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

[Arzena]

That still seems way too early for the level of civilization you've described here. I'd put it at least after -1000.

Duly noted. Yedzéowulú will live now in -860 YP.

Relevant data be here

[Cedh]

That timeframe sounds much more plausible.

Hivãi 'Righteous Blood'

Where do you derive that from? Proto-Lukpanic hidib aŋi? The canonical outcome in Fu Pitão should be Himãi [Simãi], but you can of course posit that the refugees spoke a variant that did not nasalize /w/ adjacent to nasal vowels, but strengthened it to or [v] instead. This and the palatalisation of /hi/ to [Si] are the last two sound changes in Kpitamoa Lukpanic anyway, and might not have been fully completed by the time of the conquest.

[Arzena]

That timeframe sounds much more plausible.

Hivãi 'Righteous Blood'

Where do you derive that from? Proto-Lukpanic hidib aŋi? The canonical outcome in Fu Pitão should be Himãi [Simãi], but you can of course posit that the refugees spoke a variant that did not nasalize /w/ adjacent to nasal vowels, but strengthened it to or [v] instead. This and the palatalisation of /hi/ to [Si] are the last two sound changes in Kpitamoa Lukpanic anyway, and might not have been fully completed by the time of the conquest.

Hmm, that diachronical explation sounds solid. Let's go with that. And yes, Hivãi is derived from hidib aŋi 'sweet blood'.

EDIT: maybe it's a social register issue at play here.

[Corumayas]

Hey Basilius, I haven't seen you in the Akana threads for a while. Glad you're still around!

I've started a thread at the Akana forum to talk about the Isles sphere and Duke's story.


Arzena, I'm not sure about extending the time frame of Empotle7á that late-- unless you were to add some more sound changes for the later period. (To me it looks like a fairly conservative daughter already, even for -2000.)

Also, we really need to work on the history of the Western-Lukpanic region some more, don't we? And it seems like we could use some description of personal names in Lukpanic...

[Arzena]

Arzena, I'm not sure about extending the time frame of Empotle7á that late-- unless you were to add some more sound changes for the later period. (To me it looks like a fairly conservative daughter already, even for -2000.)

Yedzéowulú...let's say that by -860, his name has changed to
[ʐe˧˦.ɮœw˦.hu˧˨] or something like that. He spends most of his life away from his homeland which causes me to feel that his native language is not the main point of his story. (well besides his memoirs)

And as for Hivãi, that concerns refugees of Kpitamoa and their attempts at empire*. The only time the Empotle7á speakers would enter the picture would be their sporadic uprisings against the Lúyé invaders.

Empotle7á will be moved back to -2000 YP

*My vision for Hivãi is that it tries to 'liberate' on occasion, the Lukpanic cities from the Coastal Westerners. Of course by the time Hivãi has the strength to do this, the Lukpanic cities identify as Western. So, not to be set back by little inconveniences, Hivãi turns to conquering the Empotle7á tribes, or whatever ethonym they call themselves by the sixth century before the Prophet.

[the duke of nuke]

Since information on the Isles languages was formerly lacking, I've made wiki pages for Thokyunèhòta and Naxuutayi with links to Legion's grammar sketches, and a new analysis of the sound changes from PI to Zele.
I've also brought the Zele grammar back online, courtesy of Basilius. Since SRCF at the university provides web hosting, I can host any other files that need a place to live.

Did you know?
Zeluzh is the reflex of Proto-Isles *dzuy dúy, meaning "dust sea".

[Corumayas]

Hmm, that diachronical explation sounds solid. Let's go with that. And yes, Hivãi is derived from hidib aŋi 'sweet blood'.

EDIT: maybe it's a social register issue at play here.

Two thoughts about this name:

1. Since it's post-classical Lukpanic, the modifier should really come after the noun.

2. /h/ and /v/ are phonemes in Siŋmeasita Lukpanic, so maybe that's influenced it somehow. (In true late SL it'd be something like Ãiyidzib though.)

[dunomapuka]

Since information on the Isles languages was formerly lacking, I've made wiki pages for Thokyunèhòta and Naxuutayi with links to Legion's grammar sketches, and a new analysis of the sound changes from PI to Zele.
I've also brought the Zele grammar back online, courtesy of Basilius. Since SRCF at the university provides web hosting, I can host any other files that need a place to live.

Did you know?
Zeluzh is the reflex of Proto-Isles *dzuy dúy, meaning "dust sea".

