Re: Austronesian style Latin...

On 5/7/07, Benct Philip Jonsson <conlang@...> wrote:

> In short I *would* expect stressed e o from Latin short
> i(/long e: and short u(/long o: to become ej ow, and then
> perhaps aj oj (e.g. Yiddish had an ou > oj change), but I
> would expect E O from short e( o( to become something along
> the lines of je/ja/ie/ia/ije/ija
> wo/we/wa/uo/ue/ua/uwo/uwe/uwa -- whatever fits your
> language best.
>
Hmm, things to think about. That does open up other possibilities,
sych as palatalization of /s/, if for instance, /ja/ is chosen: SERRA
> syara /Sja4a/. Incudentally I did go in a similar direction with
Montreiano with /ja/ and /wa/ (I still vacilate like crazy over what
sound I want there).

> It is a bit strange that Romance /e:/ and /o:/ as opposed to
> /E:/ and /O:/ diphthongize so uncommonly in Romance outside
> Gaul, but it may definitely be different in your lang, and
> that is the likely source if you want aj/ej/oj. Given your
> developments of consonant + l it isn't exactly the case that
> you dislike je etc. It might even be the other way around
> from Spanish in your lang, i.e. e: o: > ej oj but E: O:
> don't diphthongize!
In other words, to preserve ej and oj, the best route would to derive
them from e: and o:, but turn E: and O: into monopthongs?


>
> One would expect prefixes to get lost to reduce word
> lengths. Imagine all those cases where CON- and IN- + velar
> may give you gratis initial ng! :-)
Hmmm, now that's interesting. I hadn't thought of that. Initial /N/ is
very Malayo-polynesian!

> Beware! Languages usually don't skip sound changes in
> certain words to avoid homonymy. They resolve homonymy by
> whatever word-building resources they have, or borrowing,
> once it has already occurred. This is IMNSHO *very*
> important to realize in order to get realism in
> althistorical conlanging. Most cases of what Romanicists
> thaught was abeyance of sound change to avoid homonymy
> actually are better explainable as reborrowing from Latin,
> or borrowing from other Romance varieties with different
> regular sound changes.
>
You know, you're right, and I think while I wasn't intending to go for
total realism, I think it would annoy me not to do so anyway. Besides,
there are opportunities to snag alternatives from other
Malayo-Polynesian words.


>  If I don't like the effect of a sound change in certain words then I
> rather alter the sound change as a whole, in all words where
> it applies, come hell or high water. If I can't decide
> between two alternative sound changes I usually go for a
> dialect split, with the possibility that the dialects later
> borrow forms from each other (subject to any later changes
> in the borrowing dialect, of course! :-) Wonderful forms
> which you otherwise hadn't imagined appear before your eyes
> this way...
I've done that with other conlangs, which explains my frequent
switching back and forth sometimes. I've even had a few interesting
results.

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