Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: First thoughts on Prevli or Pervil

From:Jörg Rhiemeier <joerg_rhiemeier@...>
Date:Friday, September 9, 2005, 16:13
Hallo!

Roger Mills wrote:

> Prevli ~Pervil is the language of the "primitive" Lang-lang people who live > in the mountainous interior of Yanatros, the large island where my dialect > of Kash is spoken. They are also "feline" descended, but of mysterious > origin-- a different species from the Kash, and cannot interbreed. Where the > Kash are mostly black-furred, the L-L are mostly tawny, but stripes, spots, > and black-white combos occur. The Kash find them quite exotic. > > Subject to change without notice... > > Numbers: 0 duN (which probably means 'nothing') > 1 nak, 2 lat, 3 tan, 4 sar, 5 pan, 6 pnak, 7 plat, 8 ptan, 9 psar > 10 naknó, 11 nonák, 12 nolát... 20 latnó, 30 tannó... 100 sasta > Ordinals add am- (before C) ~ ma- (before CC) > > Personal pronouns: > 1st sg. kan ~gna > 2nd sg. mil ~bli > 3rd sg. --- or zok ~sko ("z" is probably /dz/, phonology not yet totally > figured out...) > 1pl. kant ~kanta > 2pl. milt ~miltä > 3pl. zet ~zeta
Which factor conditions these alternations?
> Reflexive pronouns: (basically reduplications) kanka, milmi, osko, kantak, > miltim, este > > Subject+Object pronoun forms: > 1sg+2sg kòum, 1s+3s kaska, 1s+1p kakant, 1s+2p kämilt, 1s+3p kazent > > 2s+1s mek, 2s+3s mez, 2s+1p milkänt, 2s+3p mezent (no 2s+2p) > > 3s+1s zehak, 3s+2s zehim, 3s+3s zehen or hen(?) (non-reflex.), > 3s+1p zehat, 3s+2p zehimti, 3s+3p zehent or hent ("h" is probably /x/ or an > allophone of /k/) > > 1p+2s mikänt, 1p+3s eskant, 1p+2p imlitkän, 1p+3p zeknat (no 1P+1s) > > 2p+1s imlikna, 2p+3s imlitse, 2p+1p miltikän, 2p+3p miltent (no 2p+2s) > > 3p+1s zetan, 3p+2s zetel, 3p+3s zeten~zetne, 3p+1p estant > 3p+2p estim, 3p+3p zetant (non-reflex.)
Nice! One can still see where these forms come from, though the image appears to be somewhat blurred by sound changes. This looks very realistic.
> I don't think these will be any more taxing to the Lang-lang brain than > Basque aux. forms :-))))) > > There is some vowel harmony going on, possibly fossilized, I'm not sure > yet...The original thought was that every base must contain either all high > vowels (i,u) or all low vowels (e,o,a), all front (i,e,&=ä) or all back > (u,o,O=ò). (/a/ can be either front or back). But this seems to lead to > considerable homophony... Morphophonemics are not yet figured out yet > either; quite likely a form like /pnak/ '6' will be pronounced either [fna?] > or perhaps [mpa?]. The plural morpheme is -t(a), d/r alternate > allophonically-- that's about all I know so far. > > Prevli ~Pervil is from *pede 'tongue' + *wili 'word'. > > I think the underlying form of most words is CVCVCV(CV), where alternate V > may be deleted under so far unspecified circumstances. > > Comments?
Looks promising! Greetings, Jörg.

Reply

Ph.D. <phil@...>