Project Tumbleweed

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VaptuantaDoi
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Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Now revisited just over a year later. See newer posts for up-to-date information.
Spoiler:
I've decided to go for something a bit different (for me at least) and make an Australian-inspired language family with big consonant inventories and plenty of agglutination. I'm calling it Tumbleweed because I think it sounds cool and I can't think of anything else to call it.


Proto-Tumbleweed

1. Phonology
Tumbleweed is something different for me, inspired by Australian languages. It has a lot of consonants, not many vowels and strict restrictions on word formation. Other distinctive features include three series of stops with no plain voiceless ones, eight pre-stopped consonants (inspired by Kaurna) and uvular nasals.

1.1 Consonant inventory
Proto-Tumbleweed (PT) had 46 consonants

/d ɖ ɟ ɡ ɡʷ ɢ ɢʷ/
/n͡t ɳ͡ʈ ɲ͡c ŋ͡k ŋ͡kʷ ɴ͡q ɴ͡qʷ/
/n͡d ɳ͡ɖ ɲ͡ɟ ŋ͡ɡ ŋ͡ɡʷ ɴ͡ɢ ɴ͡ɢʷ/
/d͡l ɖ͡ɭ ɟ͡ʎ ɡ͡ʟ/
/d͡n ɖ͡ɳ ɟ͡ɲ ɡ͡ŋ/
/l ɭ (ʎ)/
/n ɳ ɲ ŋ ŋʷ ɴ ɴʷ/
/ɾ ɻ j ɰ w ʁ ʁʷ/

/ʎ/ only occurred in suffixes as a result of laminal harmony. The three series of coronals were laminal dental, apical retroflex and laminal palatal.

1.2 Vowel inventory
PT only had two vowels

/i ɑ/

These likely had a lot of allophonic variation, with /i/ being [i~e~ɛ] and /ɑ/ being [a~ɑ~ʌ]. There were no rounded vowels. Although there were no diphthongs, there was the sequence /ɑji/ which may have become monosyllabic [ɑe̯] allophonically.

1.3 Word structure
Word structure was quite restrictive.

1.3.1 Syllable structure
Word-initially, only approximants (/ɾ ɻ j ɰ w ʁ ʁʷ/) or stop-initial segments (/d ɖ ɟ ɡ ɡʷ ɢ ɢʷ d͡l ɖ͡ɭ ɟ͡ʎ ɡ͡ʟ d͡n ɖ͡ɳ ɟ͡ɲ ɡ͡ŋ/) could occur; word-internally any consonant could occur. Every syllable was CV with an obligatory onset.

1.3.2 Word length restrictions
All words had to be an even number of syllables. This meant that all nouns were even-syllable roots, and all verbs were odd-syllabled roots with obligatory odd-syllabled affixes.

1.3.3 Laminal harmony
In a word, only consonants from one series of laminals (i.e. dental or palatal) could occur; this caused assimilation of affixes which is the only source of /ʎ/.

1.3.4 Vowel harmony
All vowels other than the first vowel in a word had to be the same, including suffixes. This means that all suffixes are unspecified for vowel quality and just assimilate to the second vowel of the root.

1.3.5 Word structure strings
Word structure can be defined as CaVaCbVb(CcVbCdVb... CeVbCfVb), such that Ca is any permissible word-initial consonant.

1.4 Prosody
There was probably some form of strict prosodic pattern in PT which incentivised the even syllable word length, but I’m not sure what it was yet. I’ll have to read up on Yidiny.

1.5 Orthography
PT is written with an Australianist-based orthography. Dentals are written Ch, palatals Cy and uvulars rC.

⟨dh d dy g gw rg rgw⟩
⟨nth nt nty ngk ngkw rnq rnqw⟩
⟨ndh nd ndy ngg nggw rng rngw⟩
⟨dlh dl dly gl⟩
⟨dnh dn dny gng⟩
⟨lh l ly⟩
⟨nh n ny ng ngw rn rnw⟩
⟨rh r y gh w rr rw⟩

The vowels are obviously written ⟨i a⟩.

Edit: Switched around everything to make it only even-syllabled


Descendants
I've got a couple of ideas for descendants, for example:
  • A split based on how the stop series evolve (kinda like IE)
  • A split based on where the vowel inventory will be retained as /i (e) ɑ/, or expanded to /i ʉ (e) ɔ a/
  • Innovation of a prestopped approximant series /d͡ɾ ɖ͡ɻ ɟ͡j ɡ͡ɰ (ɡʷ͡w ɢ͡ʁ ɢʷ͡ʁʷ)/
  • A shift of /d̻ ɖ ɟ ɡ ɢ/ → /d̪ ɖ d̠ ɟ ɡ/
  • Syncope
  • Non-contrastive pitch-accent based on how prosody evolved alongside syncope
Coming next, some grammar!
Last edited by VaptuantaDoi on 01 Dec 2022 01:44, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by DV82LECM »

Yay, I liked this one.
𖥑𖧨𖣫𖦺𖣦𖢋𖤼𖥃𖣔𖣋𖢅𖡹𖡨𖡶𖡦𖡧𖡚𖠨
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

PT is going to be polysynthetic. And I mean really polysynthetic. I haven't finished all the verbal morphology, but here's a taste of what's to come:

Dnhangwirgwagarnqwadhawidhinthidnhagwintinqwarhiwarngwi?
/d̪͡n̪ɑŋʷiɢʷɑɡɑɴ͡qʷɑd̪ɑwid̪in̪͡t̪id̪͡n̪ɑɡʷiɳ͡ʈiɴ͡qʷɑɾ̪iwɑɴ͡ɢʷi/
“Have they recently finished breaking the big trees by the lake?”

The split-S alignment is doing my head in so I'm gonna leave that for tomorrow.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Probably all out of date
Spoiler:
Morphology

PT – and all of its descendants – was highly polysynthetic; it had an extensive TAM marking system, polypersonal agreement, noun incorporation and an open class of proclitics. Almost all the marking was on verbs; while a verb could theoretically contain up to about fourteen morphemes (it's hard to reconstruct based on the inconsistencies surrounding clitics in descendants), free nouns were restricted to only a few suffixes. I'll get to noun morphology later because it's not as interesting. Sources of inspiration are of course this thread from the old ZBB by Whimemsz, and several natlangs including Berik and Bininj Gun-Wok.

Verbal morphology

To start with, I'll break down the verb I posted a few days ago. Actually I got that one wrong; the original would read “have the things recently finished breaking those big tree-people by the lake?”. Here's the correct version:
Dnhangwirgwagarnqwadhawidhinthidnhagwintinqwawa?
/d̪͡n̪ɑŋʷiɢʷɑɡɑɴ͡qʷɑd̪ɑwid̪in̪͡t̪id̪͡n̪ɑɡʷiɳ͡ʈiɴ͡qʷɑwɑ/
“Have they recently finished breaking the big trees by the lake?”
This can be divided into eleven morphemes; two lexical roots, two clitics and seven suffixes.

dnhangwi=rgwa=garnqwa-dhawidhi-nthV-dnha-gwinti-nqwa-Ø-wa-Ø
near.water=large=break-tree.O-REC.P-TERMIN-INTER-3PL.O-INAN.O-3PL.A-ANIM.A

The order of these affixes is determined by a slot-based template:
–1.5 adverbial clitics
–1 adjectival clitics
0 root
+1 valency
+2 S/O incorporation
+3 tense
+4 aspect
+5 mood
+6 S/O agreement
+6.5 S/O gender
+7 S/A agreement
+7.5 S/A gender
I'm not gonna discuss these in a lot of detail, because that would make this post absurdly long. I'll leave the specifics of noun incorporation and the proclitics for another post as well.

