Re: GSF revisited

Benct Philip Jonsson wrote:
> R A Brown skrev:
[snip]
>  > community and thus becomes a creole. These "flexionless
>  > Greeks'" have adopted Buddhism - maybe Benct Philip might
>  > fill out the conhistory for me :)
>
> If I had time! :-)
I know the feeling only too well.

> My own Neo-Tocharian lies in abeyance for
> lack of time, both the language, the culture and the
> religion.
Yep - must get back to Piashi somewhen   ;)

> For a quick orientation have a look at ......
[snip]
Thanks for all the suggested links etc - will follow them up.

>
>  > As for the language:
>  >
>  > 1. ORTHOGRAPHY & PHONOLOGY The language uses the Greek
>  >    alphabet. They are too far removed from the Roman world
>  >    to have ever known the Roman alphabet. Although their
>  >    uppercase letters are the familiar Greek ones, they
>  >    will have developed a different cursive script from the
>  >    Greeks of the west. However, we will for convenience
>  >    write with the familiar upper and lower-case Greek
>  >    letters.
>
>
> Have a look at the Central Asian varieties of Indic writing
> to get an idea what it may look like. Siddham
> <http://www.omniglot.com/writing/siddham.htm> should be very
> inspiring, given your concultural setting!
Thanks - I didn't really want to get into the realms of con-scripts, but
maybe it's unavoidable given the scenario I outlined. I may have to find
some other setting for 'flexionless Greek.'

>  - diphthongs: AI, OI, AY and EY remain as true diphthongs,
>  >   namely [aj], [Oj], [aw] and [Ew] respectively. (The
>  >   shift of AI and OI to single vowels does not seem to
>  >   happened till about 100 CE;
>
> It seems to have been rather much earlier in some dialects,
> notably Boeotian.
I should've said "does not become general till about 100 CE" - certainly
monophthongization of AI and OI started earlier in some dialects. I
might be persuaded to have AI = [æ] and OI = [œ]       ;)

>
>  >   Summary: there are eight simple vowels:
>  >:  /i/ written I, EI    /y/ written Y        /u/ written OY
>  >:  /e/ written H                             /o/  written Ω
>  >:  /E/ written E        /a/ written A        /O/ written O
>  >
>  > there are four diphthongs: /aj/ written AI; /Oj/ written
>  > as OI; /aw/ written as AY and /Ew/ written as EY.
>
> What about /yi/? I know it was rather marginal.
So marginal, I had forgotten it. Before a vowel it will be [yj], so
"son" is _yjo_
Does it ever occur before consonants?

[snip]
> If so YI may be around as an
> (alternative) spelling of /y/. Maybe Y was used only in
> digraphs! :-)
I don't want to change the spelling.

>  > CONSONANTS: Λ M N P shall be as, for example, in Italian
>  > /l m n r/ (i.e. Λ is a dental approximant, N is a dental
>  > nasal and P is an apical trill). Γ (agma) was (and still
>  > is) /N/ before a velar; in ancient Greek it was also
>  >     clearly /N/ before M (as, indeed, the name _agma_
>  >     /aNma/ implies); but there is no clear evidence how Γ
>  >     before N was pronounced. However, in FG, F shall be
>
> Methinks F is a typo for Γ there? Surely no digamma?
Indeed not - yes, 'tis a typo.

>  >     /N/ before the velars K, Γ (gamma), X and Ξ, and
>  >     before the nasals M and N. (For Γ = gamma, see below)
>  >     Σ shall be [s], except before voiced consonants where
>  >     it is assimilated to [z]. Ξ and Ψ are /ks/ and /ps/
>  >     respectively, and Z is always /z/.
>
> Will, conversely /z/ always be Z?
No. The ancient spelling of sigma before voiced consonants will be retained.

