Re: Morae (was: Re: Lurkers, poetic forms)

On Wed, 26 Apr 2000 04:45:29 +0100, Raymond Brown <ray.brown@...>
wrote:

>Allen is correct IMHO to censure the use of 'long' & 'short' to apply both
>to vowel length and to syllabic weight.  This usage has certainly caused
>much misunderstanding and confusion in the past.  His use of _length_
>(long/short) to apply only to vowels, and _weight_ (heavy/light) to apply
>to syllables is a welcome and a long-overdue reform in terminology.  (As
>Allen observes, ancient Hindu phoneticians were well aware of this
>distinction centuries ago.)
I can see the point. I've used "long" and "short" to describe syllables in
Tirelat, but perhaps "heavy" and "light" would be better. It might still be
confusing, since a "short" (or "light") syllable can end in a voiceless
consonant, unlike Greek or Latin.

Hmm.... I just got an idea that might end up changing Tirelat phonology yet
again. Break up diphthongs into separate syllables, then add the glottal
stop as a phoneme and define "light" syllables as ending in a voiceless
consonant. It might work.

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