Re: Hiatus in Artlangs

Elliott Lash sikayal:

> Leo Moser ániyë
>
> If we opt for two syllables, we get such initial
> combos as the following:
> Initial [dj] in: *dieto, *dieno, *dialo etc.
> Initial [sj] in: *siesto, *sievo, *siamo etc.
> Initial [kj] in: *kiano, *kiepto, *kielo etc.
> Initial [vj] in: *viato, *vieno, *violo etc.
> Initial [gj] in: *giapo, *gieno, *giosto etc.
> Initial [bj] in: *bialo, *biento, *biesto etc.
> Initial [mj] in: *mielo, *miano, *mioso etc.
> Initial [fw] in: *fuoco, *fuano, *fuero etc.
> Initial [lw] in: *luano, *luego, *luiso etc.
> Initial [pw] in: *pueblo, *puepo, *puoso etc.
> Initial [gw] in: *guano, *guero, *guido etc.
> Initial [kw] in: *kualo, *kueno, *kuoto etc.
> Initial [dw] in: *dualo, *dueno, *duito etc.
> Initial [rw] in: *ruano, *ruino, *rueso etc.
>
> Would these be safer to define as three syllables?
> What differing effects would the results have in
> an artlang? Would it be easier to sing in one
> form or another? Would poetry be easier in
> one form or another?
In poetry it would probably be variable, since most languages have
allowances for reduction or elongation of vowels to meet poetic
demands.  Poetry is always a somewhat artificial communication form.

Yivríndil, to answer the question, allows no initial consonant
clusters in theory, so all of the above would be three
syllables.  However, there are a handful of words like "vierda" which in
rapid speech probably becomes [vjerda].  It is possible that initial
consonant clusters of Cy are becoming acceptable because /y/ (=[j]) is an
exception to most other rules involving consonant clusters: for
example, there are no consonant triplets unless the third segment is /y/
"tarnya" "to live."

ObConlang:  I've always thought that a Yivríndilization of something like
"Kristian" with an illegal /#kr/ would be realized as /karistian/, using
an epinthetic /a/.  However, it might come out as /kyistian/, with the
English retroflex approximant being realized as the palatal
approximant.  A more euphonic possibility, IMHO.  What does kristian
think?

>
> Sorry if I'm a little late in responding to this topic,
> but I was visiting some friends in Boston. Anyway,
> in Silindion they would definitely be pronounced as
> three syllables, except for the fact that only combinations
> of e and i + a, o, u occur. Furthermore I have noticed
> that e and i become closed vowels rather than open
> (i.e. /E/ > /e/ and /I/ > /i/). All this has a great affect on
> poetry since it works with a system of syllabilic and
> stress alterations.
>
>  Elliott
>
Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu
"It is of the new things that men tire--of fashions and proposals and
improvements and change.  It is the old things that startle and
intoxicate.  It is the old things that are young."
-G.K. Chesterton _The Napoleon of Notting Hill_