Tanar

[Zju]

No, Janko, I haven't got the numbers yet.

This is my second more-than-a-sketch conlang, not counting one relay, that is. Here's hoping it'll turn out into something usable, unlike the first one.

· Phonology

·· Phoneme inventory

/a ɔ u ɛ i/ <a o u e i>
/p t t͡ł k/ <p t c k>
/f s ł/ <f s l>
/v z ɮ/ <v z x>
/m n ɾ/ <m n r>
/(h) (ʔ)/ - marginally phonemic distinction, not represented orthographically
Orthography is phonemic, i.e. it doesn't reflect any of the allophonic processes.

·· Syllable structure: (C)V(C)

Consonant clusters do not occur word initially or finally. Word medially only VCV and VCCV occur and in the latter case syllabification is always VC.CV - syllable codas and onsets are strictly of one or zero consonants. Onsetless syllables are realised with an epenthetic [ʔ] word medially and epenthetic [h] word initially. A handful of lexical items, however, have epenthetic [ʔ] word initially, making this distinction marginally phonemic.

·· Phonotactics

Things in this section are not set in stone, but are mostly certain:
-There are no geminate consonants; two same consonants never occur next to each other.
-The second syllable, if present, has to have an onset.
-Voiced fricatives do not occur word finally and only four clusters containing them occur, all containing only members of this class: /vz zv vɮ ɮv/.
-Likewise stops, voiceless fricatives and nasals form clusters only with members of their own class. /ɾ/ makes an exception, being able to combine freely with almost all other consonants, both as first and second member.
-There may be some exceptions to the above coöcurrence rules at morpheme boundaries.

·· Stress

Stress is fixed on the second syllable and is not marked in orthography; monosyllabic words are unstressed.

·· Allophony

This is going to be a long ride, so tighten your seatbelts.
Order matters a lot.

1. /a/ realisation:
/a/ is realised as [ä], except after [ʔ] and [h], when it's [ɑ].

2. /ɾ/ realisation:
/ɾ/ has two allophones: [ɾ] and [l]. It is always realised as [ɾ] when in syllable coda and always as [l] when word initial. In all other cases it dissimilates with the previous instance of /ɾ/ in the word. If the first instance of /ɾ/ is in syllable onset, but not word initial, it's realised as [l]. [ɾl] does not occur, as that would be a geminated phoneme. Exempli gratia: /ɾanɔɾ/ [lä'nɔɾ], /pɔɾatɾɛɾ/ [pɔ'lätɾɛɾ], /sɛɾtaɾɔɾ/ [sɛɾ'tälɔɾ].

3. Affricatisation:
/t k/ are realised as [t͡s t͡ʃ] in front of /ɛ i/: /tikɛ/ [t͡si't͡ʃɛ], /tɛnaɾ/ [t͡sɛ'näɾ]. /tu/ is realised as [t͡ʃu] in the second and third syllable, mostly so in the first syllable, but less consistently in syllables further from the stress: /tuɾi/ [t͡ʃu'li] or [tu'li], /kɔtu/ [kɔ't͡ʃu], /ɾiɾimɔntu/ [li'ɾimɔntu] or [li'ɾimɔnt͡ʃu]. A closed syllable makes this realisation more likely: /ɾiɾimɔntun/ [li'ɾimɔnt͡ʃun]. /tɔ/ and /su/ may be realised as [t͡ʃɔ] and [ʃu] in a closed second syllable, especially if it results in a dissimilation: /pɔsunmɔ/ [pɔ'sunmɔ] or [pɔ'ʃunmɔ]. /tɔ/ may also be realised as [t͡ʃɔ] in a word-final second syllable: /katɔ/ [kä't͡ʃɔ].

4. Intervocalic lenition:
/p t t͡ł k/ are realised as [b d d͡ɮ x] when:
-not in the onset of the second syllable and are lone between two vowels: /kuputa/ [ku'pudä], /ɾɔɾipa/ [lɔ'ɾibä], /łisizat͡ła/ [łi'sizäd͡ɮä].
-in the onset of the second syllable, are lone between two vowels, and the second syllable is closed: /tɔpun/ [tɔ'bun], /ɾikak/ [li'xäk].
[t͡s t͡ʃ] resulting from affricatisation are voiced correspondingly. /k/ lenites to [g] instead of [x] when:
-is between /a/ /a/: /tupaka/ [t͡ʃu'pägä].
-is between /ɔ/ /a/ and in the second syllable: /tɔkan/ [tɔ'gän].
-is between /a/ /ɔ/ and in the third syllable: /t͡łusakɔm/ [t͡łu'sägɔm].

5. A - a reduction:
When the first and second vowels of a words are /a/, the first one of them gets reduced to [ɛ]: /tanaɾ/ [tɛ'näɾ].