That's fabulous!

Can we generate some different names for Sumarušuxi? It's such an important place that seems like it ought to go by a few different monikers. What's the Thokyunehota form? Then I think this and "Sumarušuxi" should be borrowed into Fáralo, which will spread it to the other Edastean languages.

[Cedh]

Can we generate some different names for Sumarušuxi? It's such an important place that seems like it ought to go by a few different monikers. What's the Thokyunehota form? Then I think this and "Sumarušuxi" should be borrowed into Fáralo, which will spread it to the other Edastean languages.

Sumarušuxi comes from PI *tzúma dúydziws-i (lit. 'stone-seas'). If I understand the sound changes correctly, I think the Thokyunèhòta reflex of the same phrase should be Thumattuttu [θumaʈuʈu], which would still be a transparent compound.

In Fáralo, the Naxuutayi name would probably come out as Sumarušuy. The Thokyunèhòta version might give something like Sumatutu, Sumačuču or similar. The initial /θ/ might also be borrowed as /t/ due to a supposed connection to tuma 'pirate' (also a loan from Thok.), and the two retroflexes might dissimilate if they're imported as postalveolar affricates. That would give Tumačutu, which I like quite a lot. The association with pirates might then lead to a back-formation Čutu, which could either come to mean 'archipelago', or simply be used as a toponym.

[EDIT]
I propose Tumačutu as the Fáralo name for the pirate area of northwestern Sumarušuxi and the islands off Affalinnei, Sumarušuy as an "official" term for the Isles-speaking Ik'im-Wihe region (i.e. Sumarušuxi proper), and lu-kpoun Čutu 'the Čutu islands' for the Ttiruku arc as a whole.

[the duke of nuke]

All looks good to me.
However, I think the original Thok. name of the islands was Thumapahìthì [θumapahɪθɪ]. Do we want to use that or Thumattuttu, or both?

[dunomapuka]

Both! I want lots of crazy variation here, and "The Isles of Čutu" is just a great name.

[the duke of nuke]

Cool beans! Maybe the Affanons borrow "Thumapahìthì"... I think it might end up as Fumapahise. It would probably also have a nice reflex (if that's the right term here) in Doroh.

[Basilius]

Maybe the Affanons borrow "Thumapahìthì"... I think it might end up as Fumapahise.

I feel terribly sorry for delaying and delaying and delaying the simple task of writing down a sketch of historical phonetics of Affanonic and putting it online...

That is, Thokyunèhòta seems to become silent by -400 YP, and my description of Affanonic was meant to reflect the "classical" condition of ca. -200 YP. The historical phonetics of Affanonic is in fact rather dense...

On a stage immediately preceding the classical one, /s/ was normally realized as [θ], and /f/ as [ɸ]; initial /f/ in "Thumapahìthì" hardly fits this well.

On the other hand, /h/ pronounced as [h] is a relatively recent development, too. The two candidate substitutes for a foreign [h] that first come to mind developed as follows:

Classical /h/: h ← x ← xj (mostly ← şj ...)

Classical /r/: ʀ ← χ ← x (mostly ← ş ...)

That is, a pre-classical form of Affanonic could borrow Thokyunèhòta -h- as either [x] or [χ], the classical reflexes being /h/ and /r/, respectively. However, due to its origin, /h/ is phonotactically forbidden before /i/, so -hi- should be probably rendereed as /ri/.

Word-final -i is perfectly legal in both classical and late preclassical forms of the language (moreover, -iCe is near-impossible in the nominative in native nouns).

So there seem to be little choice but "Sumaparisi".

[EDIT] Th. open {ì} [ɪ] can be in principle rendered as Aff. /e/ (especially in an early borrowing). Then -hì- can be rendered as either /re/ or /he/ (and final -ì as /e/ too, to fit better the vowel harmony which Affanonic used to have).

Also, the initial stress of Th. could sound weird to the Affanons, so they could try to convey this by making the first syllable hevy: Summa-...

That is, one can also toy with variants like Summaparisi, Sum(m)aparese, Sum(m)apahese (all stressed on -pa-, BTW).

[the duke of nuke]

I didn't check the historical sound changes They all sound nice to me, particularly Summaparese. I suppose there'a no real restrictions on which can be used though.

Also, I've just realised that the /j/ > /Z/ sound change in Zele is probably spurious - it was almost cetrainly triggered "finally" by the nominaive suffix -i, which has since been dropped in many words. So *dzuy duy gives Zele, while *dzuy duy-i gives Zeluzh.