Morphosyntactic Alignment
PT had a complex split-S alignment system. The complexity revolved around two splits; one in the NP and one in the verb. Verbally PT displayed a tense-based split and nominally a split based on animacy and pronounness. I'll be using Dixon's notation; S for intransitive subject, A for transitive subject and O for object.

Verbal alignment
The verbal alignment affected the whole of a conjugated verb, including incorporated nouns (which had no morphology of their own anyway). Alignment was shown in two ways in verbs; through agreement and through incorporation. Firstly, verbs showed polypersonal agreement; one O slot and one A slot. Depending on tense, one of these was extended to cover the S role. In the two past tenses, PT showed an ergative alignment and thus conflated S with O; in the two non-past tenses (or when tense was unmarked) S was conflated with A – a nominative-accusative alignment. For example, here's two sentences (without NI) to demonstrate:
Dangkwinyirngidiyarngwi
dangkwinyi-rngV-di-RHa-rngwi
be.yellow-DIST.P-DISCONT-3SG.O-ANIM.O
"He used to be yellow"

Dangkwinyidnyi
dangkwinyi-DNHi-Ø-Ø
be.yellow-STAT-3SG.A-ANIM.A
"He's yellow"
Noun incorporation of the O role reduced the valency of verbs to become intransitive, the O markers were used for the now-intransitive subject in past tense.

Noun incorporation of a noun in the S role was also only allowed in the past tenses.
Dangkwinyidnyinggirngidiya
dangkwinyi-dnyinggi-rngV-di-RHa-Ø
be.yellow-beach-DIST.P-DISCONT
"The beach used to be yellow"

Dnyinggi dangkwinyidnyiyi
dnyinggi-Ø dangkwinyi-DNHi-Ø-RHi
beach-ABS be.yellow-STAT-3SG.A-INAN.A
"The beach is yellow"
Nominal alignment
When not incorporated into verbs, nouns and pronouns showed three alignment patterns; tripartite, erg/abs and nom/acc. The tripartite was just an overlap of the two other systems, based on two rules.

1: all pronouns (personal and impersonal) and all animate nouns marked the accusative (marked O, unmarked S and A)
2: all inanimate words marked the ergative (marked A, unmarked S and O)

These two rules overlapped with inanimate impersonal pronouns (both personal pronouns were always animate); these used both the nominal ergative suffix and the pronominal accusative suffix, so they had marked O and marked A, with unmarked S.

Valency
PT had two valency-changing operations; an antipassive (ANTIPASS) and a causative (CAUS). The antipassive (marked with -dhV turned transitive verbs into intransitives with an indirect object; this shifted the A slot to an S, and the O to an indirect object X. The main usage of this was to allow noun-incorporation of the subject in the past tense. The causative -wa was a generic causative.

TAM marking
PT distinguished four tenses, six aspects and five moods. The tense markers are only attested in a few descendants; there was a strong tendency for these to be instead shown through the adverbial proclitics.

Tense
These were shown through CV suffixes with an unspecified vowel which echoed the previous vowel of the word. Tense suffixes were optional.

distant past (DIST.P) -rngV
recent past (REC.P) -nthV
present (PRES) -rhV
future (FUT) -lhV

Aspect
Six aspects can be reconstructed; habitual, frequentive, stative, inchoative, terminative and discontinuous.

Habitual (HAB) – referring to an event repeated on several distinct occasions
Gwandyinya gayindyiyirnidirngiwiwa
gwandyi-NHa gayindyi-yirnidi-rngV-wi-wa-Ø
woman-ERG gather-fruit.sp-DIST.P-HABIT-3PL.A-ANIM.A
"The women would gather *yirnidi (a type of fruit)"
Frequentive (FREQ) – an event repeated several times but on a single occasion; -rnqa
Gwandyinya gayindyiyirnidintyirnqawa
gwandyi-NHa gayindyi-yirnidi-NTHV-rnqa-wa-Ø
woman-ERG gather-fruit.sp-REC.P-HABIT-3PL.A-ANIM.A
"The women were gathering *yirnidi (a type of fruit) that day"
Stative (STAT) – something which happens for a period of time without change, or something which is always true; -dnhi.
Diwaglidawangkadadnhiwa
di=wagli=da-wangkada-DNHi-wa-Ø
only=male=have-child-STAT-3PL.A-ANIM.A
"They only have sons"
Inchoative (INCHO) – beginning of a new state; -ra
Dliyindyayiyiranyi
dliyi-dnyayi-RHV-ra-NHi-Ø
make-shit-PRES-INCHO-1SG.A-ANIM.A
"I'm about to start taking a shit."
Terminative (TERMIN) – end of a state; -dnha.
Dliyidnyayintyidnyanyi
dliyi-dnyayi-NTHV-DNHA-NHi-Ø
make-shit-REC.P-TERMIN-1SG.A-ANIM.A
"I've just finished taking a shit."
Discontinuous (DISCONT)– a state which is no longer true at the point of reference; -di. The difference between this and the terminative is that the TERMIN focuses on the end of an event, while the DISCONT just implies that an event has ended at some point prior to the frame of reference.
Dlintidliyiwadlirngidi dlagwa gana gngawilinha
dlinti=dliyi-wadli-rngV-di-Ø-Ø dlagwa gana-Ø gngawili-NHa
north=make-hut-DIST.P-DISCONT-3SG.A-ANIM.A PREP hill-ABS hand-ERG
"He built a hut on the hill to the north by hand (but it's no longer there)"
Mood
PT distinguished 5 moods; realis (REAL), optative (OPT), conditional (COND), imperative (IMPER) and interrogative (INTER). Most descendants merged the optative with the imperative. All modal suffixes were CVCV forms with two identical vowels, apart from realis which was unmarked

REAL -∅
OPT -dlarra
COND -ngkidhi
IMPER -nhanha
INTER -gwinti

Polypersonal agreement
The "O" markers were used to agree with an unincorporated direct object, or in the past tenses, an intransitive subject (including the subject of a verb with NI). The "A" markers agreed with all transitive subjects, or outside of the past tenses, with intransitive subjects also. They both agreed for person, number and gender (animate/inanimate).

O/S markers
1SG -nhi
2SG -di
3SG -rha
1PL -dni
2PL -dni
3PL -nqwa

ANIM -rngwi
INAN -∅, -rri

A/S markers
1SG -nhi
2SG -dna
3SG -∅
1PL -dlhi
2PL -rnwa
3PL -wa

ANIM -∅
INAN -rhi
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Also possibly out of date (although not as much)
Spoiler:
Noun incorporation

The Tumbleweed family is characterised by making extensive use of noun incorporation, and PT was no exception. Noun incorporation (NI) involved the suffixing of a nominal root to the verb; this could be any object, or an intransitive subject in the past tenses (an example of the tense-based alignment split in PT verbs). The new verb was generally intransitive; however, it could take an object in some situations (see #7, #8, #10).


