Re: An arabo-romance conlang?

On Fri, 26 Jan 2001 14:51:05 -0500 Vasiliy Chernov <bc_@...> writes:
> 2) Where to get the distinction 'weak (aspirated) voiceless vs.
> emphatic (glottalized) voiceless'?
> For the second problem:
> It may be interesting to consider borrowings from Greek into Aramaic
> and Ethiopic which had a similar distinction. Typically, they borrow
> Greek aspirates as weak, and (!) Greek plain voiceless as
> glottalized
> (rarely, as voiced). This is also true for borrowings from Greek to
> Aramaic to (pre-written) Arabic. So, if you first invent an early
> Romance dialect with aspirates... (?)
> (I'd think of something along the following lines: initial C > Ch,
> but sC > C > C'... or something like that).
> Basilius
-

In order to come up with the Hebrew emphatics /t./ /s./ and /k./ for
Jûdjaca:

i derived /k./ from the clusters [kw] and [gw]: (like in the development
of Draseléq, i believe)
AQUAE > aqua [ak.a] "water"

i derived /t./ from the cluster [kt]:
MACTÂRE > maxâl [mat.Al] "to kill"

and i derived /s./ from the cluster [ks]:
PAX > paz [pas.] "peace of"

I haven't figured out a way to develop /3/ (`ayin) and /H/ (hhet)
pharyngeal fricatives, although they exist in borrowings from Hebrew and
Aramaic (along with 'free' /s/ and /z/).  However, i decided that the
word for "interesting" begins with a `ayin, along with other words prone
to semantic stress.  However, i couldn't find a word in my Latin
dictionary that Spanish _interesante_ could have developed directly
from... does anyone know the proper VL/PR word?


-Stephen (Steg)
 "Word making is world making."
     ~ _The Beginning of Desire: Reflections on Genesis_
          by Avivah Zornberg