----- Original Message -----
From: "The Gray Wizard" <dbell@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Saturday, October 21, 2000 12:57 PM
Subject: Re: I'm new!
> > From: James O'Connell
> >
> > Thank you all for the compliments!
> >
> > Anyway, to make it readable I have quickly html-ised the language
> > texts and
> > it is now reachable at
http://website.lineone.net/~istari/ling.htm - it's
> > still not perfect but it is ok. Any comments appreciated.
> > Look forward to talking again to you all later.
>
> James,
>
> I just looked at your language sketch. Nice work. A couple of comments.
>
> Phonology
> 1) You might want to describe your phonemes using IPA or an equivalent.
> English tends to be pronounced in many different ways depending on dialect,
> so English equivalents aren't really definitive.
> 2) What led you to use 'c' for /s/ and 's' for /S/?
> 3) Your labial fricative 'mf' is unusual. What prompted this?
A lone survivor from a set including mf and pf - mf was more likely to survive
because of the "a norange" idea - m is common at the end of words, and f at the
beginning, and it isn't just english speakers who are sloppy ...these sounds
sometimes become combined.
> 4) 'ae' for /aI/ is most unusual.
/aI/ is what I normally used ae to represent due to the influence latin has had on me.
>
> Case
> 1) I see that you have adopted a split ergative system motivated by animacy
> considerations. I should warn you that the tripartite system that emerges
> for 3rd person pronouns is somewhat rare, existing in a few Australian
> languages and of course in amman iar.
> 2) I don't see this tripartite distribution of cases for 3rd person pronouns
> in your pronoun table. There seems to be a missing ergative form.
The pronouns are irregular, and I have made some changes to the tables to try and
make what I meant clearer.
> Verb structure
> 1) Aspect ( can be a very subtle concept. Aspect coincident with tense (as
> it very often is) can be even more subtle and they don't always work the way
> they do in English. You might want to give some examples of these (present,
> perfect, imperfect, pluperfect, future)
This will come later when I look at usage throughout the language.
> Adjectives
> 1) I very much like the use of prenominal adjectives to provide additional
> force for the modifier.
> 2) Could you give some examples of the syntax of adjective degree (equative,
> comparative, superlative)?
halacé herúin anna síp agillir kécam ammár - The lord of the haven loved the most
gold-coloured ring
halas - haven (genetive [ + é], singular)
herú - lord (ergative [ + in ], singular)
anna - ring (absolutive, singular)
síp - superlative particle
agillar - gold-coloured (absolutive, singular)
kúnvan - to have (auxilliary. 3rd person present [ kécam ] )
ammárn - to love (3rd person, perfect [ - n ]
Adverbs
) Same question about adverb degree
Same answer
Word Order
> 1) I like the use of animacy to determine word order in transitive
> sentences. How will you handle pragmatic considerations like topic and
> focus?
>
Haven't considered this yet
> Again, nice work! I like the texture of the language. You really have to
> give it a name, however. A conlang without a name lacks soul.
will do
>
> David E. Bell
> The Gray Wizard
> dbell@graywizard.net
> www.graywizard.net
>
> "Wisdom begins in wonder." - Socrates
James
Lord Manwe
jamestomas2@yahoo.co.uk