Phonological processes
When not involved in NI, nouns had defined values for laminal harmony; i.e. they were either entirely dental or entirely palatal. However, when incorporated, they could lose their laminal marking if the verb root already had a laminal in it. If the verb root didn't have any dentals or palatals in it, the whole word's laminals assimilated to those of the noun. For example, compare the two sentences below, both of which incorporate the noun dhawidhi "tree."
#1 Dnyagadyawidyiyinyi
dnyaga-DHawiDHi-RHV-NHi-∅
strip-tree-PRES-1SG.S-ANIM.S
"I'm stripping the bark from trees."

#2 Garnqwadhawidhirhinhi
garnqwa-DHawiDHi-RHV-NHi-∅
break-tree-PRES-1SG.S-ANIM.S
"I'm cutting the tree."
Note how in #1, dhawidhi assimilates to palatal dyawidyi, whereas in #2, the suffixes -RHV-NHi assimilate to dental -rhi-nhi to match it.

Usage of NI
My analysis of how PT used NI is based on the thread, which in turn is based on Marianne Mithun's categorisation. The first type is a lexical incorporation, used to narrow the sense of the verb and allow the object to be dropped. This is clearly seen in PT
#3 Wangkwirngidiyarngwi
wangkwi-rngV-di-RHa-rngwi
hunt-fish-DIST.P-DISCONT-3SG-ANIM
"He had been hunting fish" > "he had been fishing."

#4 Rhiganthalharanhi
rhi-gaNTHa-LHV-ra-NHi-∅
go.to-house-FUT-INCHO-1SG-ANIM
"I'll start going to (your) house."
The second type is when the speaker wishes to promote an oblique to a direct object or subject, generally with the aim of emphasising it. In PT, this allowed promotion of the possessee of body parts to become the subject (as in #5, #6), and prepositional objects could become direct objects (#7, #8).
#5 Rrintyidlyayadnyinyi
rrinty-DLHa-RHV-DNHi-NHi-∅
be.weak-body-PRES-STAT-1SG-ANIM
"My body is feeling weak."

#6 Dalarwadnindhagwintidna?
dalarwa-dniNDHa-gwinti-dna-∅
hurt-back-STAT-INTERR-2SG-ANIM
"Does your back hurt?"

#7 Wangkwiwarnqantyarnwanyi dlhandi
wangkwi-warnqa-NTHV-rnqa-NHi-∅ dlhandi
hunt-goose-REC.P-FREQ-1SG-ANIM marsh
"I went hunting for geese in the marshes."

#8 Dhanhaglinthi dnyayi
dhanha-gli-NTHV-∅-∅ dnyayi
give-a.half-REC.P-3SG-ANIM brother
"He gave (his) brother half (of it)."
The third type is when the speaker wishes to deemphasise an object (or in the past tense an intransitive subject), especially when it has already been mentioned in discourse.
#9 Gwayigngidlyarnga, gwarhidnarrirhadlha
gwaRHi=gngi-DLHa-rngV-∅-∅ gwaRHi=dnarrirha-DLHa-∅-∅
then=shoot-dog-DIST.P-3SG-ANIM then=die-dog-3SG-ANIM
"And then he shot it (the dog), and after that it (the dog) died."

#10 Gwayidagwarayagwintiyarngwi?
gwaRHi=da-gwara-RHV-gwinti-RHa-rngwi-∅-∅
then=take-dried.skin-PRES-INTER-3SG.O-ANIM.O-3SG.A-ANIM.A
"So is he1 taking them (the dried skins) to him2?"
Mithun's type four did not occur (as far as we can tell) in PT. This type involves using NI as classifiers; verbs with a general incorporated noun taking more specific objects. In PT, the only objects that could occur alongside NI were the oblique arguments described in type 2.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Clitics

One of the most salient aspects of the Tumbleweed family is its use of a semi-open class of clitics, many with quite concrete meanings, which take up most of the role of adjectives and adverbs. In descendant languages, there has been a general tendency to increase the dependence on clitics, extending them to replace some TAM or evidential markers. In fact, while less than 100 are "reconstructable" for PT, descendants generally have up to three or four hundred of them. While all of clitics which can be securely reconstructed for PT were bound morphemes (i.e. don't occur as separate meaningful words), many descendants created new clitics from nominal or verbal roots. I refer to these morphemes as "clitics" rather than "affixes" due to their semantic load, and the fact that they are prefixed while PT is otherwise wholly suffixing. Note that laminal harmony still applies, so no clitics are specified dental/palatal; also, as they can be word-initial, they only begin with permissible word-initial consonants. Clitics can be divided into two types based on their usage and meaning; nominal and verbal (or adjectival and adverbial; from now on I'll stick with the former).

Verbal clitics
Verbal clitics refer to the large number of clitics which refer to the verb phrase as a whole; these are placed to the left of all other elements of the verb. I've divided them into a number of different classes here just to make them more organised; these classes have no grammatical implications.
Spoiler:
Positional
Referring to the static position of an event relative to the speaker or frame of reference. These include
gngargi= high position
gngarha= low position
dlinti= to the north
rgawi= to the south
gngi= to the east
rwigngi= to the west
dhi= close, proximal
gli= far, distal

Directional
Referring to a change in position or movement.
dna= moving away
rgwi= moving towards
wanggwi= with leftwards motion
dnha= rightwards motion
rradli= upwards motion
gwi= downwards motion
dharhi= spinning
gngargwi= downstream
gharwgi= upstream

Locational
Referring to a location in the world.
dnhangwi= near water
dni= on a flat place
warra= in a tree
dharha= in the shade underneath a tree

Temporal
Referring to the time of day
dni= during the day
gngidhi= morning
waghi= evening
dlhiga= with the sun high in the sky

Static
Describing the type of event in general, e.g. speed, intention, intensity
dantha= slowly
dirnqwa= rapidly
rhi= with intent, on purpose
rgawa= without intent, on accident
dnila= forcefully, powerfully

Other
Some more clitics. Some of these fulfil syntactic roles.
di= only
rharhi= at least
dnhila= at the same time as
gwarhi= then
Nominal clitics
These refer to the incorporated noun, generally with an adjectival sense. They are attached to the left of the verb phrase excluding verbal clitics.
Spoiler:
Positional
These are the same as the adverbial positional ones; this can cause ambiguity.
gngargi= high position
gngarha= low position
etc.

Size
rgwa= large
dhi= small

Shape
gindhi= long thin object
rwagwi= round object
gwiwa= square or flat object
wagwi= rough/stony object

Sex
wagli= male
gngangki= female

Colour
garhi= red/brown/orange
rgwa= white/yellow/pale blue
dnhirnqwa= light green
rgintha= mid green, blue
dhinthi= dark green, dark blue
gligha= black
rgangka= grey
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by DV82LECM »

A pity this is not real.
𖥑𖧨𖣫𖦺𖣦𖢋𖤼𖥃𖣔𖣋𖢅𖡹𖡨𖡶𖡦𖡧𖡚𖠨
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

I'm reviving this project for Lexember, and also as another language family in the chronically under-developed planet I'm supposed to be developing.

Phonology

The phonology stays broadly the same. Proto-Tumbleweed (PT) has 46 consonants, which helps balance out how every other language I make ends up having less than 10. It's like an Australian language on crack, minus the labials and plus a rounding contrast.

