There are 12 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
From: Roman Rausch
1b. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
From: Matthew Boutilier
1c. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
From: Jörg Rhiemeier
1d. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
From: Roman Rausch
1e. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
From: Alex Fink
2a. Re: Allophony in Siye
From: Anthony Miles
3a. Re: Active/Stative Distinctions and Pronominal Prefixes
From: Anthony Miles
4a. Re: tense/aspect quirk
From: Anthony Miles
5a. True Blood Language?
From: John Erickson
5b. Re: True Blood Language?
From: Billy J.B.
5c. Re: True Blood Language?
From: Eric Christopherson
5d. Re: True Blood Language?
From: Ben Scerri
Messages
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1a. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
Posted by: "Roman Rausch" ara...@mail.ru
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 10:37 am ((PDT))
>Yes, I'm aware of the glottalic hypothesis. I used to view it favourably but
>now, at best, hold this pre-stage view: the glottalic theory may
>describe a stage of PIE before it had begun to break up, but even if so it
>isn't valid as an outcome of comparative reconstruction, only internal
>reconstruction. It's more problematic that ejectives should have been
>eliminated independently everywhere, as the (strong) glottalic theory
>needs, than that a language should have /t d d_h\/ as its three series.
I wonder why the same cannot be said about PIE laryngeals: It keeps bugging me
that they dissolve in vowels everywhere except for Anatolian (which, as
mentioned, seems to be an early split from PIE). Shouldn't one assume that they
had disappeared already in late PIE?
>I've e.g. also seen seriously proposed (I forget by whom) the idea that they
>were voiced spirants;
Doesn't one run into the problem that their reflexes are stops throughout?
Spirants don't seem to become stops very often - except maybe for interdental
ones ([θ] > [d]), but even in this case, there are several possibilities of
change into different spirants ([s], [f]).
>Come to think of it, this should shed light on *b > *w as well; we would have
>no *wReD but some √wReT √wReDh, and probably a bias
>against simple *weD too. Do we see that?
>... hm, "root" is *wreh2d-, isn't it. That's not promising.
But not every /w/ has to be a reflex of /b/, there may have been a merger of
original /b/ and /w/, right? So one is free to postulate early /b/ whenever it
fulfills the root restrictions, and /w/ otherwise. Also, /w/ may not be the
only outcome of /b/.
Messages in this topic (23)
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1b. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
Posted by: "Matthew Boutilier" bvticvlar...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 11:58 am ((PDT))
What I like most about the glottalic theory is that it actually accounts
for the absence of *b (i.e. */p?/) ... there is a very well established
phonetic explanation for the lack of a bilabial ejective rather than any
other ejective since -- the lips being farther from the glottis than the
teeth or soft palate or what have you -- the phonetic contrast between e.g.
/p?/ and /p/ is slighter and harder to perceive than that between e.g. /k?/
and /k/. Proto-Semitic for instance has */k?/ */t?/ (and a handful of
ejective fricatives, or affricates depending on whom you ask) but no */p?/.
If PIE had an ejective series it would be totally normal for */p?/ not to
be a part of it.
>I've e.g. also seen seriously proposed (I forget by whom) the idea that
> they were voiced spirants;
>
> Doesn't one run into the problem that their reflexes are stops throughout?
> Spirants don't seem to become stops very often - except maybe for
> interdental ones ([θ] > [d]), but even in this case, there are several
> possibilities of change into different spirants ([s], [f]).
>
I've heard this too. The best evidence for this (i.e. the only evidence I
can think of which may well not be the best out there) is in Germanic. When
the PIE voiceless stops -- sticking with the traditional nomenclature --
became voiceless fricatives (Grimm's Law) in Germanic, e.g. *p > *φ ; *t >
*θ ; *k > *x, they would then in certain environments become voiced
fricatives (Verner's Law) -- i.e. *φ > *β, *θ > *ð *x > *γ. The thing is
these new fricatives *merged* with the Germanic reflexes of the PIE
aspirated stops. So *dh (and sometimes *t) > *ð, etc. These voiced
fricatives generally become stops in West Germanic (English, German, etc.)
but Norse and Gothic give pretty good evidence for this
merger-as-fricatives. So it's not too far a leap to suggest maybe they were
*always* fricatives. [v] might not become [b] that often, but [β] certainly
does; the spirant > plosive thing might not be that much of a problem.