[Basilius]

Since information on the Isles languages was formerly lacking, I've made wiki pages for Thokyunèhòta and Naxuutayi with links to Legion's grammar sketches, and a new analysis of the sound changes from PI to Zele.
I've also brought the Zele grammar back online, courtesy of Basilius. Since SRCF at the university provides web hosting, I can host any other files that need a place to live. :D

Did you know?
Zeluzh is the reflex of Proto-Isles *dzuy dúy, meaning "dust sea".

Looked at your CS's for Zele - it's really cool to have them systematized! Cudos!

There seem to be some more changes for vowels, indeed - in VhV sequences and final syllables, I suspect.

Did you use my tentative glosses? I notice a flaw in them: Pl. marker in PI should be -tziws, not -dziws (I made it because Affanonic generalizes the latter form, originally restricted to positions where there was an early voicing of the affricate).

[EDIT]

Also, I've just realised that the /j/ > /Z/ sound change in Zele is probably spurious - it was almost cetrainly triggered "finally" by the nominaive suffix -i, which has since been dropped in many words. So *dzuy duy gives Zele, while *dzuy duy-i gives Zeluzh.

!!!! you're right!

[EDIT-2]

I didn't check the historical sound changes :oops: They all sound nice to me, particularly Summaparese.

No, you couldn't know, I don't have them in readable form :(

Summaparese sounds right :)

[Arzena]

1. Since it's post-classical Lukpanic, the modifier should really come after the noun.

That would make it ''Ãihib'' [ãi.ʃip]. cum grano salis

2. /h/ and /v/ are phonemes in Siŋmeasita Lukpanic, so maybe that's influenced it somehow. (In true late SL it'd be something like Ãiyidzib though.)

The mixing of individuals from around the Lukpanic Coast would have resulted in the mixing of phonemes and other features of different dialects. The name though, Ãihib, reflects the original Kpitamoan dialect of the founders.

[the duke of nuke]

Thanks for pointing out the extra changes. The new version of the SCs, which is probably very close to complete, is up on the wiki. The sequence *VhV is subject to vowel assimilation, and /E O/ are (usually, if not always) lost finally along with /i/. /h/ is also preserved in some environments.
I did indeed use your glosses as a guide. The -tziws / -dziws issue meant I had an incorrect change (dz > ts / !#_ ) listed, which has also been corrected. My other sources were the grammar (thanks!) and Zompist's excellent PI reconstruction.

[Basilius]

Duke: I started a topic about Zele in the Akana Forum, and replied there.

[dunomapuka]

Guys, all this recent work has just been beautiful. I love you all. I sorta want to do an Isles language, but let's hold off on that. I put some stuff up on the Toło (spiritual cousins to the Puoni) recently, and will probably add more later, and some stuff on Lewsfárah.

One problem: I'd like to add some people into the histories, maybe a couple bios - but I can't figure out how Fáralo personal names should work. I don't know whether to make them transparent or what. A lot of them should probably be Faraghin in origin but we don't have much Faraghin vocab available. Maybe you have some thoughts on this, thedukeofnuke?

[dunomapuka]

You should put up lots on Lukpanic, if you have the inclination - given how much interest it has generated. If you like I would be happy to assist in making up vocab.

Forgot to respond to this: Yes. Please do. Not sure what I want to tackle next in Lukpanic. I wasn't planning on doing a full grammar, but, who knows...

[the duke of nuke]

My current notes on names in Woldulaš, copied and pasted verbatim:

Everyone has a given name, which is generally a transparent derivation of a Woltu Falla word. Typically it will be of one element; nobles often have two, but for commoners this is seen as above one’s station. People are also often named after historical figures, or virtues (especially in the case of the strongly religious).

Commoners generally have a patronymic, expressed as <name> aš <father’s name>.
Example: Alo aš Sečas, a woman called Alo whose father is called Sečas.

Nobles belong to a House (üšala) and their name is expressed as Ü <name> aš-üšala <House name>. (Ü is an honorific.)
Example: Ü Gamiga aš-üšala Hesidda, Lord Gamiga of House Hesidda.

In case anyone's wondering, üšala is itself a transparent compound meaning "noble house" or "noble hearth". Aš-üšala is the genitive.

Sietan nasielo Ñareled is supposed to be based on a similar system in the dialect of Mendia. Sietan is my inferred form for "virtuous".

