[Game] Another of those historical linguistics games!

[Ralph]

As I've mentioned elsewhere, I've been working on a proto-language for some of my conlangs, and thought it might be fun to put up a cognate set as one of these historical linguistics challenges!

Here's the map:



It's worth noting that there are two variants of this word in the proto-language: one with a derivational suffix and one without.

Enjoy!

[brandrinn]

The map is too big on my screen. Could you scale it down a bit?

[Ralph]

The map is too big on my screen. Could you scale it down a bit?

I'll see what I can do!

Edit: It should be a better size now.

[taylorS]

I think the two forms of the proto-word are *gʷeʦu and *gʷeʦume.

The family originated in the southern landmass, and then spread over the islands, with a proto-islands *eʦume.

[brandrinn]

I'm leaning more toward /c/ as the middle consonant.

[Ralph]

I think the two forms of the proto-word are *gʷeʦu and *gʷeʦume.

The family originated in the southern landmass, and then spread over the islands, with a proto-islands *eʦume.

Pretty close, but not quite there yet.

I'm leaning more toward /c/ as the middle consonant.

In which case you're leaning in the right direction!

I'd be interested to see how you'd group the languages into families too.

[taylorS]

Proto-Yellow: *ˈetomi
Proto-Red: *eˈtome
Proto-Purple: *eˈʦome
Proto-Green: eˈsome
Proto-Pink: ˈɡʷiʦumu
Proto-Blue: ˈɡʷiku

*ˈɡʷiku(mu)

[Ralph]

Proto-Yellow: *ˈetomi
Proto-Red: *eˈtome
Proto-Purple: *eˈʦome
Proto-Green: eˈsome
Proto-Pink: ˈɡʷiʦumu
Proto-Blue: ˈɡʷiku

*ˈɡʷiku(mu)

You're groupings are mostly right, except for ˈeːme and ˈemːe. Some of the groups can be linked together into higher level groupings though.

As for the reconstructions, *eˈtome for Proto-Red and *eˈsome for Proto-Green are correct. The others are close, but not quite right yet. You might want to re-think the initial consonant, for example (hopefully the tones in three of the coastal languages in the blue group might provide a clue).