Re: Germanic YANC alert!

yl-ruil writ:

> Since the only other Germanic Conlang on the list is Jameld AFAIK, I =
> want to ask the estimable Mr Campbell a few questions:
Feel free. Oh, you have.

> What does "t~s" mean, and where do you derive it from?
It's the highly unattractive ASCII version of the Jameld letter Aut~s, which
is written as a ts ligature, the tops of the t and s being joined by a
curved bar. It's pronounced /S/, and occurs where German and Dutch would
have _sch_, normally. See it accurately represented, along with lots of
other blithery, in the PDF of my last newsletter, The Jameld Line. Exact URL
escapes me, but go to www.zolid.com/zm and follow the Jameld Line link.
Sorry if you hate PDFs, but they're great for font embedding.

> Do you have anything digital on Jameld grammar you would let us look at, =
> please?
Working on that... Yes, I'm aware that there's precious little on the
website, it's on my list of Things To Do this year, but I'm currently moving
house and attempting to finish the long-gestated Jameld Dictionary (Third
Edition), so the website's been slightly neglected.

The Jameld grammar is very simple, as at the time I wanted to get rid of all
the complexity that, as a 12-year-old, I disliked in French and German (and
which I now love, as a conlanger). So, in the dominant Üstzur dialect
anyway, there are no case endings, no grammatical gender, no agreement in
number, and there's only one verb conjugation and it's the same for all
persons and numbers (it was all there in Old Jameld, but was simplified out,
as in English). Jameld's really about vocab, with a simple grammar. To begin
with, it was pretty close to being a relex, but after 18 years I've
gradually given it its own flavour and made it less Englishy. I don't even
like some of the verb endings, but I feel rather stuck with them.

If you want detail, please say and I'll dig out some stuff and post it here.

> What do the umlaut on the letters mean?
Um, ä ö ü as in "standard" German (if it exists), ë is /i:/ and ï is /aI/
(cf. German _ie_/_ei_). And é is as in French.

> Actually, would it be possible to have a quick Jameld pronunciation =
> lesson, please?
Ooh. Give me a day or so. I have Word files I can repurpose and hack about
with pronunciation and grammar.

James

> -----------------------------
> I chirikleski kul chi perel duvar pe yek than
>
> The droppings of the flying bird never fall twice on the same spot
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------=
:)

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james@zolid.com  James Campbell  Zeugma--Our Life Is Design  www.zolid.com
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