Come to think of it, this should shed light on *b > *w as well; we would
> have no *wReD but some √wReT √wReDh, and probably a bias against simple
> *weD too. Do we see that? ... hm, "root" is *wreh2d-, isn't it. That's
> not promising.
>
Yeah good point Alex.
I've always wondered about that restriction rule about two voiced stops in
one root. Has anybody ever concluded something noteworthy based on that? I
feel like that tells us a lot about the (original) pronunciation of those.
There was a change in East Semitic (which, as I said, had a bunch of
ejective phonemes) where the first of two ejectives in a single word would
de-glottalize and become ... well, normal, non-glottalic. PSem **qa****ṣ**
ārum* (q = [k?], ṣ = [s?])* >* Akkadian *ka**ṣārum* 'to tie' (this is
apparently called Geers' Law). It's similar to Grassmann's law in Greek and
Sanskrit but actually deals with glottalic consonants rather than
aspirates. There could have been something like Geers' law in
glottalic-theory-PIE!
matt
On Sun, Aug 12, 2012 at 12:37 PM, Roman Rausch <ara...@mail.ru> wrote:
> >Yes, I'm aware of the glottalic hypothesis. I used to view it favourably
> but now, at best, hold this pre-stage view: the glottalic theory may
> >describe a stage of PIE before it had begun to break up, but even if so
> it isn't valid as an outcome of comparative reconstruction, only internal
> >reconstruction. It's more problematic that ejectives should have been
> eliminated independently everywhere, as the (strong) glottalic theory
> >needs, than that a language should have /t d d_h\/ as its three series.
>
> I wonder why the same cannot be said about PIE laryngeals: It keeps
> bugging me that they dissolve in vowels everywhere except for Anatolian
> (which, as mentioned, seems to be an early split from PIE). Shouldn't one
> assume that they had disappeared already in late PIE?
>
> >I've e.g. also seen seriously proposed (I forget by whom) the idea that
> they were voiced spirants;
>
> Doesn't one run into the problem that their reflexes are stops throughout?
> Spirants don't seem to become stops very often - except maybe for
> interdental ones ([θ] > [d]), but even in this case, there are several
> possibilities of change into different spirants ([s], [f]).
>
> >Come to think of it, this should shed light on *b > *w as well; we would
> have no *wReD but some √wReT √wReDh, and probably a bias
> >against simple *weD too. Do we see that?
> >... hm, "root" is *wreh2d-, isn't it. That's not promising.
>
> But not every /w/ has to be a reflex of /b/, there may have been a merger
> of original /b/ and /w/, right? So one is free to postulate early /b/
> whenever it fulfills the root restrictions, and /w/ otherwise. Also, /w/
> may not be the only outcome of /b/.
>
Messages in this topic (23)
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1c. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
Posted by: "Jörg Rhiemeier" joerg_rhieme...@web.de
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 12:29 pm ((PDT))
Hallo conlangers!
On Sunday 12 August 2012 19:37:29 Roman Rausch wrote:
> >Yes, I'm aware of the glottalic hypothesis. I used to view it favourably
> >but now, at best, hold this pre-stage view: the glottalic theory may
> >describe a stage of PIE before it had begun to break up, but even if so
> >it isn't valid as an outcome of comparative reconstruction, only internal
> >reconstruction. It's more problematic that ejectives should have been
> >eliminated independently everywhere, as the (strong) glottalic theory
> >needs, than that a language should have /t d d_h\/ as its three series.
>
> I wonder why the same cannot be said about PIE laryngeals: It keeps bugging
> me that they dissolve in vowels everywhere except for Anatolian (which, as
> mentioned, seems to be an early split from PIE). Shouldn't one assume that
> they had disappeared already in late PIE?
It is tempting to think that way, but there are problems, such
as the Greek triple reflex, which proves that the three laryngeals
must still have been there in one form or another in Late PIE.
So the case of the laryngeals shows that sound changes in a dozen
branches of a family *can* "conspire" to eliminate a class of
phonemes from every single branch of a far-flung family.
> >I've e.g. also seen seriously proposed (I forget by whom) the idea that
> >they were voiced spirants;
>
> Doesn't one run into the problem that their reflexes are stops throughout?
> Spirants don't seem to become stops very often - except maybe for
> interdental ones ([θ] > [d]), but even in this case, there are several
> possibilities of change into different spirants ([s], [f]).
