Re: Aelya Phonology

Nik Taylor wrote:
>
> Aidan Grey wrote:
> > fric            f/v     th/dh   s       sh      h       ch
>
> Any particular reason why there's no voiced equivalents of "s", "sh",
> "h", or "ch"?
>
    well, Old Irish didn't have z or zh, so it didn't make it into
aelya. When it would show up (as in a compund), it became r:
        i.e. s+d > zd > rd
    gh (voiced equivalent of ch) merged early with [j]. And the voiced
equivalent of h was just lost altogether.




> > As in English, these
> > consonants are all aspirated, except when geminated.
>
> Are they actually geminated?  It doesn't appear so from your examples,
> you wrote [pata], not [pat:a] for patta.
>
        you're right - it should be [pat:a] - or even [pat.ta].


> Also, can long vowels exist in closed syllables?
>
        yes - but they're usually monosyllabic. At least, I think so. I'll have
to dive into the dictionary i have so far (not very big).

> Given your examples, it seems that the geminates are not phonemic, only > an
> orthographic convenience, and that with [patha]/[pa:ta], the
> distinction is conditioned by the preceding vowel's length.
>
        since you caught my goof the above is not correct. the difference
again, to clarify:

        pata (long vowel, no gem.) [pa:tha]
        patta (sht V, gem.) [patta]


        Thanks for pointing this out!! I'l be fixing that tonight for sure.

        Aidan