Re: milimpulaktasin

From: "daniel andreasson" <daniel.andreasson@...>
> Ha! I've been toying with using the Aramaic alphabet for
> Nakiltipkaspimak just this evening. (Why oh why? I should
> be studying for my exam on Friday). I had some troubles with
> the vowels. I didn't like having them as dots above and below
> the letters so now [a] is written with the original letter
> "Ain", [u] is [q] and [i] is [S]! It looks much better though.
> And if the Greeks did it, then I don't see any problem with me
> doing it. ;)
I read on another mailing list [it *may* have been another, but it could just as
easily have been this one] that it's possible the Greeks didn't intend to
'innovate' the vowels in borrowing the Semitic alphabet, but that they merely
didn't hear the glottal consonants that begin their names.

[ObConlang: Apparently the Hadwan speakers did, however, as the irrelevant
Semitic consonants were simply dropped and there are no 'native' vowel signs to
the alphabet--contact with the Greeks caused the Hellenic vowel letters to be
borrowed for this.  It isn't particularly known how vowelless written Hadwan was
handled, as no documents from that period survive.  Even the relatively early
'name-literacy' law (everyone must at least know how to write their own name)
comes afterwards.]

     *Muke!