conlang
oh gosh, this looks way more complicated on the screen than it does on paper...
(this is the table of endings for verbs, which indicate Evidentiality and Epistemic Modality)
conlang
(in this thread, any words that I put with a Capital letter at the start are ones that you can look up on wikipedia and get a fairly understandable explanation)
conlang | explaining that table [1]
the – before the letters just means that it's a suffix (they're all suffixes)
following that is the optional vowel. This vowel is inserted in between the verb and the rest of the suffix, but ONLY if the vowel's absence would break the pronounciation rules.
Each of the optional vowels has an acute accent above it, which means that it is associated with a high tone. Any vowels without an accent above them have a low tone.
conlang | explaining that table [2]
after the optional vowel comes the actual suffix, which (with the exception of the "surprised but believe it's true" form of the Reported evidential ending) is a consonant cluster.
tɬ and ʈʂ are single consonants rather than 2 (voiecless alveolar lateral affricate and voiceless retroflex affricate)
conlang | a very early draft
A very early draft describing the language is available here:
https://averylychee.neocities.org/languages/lang3/
(this link is not a permalink! Once I come up with a name for the language, it will move to a different address – if you're reading this in the future, scroll down this thread to find the more up to date link)
Let me know if I've made any mistakes or if there are any things that need clarifying ♥
conlang | request for resources/help
hmm... I'm concerned that my tense/aspect/mode system is unconciously tending towards the way Germanic languages work.
Does anyone have any good references for Tense and Aspect systems that aren't like English? Either from the perspective of creating a conlang, or from grammars of real languages.
conlang | "how do I make my own conlang?"
Since I was asked "how do you even manage to start a conlang?", here's my answer:
It's kind of like worldbuilding, in that you can either do a vague overview and just give the impression of a language, or you can delve into the depths and build a complex beast.
The way I started was with this guide: http://zompist.com/kit.html
(the first paragraph-ish is just an add for future books, the actual guide starts with the italics text)
conlang | "how do I make my own conlang?"
even though my current conlang is called "unnamed language 3", it's actually my 6th conlang in the past 5 years. If you start making your own and need some help, I'm very happy to help you out with anything!
conlang | naming
part of why my current language doesn't have a name is because it's very difficult to come up with a name that works in both the language itself and in English, since the sounds they have in common are:
/p/, /m/, /i/, /a/
And while I could name it something like "pami", I feel like this language would have a much longer name.
conlang | now named (new link)
The language has been named and moved to a new page:
https://averylychee.neocities.org/languages/tlueqto/
I don't yet know what tɬɯ́qʈɤ means (if it even means anything at all), but that's what it's called!
conlang (Tlueqto)
I'm really tempted to put reduplication into Tlueqto, but I'm not sure what I would do with it.
And I really don't want to accidentally make a kitchen-sink language (a language where you just throw in every single linguistic concept you learn about)
conlang (Tlueqto) | grammatical vowel harmony
So tɬɯ́qtɤ has vowel harmony (meaning there are 2 categories of vowels, and a word can only ever contain vowels form one category or the other, not from both) but unlike real world languages the vowel harmony actually has a grammatical effect on the word.
So for example, pɛɬá is cat (all vowels are front vowels), and pɤɬʌ́ is cats (all vowels are back vowels).
But, this is not particularly realistic...
(continued)
conlang (Tlueqto) | grammatical vowel harmony
In real life languages with complex vowel changes, these were historically created by a affix that, after several sound changes, was dropped at some point.
So, in order for my vowel harmony system to actually exist, it can't have occurred intentionally – it must have been the consequence of a historical affix.
(continued)
conlang (Tlueqto) | grammatical vowel harmony
So, here's my idea: historically, the affix /nɯ-/ was attached to the front of nouns to form the plural, and because this contains /ɯ/ (a back vowel) the rest of the word is forced to be all back vowels (because of vowel harmony).
so (originally), to pluralise /pɛɬá/, you would say /nɯpɤɬʌ́/
But hundreds of years of language change meant that the /nɯ/ ended up being dropped, and the only difference between singular and plural is the vowels inside.
conlang (Tlueqto) | grammatical vowel harmony
Any thoughts? Does this feel natural?
conlang (Tlueqto)
My main problem is inventing words.