/d ɖ ɟ ɡ ɡʷ ɢ ɢʷ/ ⟨dh d dy g gw rg rgw⟩
/n͡t ɳ͡ʈ ɲ͡c ŋ͡k ŋ͡kʷ ɴ͡q ɴ͡qʷ/ ⟨nth nt nty ngk ngkw rnq rnqw⟩
/n͡d ɳ͡ɖ ɲ͡ɟ ŋ͡ɡ ŋ͡ɡʷ ɴ͡ɢ ɴ͡ɢʷ/ ⟨ndh nd ndy ngg nggw rng rngw⟩
/d͡l ɖ͡ɭ ɟ͡ʎ ɡ͡ʟ/ ⟨dlh dl dly gl⟩
/d͡n ɖ͡ɳ ɟ͡ɲ ɡ͡ŋ/ ⟨dnh dn dny gng⟩
/l ɭ ʎ/ ⟨l rl ly⟩
/n ɳ ɲ ŋ ŋʷ ɴ ɴʷ/ ⟨nh n ny ng ngw rn rnw⟩
/ɾ ɻ j ɰ w ʁ ʁʷ/ ⟨rh r y gh w rr rw⟩

And there's two vowels:

/i ɑ/ ⟨i a⟩

In unstressed syllables, /i/ becomes [e].

Word structure is pretty restrictive. Word-initially, only approximants (/ɾ ɻ j ɰ w ʁ ʁʷ/) or stop-initial segments (/d ɖ ɟ ɡ ɡʷ ɢ ɢʷ d͡l ɖ͡ɭ ɟ͡ʎ ɡ͡ʟ d͡n ɖ͡ɳ ɟ͡ɲ ɡ͡ŋ/) could occur. Every syllable is CV with an obligatory onset; word-internally these can begin with any consonant. All words must be an odd number of syllables. Stress is on the first syllable, with secondary stress on every odd-numbered syllable except the final.
In a word, only consonants from one series of laminals (i.e. dental or palatal) can occur; this causes assimilation of affixes. All vowels other than the first vowel in a word have to be the same, including suffixes (but probably not enclitics). This means that all suffixes are unspecified for vowel quality and just assimilate to the second vowel of the root.

Next up, revisiting grammar. It'll probably end up being generally pretty similar to the original version, but with a few new things like nominal gender.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Nominal morphology

I'm overhauling nominal morphology, which is now based around a noun class system with prefixes. Nouns take relatively little morphology – just number and case – so this should be a pretty short post.

Noun classes and number

All nouns are part of broadly predictable semantic classes, which are broadly animacy-based:
  1. Terms for humans, kinship terms, human body parts, professions, actions performed only by humans, supernatural entities, names
  2. Animal terms, animal body parts, clothing, tools used for hunting
  3. Plants, specifically named geographical locations, fire, water, animal or plant products including meat, waste, wood and bodily fluids, some abstract concepts like death and sleep, food
  4. Tools not used for hunting, other manmade items, rocks, geographical features, corpses, some products like ash, charcoal, pottery, string, bags etc.
Noun roots consist of two or four syllables, all of which must contain the same vowel. These take noun class prefixes which are all one syllable and suppletively mark a number distinction of singular vs. dual vs. plural. This is shown in the table below:

Code: Select all

   singular dual     plural
1  ya-      rga-     rhi-
2  dlhi-    dlya-    dna-
3  dna-     wi-      gwa-
4  gha-     rwa-     rwi-
Nouns can freely change class with somewhat predictable semantic implications; e.g. yarnadnya "muscle (of a human)" > dlhirnadnha "muscle (of an animal)" > dnarnadnya "meat" > gharnadnya "wet clay"; yangkalarangkwa "woman" > dlhingkalarangkwa "bee" > dnangkalarangkwa "honey" > ghangkalarangkwa "dead woman". In some cases however this would seem weird to a native speaker; shifting dnanindi "urine" to class 1 produces yanindi "?piss man".


Noun incorporation

In isolation, these class prefixes are obligatory. However, when incorporated into the verb, they drop their prefixes so that they don't violate the odd-syllable rule. Compare the two sentences below:

1. Gwinthidhi rhingkalarangkwa.
gwi-NTHV-DHV rhi-ngkalarangkwa
see-1SG.SUBJ-3PL.I.OBJ I.PL-woman

"I see the women."

2. Gwingkalarangkwanthaga.
gwi-ngkalarangkwa-NTHVgV
see-woman-1SG.SUBJ/PL.OBJ

"I see the women."


Case

Tumbleweed has a split-S alignment system. All nouns of classes II, III and IV are ergative-absolutive, while all pronouns and nouns of class I are nominative-accusative. Third-person pronouns and demonstratives in classes II, III and IV are tripartite; I'll leave that for a later post however. Case is quite simply marked by suffixes:

ergative: -ndVNHV
accusative: -nggVngV
nominative, absolutive: unmarked

Note that the V in these assimilates to the preceding vowel, while NH displays laminal harmony, being nh by default. There's also one more case, the oblique, which is marked with -ngVDLYV (DLY being dly by default but assimilating to dental dlh).
Here's a few examples:

Class I:

Code: Select all

-LIDYI “man”
      singular:      dual:           plural:
nom:  yalidyi        rgalidyi        rhilidhi
acc:  yalidyinggingi rgalidyinggingi rhilidhinggingi
obl:  yalidyingidlyi rgalidyingidlyi rhilidhingidlhi

-WALYA “baby”
      singular:      dual:           plural:
nom:  yawalya        rgawalha        rhiwalha
acc:  yawalyangganga rgawalhangganga rhiwalhannganga
obl:  yawalyandalya  rgawalhandadlha rhiwalhangadlha
Class II, III and IV:

Code: Select all

-NTHINTHI “rat”
      singular:           dual:               plural:
abs:  dlhinthinthi        dlyantyintyi        dnanthinthi
erg:  dlhinthinthindinhi  dlyantyintyindinyi  dnanthinthindinhi
obl:  dlhinthinthingidlhi dlyantyintyingidlyi dnanthinthingidlhi

-LAYA “bone arrowhead”
      singular:           dual:               plural:
abs:  dnalaya             wilaya              gwalaya
erg:  dnalayandanya       wilayandanya        gwalayandaya
obl:  dnalayangadlya      wilayangadlya       gwalayangadlya

-NDADLA “grit”
      singular:           dual:               plural:
abs:  ghandadla           rwandadla           rwindadla
erg:  ghandadlandanha     rwandadlandanha     rwindadlandanha
obl:  ghandadlangadlya    rwandadlangadlya    rwindadlangadlya

This can produce some pretty hefty-looking words, e.g. dlyangkalarangkwandanya "two bees ERG", yagligingirninggingi "person who kills small game ACC", ghadnirindirwingidlyi "of powdery sand." (That second one's quite a tongue twister - try saying [ˈjɑɡ͡ʟeˌɡiŋeˌɴiᵑɡeŋe] three times fast)

Anyway, that's all the nominal morphology done. On to verbal morphology next, which is a lot more complicated – I assume it will be anyway, I haven't actually done any of it so I don't know.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Verbal morphology

Verbal morphology is gonna be pretty similar to the previous version of Tumbleweed, although with a slight reordering of the verb slot template:
–1.5 adverbial clitics
–1 adjectival clitics
0 root
+1 noun incorporation
+2 valency
+3 tense
+4 aspect
+5 mood
+6 S/A agreement
+7 S/O agreement
I’ll discuss clitics and noun incorporation in separate posts, as they blur the lines between grammatical and derivational morphology. Here's an example of a maximal verb form:

​ ​ ​ Gngargwirgwanigidhinthirgargawagarnganhadadhagwantargwadna?
​ ​ ​ [ˌɡ͡ŋɑɢʷeˌɢʷɑɳeˈɡid̻eˌⁿ̻t̻iɢɐˌɢɑwɐˌɡɑɴɐˌn̻ɑɖɐˌd̻ɑɡʷɐˌᶯtɑɢʷɐɖ͡ɳɐ]
​ ​ ​ gngargwi=rgwani=gidhinthi-rgarga-wVgV-rngVNHV-dVDHV-gwVntV-rgwV-dnV
​ ​ ​ DOWNSTREAM=LARGE=fall.into-river-CAUS-FAR.PAST-DISCONT-INTERR-2SG.A-3.III.SG.O

​ ​ ​ "Had you knocked it (the plant) downstream into the big river (although it's out now)?"

