Re: Padraic's numbers (fi: JG's list of conlangs)

--- Jan van Steenbergen <ijzeren_jan@...>
wrote:
>  --- Padraic skrzypszy:
>
> > Did you get the Giants' numerary? The
> > peculiar way the Giants of Kemrese legend
> > count. When they
> > can count at all. If not, it's: [...]
>
> Interesting. No, never seen it before. Who are
> these Giants of Kemrese legend?
You know. Gog Magog and his ilk. Them as put up
the standing stones, rings and menhirs.

> I don't think I have ever read about them.
Big blokes. They were driven away long ago.
Tolkien wrote about them, when they still lived
in the vicinity of the little kingdoms...

> How come they speak a descendant of Old English
> (or perhaps Old Frisian?)
> |x| is pronounced [x], I presume?
[ks]. Just like English! :)

> > Ah - well, Talarian has two sets of numbers,
> > a usual base twelve and a mathematical base
> > ten.
> > The mathematical numbers are Sanskrit in
> > origin;
>
> Ha! No, I've never seen these before either,
> otherwise I would surely have
> remembered. Be sure I'm not disappointed!
:)

> I'm curious about the pronunciation, though,
> especially in cases like |ww|, |ç| and |çç|.
[uw] and [S] respectively. There's some funky
sound shifts going on under those forms. ç is
derived from "tw", "dw", "dwh", "sw" (native or
v. ancient borrowings); çç comes from "sk",
"skw". Modern borrowings from "sw" yield çw.

> Why do I always get such a "Hittite feeling"
> when I look at Talarian?
Cos Talarian occupies the middle ground between
Aryan and Anatolian? :) Their ancestors were
southwestern Punt, living south of the ancient
city of Ibizond, like the proto-Hitites, living
around the ancient Inland Sea, before it flooded
out. [The northwestern and northern Punt give us
the Hellenic-Italic-Celtic-Germanic and
Indo-Persian Aryans respectively.]

> > the usual numbers derive from some adstrate
> > language or other. I don't know what one,
> > though,
> > and there are no traces of IE roots at all in
> > this number set.
>
> That's clear. In other words: this set is a
> priori?
They got the numbers from some other language.
There's not enough weird consonant clusters for
it to be one of the Oritanian languages (like
Anian, which favours clusters like "hhcs", "ctl"
and "ccrc". Mind you, H and R are syllabic, so it
is in fact pronounceable). They aren't Daine for
sure, nor Yllurian, certainly not Romish,
Teutonic or similar. They could be Yllemese, but
that language is so poorly known it would be
impossible to say with certainty.

> BTW Yllurian has the same set as Talarian?
No. Their number words largely come from the
local elvish language.

> > The Daine in general do not count the way Men
> > do.
>
> What exactly are the Daine? Another sentient
> humanoid species within The World?
Yes. Tall narrow people with wings. Fond of
jewellery and bits of bright cloth, which they
_still_ haven't learnt to make into clothing yet.
;)

> > They use "number
> > estimations", so in stead of saying they have
> > twenty-seven widgets, they'd say they have a
> > score and a half or five hands; and not worry
> > about the extra or lacking widgets.
>
> Interesting.
>
> > In general, the native Daine numbers are:
> >
> > 10  crunc
> > 20  gamal  (=quite a few)
>
> Is Daine, like Kerno, a language that allows
> more than one spelling for a word?
Well, they don't habitually write, so the
spelling is largely from non-Daine informants.
Especially the learned articles of Dr. Norwycce.

> Like you write "crunck" and "gammal" in the
> description?
>
> > Only in Westmarche do the Daine count in
> > Mannish fashion:
>
> That's England, I suppose?
Yep! After a fashion. The two countries of
Hoopelle and Auntimany were inhabited by, well,
"English"-speaking peoples: the Oswaldimen and
the Avantimen. The latter are still thriving in
their coastal lands and overseas empire; the
former were wiped off the map by invaders and
Daine who'd had jolly well enough of oppression.

Westmarche _now_ is inhabited by Daine who speak
English. :S

Mind you, the English of *there* has probably
more the flavour of Middle English. Curiously,
-am is a typical masc. sing. nominative ending;
so you get things like "Thon markam he standas at
ocktey stradum", with an ever so slight Scots
accent. I think I ended up with -am, -an and -ar
declensions; and a few miscelaneous words like
foote and bocke which are irregular:

markam      jarran     watar     mon    bocke
markis      jarran     wateran   monis  bockis
markon      jarran     weteron   menon  beckum
marke       jarran     watar     mon    bocke

markas      jarres     wateras   men    beck
markum      jarres     wateras   menum  bockum
markum      jarres     wateras   menum  bockum
markas      jarres     wateras   men    beck

> > The Dream Language numbers: [...]
>
> Hmm... Celtic impressionism?
I was surprised at getting some of the words
right in the dream. I went out and bought a Welsh
dictionary just to see if I hit anything. The
text and context were a tad gruesome, but I was
surprised at how well I could recall the words
and how close I got the ones I'd _never_ seen
before. I got wrist = cal (Ir. caol), palm = clur
(W. cledr) and finger = mar (Ir. mear) very
closely with wither Gaelic or Welsh.

> > Mentolatian, spoken by a curious people a
> > ways
> > down the coast whose chief occupation is the
> > cultivation and export of medicinal herbs:
>
> Strange, I was always under the impression that
> Mentolatian was a Romance language.
? Possibly because the roots of the country's
name are also found in Latin? Munt = mint
(mentha); dlatyo = transfer, send away (and hence
export) (latum). The numbers should also be
familliar: syam, du, der, quadur, ponc, sano,
saffo, oggun, novun, dus; probably more familliar
than any other part of the language!

> Well, clearly Indo-European, but I
> couldn't say which family. I see
> traces of Italic, Germanic, Tocharian, Indic...
> Please remind me: Mentolatian is also a
> language of The World, right?
Yes. It is _thought_ by Avantimannish
philologists to be a long sundered Teutonic
language (not true, mind); though they are sure
it is at least Aryan. I suspect they've spent a
lot of time influenced by non-Aryan peoples; but
there's a lot of blank space down in their part
of the map. There are empty lands to the north,
and wild lands to west and south; there are ruins
of the country of Narnen to the northwest. But I
don't think anyone knows anything about them...

Padraic.


=====
Ne savem rhen cong quen dormises l' Etang; mays ieo savem que ne dormises
rhen di solèz.
    -- per tradicièn Ewrnor



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