Re: Holic and other languages

Ian Spackman sikyal:

Sorry for the late reply, but I've been busy. I was fascinated by this
post, though, and I'm excited to see another conlanger with my love for
historical linguistics. Proto-language reconstruction is my absolute
favorite part of conlanging.

> syllable structure CVC (from CVCV, historically); most names have two
> syllables.
>
> Phonemic inventory
> p  t  tj  k        i     u
> b  d  dj  g        e     o
> f  s  sj  x  h        a
> v  z  zj  q
> m  n  nj  c
>     l  lj
>     r
>        y   w
>
> (Incidentally, I have since had objections that using q for the voiced
> velar fricative and c for the velar nasal is just too weird.  Other
> proposals have been to use sx zx nx or sq zq nq for x q c.  I'd vaguely
> like to hear opinions on the matter.)
The obvious choices, as Andreas said, are |gh| and |ng|. Or you can use
the Teonaht Way and write |hg| and |gn|. Or the Greek way and write |gg|
for /N/. Thinking about some sample words, I think my preferred aesthetic
solution would be |hg| for /G/ and |ng| for /N/. Ngoldo, prahga, hgasju.
Mmmmmm. I especially like that last one as ['Gas`u]

> proto-Oigulao-Holic (PrOH)
>
> I don't know yet where this language was spoken exactly; it's probably off
> my map. :)  Or it may be that the ancestral home is indeed the Hol Valley
> itself; certain the inhabitants have no stories of ever having lived
> elsewhere.
This is not dissimilar from my experience with locating the ancestral home
of Proto-Yivrian. Internal evidence (lack of roots for snow or ocean)
suggests a location in the interior of the warm northern continent (the
Yivrindi live south of the equator, so North = Hot). Fortuitously, the
earliest Yivrian legend involves the tale of a disaster and subsequent
migration, so this seems likely.

Have you put internal criteria to the test to find the site of PrOH? E.g.
what vocabulary items are present or conspicuously missing, how old is the
name of the valley, etc.

> Now, I had always imagined that Oigulaoan(?) had a CV syllable structure,
> and the CVC of modern Holic I had always imagined to have been from CVCV
> historically, so I was quite surprised to "discover" that PrOH had CCVC,
I love it when I discover previously unknown facts about my languages.

> different stress pattern - the accent fell on the class inflection.  (I
> think this was originally a marked form, perhaps used when the adjective
> and noun were in the reverse of the usual order, and then got generalised,
> but I haven't really touched syntax yet.)
Proto-syntax is such a difficult problem, even in the real world. I intend
to leave the syntax of PY alone for quite some time.

> The feminine noun class is reinterpreted as neutral class (with a certain
> ending on the root); and the non-human plural is reinterpreted as
> neutral/feminine.  At some later stage, when the deverbal class begin to
> take plurals, they happen to take the human (now masculine) plural.
This is a rather peculiar set of changes--what motivated them? Do you
know?

> At the end of the period an event of great significance occurred: the gods
> turned up in person and took up residence in a city southwest of the mouth
> of the Hol.
?????? That is an even of great significance, all right. Are these
actually the gods, or is there a rationalist explanation. (Not that there
is any problem with the gods. They've impacted the Yivrian world as well.)

> (1) the retroflex series which had resulted from cluster reduction became a
> palatal series (most likely the gods substituted palatals for retroflex
> consonants they found difficult, and then were imitated);
What an amusing explanation! One doesn't often think of gods having
trouble pronouncing things.

> etymologically a monosyllabic noun that retains its cases).  (Hm, but as I
> write this I recall that I had previously intended to distinguish inherent
> and accidental possessives in this language; that means I'll either have to
> forget that idea or rethink the case system. :(  )
Analogy often works wonders. I'm no stranger to the fact of losing an
interesting grammatical or vocabulary quirk to the ravages of history.

I found your entire history quite interesting, and very impressive. Keep
up the good work! Please do come back with more historical explanations
and questions.

Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/blog

Jesus asked them, "Who do you say that I am?"

And they answered, "You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground
of our being, the kerygma in which we find the ultimate meaning of our
interpersonal relationship."

And Jesus said, "What?"

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