Verb roots
Verb roots are always an odd number of syllables, so to preserve the odd-syllable rule, they take even-syllables affixes. This extends to noun incorporation, as noun roots are always even-syllabled. The only suffixes which are monosyllabic are the argument agreement suffixes, which have bisyllabic allomorphs in intransitive sentences. A couple of example verbal roots are gwi- "see", wanyili- "pound, crush", da- "come" and gwarhirnqwi- "bite".

Valency
There are three valency-modifying suffixes which change the number of arguments on a verb; antipassive -DHVRHV, causative -wVgV and reflexive -ntVdV.

​ ​ ​ Dnanqantha rgwidhirganthigirnginhirngwingkwintighi gwarhigadharhantharngwantagha dhangadlha
​ ​ ​ dna-nqantha rgwiDHi=rganthigi-rngVNHV-rngwVngkwV-ntVghV gwaRHi=ga-DHVRHV-NTHVrngwV-ntVghV dha-ngVDLYV
​ ​ ​ CLASS.III-tumbleweed(ABS) TO.HERE=roll-FAR.PAST-TERMIN-3.III.SG.S then=hit-ANTIPASS-CLOSE.PAST-3SG.S 1SG-OBL

​ ​ ​ "The tumbleweed rolled up to here and then hit me."

Note that valency can also be changed using noun incorporation, which turns transitive verbs into intransitives:

​ ​ ​ Gangwargawanhadharha.
​ ​ ​ ga-ngwarga-wVNHV-DHVRHV
​ ​ ​ hit-thigh-HABIT-3.I.SG.S

​ ​ ​ "He likes to slap his thigh."

Directional clitics can also create shifts in valency, with a number of applicative senses:

​ ​ ​ Dnarignginthirngwinthili.
​ ​ ​ dnari=gngi-NTHVrngwV-NTHV-lV
​ ​ ​ MOTION.AWAY=carry-animal.sp-CLOSE.PAST-1.SG.A-3.I.SG.O

​ ​ ​ "I carried the dlhiringwi over to him."

This is especially common with rha- "put":

​ ​ ​ Wanggwirhantharngwanthadla, rradlirhantharngwadhadna dnadhidhi.
​ ​ ​ wanggwi=rha-NTHVrngwV-NTHV-dlV, rradli=rha-NTHVrngwV-DHV-dnV dna-dhidhi
​ ​ ​ LEFT=put-CLOSE.PAST-1.SG.A-1.SG.O, UPWARDS=put-CLOSE.PAST-3.I.SG.A-3.III.SG.O CLASS.III-tree

​ ​ ​ "I put (my one) to the left of me, while he put (his one) above him in a tree."


Tense
Tumbleweed has a four-way tense distinction of further past (-rngVNHV), closer past (-NTHVrngwV), present (unmarked) and future (-dVntV). The distinction between the two past tenses is relative rather than absolute; for example:

​ ​ ​ Dnaridlyantyarngwadyala yawantangganga, gwiwantarnganhalarnwa.
​ ​ ​ dnari=dlya-NTHVrngwV-DHV-lV ya-wanta-nggVngV, gwi-wanta-rngVNHV-lVrnwV
​ ​ ​ MOVING.AWAY=jump-CLOSER.PAST-3SG.II.A-3SG.I.O CLASS.I-man-ACC, see-person-FURTHER.PAST-3SG.S

​ ​ ​ "The animal jumped away from the person, having seen him earlier."

The other tenses work as expected:

​ ​ ​ Gwingkidhinthilhi.
​ ​ ​ gwi-ngkVDHV-NTHV-LHV
​ ​ ​ see-POT-1.SG.A-3.II.SG.O

​ ​ ​ "I can see it (the animal)."

​ ​ ​ Dirnqwadadharhadantantadna.
​ ​ ​ dirnqwa=da-DHVRHV-dVntV-ntVdnV
​ ​ ​ RAPIDLY=come-ANTIPASS-FUTURE-3.III.SG.A

​ ​ ​ "It (the storm) will come soon."


Aspect
I'm keeping the same aspectual system as the previous version because I like the distinctions it made. To recap, there were six marked aspects; habitual (-wVNHV), frequentive (-rnqVnggwV), stative (-DNHVRHV), inchoative (-rVlV), terminative (-rngwVngkwV) and discontinuous (-dVyV).
Spoiler:
  • Habitual – referring to an event repeated on several distinct occasions
Rhingkalarangkwa gayindyirnidirnginyiwinyidyidyi.
rhi-ngkalarangkwa gayindyi-rnidi-rngVNHV-wVNHV-DHVDHV
CLASS.I.PL-woman.NOM gather-fruit.sp-FAR.PAST-HAB-3.I.PL.S

"The women would gather dnarnidi (a type of fruit)."

  • Frequentive – an event repeated several times but on a single occasion
Rhingkalarangkwa gayindyirnidirnginyirnqinggwidyidyi.
rhi-ngkalarangkwa gayindyi-rnidi-rngVNHV-rnqVnggwV-DHVDHV
CLASS.I.PL-woman.NOM gather-fruit.sp-FAR.PAST-FREQ-3.I.PL.S

"The women were repeatedly gathering dnarnidi that day"

  • Stative (STAT) – something which happens for a period of time without change, or something which is always true
Dirhawaglidlangkadadnharhadadha.
diRHa=wagli=dla-ngkada-DNHVRHV-dVDHV
only=male=have-child-STAT-3.I.DU.S

"They only have sons."

  • Inchoative – beginning of a new state
Dnhirilinthigi.
dnhi-rVlV-NTHVgV
run-INCHO-1SG.S

"I'm starting to run."

  • Terminative – end of a state
Dnhirngwingkwinthigi
dnhi-rngwVngkwV-NTHVgV
run-TERMIN-1SG.S

"I just stopped running."

