Re: Elvish ideas ...

Quoting Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...>:

> En réponse à Andreas Johansson :
>
> Why do I keep wanting to read "Evil ideas ..."? ;))))))
>
>
> >The Elves we're speaking of are essentially just skinny, long-lived humans
> >with pointy ears -
>
> How much long-lived?
Not really decided; perhaps an average live-span of 200 years. Certainly more
than 100 and less than 1000, in any case.

> >_t d c g_ are [t d k g] before back vowels; before _i_ and _e_ they're
> >respectively [tS dZ tS dZ] - notice that the alveolar-velar distinction is
> >neutralized; it returns with fricativization, since _th dh ch gh_ before
> front
> >vowels is [T D S Z] (cf [T D x G] before back ones).
> >
> >The "front" versions of these consonants can be forced before back vowels
> by
> >inserting a _-e-_; _cea_ is [tSa].
>
> And how do you force the back pronunciation before front vowels? Or isn't
> that possible? If it is, my personal favourite would probably be -a-
> (creating in front of i another ambiguity between [aj] and [i] after a back
> vowel. As you know, I love those things ;)) ).
That doesn't occur in native words. In the transcription of Yargish, -o- is
used. This is reasonably safe since Yargish have no /o/ phoneme. I'd guess the
same is used in any loans, creating three-way ambiguity /oj/~/wi/~/i/.

> >Initially or preceeded by a consonant other than _t d c g ch gh_, _e_ before
> a
> >back vowel spells [j], eg _creach_ [krjax].
>
> I see that a final t, d, c or g (and their fricative versions) receives its
> back pronunciation. How do you force a front pronunciation there? Or is it
> not possible? You could allow final mute -e and/or -i, possibly coming from
> a time when they were actually pronounced, but fell from pronunciation due
> to sound changes :) .
Again, don't occur in native words. In the transcription of Yargish, silent
final -e is used. Again, pretty safe, since Yargish don't have /e/.

> >Similarly, _o_ before an unrounded vowel
> >spells [w], eg _coar_ [kwar].
>
> Having been reading a grammar of Portuguese, I can only say I like the
> choice :) .
Wasn't aware of the Portuguese's good taste in this respect, act'ly.

> >An uninflected noun never begins in a fricative; fricativizing an initial
> stop
> >makes the noun definite, eg _creach_ "castle", _chreach_ "the castle". It
> >should be stressed that "fricative" and "fricativizing" here essentially
> >means "anything spelt as stop+h" and "add -h" respectively.  Thus we also
> see
> >_cea_ [tSa] "lady" and _chea_ [Sa] "the lady". I'm not yet sure what to do
> >with nouns beginning in a vowel, liquid or [w-] or [j-] - leaving those
> >without a definite-indefinite distinction strikes me as odd,
>
> Why? Basque has this kind of problem in some cases with nouns ending in -a,
> but that doesn't make it stop from having a lot of its nouns ending in -a
> :))) . Personally, in the case of nouns beginning with a vowel, liquid or
> [w] or [j], I'd put the "h" anyway (in front of the vowel if no consonant
> at all) but leave it unpronounced. I like orthographic changes which are
> not shown in the pronunciation (hey, I'm not French for nothing! :) ). Of
> course, I don't know if it's possible in the original script...
It's certainly possible - graphically, "h" is just another letter. I imagine
it actually indicated a phoneme when the script was originally exapted as a
kind of diachritic when the language changed. Throwing in the fricativizer
regardless is a good idea ... but I think I'll have it pronounced as [j]
before back vowels. The fricativization is supposed to have been caused by a
later lost prefix e-.

> >  but I don't
> >really know what I want to do with them. Something evil, little doubt.
>
> So *that*'s why I kept wanting to read "Evil ideas ..." ;)))) .
I might make the Elvish word for "evil" _magel_ if you don't behave! :-)

> >Plurals, more well-behavedly, are formed by adding _-an_, or, after vowels,
> >simply _-n_, except, for no good reason, when nouns end in a fricative, in
> >which case the fricative becomes a stop (AKA, the "h" is dropped) and a
> >homorganic nasal is inserted before the newly-born stop. Eg _cean_
> "ladies",
> >_canan_ "lords" (sg _can_), but _creanc_ "castles".
>
> Nice. I suppose you'll have a dialect where the nasal will become
> unpronounced, but will have left its mark by nasalising the vowel, so that
> plural is marked by nasalisation of the vowel and defricativisation of the
> final fricative? ;)))
'S entirely possible, except I dislike nasal vowels. (And I'm telling a
Frenchman this? - my survival instincts cannot be working!)

> >Accusatives, serving as direct objects, and probably in some other
> >miscellaneous functions, are formed by suffixing -o to the stem. It goes
> >before the pl -an (which loses its -a-), but of course after the pl infix
> with
> >final former fricatives. Not yet sure how it combines with nouns ending in
> >vowels.
>
> After -o, I'd see it disappear. There's nothing wrong with having some
> nouns lacking a case distinction for phonetic reasons. I'd do the same with
> nouns ending in -u (because I'm evil ;)) ), and with nouns ending in -a, -e
> or -i, I'd have the -o suffix put there, but pronounced [w], introducing
> falling diphtongues in [w] :)) (creating again another ambiguity with eo:
> [ew] or [o] after a front consonant ;))) ). But that's just a suggestion :)
> .
It's a possibility. I'm not quite sure I'm attracted or appalled by the
implication there'd be accusative possessives like _ceaio_, involving what
would be a triphthong taking quite a trip in the vocalic tetragon. Another
possiblity is hijacking the pl accusative (_ceaino_ in this case) for use a
sg, and creating a new pl by strapping on yet another -n. Any anadewism for
that?

> >The possessive, finally, is formed by infixing an _-i-_ , turning the stem
> >vowel into an diphthong. Pronunciation; _ii_ [ej], _ei_ [ej], _ai_ [aj],
> _oi_
> >[oj], _ui_ [uj]. Yes, _oi_ is ambigious between [wi] and [oj].
>
> What's wrong with that? ;))))
Who ever said there was anything wrong with it? ;-)

> >  The possessive
> >goes after the thing possessed; _chreach chain_ "the castle of the lord".
> To
> >top it off, it, out of misplaced sympathy, echoes any accusative ending on
> the
> >thing possessed, giving us things like _chreanco chainon_ "the castles
> (acc)
> >of the lords".
>
> I like it :) . It does, at first sight, give a vaguely Celtic impression,
> but when you get deeper in it you see that that Celtic impression is
> misplaced :))) . I like conlangs that try to mislead people ;))) .
I, for some reason, suspected you'd like it. Just wait for the complete
grammar!

> >Well, that'll have to suffice for now.
>
> Yep, waiting for the verbs now ;))) .
Much work remaining there, 'mafraid. Since the verbal complexity in my
conlangs this far have mainly been in the areas of tense and mood, it'd seem
to follow that aspect would be the big thing in this lang (I really must
figure out its native name soon!), but beyond that there's much haziness.

Oh, and a typological question; the nominal inflection sketched above is
certainly no isolating, and hardly agglutinative either - does that make it
fusional? It don't like much like systems like Latin's, which is kind of
my "instant image" of a fusional language.

                                                           Andreas

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