Re: Question about word-initial velar nasal

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Tim May <butsuri@M...> wrote:
Danny Wier wrote at 2004-10-21 14:27:39 (-0500)
 > This is a natlang/histlang/theory question, the answer of which may
 > affect the development of my conlang.
 >
 > I've noticed that a lot of languages that have /N/ in their
 > inventories do not allow it word-initially.

>>Incidentally, what languages _do_ allow /N/ initally?  Offhand, I
>>can only think of Vietnamese and Tibetan, and it's a tricky thing
>>to look up.

Swahili has an initial /N/: ng'ombe = cow.

The apostrophe is used to distinguish this single phoneme from the
two phonemes in "finger,": /NJ\/,  nguruwe = pig.

Charlie