Re: Hellenic Romance? (was [CONLANG] Re: Babel text in Spanzhol)

On Wed, 07 Apr 2004 19:51:56 -0400, ROGER MILLS <rfmilly@...> wrote:

> Ray-- you seem to have assumed (unless I mis-read) that W.Europe would
> still
> have used Latin, but with Graecified sound changes....?  My
> interpretation
> of Paul's question was: That the languages of present day W.Eur. would be
> descended from Greek rather than Latin (though maybe some Latin-derived
> vernaculars might have survived in dark corners, like Dacia, Rhaetia).
> Consequently we might not be talking about _lenguas románicas/langues
> romaines...etc._ but _glossa rumaika_  (I'm making up endings here, as I
> know poco Greek)-- or however those two words might have developed in
> various areas ("glosa rumiega, glosse roumèche"??.)
>
> I guess what would have happened is: Greek with Celto-Germano sound
> changes
> in Gaul, Vasco-Ibero changes in Hispania, Britannic changes etc etc.
I think the point Ray was making (and a bloody good point it was, too, and
one which I admittedly had failed to consider) was "What happens in those
cases where Greek has phonemes not present in Latin?"

Also, some of the sound change rules in Romance require changing phonemes
into slots already occupied by Greek phonemes (AIII), which produces a
whole extra set of challenges. A chain shift such as /g/ > /k/ > /x/ might
end up with an overabundance of /x/'s, or might end up with /x/ > /h/ or
something tacked onto the end of it.






Paul

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