Coming up with grammar rules is easy. But words? They're just arbitrary collections of sounds. It's really hard to come up with sounds to associate with a concept.
Like, consider these words in English, Chinese, Arabic, and Tlueqto:
book — shū — kitab — wátɬym
rice — báifàn — 'arz — sø
lizard — xīyì — sahalia — çɛɻtɛɬá
It's all arbitrary sounds that we've decided means the thing it means! There's no reason for them to be like that!
conlang (Tlueqto)
I need to figure out a bunch more history of words, though it's hard to do that when you only have 11 words total.
I have got a relation between ʈʂʌʂ "hills", ʈʂaʈʂí "mountain", and ɤ́ʈʂʌʈʂɤ́ "city".
The main word for a home is actually qaʔatɛ́n, but that only refers to homes that can be moved (like tents or caravans). Most of the speakers of Tlueqto are nomadic, but a few have created unmoveable homes (usually either carved out of cliffsides or made out of stone.)
conlang (Tlueqto → tlýqdo)
I think I've got a half decent romanisation of the language going.
Previously, I'd just write it out phonemically:
sácinátɬ ɛ́ʈʂaʈʂɛ́
which is accurate, but hard to type. Now I can write it as:
sákinátl écacé
Which is much easier.
The main problem with writing this way is my brain starts wanting to pronounce it more like English, which is wrong and bad.
tlýqdo (conlang)
I think I might make a few changes soon:
• More tones! 2 tones (high and low) is fine, but I find myself wanting to have syllables with rising or falling tones.
• /ʋ/ is going to become /w/, partly because it's much easier for me to pronounce, partly because I think it's a bit more believable, and partly because I'm considering making labialisation a contrastive feature.
• 2 of the vowels are going to be dropped, so it will be a 7 vowel language instead of a 9 vowel one.
tlýqdo (conlang) | An aside: romanisation
I should say: whatever romanisation* I come up with, it's solely for my benefit (and the reader's benefit).
The world that tlýqdo speakers come from is not our own, and Rome never existed there.
The actual writing system of tlýqdo is a vertical writing system (similar to the Mongolian or Clear script, (see image)).
*romanisation: the transcription of a language into the Roman alphabet (the one we use in English!)
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@lizardsquid There's the historical reason, and relations to other things. Arabic and other Semitic languages in particular are pretty explicit with that, with triliteral roots
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@Rosemary well sure, you can trace back the history of the word and related words in a language.
But there's nothing in the real world that indicates that a book should be associated with the sounds "kitab".
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@lizardsquid There's actually some debate on that topic, I believe. Onomatopoeic words are a good counterexample, and some people think that there's some actual connection between sounds and traits. Have you heard of the bouba-kiki effect?
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@Rosemary yes, bouba-kiki is interesting!
But the effect isn't very strong - if it was, every language's vocabulary would sound somewhat similar.
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@Rosemary I guess my point is "onomatopoeia doesn't help me if I'm coming up with words for things that aren't sounds, and word history doesn't help me when I have to actually invent that history myself"
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@lizardsquid Fair enough. Inventing relations between words would be helpful, though. I'd almost say that you need to invent a linguistic history to have a good conlang, but I suppose you could do without.
re: conlang (Tlueqto)
@Rosemary I am inventing some amount of history, it just takes a long time to do all that!
re: tlýqdo (conlang) | An aside: romanisation
@lizardsquid if you use reddit, do you know of r/neography? A whole group just for invented/inventing writing systems.
re: tlýqdo (conlang) | An aside: romanisation
@LilFluff I haven't heard of that, I'll check it out!
conlang (Tlueqto)
conlang stuff is fun, but it always takes me a long time