Inflexions (was: Greenberg's universals for SVO languages & Caos Pidgin ruff-sketch)

At 8:08 am -0400 9/9/00, H. S. Teoh wrote:
[....]
>(English inflection is residual and not very complex at all, so it doesn't
>help me much in thinking about inflection when conlanging;  and the only
>other inflected language I know is classical Greek which isn't even spoken
>today :-P)
But modern Greek is.  And, altho it doesn't have all the inflexions of the
ancient language, it still has plenty enough to give the full flavor of an
inflected language.  It shouldn't be too difficult to upgrade (or
'downgrade' in the view of some - not a view I share) from the Classical
language to the modern one - at least if you stick to the written form  ;)

If it is verb inflexions that you want, any of the Romance languages will
do splendidly. Spanish also has the advantage of being widely spoken, being
the official languages of some twenty or so nations IIRC.

Ray.

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A mind which thinks at its own expense
will always interfere with language.
                   [J.G. Hamann 1760]
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