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Re: Sohlob writing

From:Benct Philip Jonsson <bpj@...>
Date:Saturday, January 29, 2005, 19:50
I wrote:
> I have uploaded a tentative image of Sohlob writing: > > <http://www.melroch.se/conlang/sohlob/sohlobwri.gif> > > Perhaps it is too somilar to Hebrew for its own good, > especially since it runs right-to-left! > -- > > /BP 8^)> > -- > Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se > > Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant! > (Tacitus) > >
I have uploaded a much refined version (in PDF format): <http://www.melroch.se/conlang/sohlob/sohlobalph.pdf> <conculture> The Kejeb syllabary, which was used to write Ancient Sohlob, didn't mark the phonologically relevant distinctions of voicing, fricative vs. stop, and palatalization, so that a reader had to use context clues to determine how to pronounce a syllable sign like |pat|, where the initial could be read as any of */p b f w/ or their palatalized counterparts, and the final could be either /t/ or /s/. That this system was perceived as cumbersome already in the Kejeb period is shown by spellings like |pat-ti| for /pasi/, in spite of the fact that the only possible traditional reading for |t-t| was /st/. By the time alphabetic writing was introduced there were signs for the new distinctive vowels /i\/ (_e_) and /Q/ (_o_) and for the fricatives /f x h/, but there was still no indication of the voiced/voiceless distinction, nor were there any separate signs for the new alvopalatal phonemes, nor any distinction between the liquids /r/ and /l/. In time these deficiencies were met by a variety of digraphs and the use of a diacritic point. In this way some sounds even acquired two graphemes each. </conculture> I'm not really happy with the visual effect of doubling, so I gave up that idea. I also discovered that I had forgotten to design a grapheme for /m/!, so I created a new |r| grapheme and assigned the old |r| grapheme to |m|. -- /BP 8^)> -- Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant! (Tacitus)