Altlang Ideas Discussion

[WeepingElf]

Probably not the most original idea, but I've toyed with making a conlang that is the only surviving descendant of the East Germanic branch.

There are several such conlangs, including one of myself (which is incomplete and not on the Web yet, but I plan to put it up in the next update of my conlang pages).

[Salmoneus]

Yes; but the more direct the contact, the moe likely it is for sizeable amount of currency to end up somewhere - I'm not aware, for instance, of Roman currency being found in eastern Siberia, though the same via-china route would be possible.

Possible, yes...but did Eastern Siberians want Chinese goods or Chinese coins? (and if they only used Chinese coins with the Chinese, what exactly would they do with Roman coins? Aside from turn them into decorations on necklaces like the Saxons did)

These questions could equally be asked of the Vietnamese.

In general, I'd expect Vietnamese* to want Chinese currency from the Chinese, as they'd have been more familiar with it, and there would have been more of it.

Well, given how much gems and other resources from Afghanistan were found in Pharonic Egypt, such as famously in Tut's tomb, how big was the Afghani community on the Nile?

That doesn't seem like a good-faith argument. There is a difference between a) Roman currency occuring in a place where there's multiple independent forms of evidence that Romans were, and b) Afghan gems occuring in a place where it's independently unlikely that Afghans were (in any number). Gems and other minerals are more easily and widely traded than currency, and frequently travel immense distances.

And the people are Afghans. Afghanis are the unit of currency.

- The Chinese also record Indian visitors in this era coming via Vietnam, rather than via the western route. This would suggest that the sea route from India to China was known about in this era (as it clearly was to the Arabs a few centuries later), even if nobody told Ptolemy about it.

Wait...so does this mean that bananas and birds of paradise reached Rome via Romanovietnamese traders, and not Rome and New Guinea linked as two ends of a trade route?

Bananas were not invented until the 19th century. Romans did eat plantains, but by this point they'd been eaten in the middle east for more than a thousand years. Apparently Romans got them from Egypt, but they were also definitely grown in India at that time.

I've no knowledge birds of paradise in Rome; you clearly know more than me. So far as I know there's no reason to think Romans reached new guinea; few people did, and bird of paradise feathers were very expensive even in east asia, let alone in rome.

[Khemehekis]

I've no knowledge birds of paradise in Rome; you clearly know more than me. So far as I know there's no reason to think Romans reached new guinea; few people did, and bird of paradise feathers were very expensive even in east asia, let alone in rome.

I had never heard of this either. Maybe Keenir read that the Romans imported birds-of-paradise, and misinterpreted this as New Guinean birds, but actually it was strelitziaceous flowers traded from Africa?

[Ælfwine]

Probably not the most original idea, but I've toyed with making a conlang that is the only surviving descendant of the East Germanic branch.

I've worked on a few of these, including modern Crimean Gothic.

[Ælfwine]

I was reading the wikipedia page on the Azores recently and I found this quip:

"According to a 2015 paper published in Journal of Evolutionary Biology, research based on mouse mitochondrial DNA points to a Scandinavian rather than Portuguese origin of the local mouse population.[9][10] Some years later, a 2021 paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, using data from lake sediment core sampling suggests brush-clearing was undertaken and animal husbandry introduced between 700 and 850 C.E.[11] Together, these findings suggest a brief period of Norse settlement and the 2021 paper further cites climate simulations carried out that suggest the dominant winds in the North Atlantic Ocean in that period blew from the northeast, which would have taken Viking ships heading southwest from Scandinavia more or less directly to the Azores.[11]"

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azores

So, Norse Azores anyone?

[Keenir]

I've no knowledge birds of paradise in Rome; you clearly know more than me. So far as I know there's no reason to think Romans reached new guinea; few people did, and bird of paradise feathers were very expensive even in east asia, let alone in rome.

I had never heard of this either. Maybe Keenir read that the Romans imported birds-of-paradise, and misinterpreted this as New Guinean birds, but actually it was strelitziaceous flowers traded from Africa?