  • Discontinuous – a state which is no longer true at the point of reference; -di. The difference between this and the terminative is that the terminative focuses on the end of an event, while the discontinuous just implies that an event has ended at some point prior to the frame of reference.
Dlintidliwadlarnganhadadhadhadha.
dlinti=dli-wadla-rngVNHV-dVDHV-DHVDHV
north=make-hut-FAR.PAST-DISCONT-3.I.SG.S

"He built a hut over to the north (but it's no longer there)"

Mood
Tumbleweed distinguishes between an unmarked realis mood and five marked irrealis moods; a general irrealis -gVnV, optative -dlVrrV, potential -ngkVDHV, imperative -NHVNHV and interrogative -gwVntV.
Spoiler:
  • General irrealis - like a subjunctive, used for events where the speaker has no way of knowing whether or not they are or are not true, most common in relative clauses.
Rgwintyilyintyigi rgwiridawadladantaganadharha.
rgwintyilyi-NTHVgV rgwiri=da-wadla-dVntV-gVnV-DHVRHV
think-1SG.S MOTION.TO=come-hut-FUT-IRREAL-3.I.SG.S

"I think that he will come back home."

  • Optative – an event the speaker desires to happen
Rgwiridawadladlarradharha.
rgwiri=da-wadla-dlVrrV-DHVRHV
MOTION.TO=come-hut-OPT-3.I.SG.S

"I hope that he comes back home."

  • Potential – speaker believes that the actor is able to do something

    Rgwiridawadlangkadhadharha.
    rgwiri-da-wadla-ngkVDHV-DHVRHV
    MOTION.TO=come-hut-POT-3.I.SG.S

    "He can come back home."

    • Imperative – this does not require person agreement marking

    Rgwiridawadlanhanha!
    rgwiri-da-wadla-NHVNHV
    MOTION.TO=come-hut-IMPER

    "Come back home!"

    • Interrogative – turns the sentence into a question
    Rgwiridawadlagwantalarnwa?
    rgwiri=da-wadla-gwVntV-lVrnwV
    MOTION.TO=come-hut-INTERR-3.I.SG.S

    "Has he come back home?"

Argument agreement
Tumbleweed has two series of agreement affixes, each of which has two variants. In transitive sentences, monosyllabic variants occur, while in intransitive sentences the bisyllabic variants surface to preserve word length. Note that this hints at the diachrony of the odd-syllable rule; as the bisyllabic variants are unpredictable, it's likely that some kind of syncope took place in pre-Tumbleweed.

Code: Select all

Series one (A/S) :
      singular    dual        plural
   1  -NTHV(gV)   -NDHV(NDHV) -NDHV(dV)
   2  -rgwV(rnqV) -rgwV(rgwV) -rgV(LHV)
  3I  -DHV(RHV)   -dV(DHV)    -rgwV(DHV)
 3II  -DHV(LHV)   -dV(DHV)    -rgwV(DHV)
3III  -ntV(dnV)   -ntV(ntV)   -ngkV(ntV)
 3IV  -ntV(ghV)   -ntV(ntV)   -ngkV(ntV)

Series two (O/S):
      singular    dual        plural
   1  -dlV(gV)    -dlV(gV)    -rgwV(DHV)
   2  -gV(DV)     -gV(gV)     -NTHV(DHV)
  3I  -lV(rnwV)   -dV(lV)     -DHV(DHV)
 3II  -LHV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
3III  -dnV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
 3IV  -ghV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
These two series correspond to a split-S alignment system which is different to that used with nouns; verbal agreement is nominative/accusative in the non-past tenses and ergative-absolutive in the past tenses. This is entirely separate to the alignment system of nouns and pronouns which was discussed previously:

​ ​ ​ Yangwidi yadadyingidlyi gwayidnyidyiyilirnwi.
​ ​ ​ ya-ngwidi ya-daDHi-ngVDLYV gwaRHi=dnyi-DHVRHV-lVrnwV
​ ​ ​ CLASS.I-mother(NOM) CLASS.I-father-OBL then=talk.to-ANTIPASS-3.I.SG(O/S)

​ ​ ​ "Then (my) mother started to talk to my father."

​ ​ ​ Dlhiringwindinhi gadyilyidyidli.
​ ​ ​ dlhi-ringwi-ndVNHV gadyilyi-DHV-dlV
​ ​ ​ CLASS.II-animal.sp-ERG chase-3.II.SG(A/S)-1.SG(O/S)

​ ​ ​ "The dlhiringwi is chasing me."



This does seem to generate absurdly long words even for a polysynthetic language. However, this is still technically the protolang, and the system will be simplified greatly in descendants.
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Re: Tumbleweed Scratchpad

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Some very disorganised thoughts

I've come up with two ideas for descendants regarding the stop system. The first is a chain shift of

*d ɖ ɟ ɡ ɡʷ ɢ ɢʷ → b d̪ ɖ ɟ ɟʷ ɡ ɡʷ

With an intermediate stage of linguolabial *d̼ for the first one. Also /ɟʷ/ seems unstable and might become /bʲ/ or /dʷ/ or something. The second idea is just to have *ɡʷ → b, so you end up with /b d̪ ɖ ɟ ɡ ɢ ɢʷ/. This might be a family-wide two-way split, like centum and satem in IE.

The first branch obscures regular derivations which is fun:

ya-dyirri "skin" → /ˈeʈeɣe/
dlhi-dhirri "clothes" → /ˈwibeɣe/ (or /ˈbʷibeɣe/)
gha-dyirri "glaze (of pottery)" → /ˈjaʈeɣe/

Also regular laminal harmony would be lost in this branch.

I'm also considering doing something similar with the unbalanced three stop series, with ideas like

*d ⁿt ⁿd → ð t d (or even /ɗ t d/ or /t’ t d/)
*d ⁿt ⁿd → d t ⁿd
*d ⁿt ⁿd → d t d
*d ⁿt ⁿd → t ⁿd t

As well as

*d͡n d ⁿt ⁿd → d t ⁿt ⁿd

Again mirroring indo-european. Maybe even Grimm's law could be bogoed into Tumbleweed, if I treat /d ⁿt ⁿd/ as equivalent to /dʰ t d/, i.e.

d ⁿt ⁿd → d θ t

(I'm aware that /d ⁿt ⁿd/ aren't actually part of proto-Tumbleweed's inventory, they just represent the three series)

Also, I have an idea of word-level rounding harmony based on post-tonic vowels.

dna-yangwa "tree sap" → *ɖɳɑjoŋʷo → /ɖʷɑɥəmʷə/ [ɖʷɔɥumʷu]
dlhi-dhirri "clothes" → *dlideʁe → /dlʲidʲəʁʲə/ [dlʲidʲiʁʲi]

This way you can analyse all words as having a single vowel thanks to the obligatory CV structure - i.e. [ɖʷɔɥumʷu] is actually /ɖɑjm/ + ʷ, and [dlʲidʲiʁʲi] is /dlidʁ/ + ʲ.





Regarding worldbuilding, Tumbleweed is one of the five major language families of the Continent I allegedly set all my (a priori) conlangs in. The others are Nomadic-Bechsukchwan, Kwreid Isthmus, Click and Trintinic. There's also a number of isolates like Decééyinéeqi and Ánni, and a Sprachbund of click languages, which will include the whole Click family, Ánni, a number of Nomadic-Bechsukchwan languages and some Tumbleweed languages. Sibotabe, a Kwreid Isthmus language, is a major trade language, as the Kwreid isthmus is the one point on the continent where all three sentient species of Rodgežu meet - the Humanoids, Tribrachids (octopus-like), and Re (corvid-like). Añoþnın and Magmhi (Trintinic) are local linguæ francæ. The Tumbleweed people are the most technologically advanced of the continent, because who doesn't like the idea of space-faring aliens speaking polysynthetic Australian-like languages, especially if they have monomorphemic words for "Alcubierre-Casimir drive" or "radiation shielding".
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Numbers:

Janko's been asking for numbers, and this is my only project well-developed enough that it deserves them. So here they are! They stand out amongst Rodgezhuan proto-languages for being highly developed; most other proto-languages sourced numbers over 3 from historical Click languages. This is because they were most likely borrowed from time travellers, although the numbers 1 to 4 could be cognate to proto-Click *ɡ͡ǀadə, ʕoŋɨ, koɢa, ŋeɡ͡!ˤa.


