the way Latin did, effectively dead in speech for a long time but still used as a lingua franca until it was replaced by Naxuutayi.

Actually, I wanted to wikify something and didn't know what to write in the "Period" line of the language template. Will you create the wiki page for Thokyunèhotà, then? I suppose the template info doesn't need to be very specific, it could be something like "Certainly extinct by 1 YP" :)

The sensory paradigm would suggest that and are analyzed as /i/ and /u/ but the proposed imperative would suggest that and are analyzed as /ij/ and /uw/.

How about we try to figure out the sound changes for the Isles languages, then see if the paradigm works? If we're going to design around the Isles languages we should probably figure out what we're working with.

I see. Sorry for not understanding earlier :)

Indeed, -iw- could be more difficult to interprete later on, when we proceed to "Ultimate PI", then to "Proto-Macro-Isles", and then to "Proto-Ultimundic" :)
(My plans on the above may look a bit Napoleonish, but actually I just know I'll need related languages on Ttiruku; I don't think PI can be an isolate, given the location of its homeland.)

Maybe the canonization of the imperative can be postponed? It can be simply stated for now that it was formed by vowel alternations, like the tense forms (with a tentative version wikified in a talk page).

BTW, what do you think of my escape-hatch proposal, with a discourse particle? E. g. what tense form could it combine with?

[Rory]

A lot of these "issues" are just quirky ways the language works. A lot of it I took from real-world languages - for example, the ordering of "and" in nominal coordination ("horse cart and") was calqued from Sanskrit.

No, my "issues" are not meant to question the plausibility of the features themselves. It would be a pity to alter the rules for coordination in Mûtsipsa', they do add individual flavor to the language

Definitely, I don't want to be ret-conning anything.

But the diachronical scenarios behind those features can be too complicated, so a more lazy way to analyze them could be to treat them as archaisms not retained in the "standard dialect" of PI. (See, for example, my recent lamentations on the subject.)

Thus, seeing constructions like 'A and B' in some languages but 'A B-and' in others, I'd instinctively suppose that in the protolanguage the 'and' was an optional word (maybe meaning properly 'also' or somesuch) while the default way to construe coordinated phrases was simply 'A, B'. However, this is clearly not the way they are construed in the "standard dialect" described by Ran.

Therefore, ultimately we'll have either to find a detailed explanation (with intermediary stages and a timeline for them) of how the Mûtsipsa' construction evolved from "Ran's PI", or to re-interprete the Mûtsipsa' construction as evolving from an earlier stage, some "Ultimate PI", which differed from "Ran's PI" in this point. Right now the latter option looks much easier (for the Mûtsipsa' conjunctions as well as all the other "issues"), but this can be changed by finding a plausible diachronical scenario for the other option (or rediscovering it, if you already had one).

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but I see both options as involving equal amounts of work - in both cases, you have to explain how X became Y. I also don't see the option of explaining how Mutsipsa' arose from "Ran's PI" as being particularly complicated. I regard much of language change as arising from probabilistic linguistic variation, partly due to social and geographic stratification.