The way I learned it was this:
At one point, the Romans (republic or empire) were aware of aware of bananas and gave them the name Musa (bear in mind this is all via my memory, so spelling is right out the window)...later on, when my belief in such a trade route flagged, I was informed that, yes, the route did in fact exist, and it was also how the Birds of Paradise were brought to the awareness of Romans and their neighbors, in the form of a bird which had no feet and therefore lived in Heaven (when it was actually footless because of how it was caught)

Back then, I was told that the trade route was mostly by sea...but even then, there were a few stopovers on a mainland or island somewhere between New Guinea and ports on Arabia and the Red Sea that traded with Rome. Under Salmoneus' account of events, the Roman traders could pick up the birds and bananas as they go to and from Vietnam.

Yes; but the more direct the contact, the moe likely it is for sizeable amount of currency to end up somewhere - I'm not aware, for instance, of Roman currency being found in eastern Siberia, though the same via-china route would be possible.

Possible, yes...but did Eastern Siberians want Chinese goods or Chinese coins? (and if they only used Chinese coins with the Chinese, what exactly would they do with Roman coins? Aside from turn them into decorations on necklaces like the Saxons did)

These questions could equally be asked of the Vietnamese.

True, there is the question of what good a Roman coin is, in a place that does no business with Rome or her trading partners. (or so my logic would run, had you never mentioned Vietnam being home to Roman communities; I would very much enjoy reading about these archeological discoveries)

In general, I'd expect Vietnamese* to want Chinese currency from the Chinese, as they'd have been more familiar with it, and there would have been more of it.

Well, given how much gems and other resources from Afghanistan were found in Pharonic Egypt, such as famously in Tut's tomb, how big was the Afghani community on the Nile?

That doesn't seem like a good-faith argument. There is a difference between a) Roman currency occuring in a place where there's multiple independent forms of evidence that Romans were,

I confess I've never heard of Romans being in Vietnam. Even with China, I heard of it in the context of "the Romans got this far because Crassus' army got captured and sold far away."

Though, the obvious question is, if the Romans have a trade route of their own, why would Chinese traders try to go overland through Persia to get to the markets of Rome...when the Roman traders are right there, in what we used to call spitting distance of them.

and b) Afghan gems occuring in a place where it's independently unlikely that Afghans were (in any number). Gems and other minerals are more easily and widely traded than currency, and frequently travel immense distances.

Don't Saxon and Roman coins and trade goods show up in the Nordic countries well after the fall of Rome, at the same time that amber beads are showing up in what had been Roman Britain?

And the people are Afghans. Afghanis are the unit of currency.

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."
{Babylon 5 took that and ran with it}

* = I think it was even mentioned in the LCK.

[Khemehekis]

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."
{Babylon 5 took that and ran with it}

* = I think it was even mentioned in the LCK.

Wouldn't that be "Afghanistani", then?

[Keenir]

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."
{Babylon 5 took that and ran with it}

* = I think it was even mentioned in the LCK.

Wouldn't that be "Afghanistani", then?

Afghan is a tribal group; analogies and examples rarely work out when I try to use them together. :)
(though I suppose your suggestion would work, to refer to someone from there)

[Dormouse559]

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."

-i is used in a lot of demonyms, but "Pakistan" — I assume because of its unique etymology — is the only "-stan" country that commonly forms its demonym with that suffix. Uzbekistan -> Uzbek, Turkmenistan-> Turkmen, Tajikistan -> Tajik, Kyrgyzstan -> Kyrgyz. "Afghani" and "Afghanistani" do exist, but they're a lot less common than "Afghan".

[Salmoneus]

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."
{Babylon 5 took that and ran with it}

* = I think it was even mentioned in the LCK.

Wouldn't that be "Afghanistani", then?

Afghan is a tribal group; analogies and examples rarely work out when I try to use them together. :)
(though I suppose your suggestion would work, to refer to someone from there)

Wiktionary says of 'Afghani' in this sense: "uncommon and deprecated by some style guides". In my experience it's also strongly deprecated by Afghans and people who work with Afghans, who don't generally like white Westerners inventing names for them as though they're conlanging.

