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Re: New project of mine

From:Jan van Steenbergen <ijzeren_jan@...>
Date:Friday, May 10, 2002, 12:34
 --- Pavel wrote:

> [...] So here's a 'fictional diachronic language', > though I haven't thought of the name yet! But still, I suspect it'll > fall into the category of 'North Slavonic', though it's going to be > quite different from the Germanic-influenced ones (hiya Jan and James! > :-)).
Welcome to the club, then! Don't forget Libor Sztemon, who had already two North-Slavonic languages and recently came up with a third one. If you don't know them, check 'em out: Slavëni: http://www.volny.cz/sztemon/Artificial%20Language%202.htm Seversk: http://www.volny.cz/sztemon/Seversk.html Slavisk: http://www.volny.cz/sztemon/slavisk.htm What reminds me: Jan could be either Jan Havlis or me.
> The principality (I am yet to think out the name and things, you know) > continues until it is conquered by Mindaugas of Lithuania, and it is > subjugated by Lithuania and then Poland for some three centuries. At > that time the language experiences a heavy Lithuanian influence, mainly > in the lexicon, of course.
Don't forget that the state language of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in those days was not Lithuanian, but Old-Belorussian; Lithuanian was still a typical peasants' thing.
> Characteristic features I have worked out already: > In phonology, the Finnic substrate did not allow the development of the > palatalization correlation. However, the first palatalization of velars > did take place whie the Slavonic population was still distinct. However, > the Finns cannot cope with [tS] and [dZ], which they do substitute for > [t_j] and [d_j]. Slavic *tj and *dj also yield these.
Fair enough.
> One important thing is the failure to lose diphthongs (so no second > palatalization of velars, alas - cf. Russian 'cena' and unnamed lanuage > 'kooina'). [...] > No loss of the reduced vowels (now that's gonna be cool). In fact, the > reduced vowels yielded [o] and [e], while the full *o and *e yeld > respectively [uo] and [ie]. > Nasals are consistently realised as [uon]/[uom]/[uoN] and > [ien]/[iem]/[ieN]. > I'll keep you posted, if you're interested (but then, I'll keep posting > anyway!)
This sounds very interesting, so keep posting (but don't spoil your exams)! Regards, Jan ===== "You know, I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair. Then I thought, wouldn't it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them? So, now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe." --- J. Michael Straczynski __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Everything you'll ever need on one web page from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts http://uk.my.yahoo.com

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Pavel Iosad <pavel_iosad@...>