This is indeed a good reason to doubt that the traditional voiced
stops were fricatives. They are reflected as fricatives in *no*
early Indo-European language (some *modern* IE languages have
fricatives dating back to them, but these result from changes
that are accounted for). If there was any stop grade in PIE that
was close to being voiced fricatives, it was the breathy-voiced
one, not the plain voiced one. (Indeed, it has been proposed
that the breathy-voiced stops actually were voiced fricatives;
but I have forgotten who said that.)
> >Come to think of it, this should shed light on *b > *w as well; we would
> >have no *wReD but some √wReT √wReDh, and probably a bias against simple
> >*weD too. Do we see that?
> >... hm, "root" is *wreh2d-, isn't it. That's not promising.
>
> But not every /w/ has to be a reflex of /b/, there may have been a merger
> of original /b/ and /w/, right? So one is free to postulate early /b/
> whenever it fulfills the root restrictions, and /w/ otherwise. Also, /w/
> may not be the only outcome of /b/.
Yes. Even if */b/ merged with */w/ in Pre-PIE (which is so far
just a hypothesis, with not really that much speaking for it),
there is no reason to assume that every /w/ we see in PIE is an
earlier /b/.
I think the glottalic hypothesis makes a better account for the
absence of */b/ than any speculations about a /b/-/w/ merger.
If */b/ merged with */w/, why didn't */bh/? Also, as Alex says,
a chain shift /b/ > /bh/ > /w/ can be ruled out, as that would
have created irregularities in the root structure constraints
(which are in themselves a piece of evidence for glottalism).
In PIE, no two plain voiced stops occur in a single root, while
otherwise two stops in a root have to agree in their voicing
and aspiration. PIE */bh/ behaves as it should regarding these
rules, and not like */b/.
ObConlang: In my Hesperic family, which is meant to be a sister
group of IE, I work with the glottalic hypothesis thus that I
accept it for Pre-PIE; in Hesperic, the glottalic stops lost
their glottalization and the plain voiceless stops are aspirated.
There are similar pieces of evidence for former glottalization
in Hesperic as there are in IE (e.g., near absence of */p/;
root structure constraints that forbid two neutral stops in a
root, while aspirated stops do not co-occur with voiced stops;
absence of neutral stops in inflectional affixes).
--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html
"Bêsel asa Éam, a Éam atha cvanthal a cvanth atha Éamal." - SiM 1:1
Messages in this topic (23)
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1d. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
Posted by: "Roman Rausch" ara...@mail.ru
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 2:11 pm ((PDT))
>It is tempting to think that way, but there are problems, such
>as the Greek triple reflex, which proves that the three laryngeals
>must still have been there in one form or another in Late PIE.
>So the case of the laryngeals shows that sound changes in a dozen
>branches of a family *can* "conspire" to eliminate a class of
>phonemes from every single branch of a far-flung family.
'In one form or another' - so why not in an already vocalized form?
>I think the glottalic hypothesis makes a better account for the
>absence of */b/ than any speculations about a /b/-/w/ merger.
>If */b/ merged with */w/, why didn't */bh/?
Well, gaps in plosives are widespread, so asymmetric sound changes that lead to
them are nothing new in general. Without knowing a language with voiced
aspirated stops to any reasonable degree, it is hard for me to apply any
intuition to say what would be natural here. But there is still the possibility
that /b/ had disappeared before /bh/ was acquired (is there any theory on how
*that* happened, btw?).
Also, A. Sihler mentions another argument in favour of /b/ > /w/ (p. 146),
namely lots of homophone roots in /w/- , more than with any other initial
sound, apparently.
Messages in this topic (23)
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1e. Re: PIE stops (was: Allophony in Siye)
Posted by: "Alex Fink" 000...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 2:38 pm ((PDT))
On Sun, 12 Aug 2012 13:37:29 -0400, Roman Rausch <ara...@mail.ru> wrote:
>>Yes, I'm aware of the glottalic hypothesis. I used to view it favourably but
>>now, at best, hold this pre-stage view: the glottalic theory may
>>describe a stage of PIE before it had begun to break up, but even if so it
>>isn't valid as an outcome of comparative reconstruction, only internal
>>reconstruction. It's more problematic that ejectives should have been
>>eliminated independently everywhere, as the (strong) glottalic theory
>>needs, than that a language should have /t d d_h\/ as its three series.
>
>I wonder why the same cannot be said about PIE laryngeals: It keeps bugging me
>that they dissolve in vowels everywhere except for Anatolian (which, as
>mentioned, seems to be an early split from PIE). Shouldn't one assume that
>they had disappeared already in late PIE?