Numbers 1 to 10

Proto-Tumbleweed used a base 10 system, with numbers formimg a somewhat unique class by taking nominal gender prefixes, but not alignment cases; this means that all the roots are bisyllabic. Note that these all take the singular prefixes, not dual or plural ones.

1. -dhanda
2. -gidni
3. -ntyinggi
4. -rngwarna
5. -gngadnya
6. -dyilyi
7. -gangka
8. -rhirgwi
9. -glidhi
10. -dyarwa

When modifying a noun, they took the same gender prefix, although remaining in the singular, and could simply be concatenated:
Ghantyinggi rwingkwangkwa dnandilhindinhi dnyanyiliginintighi.
gha-ntyinggi rwi-ngkwangkwa dna-ndilhi-ndVNHV dnyanyili-gVnV-ntVghV
CLASS.IV-three CLASS.IV.PL-bottle CLASS.III-oil-OBL suffice-IRREAL-3.IV.SG.S

"Three bottles of oil would be enough."
Or alternatively, the noun could be placed in the oblique, with the number taking case marking:
Dlhiglidhi dlyigwityingidlyi gngiridnidnirridirhirgwidhi.
DLHI-glidhi DLHI-gwidyi-ngVDLYV gngiri=dnidni=rri-dVRHV-rgwVDHV
CLASS.II-nine.ABS CLASS.II-bird-OBL EASTWARDS=DAYTIME=fly-DISCONT-3.II.PL.S

"Nine birds have flown eastwards today."
They can also be used on their own with a nominal sense:
Gngintyilyigwintintyigi? Yaya dlyidyarwa wanthaga.
gngi-ntyilyi-gwVntV-NTHVgV? yaya DLHi-dyarwa wa-NTHVgV
carry-spear-INTERR-1.SG.S? AFFIRM CLASS.II.SG-ten hold-1.SG.A

"Do I have any spears? Yeah, I've got ten of them."
In fact, the roots of numbers up to 9 could be incorporated into verbs as if they're normal nouns:
Gwirngwarnantharngwadlaga ghangarnangadlya.
gwi-rngwarna-NTHVrngwV-dlVgV gha-ngarna-ngVDLYV
see-four-PAST-1SG.S CLASS.IV.SG-temple-OBL

"I saw four of them at the temple."

Teens

Teens were formed through concatenation of the two roots, allowing the word length rule to be preserved:

11. -dyarwadyanda
12. -dyarwagidni
13. -dyarwantyinggi
...
18. -dyarwayirgwi
19. -dyarwaglidyi

Descendants differ as to whether the vowels were assimilated; cf. Naghfa vidghojne < dlyidyarwagidni vs. Ḍanḳanta dlicarōkaḍa < *dlyidyarwagadna. The original form however was with dissimilated vowels, which suggests that they were recent formations.


Higher numbers

Above this it gets a bit more confusing. 20 is simply the dual of ten; i.e. it uses the same root -dyarwa, but uses the dual prefixes rga- dlya- etc. 30 is a separate root, -dara, the dual of which is used for 60. Numbers 40, 50, 70, 80 and 90 were expressed with the plural forms of 4, 5, 7, 8 and 9, presumably a clipped form of "(ten) fours" etc. They're given below with the prefixes for class I.

20. rga-dyarwa
30. ya-dara
40. rhi-rngwarna
50. rhi-gngadnha
60. rga-dara
70. rhi-gangka
80. rhi-rhirgwi
90. rhi-glidhi

In many descendants such as Naghfa, the prefixes merged to the roots, so ganyma "50" is a synchronically separate morpheme to enyna "5".

Proto-Trintinic even had roots for higher numbers, which are pretty much unanalysable:

100. -lhana
10,000. -ngkwingwi
100,000,000. -gwarnantyandya

Although given the scarcity of 4-syllable roots, 100,000,000 could possibly be a historic compound. Note that Tumbleweed allowed multiplicative concatenation of any of these roots with all previous numbers, rather than simply 1-9 as in most base-10 systems. For example, 9,999 was expressed as
Rwiglidhi ghaglidhi ghalhanangadlha rwiglidhi ghaglidhi
rwi-glidhi gha-glidhi gha-lhana-ngVDLYV rwi-glidhi gha-glidhi
CLASS.IV.PL-nine CLASS.IV.SG-nine CLASS.IV.SG-hundred-OBL and CLASS.IV.PL-nine CLASS.IV.SG-nine

"Ninety-nine hundred and ninety-nine."
Likewise 8,000,000 would be "eight hundred myriad" and 99,000,000 would be "ninety-nine hundred myriad." This way numbers up to 10,000,000,000,000,000 could technically be expressed. Reflexes in modern-day languages differ to this however; in most cases, the reflex of -ngkwingkwi is used for a thousand, and -gwarnantyandya for a million, due to the pressures of a positional numeral system. You could also express 200 with the dual of -lhana, which is preserved as a root in many languages (e.g. Naghfa ovna "100", ghuvna "200"), and presumably this would also work with 20,000 and 200,000,000, although these aren't reflected in the daughter languages.



That's about it. Shortly I'll be posting some sound changes hopefully, as well as some basic history of how the Tumbleweeds were visited by their own distant descendants for brief periods in 3872BC and 1976AD.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Pan-Tumbleweed orthography

I have some plans for an orthography which can be used consistently throughout all the Tumbleweed languages with no need for confusion. It's pretty similar to Australianist orthography but with a few divergences.


Places of articulation

The three basic places of articulation are labial, coronal and dorsal. The default symbols for these are:

Stops: /p t k/ <p t k>
Voiced stops: /b d ɡ/ <b d g>
Nasals: /m n ŋ/ <m n ng>
Approximants: /w r ɰ/ <w r e>
Laterals: /– l ʟ/ <– l lg>
Fricatives: /f s h/ <f s h>
Voiced fricatives: /v z ɣ/ <v z gh>

The default place of articulation for the coronal is alveolar if it exists and otherwise retroflex (Tumbleweed langs always have one of these POAs), i.e. the least marked of the apical series. There is also a letter for the voiceless uvular stop, <q> and for the palatal approximant, <y>.