6. Further a - a reduction:
When there are two consecutive /a/ phonemes elsewhere in the word, i.e. they are not in the first and second syllable respectively, and the second one does not happen to be word final, the second one gets reduced to [ɛ]: /tapaɾan/ [tɛ'päɾɛn], /fɔsilamanɔ/ [fɔ'silämɛnɔ], but /tapaɾa/ [tɛ'päɾä], /fɔsilama/ [fɔ'silämä].

7. Onset filling and rhinoglottophilia:
When a syllable lacks onset, a glottal consonant is inserted to prevet hiatus. That glottal consonant is [ʔ] word medially and [h] word initially, but a handful of words have [ʔ] word initially instead. The glottal consonant then causes rhinoglottophilia, nasalising the vowel: /ipu/ [hĩ'pu], /a/ [ʔɑ̃], /atɔ/ [ʔɑ̃'tɔ], /tikaapɔ/ [t͡si'käʔɛ̃bɔ], /a/ [hɑ̃]. Onsetless syllables with /i/ and /u/ in the nucleus are rare, with /ɛ/ and /ɔ/ moderate in count, but with /a/ are by far the most abundant. Word-medially almost only /a/ occurs as nucleus of onsetless syllables. Still, onsetless syllables are relatively rare.

· Morphology

It's somewhere between fusional and agglutinative, with rich derivational and moderate inflectional morphology. I got a few dozens of words, but no almost affixes yet. One of them is -ri, adjective to noun, meaning something built out of that material.

Anyway, some color words:

taron - white
tumu - black
lamo - light gray; light (color modifier only)
lalamo - dull, smudged
kixar - dark gray; dark
kikixar - dirty
rimo - yellow
lalamorimo - dull light beigish or yellowish color; sand color
rime - more intense, bright yellow
lemi - orange
lelemi - copper(ish)
kaxar - beige
kakaxar - brown
lanar - light blue
lalamolanar - greenish blue, bluish green
razon - dark blue
rarazon - deep blue, violetish blue
rena - green
lalamorena - yellowish green, greenish yellow
rerena - deep green, dark green
riri - red
ririri - dark red, brown, rust color
riro - reddish violet
riran - bluish violet

Yeah, I kinda realise I broke a universal by having so many basic color terms, but I couldn't help it. Even more that there is no word for pink, which would be lamo riri.
I'm intending to create most (all?) roots based on sound symbolism, visual onomatopoeia, whatever you call it.

· Bits of grammar

pa- interrogative root

personal pronouns

Code: Select all

   SG PL
1. na ta
2. ra me
3. a  kaa

subject verbal prefixes

Code: Select all

   SG  PL
1. ni- ti-
2. ri- me-
3. i-  kai- / ki-

[Chengjiang]

The sound system and syllable structure are interesting. It reminds me of Inuktitut.

I'm not aware of any language that has regular second-syllable stress, but it's certainly distinctive.

The affrication of /t/ to [t͡ʃ] before /u/ is pretty unusual. More so that it happens inconsistently as you get farther from the stress. Also the circumstances in which /k/ lenites to [g] versus [x]. Did anything inspire these?

[Vijay]

I'm not aware of any language that has regular second-syllable stress, but it's certainly distinctive.

I think Standard Basque (euskara batua) is supposed to have this. (In practice, though, it really isn't that simple).

[Zju]

The sound system and syllable structure are interesting. It reminds me of Inuktitut.

Yeah, bit of inspiration from Inuktitut present here.

I'm not aware of any language that has regular second-syllable stress, but it's certainly distinctive.

I don't know any either, but since stress can be fixed on the penultimate or first syllable, I figured out stress being fixed on the second syllable is not that outlandish.

The affrication of /t/ to [t͡ʃ] before /u/ is pretty unusual. More so that it happens inconsistently as you get farther from the stress. Also the circumstances in which /k/ lenites to [g] versus [x]. Did anything inspire these?

On the former, it's based on acoustic similarity, think of RUKI. I guess it comes with a bit of retroflexion. As for the later, even though I'm creating this outside of any conworld, culture and context so I can have whatever words I want in it, I'd imagine g > ɣ > x / ! a_a & / ! a[+stress]_o & / ! o_a[+stress] is a reasonable way to explain it. But again, it's more based on acoustic similarity and gut feelings.

I'm not aware of any language that has regular second-syllable stress, but it's certainly distinctive.

I think Standard Basque (euskara batua) is supposed to have this. (In practice, though, it really isn't that simple).

There's a plethora of different accent systems and prosodies in various Basque dialects; the one of standard Basque is just recommended and IIRC it's main stress on ultimate, secondary stress on second syllable, the latter only in longer words.

[Vijay]

There's a plethora of different accent systems and prosodies in various Basque dialects; the one of standard Basque is just recommended

That's pretty much why I said it isn't that simple.

and IIRC it's main stress on ultimate, secondary stress on second syllable, the latter only in longer words.

That doesn't sound right to me at all, but who knows, maybe I have a bad memory or have been getting unreliable information on that. Maybe I should look for some actual sources on the topic and check.