>  >
>  > Π, T , K are as /p t k/ in French and the Romance
>  > languages, i.e. the are _unaspirated_ and the T is dental
>  > rather than alveolar. B, Δ, Γ were certainly /b d g/ in
>  > the ancient language, but are /v D G/ in modern Greek. We
>  > do not know when the shift took place, but it seems to
>  > have been completed by the Byzantine period. It had
>  > certainly not occurred by the period we are considering,
>  > but the are some indications that the process had begun in
>  > some areas. I therefore propose to give these the values
>  > of standard Spanish /b d g/, i.e. voiced plosives when
>  > initial or following a nasal, voiced fricative elsewhere.
>  > Φ, Θ, X -these were certainly aspirated, voiceless
>  > plosives in the ancient language /p_h, t_h, k_h/ - but a
>  > voiceless fricatives in the modern, namely /f T x/.
>  > Evidence from graffiti at Pompeii (which a Greek, Oscan &
>  > Latin speaking inhabitants at the time of its destruction)
>  > shows this shift to have taken place in popular Greek
>  > before the end of the 1st cent CE. So at present I am
>  > undecided between:
>  > (a) retaining the ancient pronunciation.
>  > (b) treating rather like B, Δ, Γ, that is the are
>  >     aspirated voiceless plosives when initial or after
>  >     nasals, but voiceless fricatives elsewhere (Φ of
>  >     course being a _bilabial_ fricative).
>  > (c) a modification of (b) in which the aspirate has given
>  >     way to a fricative, thus giving rise an affricate
>  >     sound /pf tT kX/ when initial or after a nasal, and a
>  >     simple voiceless fricative elsewhere - in (c) the
>  >     fricative pronunciation of Φ will be [f].
>  > (d) using the Byzantine & modern pronunciation.
>
> One thing that should probably weigh in is the fact that
> Central Asia, notably including Bactria and the lands west
> north and east of it, at this time was dominated by Iranian
> languages, which had rather full sets of fricative sounds.
Interesting - thanks.

> Moreover these fricatives could apparently be written with
> the Indic letters for aspirated stops.
Just as English _f_ is in modern Hindi, I believe.

[snip]
> each other's phonologies. Also have a look at the
> Introduction to Chinese Historical Phonology by Guillaume
> Jacques <http://xiang.free.fr/leiden- en.pdf>
I have - very interesting.

[snip]
>
> NB that most Iranian languages had /h/, developed out of
>    IndoEuropean *s much the same as in Greek -- except that
>    Iranian languages did *not* lose intervocalic /h/! Also
>    it is notable that the Greek alphabet developed in
>    Bactria for the Iranian Kushan language includes a letter
>    for /S/ which looks exactly like Þ (Thorn) and probably
>    is derived from Greek aspirated Rho -- whether from the
>    actual 'P graphy, or as a modification of P.
Aspiration of rho was non-phonemic in ancient Greek. Do we actually know
if the sign for /S/ really did develop from rho. Also if aspirated rho
was pronounced anything like Welsh _rh_ (and I believe it was), then the
sound bears little or no resemblance to /S/. I think we need more
certain evidence to decide whether Bactrian Greek was psilotc or not.

[snip]
>
> Which brings up the question if there were any shibilants --
> palatal(ized) and/or retroflex fricatives and affricates. in
> your FG?
As few as possible! It's meant to have a similar relationship to ancient
Greek as "Latino sine flexione" has to Classical Latin. No retroflex
consonants - possible very moderate non-phonemic palatalization.
Probably no affricates.

[snip]
> them. Some suggestions related to this:
>
>  - I may be used as a palatalization diacritic, and then EI
>    may be used to mark that palatalization does *not* take
>    place -- e.g. ΣI or XI for /Si/ against ΣEI for /si/
>    and XEI for /xi/. This would of course primarily apply to
>    loan words, but may then influence how I and EI are used
>    in Greek words.
Looks reasonable (but not for FG!)

>  - Iranian and Chinese retroflex and palatoalveolar sounds
>    may be identified with Greek dental + /r/ combinations,
>    notably ΘP for /S/-like sounds.
But then we're moving away from 'Greek without flexions' into a Greek
derived conlang, which is not what I intended.
  [snip]
>
>  > At present I am considering using the accusative singular,
>  > dropping a final -N if there is one, for all nouns,
>  > whether 1st, 2nd or 3rd declension and whatever their
>  > grammatical gender (FG shall, of course, have no
>  > grammatical gender.
>
> Seems reasonable.
Yes, but there are problems. What do we do with nouns like πατήρ? Do we
take the acc. πατέρα, or go for, say, πατρό from the genitive πατρός?
The former is in keeping with modern Greek, but most (all?) derivatives
are based on the stem πατρ(ο)-

What happens to verbs? Will they be all
> infinitive like in Lingua Franca, or derived from the 3.
> person singular?
Neither - I'll follow LSF practice and use the singular imperative - tho
verbs with 'strong aorists' should probably have the aorist imperative
form rather than the present imperative.

> Too bad we don't know anything of the Greek pidgins that
> must have existed in ancient times!
Indeed!

--
Ray
==================================
ray@carolandray.plus.com
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
TRADUTTORE TRADITORE

Reply