Re: OT: What makes a good conlang? (was Re: Super OT: Re: CHAT: JRRT)

David Peterson wrote:

  Teoh wrote:

  <<I'm still not sure if Tamahí phonology is more "naturalistic"... it has to
  *somewhat* resemble Ebisédian, being a descendent lang, although I've
  taken the liberty to introduce such sound changes as:
      H -> G -> g
      h -> x -> k_h>>

 I'll defer to others on this, but if you've got the directionality of these
sound changes listed right, they seem...well, backward. I can't imagine them
happening--at least not categorically. Any thoughts on this, anyone?

 RM: I see your point, but at first blush I don't see anything odd in Teoh's
changes. Perhaps they're missing a stage-- seems to me that glottal [h H] would
first > pharyngeal or uvular, then continue to be fronted to velar frics. Then,
hardening to stops might be a little odd, but I'm sure it's attested somewhere.
(E.g. in historic Gwr, where the *(vd.uvular stop) merged with the *(vd.uvular
fric), then a little later merged with *g)

  What might be called odd is for the **x > kh, rather than plain /k/