One of the most intriguing bits of evidence, hinting at a consonantal (probably
velar?) nature even late, is Cowgill's law in Germanic: to wit, PIE *h3 (and
maybe *h2) > PGmc *k when following a sonorant and preceding *w.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowgill's_law#Cowgill.27s_law_in_Germanic
>>I've e.g. also seen seriously proposed (I forget by whom) the idea that they
>>were voiced spirants;
>
>Doesn't one run into the problem that their reflexes are stops throughout?
Yes, this also falls into the province of internal reconstruction. It's even
less plausible to have survived to the point of breakup.
>>Come to think of it, this should shed light on *b > *w as well; we would have
>>no *wReD but some √wReT √wReDh, and probably a bias
>>against simple *weD too. Do we see that?
>>... hm, "root" is *wreh2d-, isn't it. That's not promising.
>
>But not every /w/ has to be a reflex of /b/, there may have been a merger of
>original /b/ and /w/, right? So one is free to postulate early /b/ whenever it
>fulfills the root restrictions, and /w/ otherwise.
Yes; that's why I said "a bias against". But the presentation of this I saw
thought to completely explain all *wl *wr as from **bl **br ('cause their
presence is kinda anomalous in the rest of the phonotactics), so at least
_that_ form of the idea is sunk.
Or, as Matt speculates, the process that introduced the *DeD constraint could
have come late, if the *D series was glottalised or something else prone to
dissimilation at a distance (i.e. whose auditory cues are diffuse in time). It
may've thus been later than imagined *b > *w.
Alex
Messages in this topic (23)
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2a. Re: Allophony in Siye
Posted by: "Anthony Miles" mamercu...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 1:35 pm ((PDT))
I've thought this through, and here's what I think happened:
There were two dialects, henceforth referred to as Dialect A and Dialect B,
which were closely related descendents of Old Siye (I have taken the suggestion
that [ti] > [si] in the shift from Tiye to Old Siye), both spoken in the
Central Province where the "capital" developed. Dialect A had the following
rules:
[p] > [t_C]/_ [i]
[p] > [p\]/_[u]
[t] > [t_s]/_[u]
[k] > [t_S]/_[i]
[k] > [x]/_[u]
[s] > [S]/_[i]
Dialect B had gone further and thus had the following rules:
[p] > [C]/_ [i][
[p] > [p\]/_[u]
[t] > [s]/_[u]
[k] > [S]/_[i]
[k] > [x]/_[u]
[s] > [S]/_[i]
When the "capital" grew, commercial lines extended, and there was a need for
standardization, the powers that be decided that /si/ was [Si], /ku/ was [xu],
and /pu/ was [p\u]. Furthermore, /tu/ was to be pronounced [t_su] because
Dialect B's neutralization of /tu/ and /su/ had obscured the distinction
between the allative and ablative directions /tu/ and /su/, which disambiguated
such words as /lesupu-su-ma/ 'I go' and /lesupu-tu-ma/ 'I come', and even more
importantly, /eletompu-su-na/ 'I sold it' and /eletompu-tu-na/ 'I bought it'.
The syntax can compensate, but the powers that be deemed this insufficient.
Once that matter was settled, the only two divergent pronunciations were /pi/
[t_C] or [C] and /ki/ [t_S] or [S]. The representatives of each dialect decided
that each dialect would get one "syllable" (the Siye writing system is a
syllabary). After much discussion, the representatives decided that /ki/ would
be pronounced [t_Si] in order to distinguish it from /si/ [Si]; this meant that
/pi/ was now officially pronounced [Ci]. Then the representatives of the two
dialects set up the Guild of Scholars to promulgate proper speech throughout
the Valley, or at least proper pronunciation. Unfortunately the growth of the
city meant that many less well-spoken Siye-speakers moved to the city and
confused [C] and [S], so that /pi/ and /si/ were (mis)pronounced identically.
It is the mark of a well-spoken city dweller to distinguish [C] and [S].
(As you can see, the Siye-speakers take their language very, very seriously,
almost as seriously as they take commerce.)
