Re: Conlang for giant caterpillars

Sally Caves (Sali Otuhko) wrote:

>> As Sally remarked in another message, it's indeed the Welsh 'll'
>> sound. Valdyan also has it (I transliterate it 'lh'), and IIRC
>> Teonaht too.
>>
>Ooooh YES!  I didn't study Welsh all those years not to pinch it
>for Teonaht!  It's also in Old English, although we have no real
>idea how it was pronounced... probably not very strongly, as it
>dropped out:   hlaf  to loaf,  hleahtor  to laughter.  This may
>have been a consonant cluster: /xl/.  Interestingly, though, I
>pronounce ir very much like a softer Welsh "ll" when it probably should
>have been more like "kl."  But there it is.
There's a lateral fricative in Tokana too, also transcribed "lh".
However, the Tokana sound is postalveolar and laminal (i.e. pronounced
with the body of the tongue) while Welsh "ll" is alveolar and apical
(i.e. pronounced with the tip of the tongue).  Thus, Tokana "lh"
is to Welsh "ll" as /S/ is to /s/.

Matt.

------------------------------------
Matt Pearson
mpearson@ucla.edu
UCLA Linguistics Department
405 Hilgard Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1543
------------------------------------