[there's not even the sort of political justification there might be with, say, Uzbek. Not all people from Uzbekistan are ethnically Uzbek, so someone might find it helpful to talk about a non-Uzbek 'Uzbekistani', even if it's non-standard. But 'Afghan' isn't a tribal term - anyone from Afghanistan is an Afghan, whether they're Tajik or Pashtun or anything else. So there is literally no purpose for a word "Afghani" (other than its established meaning as a coin).]

[WeepingElf]

Wiktionary says of 'Afghani' in this sense: "uncommon and deprecated by some style guides". In my experience it's also strongly deprecated by Afghans and people who work with Afghans, who don't generally like white Westerners inventing names for them as though they're conlanging.

Afghani, as you say below, is the name of the Afghan currency unit. Perhaps the Afghans don't like being mistaken for their money, especially if that money is not worth very much?

[there's not even the sort of political justification there might be with, say, Uzbek. Not all people from Uzbekistan are ethnically Uzbek, so someone might find it helpful to talk about a non-Uzbek 'Uzbekistani', even if it's non-standard. But 'Afghan' isn't a tribal term - anyone from Afghanistan is an Afghan, whether they're Tajik or Pashtun or anything else. So there is literally no purpose for a word "Afghani" (other than its established meaning as a coin).]

This reminds me of something I found in a German-language journal on Eastern European politics. Instead of Russische Föderation they wrote Russländische Föderation. Of course, this reflects the difference between the two Russian adjectives russkij 'pertaining to the Russian ethnic group or language' and rossijskij 'pertaining to the Russian state'; and the state is named Rossijskaja Federacija. After all, not every Russian citizen (rossijskij) is an ethnic Russian (russkij), there are, as you certainly know, about a hundred ethnic minorities living in Russia.

[Keenir]

I was taught that -i is a reliable way of making a population from a group or state*. Ie, people from Pakistan are Pakistanis. You don't say "My neighbor is a Pakistan" you say "My neighbor is a Pakistani"...though you could say "My neighbor is an Afghan" or "My neighbor is an Afghani."
{Babylon 5 took that and ran with it}

* = I think it was even mentioned in the LCK.

Wouldn't that be "Afghanistani", then?

Afghan is a tribal group; analogies and examples rarely work out when I try to use them together. :)
(though I suppose your suggestion would work, to refer to someone from there)

Wiktionary says of 'Afghani' in this sense: "uncommon and deprecated by some style guides". In my experience it's also strongly deprecated by Afghans and people who work with Afghans, who don't generally like white Westerners inventing names for them as though they're conlanging.

White Westerners, eh? I knew that Lebanese were declared legally caucasians at one point in US history {it was an episode of either Who do you think you are? or Faces of America, interviewing Queen Noor}, but now all Arabic-speakers are white?
After all, from Wikipedia:

In Arabic names, a nisba (Arabic: نسبة nisbah, "attribution"), also rendered as nesba or nesbat, is an adjective indicating the person's place of origin, tribal affiliation, or ancestry, used at the end of the name and occasionally ending in the suffix -i for males and -iyyah for females. Nisba, originally an Arabic word, has been passed to many other languages such as Turkish, Persian, Bengali and Urdu.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nisba_(onomastics)

And before I found that, I was just going to mention to you that I'm 99% sure I learned about the -i and Afghan & Afghani from a childhood reading National Geographic magazines, and (i think, as i mentioned before) reinforced by the LCK or Langmaker.

So there is literally no purpose for a word "Afghani" (other than its established meaning as a coin).

I can understand that people might not like collective nouns of recent or nonrecent origin, and may seek to discourage others from using such nouns...thats fine, thats how pragmatics and such work, after all, as i understand. There are words that were applied to me when I was growing up, that dated to various parts of the early 20th and even mid-19th Century; but I never said they were not real words...though, to be fair, I never realized that that was an option. :)

[Salmoneus]

Arabic is not the language of Afghanistan; nor are we speaking Arabic. The suffix found in Arabic is not relevant here.

Neither (your memories of) National Geographic nor the LCK are authoritative sources. If they referred to the people of Afghanistan as 'Afghanis', they were wrong to do so.

It is true that the Arabic suffix is also found in Persian, Turkish and Urdu. But in all these languages the proper word for 'Afghan' is just (allowing for spelling and precise phonetic qualities) 'Afghan'. The name far predates the introduction of the suffix from Arabic, and the -an part of the name already serves the same function in any case.

