Re: Conworld language sound inventory

On Sun, 27 Jan 2008 14:07:36 +0100, Geijss Streijde wrote:

>I am working on my own conworld, and am in the process of making
>languages for this world. For the ancestor languages of the draconic
>languages, I'd like to hear what you think of this sound inventory.
>
>*Old draconic*
>_Vowels_
>Single vowels
>[i]  = /i/
>[E]  = /e/
>[a]  = /a/
>[o]  = /o/
>[u]  = /u/
>[@]  = /y/
Phonemically perfectly fine. Phonetically, [E a o] seems a bit uncommon in
natlangs, I could understand the imbalance a bit better if it were [E A o]
or [e & O] but usually you have either [E O] or [e o]. Still, good for
flavor, it's not really implausible or anything.

>Diphthongs
>[&i] = /ei/
>[Ai] = /ai/
>[oi] = /oi/
>[ui] = /ui/
>[Vu] = /ou/
The last one looks kind of out-of-the-blue, or like it's miming Dutch. Or
maybe it's a former [@u] on its way to [Au]?? Eh. Go with it if you want to.

>_Consonants_
>Single consonants
>[f]  = /f/
>[s]  = /s/
>[x]  = /g/
>[p]  = /p/
>[t]  = /t/
>[k]  = /k/
>[n]  = /n/
>[N]  = /m/
Quite far remoovd from the "standard" sonorant inventory of /m n r l j w/.
Or do some of those pop up as allophones of something else? You have
difthongs ending in [i] so I'd expect at least a [j] somewhere.

Then again, worse things are kno'n to happen (Rotokas etc). There's a long
way from "improbable" to "implausible".

>Allowed consonant clusters
>[sx] = /ks/ (Start of syllable only)
>[ks] = /x/
>[pt] = /pt/ (End of syllable only)
>[Nk] = /mk/ (End of syllable only)
IMO treating /ks/ as if it were a single consonant is overdone... and the
rest of the cluster inventory looks kinda random too. But again not
implausibly much so. I would however be tempted to add at least a *little*
symmetry into it; final /nt/ comes into mind first. And maybe /ks/ is
underlyingly //kt// with /t/ assibilating after /k/??

The [sx] seems still out of place. Not sure what might be an advisable
course of events. I read on ZBB the other day about some Amerind
(Algonquian, IIRC?) language where s > xs universally, thru s` or something
I suspect, so some similar explanation might suffice to leave it as it is
(indeed, I had independantly done something similar in my first conlang), if
you don't want to add some more similar clusters such as [sf].

Have you considered what can happen between syllables? Is, say, [tafNa] a
possible word? How about [taxsxa]? [taiptksa]? [tE.o.au.u]?

John Vertical