Re: Question about Romlangs/CeltiConlangs

On Tue, 20 Aug 2002 11:51:04 +0100
=?iso-8859-1?q?Jan=20van=20Steenbergen?= <ijzeren_jan@...>
writes:
> > Addition of Semitic (Hebrew and Aramaic) and Greek (Koine)
> vocabulary,
> > including the idiosyncratic introduction of Semitic phonemes into
> Romance
> > vocabulary.
> Are there Arabs/Palestinians as well in your setting? And if so, how
> far reaches their influence?
-

No Palestinians, but that's just because the Romans *there* forgot to
rename the country :-P .  There are Arabs, and Arabic influence, but not
that much compared to Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek.  Judea *there* was
intermittently independent after the Roman period, so other influences
weren't as strong as the original ones.  There are words borrowed from
Arabic that have to do with government, literature, and linguistics,
though..

> > Judajca is known as [ju:zajkO:] (it's native name, meaning
> "Judean") as
> > well as [ittalki:s] (it's Hebrew name, meaning "Italian").
> "Italkit" is the normal Hebrew name for "Italian?" How do
> Hebrew-speakers distinguish between Italian and Judajca?
-

Over *there* Italian is called in Hebrew |italit|, while Judajca is
|italkit|, with the anomalous /k/ that appears in *here*'s "Italkit".
Italkit (or maybe spell it Ittalcit to be more Romance-like) was the
standard name for Judajca up until the independence movements (beginning
of the 20th century) that preceded the Fifth Commonwealth, which was when
Judajca was finally accepted as the official language of Judea; up until
then everybody was still overly nostalgic for Hebrew, and refused to
accept that it had terminally fallen out of common use.  Hebrew is still
used; it just isn't the vernacular, except among Quanaim (Zealots) who
refuse to speak Judajca because it's "Roman Solider-Speak".

> Thank you! Meanwhile, I'm patiently but eagerly waiting for more...
> Jan
-

Ah hah!  Found some stuff in an old email.
Here it is, edited and annotated.

A more recent example of the language is (something like):
(i hope the 'special' characters go through properly)

CELEP Â HUDDÎ!  CELEP Â HUNNOX!
(ideally, the circumflexes should be macrons, and there should be
cedillas hanging from the two Ps)
[kElEP O hUddi  kElEP O hUnnOt']
"seize the day!  seize the night!"

|celep|, imperative form of |calpîl| (<carpere)
|â|, direct-object marker, from |ad| "to"
|hu-|, "the" from |hujus|
|dî|, "day" (normal form), from |diêî|
|nox|, "night" (normal form), from |noctis|

I may change |hu-| to |ha-|; it's similar enough that i'm sure it could
have been completely absorbed by the Hebrew definite article instead of
just acting like it.

The conhistory background for Jûdajcâ (Ju:d,ajca:) is that instead of
trying to militarily punish Judea for the Bar Kokhba Rebellion, the
Romans decided to swamp the country with imperial colonists who would
absorb the native populations.  However, the plan went wrong when most of
the colonists ended up "going native" and taking over from the Judeans
only linguisticly, in that their form of Proto-Romance became the common
language instead of Hebrew and Aramaic.

However, since i don't know that much about Vulgar Latin or the
intricacies of the Mishnaic-period Hebrew vowel system, this project is
perpetually on hold.  I think the last thing i ever did on it was the
beginnings of a verb conjugation table:

pronouns:
i = eg [EG]
you = tû [tu:]
he = hâc [hO:x]  /  she = hajic [hajix]
we = nôs [no:S]
y'all = jôs [jo:S]
they(m) = hîdê [hi:ze:]  /  they(f) = hajdê [hajde:]

JELBÎ ÂMA"Z [jElbi O:mas'] (Â-Verbs)
active infinitive: -ÂL [O:l]
passive infinitive: -ÂR [O:r]

prayyentâ [praZZEntO:] (present):
actîvâ [axti:vO:] (active):
-Ô        -Â        -        -ÂMÛ        -ÂTÎ        -AN
[o:]        [O:]                [O:mu]        [O:si:]        [an]
passîvâ [paSSi:vO:] (passive):
-ÔS        -ÂRÊ        -ÂTÛ        -ÂMÛYÛ        -ÂMÎN        -ENET
[o:S]        [O:re:]        [O:su:]        [O:mu:Zu:]        [O:mi:n]
   [EnEs]

pelpectâ [pElpExtO:] (perfect/past):
actîvâ [axti:vO:] (active):
-ÂVÎ        -ÂVESET        -ÂV        -ÂVÎMÛ        -ÂVESET
-ÂVÊREN
[O:vi:]        [O:vESEs]        [O:v]        [O:vi:mu:]        [O:vESEs]

[O:ve:rEn]
passîvâ [paSSi:vO:] (passive):
-ÂTÛS        -ÂTÛYÊ        -ÂTÛYÊS        -ÂTÎYÛM        -ÂTÎJÊS
-ÂTÎYÛN
[O:su:S]        [O:su:Ze:]        [O:su:Ze:S]        [O:si:Zu:m]
[O:sijje:S]
    [O:si:Zu:n]

puttûrâ [puttu:rO:] (future):
actîvâ [axti:vO:] (active):
-ALJÔ        -ÂLÎ        -ÂLÎT        -ÂLÎMÛ        -ÂLÎTÎ        -ALJÛN
[aljo:]        [O:li:]        [O:li:s]        [O:li:mu:]
[O:li:si:]
[alju:n]
passîvâ [paSSi:vO:] (passive):
-ÂBÔ        -ÂBERES        -ÂBÎTÛ        -ÂBÎMÛ        -ÂBIMMÎN
-ÂBÕNET
[O:Bo:]        [O:BErES]        [O:Bi:su:]        [O:Bi:mu:]
[O:Bimmi:n]
  [O:BonEs]

The active future conjugations come from the infinitive plus "to go", if
i remember correctly.
I may end up changing some of the verb forms; especially the ones with
/Z/ and /S/ seem too tongue-twistery to not have been simplified.
I'm also not sure whether to keep this "official" Latin-Alphabet
orthography for Judajca; it seems more likely that they'd just use one
alphabet, instead of switching back and forth between two.  And they may
have written (or tried to write) in the Greek alphabet for a while.
Although i always liked the idea of duo-alphabetical boustrophedon :-) .


-Stephen (Steg), brother of the Left-Handed Lithuanian
 "Dievas dave dantis, Dievas duos duonos"
 (with a dot over the E in |dave|)

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