'Afghani' is a word in Persian, but it's a derogatory word. In my experience, Afghans in the West generally do not like to be known by that word.

I feel that this has been explained adequately to you now. If you want to call people by ethnic slurs just because you think it would be cool to add an Arabic suffix you heard about from National Geographic onto a random ethnicity's name for literally no rational reason and you don't give a shit what they think about it, I guess that's up to you, although it would make you a bad person.

[Keenir]

Arabic is not the language of Afghanistan; nor are we speaking Arabic. The suffix found in Arabic is not relevant here.

I was under the impression that, if it is used by speakers of more than a particular language, then it is relevant -- I don't know about you, but I wager I don't speak the language that the -stan suffix comes from, and yet I find I can use it on country names with no problems.

Neither (your memories of) National Geographic nor the LCK are authoritative sources. If they referred to the people of Afghanistan as 'Afghanis', they were wrong to do so.

It is true that the Arabic suffix is also found in Persian, Turkish and Urdu. But in all these languages the proper word for 'Afghan' is just (allowing for spelling and precise phonetic qualities) 'Afghan'. The name far predates the introduction of the suffix from Arabic, and the -an part of the name already serves the same function in any case.

I knew none of that.

'Afghani' is a word in Persian, but it's a derogatory word.

I did not know that.

I feel that this has been explained adequately to you now. If you want to call people by ethnic slurs just because you think it would be cool to add an Arabic suffix you heard about from National Geographic onto a random ethnicity's name for literally no rational reason and you don't give a shit what they think about it, I guess that's up to you, although it would make you a bad person.

Up until just now, nobody in this conversation had said that it was a slur. You yourself had said that persons you were familiar with, simply prefered not to be called that. That in and of itself is not indicating a word is a slur...and at no point in this conversation or in my lifetime, was I aware that it was a slur.

Nor did you say earlier that it was an ethnic slur - I suspect that that would have ended the conversation then and there.

[Keenir]

Salmoneus,

If, at the outset of this discussion, you had simply said using -i turns a noun into a slur, I would have been startled, surprised, and shocked. yes...on par with when you mentioned that the Roman Republic/Empire had trading communities/colonies in Vietnam...

...but I would have believed you, and ended the discussion before it became a discussion.

Because I cannot remember you or anyone else here or on the ZBB ever lying to me. So I believe you, all of you, when any of you tell me something.

Including this.

[Ælfwine]

An interesting thought that occurred to me earlier on when working on my native american influenced vinlandic conlang.

A creole descendant of 17th century English and Algonquian, presuming a different outcome from the failed Roanoke colony. Algonquian would be the superstrate and English the substrate

[Omzinesý]

A Finnic lang where inessive and illative merge as well as adessive and allative.

maja 'house'
Iness maja-s <= maja-ssa
Illat maja-s <= maja-sse (at least Estonian has this)
Elat maja-st <= maja-sta
Adess maja-l <= maja-lla
Allat maja-l <= maja-lle(k)
Abl maja-lt <= maja-lta

If goal and location cases merge, verb-framing should also develop.

[Ælfwine]

Thinking again of a romlang, except perhaps nestled somewhere in North Italy, amongst all those other weird and wonderful Italian dialects there. Key feature might be a shift of stress to the initial syllable due to widespread pretonic syncope.

A Finnic lang where inessive and illative merge as well as adessive and allative.

maja 'house'
Iness maja-s <= maja-ssa
Illat maja-s <= maja-sse (at least Estonian has this)
Elat maja-st <= maja-sta
Adess maja-l <= maja-lla
Allat maja-l <= maja-lle(k)
Abl maja-lt <= maja-lta

If goal and location cases merge, verb-framing should also develop.

Wonderful!

[Visions1]

If I could suggest something: Make it a Tyrrhenian-Latin creole.

[VaptuantaDoi]

Thinking again of a romlang, except perhaps nestled somewhere in North Italy, amongst all those other weird and wonderful Italian dialects there. Key feature might be a shift of stress to the initial syllable due to widespread pretonic syncope.

Gotta love a romlang with initial stress