Re: Fave Conlangs WAS: Silindion

Christian Thalmann wrote:
>--- In conlang@y..., Andreas Johansson <and_yo@H...> wrote:
> > Raymond Brown wrote:
> > >At 12:11 am +0100 23/3/02, Christian Thalmann wrote:
> > > >That's a very interesting but tough question...
> > > >
> > > >- Quenya certainly ranks highest on my list.  Tolkien tried hard to
> > > >make it as beautiful as possible, and apart from the inexplicable
> > > >omission of /Z/ he succeeded exceedingly well.
> > >
> > >Nothing inexplicable - Tolkien kept ugly sounds like /Z/ for things
>like
> > >Sauron's 'Black Tongue'   :)
> >
> > Actually, /Z/ seems to be unattested in Tolkien's created languages - it
> > doesn't even pop up in Black Speech or Valarin*, despite that the few
>words
> > we know are quite rich in /s z S/. It seems that Tolkien' really
>despised
> > /Z/.
>
>Quite a rash and unfounded deduction IMHO.  Do you happen to be a
>theologist, or a politician?  ;-)
I disagree with the implication that theologist are more-than-averagely
prone to rash and unfounded deductions, but no, I'm neither.

>/Z/ apparently doesn't occur (at least not natively) in the languages
>Tolkien mainly used for inspiration (Latin, Finnish, Old English,
>Welsh (?), German).  His omission of /Z/ is probably not any more
>significant than the absence of retroflexes, voiceless nasals,
>or clicks.
But it does occur several languages he did know, and I rather suspect that
it's alot more common across the world than are retroflexes*, voiceless
nasals or clicks. And both the Valarin and Black Speech inventories would
looks neater and more regular with a /Z/ thrown in, whereas you'd need to
add a whole new series to fit in either of your suggestions and maintain
neatness. It may also be noted that /S/ seems to be restricted to the
non-Elvish languages.

* Indeed, there's no reason he couldn't've disliked retroflexes - several
people on this list seems to do.

> > Neither does he seem to've liked /G/, which swiftly disappears
> > everytime it turns up in the Elvish languages, but persists in Black
> > Speech.
>
>This, on the other hand, is a clear case.
This is what I call a rash deduction! :-)

Seriously, it's a well-founded suspicion, but we can't know.

>Also, I do think he disliked /2/, since it would have occurred in
>Sindarin's umlauting system, but got merged into /y/ and /e/.
Tend to agree.

                                              Andreas

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