Re: CHAT: The Conlang Instinct

John Cowan wrote:
>
> "Grandsire, C.A." wrote:
>
> > Chasma"o"cho is an exception, but here I use the semi-colon as an
> > interrogative mark,
>
> Is that influence from Greek?
>
        Yes, and admittedly so :) . In fact, this punctuation mark is at the
confluence of several influences:

- Greek for the form (a semi-colon for a question mark).
- Spanish for the use (two semi-colons surrounding an interrogative
expression).
- French for the spacing (two mandatory spaces, one before and one after
the mark, even if it is followed by another punctuation mark).
- and a last particular behaviour being that, like quotes, it's not a
marker of the end of a sentence, so a marker must be added at the end of
the sentence.

        The exclamative mark (the colon :) ) works exactly the same way.

--
        Christophe Grandsire

        Philips Research Laboratories --  Building WB 145
        Prof. Holstlaan 4
        5656 AA Eindhoven
        The Netherlands

        Phone:  +31-40-27-45006
        E-mail: grandsir@natlab.research.philips.com