Messages in this topic (23)
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3a. Re: Active/Stative Distinctions and Pronominal Prefixes
Posted by: "Anthony Miles" mamercu...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 1:48 pm ((PDT))
Yes, the 1st and 2nd person were there before I began transformations in my
thought-experiment that led to C081812 - IMHO it's more naturalistic to have
bumps like this. As for options, I like four and five. I'll use four for now in
any translation exercises, so that these are grammatical:
1-walk 'I walk'
1-sleep DAT 1 'I sleep'
I would like to use option five, but I need to figure the metaphors
C081812-speakers live by. To the active-stative-language-speaker's mind, I
assume 'sleep' is something that (albeit temporarily) has more agency than the
1st or 2nd person. Does it capture you? Hold you? Protect you? Seduce you?
Perhaps I should examine the stock of active verbs to see what metaphors
already exist.
Messages in this topic (5)
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4a. Re: tense/aspect quirk
Posted by: "Anthony Miles" mamercu...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 2:30 pm ((PDT))
First of all, I have to say that the name VAN is much better than BUN.
My conlang Na'gifi Fasu'xa does a similar thing in terms of tense and relative
tense (the Pi'naax, who speak Na'gifi Fasu'xa, don't seem to be very interested
in aspect). Typographically, this is indicated by indentation, in speech by a
pause:
u'pmanu ixpunu' ta'kafi xiupfi.
a'fussi atakmi' fa'suak ka'naux.
The father will advocate on behalf of (his) daughter, (because) (she) had
shared medicines reluctantly (with) the villagers.
u'pmanu ixpunu' ta'kafi xiupfi.
advocate.on.behalf.of-ACT.VB-M.SG FUT-M.SG parent-N-M.SG child-N-F.SG
a'fussi atakmi' fa'suak ka'naux.
share.reluctantly-ACT.VB-F.SG PST-F.SG medicine-M.PL villager-M.PL
Messages in this topic (2)
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5a. True Blood Language?
Posted by: "John Erickson" john.erickson.so...@gmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 8:20 pm ((PDT))
Does anyone know what language the vampire authority on True Blood is
using? Is it a natlang or a conlang?
Messages in this topic (4)
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5b. Re: True Blood Language?
Posted by: "Billy J.B." ad...@caudimordax.org
Date: Sun Aug 12, 2012 11:57 pm ((PDT))
>From the comments it appears someone pointed out that it was Aramaic, I
think.
On Aug 13, 2012 6:29 AM, "Eric Christopherson" <ra...@charter.net> wrote:
> On Aug 12, 2012, at 10:20 PM, John Erickson wrote:
>
> > Does anyone know what language the vampire authority on True Blood is
> > using? Is it a natlang or a conlang?
>
> Apparently it's bastardized Hebrew (I recognized a few words and thought
> maybe it was real Hebrew), and not everyone's pleased:
> http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/103445/hbos-true-blood-libel
Messages in this topic (4)
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5c. Re: True Blood Language?
Posted by: "Eric Christopherson" ra...@charter.net
Date: Mon Aug 13, 2012 12:15 am ((PDT))
On Aug 12, 2012, at 10:20 PM, John Erickson wrote:
> Does anyone know what language the vampire authority on True Blood is
> using? Is it a natlang or a conlang?
Apparently it's bastardized Hebrew (I recognized a few words and thought maybe
it was real Hebrew), and not everyone's pleased:
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/103445/hbos-true-blood-libel
Messages in this topic (4)
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5d. Re: True Blood Language?
Posted by: "Ben Scerri" psykieki...@gmail.com
Date: Mon Aug 13, 2012 1:35 am ((PDT))
Aye, from what I know of Aramaic, it looks closish to that. However, I
don't know much about Aramaic, nor Hebrew, which is derivative of it, so I
guess that doesn't help much.
Regardless, I think that same comment, and further comments are correct;
the OP author is being incredibly touchy and I think reading into something
which perhaps isn't there.
On 13 August 2012 16:30, Billy J.B. <ad...@caudimordax.org> wrote:
> From the comments it appears someone pointed out that it was Aramaic, I
> think.
> On Aug 13, 2012 6:29 AM, "Eric Christopherson" <ra...@charter.net> wrote:
>
> > On Aug 12, 2012, at 10:20 PM, John Erickson wrote:
> >
> > > Does anyone know what language the vampire authority on True Blood is
> > > using? Is it a natlang or a conlang?
> >
> > Apparently it's bastardized Hebrew (I recognized a few words and thought
> > maybe it was real Hebrew), and not everyone's pleased:
> >
> http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/103445/hbos-true-blood-libel
>
Messages in this topic (4)
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