Search found 671 matches

by Davush
28 Mar 2024 13:40
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Another of my 'speculative' questions... How might a language develop an animate/inanimate (or any other binary gender-like) distinction, on demonstratives specifically? I ask about demonstratives, since they are likely one of the first points in the development of a gender system (at least accordin...
by Davush
27 Mar 2024 09:47
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

A fun idea... 'Simple' (i.e., non-reduplicated) stems show the following : *p, *t, *k, *s > ps, ts, ks, s ~ mb, nd, ng, nz *h > s ~ n *r, *l > y, y ~ r, l *m *n > no change Additionally, -t added to consonant stems causes some changes (as has been previously mentioned) *pt *kt *tt > ut, it, Vt *mt *...
by Davush
26 Mar 2024 22:36
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

Nice work so far. I like the attention given to the declensional classes; I think having variety in inflection is often something overlooked in a priori conlangs. Thanks! To be honest, I probably tend towards having too many declension classes precisely because of the variety! On a similar note, I ...
by Davush
24 Mar 2024 13:33
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

A fun idea for plural marking on the participle forms occurred to me, so I'm going to write it down before I forget. Starting with a proto-plural suffix, something like * (i)j . Maybe this is related to the -i in the accusative plural -eri . Initially, this is applied as a regular agglutinative suff...
by Davush
24 Mar 2024 11:38
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Not an expert, but since we've raised the question, I'd guess there are three reasons why Latin developed mostly-free word order: a) the word order was probably ancestrally never totally fixed anyway. Strong SOV tendencies in the earliest records may be in part a literary decision, a style of "...
by Davush
24 Mar 2024 09:47
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

I like that. Reminds me of Arabic, but not too much. It was indeed (partially) inspired by Semitic-like forms! The verbal system will probably have some more non-concatenativity, but not exactly in the Semitic style. More on the participles The tā-tam/active form is (or was) primarily used to comme...
by Davush
23 Mar 2024 23:29
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Quick Diachronics Challenge
Replies: 1036
Views: 268273

Re: Quick Diachronics Challenge

It is retrievable, maybe even more than that. But I agree that the closest should win. That's why I said, I don't want to wait much longer before revealing it. So, why spend more time waiting. Here is the solution I had in mind. The protoform was simple: *ma, my favorite syllable. Ha! Who would hav...
by Davush
23 Mar 2024 20:23
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Quick Diachronics Challenge
Replies: 1036
Views: 268273

Re: Quick Diachronics Challenge

Not to spoil the fun or anything, but I thought part of the game was to reconstruct what is possible from the given cognates. If the exact proto-word is unretrievable on the basis of the cognates, then surely the closest one should just win? Otherwise it literally just becomes a guessing game...
by Davush
23 Mar 2024 15:24
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Having said that, there may also be one typological nudge in Latin's case: its prepositions and tendency for post-nominal adjectives conflicted with its tendency for final verbs, and moving to SVO resolved that. But that of course is just shifting the question (why did its mixed order originally ar...
by Davush
23 Mar 2024 15:21
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

So, I'm not happy with the pronominal system at all. I'll just leave that alone for now. Let's move on to verbs. I feel like doing something that revolves around a participle-like system, starting with something like this: tam- eat tā-tam- eating (active) tam-ām- eaten (passive) With CVCVC roots, th...
by Davush
22 Mar 2024 18:50
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

I'm afraid I don't know any syntax (in a linguistics sense, imaginary trees and brackets and anagrams and whatnot), so I probably can't give the sort of answer you want. Thank you very much for this! To be honest, my knowledge of syntax/"linguistics" is very rudimentary, and I favour comm...
by Davush
22 Mar 2024 09:52
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Related to my recent question about word order, I have another one. Supposing it is true that the shift from SOV starts "top down", what would this look like in practice? Let's use Japanese as an example since it is rigidly SOV/head final. According to the proposed pathway of change, the o...
by Davush
20 Mar 2024 21:48
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

One intriguing thing is that in VO languages, V-O-Adverb is usually the favored word order when adverbs are involved ─ so if an adverb were to lexicalize into an auxiliary, it would result in V-O-Auxiliary ─ yet this occurs rarely in natlangs, so there must be something else at work! [...] Since au...
by Davush
20 Mar 2024 21:19
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

I know; I don't have an answer for the overall question, but I thought I could offer some preliminary insights. You did, thank you. Syntax is not often an area I get into, because my questions tend towards the 'why' (a lot of which are probably unanswerable, but interesting to speculate on nonethel...
by Davush
20 Mar 2024 21:04
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

AFAIK, the FOFC is supposed to be asymetric, so [V-O]-Aux is banned but Aux-[OV] is okay, contrary to what the name suggests. I hasten to add that this in itself does not explain anything and could only be a first step on the way to a potential explanation. Edit: I had misunderstood (apologies!). B...
by Davush
20 Mar 2024 19:54
Forum: Linguistics & Natlangs
Topic: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here
Replies: 1107
Views: 282104

Re: (L&N) Q&A Thread - Quick questions go here

Does anyone have any thoughts/ideas on why, in languages that use auxiliary verbs, the order V-O-Aux never seems to appear as a 'default' order, and when alternative orders are allowed, it is exceedingly rare? (Apparently Classical Latin allowed this order, but it was not common, and eventually disa...
by Davush
19 Mar 2024 20:30
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

Ok, since this is a scratchpad, scratch all of the above on pronouns. I have come up with a system that I like much better. Preverbal Enclitic Chains Let's only focus on 1st and 2nd persons for now, as 3rd person will somehow be 'peripheral'. We have the following subject enclitics: 1sg. = wa 2sg. =...
by Davush
18 Mar 2024 21:05
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

Pronouns and Pronominal Enclitics A series of (pronominal) clitics often precedes the verb. Clitics are always attached to a 'conjunctive' particle, most often a- , which has no meaning, and serves only as a 'joiner' morpheme. Other conjunctive particles will have semantic content. The order of pro...
by Davush
18 Mar 2024 09:51
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Re: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

Quenya comes to my mind. Interesting! Quenya definitely wasn't an influence here – maybe that's a product of the specific examples. I think it will be less 'mellifluous' and more stop-heavy. I imagine it will look less Quenya once we get to verbs. I like the case paradigm. It's agglutinative and st...
by Davush
17 Mar 2024 21:43
Forum: Conlangs
Topic: Tsayyākan - Scratchpad
Replies: 12
Views: 516

Tsayyākan - Scratchpad

Intro This language is inspired by (Classical) Japanese, the non-concatenativity of Semitic, and a touch of Ancient Greek — mostly just trying out things I like. The name is tentative for now. Phonology I won't focus too much on this right now. Predictably, it has quite a simple phonology: /p t k t...