How does all that sound? It's still up in the air at the moment, but it doesn't contradict anything we know at the moment; the names of the Fáralo kings are either transparent Faraghin or Fáralo compounds, or unanalysable.

[Corumayas]

On Thumapahìthì: in Thok. this is a transparent compound of thuma 'stone' (< PI tzúma) + pahìthì 'country' (which seems to be < PI pasay-tziws 'houses', but if so the development looks somewhat irregular). At a slightly earlier period it was /t_humapahi:t_hi:/, so it could also be borrowed in that form. I think this could become Tumapahiti in Fáralo, but if it was more adapted to Fáralo phonotactics it might become Tumapasiti, Tumapasit, or even Tumabazid. (If the /h/ were dropped instead of being borrowed as /s/, you might get things like Tumapeit(i), Tumabeid or Tumapat(i), Tumabad...)

On Fáralo names: most of the classical emperors' names are transparent in Faraghin; Etou, though, looks like it could be an old Ndak name (< NT Ntau or Ntô). I'd guess that these are the two most likely sources of names in the Classical nobility. Of course later personal names could be newly formed.

In both cases, I'd prefer to let zompist make the decision for classical Fáralo; but you're of course free to do things differently in your daughter langs.

(If more Faraghin vocab is needed, I'll make that my next project. In the meantime, there's no reason you can't invent words as you need them... just, if you do, please run them by me, Radius, and/or Cedh first.)

[Corumayas]

Siŋmeasita Lukpanic has been coming along nicely, but I'm stuck on some details of sound changes. The main question that keeps coming up is "do I do what Kpitamoa does, or something different?" Given that one of my goals is to make a realistic "middle" for the dialect continuum, and that the extant Lukpanic dialects already look very different from one another, I don't want to create unnecessary differences; but I'd also like it to be its own dialect.

The biggest question is whether it should share the Kpitamoa change p > f-- the pros and cons of this seem pretty balanced to me (the main con being that, given the outcomes I've decided on for the labiovelars, it results in a really weird distribution of [p]: only before [a] and word-final).

Any opinions?

[Cedh]

Siŋmeasita Lukpanic has been coming along nicely, but I'm stuck on some details of sound changes. The main question that keeps coming up is "do I do what Kpitamoa does, or something different?" Given that one of my goals is to make a realistic "middle" for the dialect continuum, and that the extant Lukpanic dialects already look very different from one another, I don't want to create unnecessary differences; but I'd also like it to be its own dialect.

The biggest question is whether it should share the Kpitamoa change p > f-- the pros and cons of this seem pretty balanced to me (the main con being that, given the outcomes I've decided on for the labiovelars, it results in a really weird distribution of [p]: only before [a] and word-final).

Any opinions?

You could make lenition of /p/ related to stress (e.g. only after a stressed vowel, which would give interesting alternations when you add more suffixes) and/or related to vowel quality (e.g. followed by a high vowel, not including PL /ia ua/ [ea oa]).

Another thing to take into account would be what happens to PL /h/, which gives /f/ in Kpitamoa when followed by a rounded vowel (this is also an active allophonic process in Isho'u 'Ohu, btw) - if Siŋmeasita shares that change, it seems reasonable that more /f/ would emerge from some other source.

[Radius Solis]

In re Zele: Duke, thank you, thank you!

On the minus side, this has pulled me (once again) out of my Jamna work, which is not necessarily good because I get derailed so easily and Jamna Kopiai really has been coming along nicely - I've mainly been lexicon-building lately, but I've still got all kinds of grammatical details in my head waiting patiently in line to get described...

On the plus side: Isles languages woo! I have spent the last few days' free time constructing an SC list intended to give Zele a sister language that's a phonological cross between Zele and Yawurenyi. (!!!) Having trouble finding enough plausible sources for the right kinds of clusters without breaking a realistic relationship with Zele, so that's taking time, but even if I do nothing more with them I'll at least stick the sound changes up on my userpage when they're done. On that note I should probably move Kozzang Fasa's there too because that's not going to go further in the near future and might need to be entirely written out of the script. What can I say, I'm really good at ideas and starting cool new projects, but a lot less good at bringing finished products to the table.

Further, I am again reconsidering placing Jamna anywhere in Xshalad, mainly because it's such a nice linguistic fit with Isles-language neighbors, especially this Zwirwi (= cognate of Zele) and Zele itself. There's quite a lot of potential typological matchup.