Re: Conlanging with constraints

2008/2/17, Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhiemeier@...>:

> I am working more freely in my Albic languages, but even
> there, I have set myself similar constraints. The
> individual Albic languages are linked to each other by a
> system of regular sound changes, so as soon as I determine
> the shape of a word in one of them, the shapes of its
> cognates in the other Albic languages fall out from those
> rules automatically. Of course, a cognate may have been
> lost and replaced by a word of different origin in a
> particular language, or its meaning may shift, but most of
> the words are determined by the interplay of the Proto-
> Albic word form with the sound changes of the various
> Albic languages.
>
Of course the same applies mutatis_mutandis to my historical
conlanging as well, whether it be the internal relations
between the different languages of the a-priori Sohlob
language family or the way my different a-posteriori
languages and bastard languages relate to their source
language(s). Since sound changes are in principle
exceptionless that constitutes a constraint. I only take
that so much for granted that I don't think of it.

If I for some reason would like to 'cheat' and introduce a
word or form which doesn't conform I have to assume
borrowing from a cognate dialect or language ('dialang' in
my termoinology) -- or a different noncognate language --,
and so that dialect or language is automatically created,
however rudimentary elaborated (at first).

Another situation where a new 'dialang' will spawn is
typically when I can't decide between two potential
developments: then there will be one cognate 'dialang' with
the one development and one with the other. While this kind
of multiplication of 'dialangs' is potentially infinite
(like alternate timelines!) in practice I often find that
different potential changes fit different existing
'dialangs' and so are added to them. Unfortunately such
'rule additions' tend to reverberate throughout already
generated vocabulary, rendering already written texts and
descriptions more or less outdated. Thus another constraint
-- not to multiply such retroactive changes -- is added.

--
/ BP