Re: Tong-cho-la, a philosophical language

From: "Christophe Grandsire" <christophe.grandsire@...>
Subject: Re: Tong-cho-la, a philosophical language


> >Why so few vowel combinations?
>
> Joe already explained that it was for maximum recognability while using
> only the main cardinal vowels. ae sounds often like ai, au and eu like ao
> and eo, ei like e (especially for English speakers), and any diphtongue
> beginning with i or u would easily be confused with syllables beginning
> with y or w (French people would confuse them easily). The only addition I
> think he could do would be oi, which to me sounds different enough from
> everything else. And if he writes ao and eo as au and eu, and oi as oe, he
> would get the exact diphtongues Classical Latin had ;))) .
The i-first and u-first diphthongs are definitely out, for the reason you
mentioned.

But /oi/ is a good idea...  And "ao, eo, oi" is in just one possible
orthography.  If you wanted to use a Latin one with "au, eu, oe", that'd be
just fine.  I'm still experimenting with the orthography.  I think I'll add
/oi/.