The following modifying letters are used:

Backing: <r-> (e.g. /ʈ/ <rt>, /ɢ/ <rg>)
Dental: <-h> (/t̪/ <th>, /n̪/ <nh>)
Palatal: <-y> (/c/ <ty>, /ɲ/ <ny>)
Rounded: <-w> (/kʷ/ <kw>, /ɢʷ/ <rgw>)
Velar: <-g> (/ʟ/ <lg>, /x/ <hg>)


Manner of articulation

Unmarked series are voiceless for stops and fricatives, voiced for everything else. Otherwise:

Aspirated/voiceless: <-‘> (/pʰ/ <p‘>, /n̥/ <n‘>)
Prenasalised: <N-> (/ᵐb/ <mb>, /ᶮʈ/ <rnt>)
Ejective/implosive/glottalised: <-’> (/ɓ/ <b’>, /k’/ <k’>, /m̰/ <m’>)
Pre-stopped: <D-> (/ɖɽ/ <rdr>, /ᵇm/ <bm>)

The prenasalisation and prestopping use homorganic graphemes but are underspecified, with any secondary effects marked only once, hence e.g. /ⁿ̪d̪/ is <ndh> rather than *<nhdh>. The exception to this is velarisation marked on the nasal component of prenasalised consonants e.g. /ᵑkʷ/ <ngkw> not *<nkw>. Only the modifier at the outside of the multigraph is used; hence /ⁿtʷ/ <ntw> vs. /ᶯɖ/ <rnd> (*<nwt nrd>).


Vowels

Most Tumbleweed languages only have two or three vowels. If there are two vowels, the high vowel is <i> and the low vowel is <a>. A third back rounded vowel may be <u> or <o>. For those few languages which also have a front mid vowel, this may be written <e> while /ɰ/ is <gh>. Syllabic consonants are indicated with a circle below, hence /ŋ̩/ <n̥g>, /ɰ̩~ɨ/ <>.
Some languages have larger vowel systems which include central vowels, these may be transcribed as follows:

/i ɨ u/ <i ai u>
/e ə o/ <ei ae ou>
/ɛ a ɔ/ <e a o>

These are rare however.


Clicks

A few Tumbleweed languages have clicks, and some Click languages are written using Tumbleweed alphabets, so graphemes for a number of clicks exist. The click version of a consonant is written with a dot below, hence:

/k͡ʘ k͡ǀ k͡ǁ k͡ǃ k͡‼ k͡ǂ/ <p̣ ṭh ṭl ṭ rṭ ṭy>
/ɡ͡ʘ ɡ͡ǀ ɡ͡ǁ ɡ͡ǃ ɡ͡‼ ɡ͡ǂ/ <p̣ ḍh ḍl ḍ rḍ ḍy>
/ŋ͡ʘ ŋ͡ǀ ŋ͡ǁ ŋ͡ǃ ŋ͡‼ ŋ͡ǂ/ <ṃ ṇh ṇl ṇ rṇ ṇy>
etc.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

General scratchpady stuff:

- I'm considering simplifying the PT verbal system so it doesn't create such unwieldy words
- I'll probably do the descendants with an isogloss approach rather than a tree approach

A couple of major isoglosses will be:
- Even-vowel syncope
- Collapse of laminal series d̪ ɟ > ɟ
- Apicalisation of front coronals d̪ > d
- Fronting of palatals ɟ > d̪
- i > ə
- Fronting of vowels > i following laminals
- Backing of vowels > u following peripherals
- Laminalisation of initial segments (*dnarnqantha > *dnyarnqantyi)
- Fronting of plain velars ɡ > ɟ
- Fronting of uvulars ɢ > ɡ ( > ɟ)
- Loss of the nasal segments of pre-stopped nasals
- Merger of pre-stopped and plain consonants
- Final vowel loss
- Various stop treatments e.g. B MP MB > b v p, B MP MB > b pʰ p’, B MP MB > m p b etc. (like IE, I'll cluster a bunch of these in one area and have them quite spread out elsewhere)
- Word-initial segment loss (*dlhidhirri > *ədyirri), w/wout metathesis (*dlhidhirri > *ədyərrə > cɛɻɛ
- Stem-initial segment loss
- Stop voicing lost with compensatory lengthening
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Clitics

I'm reviewing the clitics and I've decided to reduce them in number and add in some more spicy syntactic ones. The adjectival clitics have been dropped, although descendants may innovate them. That leaves just adverbial and syntactic ones. I've also modified them to have them all bisyllabic.

Adjectival:
dlinti= to the north
rgawi= to the south
gngigha= to the east
rwigngi= to the west
dhidhi= close, proximal
glirngi= far, distal
rradli= higher than speaker
gwilha= lower than speaker
dnawi= moving away
rgwirnqwi= moving towards
gngargwi= downstream
gharwgi= upstream
dnhangwi= by water
warra= in a tree
dnindyi= during the day
gngidhi= morning
waghi= evening
dlhiga= at night
dantha= slowly
dirnqwa= rapidly
rhinggwa= with intent, on purpose
rgawa= without intent, on accident
dnila= forcefully, powerfully
digi= only
gngagngi= almost, frustrative

Syntactical:
rharhi= switch reference (next clause has different subject, with cause/result implication)
dnhila= same referent causal
rangkwi= result of previous action
gwarhi= sequential ("then")
dnhagu= "first"

The syntactical clitics can be stacked on top of adjectival clitics, but the reverse is not true, and other clitic stacking does not occur except for two sequences; dnhagu=rharhi= and dnhagu=dnhila=, the meanings of which should be pretty clear. I'll come up with examples once I've worked on verbal morphology.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

The verb

The maximal verb template in its latest incarnation is:

–2 syntactic clitics
–1 adverbial clitics
0 root
+1 noun incorporation
+2 valency
+3 tense
+4 aspect
+5 mood
+6 S/A agreement
+7 S/O agreement
+8 IO agreement

In this post I'll basically just list the forms of the affixes, to be elucidated on never in a future post.

Valency
There are two main valency-changing suffixes; valency-increasing -wVgV and valency-decreasing -DHVRHV. -wVgV functioned as an applicative or as a causative, while -DHVRHV could variously be a passive, an antipassive or a reflexive; these variations were determined lexically and contextually; e.g. gwiwigi- "see-wVgV" could mean either "show" or "look at" depending on context. (A few instances of -wVgV seem more like benefactives, e.g. dawaga- "come looking for") The third valency-changer was reciprocal -ntVdVDHVlV (gwintididhili- "see each other").

Tense
Three tenses are marked:

Past -NTHVrngwV
Future -dVntV
Pluperfect -rngVNHV

Aspect
Aspects have been trimmed down to just three slots:

Habitual/frequentive -wVNHV
Inchoative -rVlV
Terminative -rngwVngkwVdVRHV

Mood
The five marked irrealis moods are retained:

Irrealis -gVnV
Optative -dlVrrV
Potential -ngkVDHV
Imperative -NHVNHV
Interrogative -gwVntV

Argument agreement

The bisyllabic forms are used for intransitive sentences. Dative forms are always monosyllabic; when used with transitive sentences, the subject suffixes are monosyllabic but the object suffixes are bisyllabic (gwa-ntharngwa-ntha-dnadha-gwa "I gave it to you.")


Series one (A/S):

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      singular    dual        plural
   1  -NTHV(gV)   -NDHV(NDHV) -NDHV(dV)
   2  -rgwV(rnqV) -rgwV(rgwV) -rgV(LHV)
  3I  -DHV(RHV)   -dV(DHV)    -rgwV(DHV)
 3II  -DHV(LHV)   -dV(DHV)    -rgwV(DHV)
3III  -ntV(dnV)   -ntV(ntV)   -ngkV(ntV)
 3IV  -ntV(ghV)   -ntV(ntV)   -ngkV(ntV)
Series two (O/S):

Code: Select all

      singular    dual        plural
   1  -dlV(gV)    -dlV(gV)    -rgwV(DHV)
   2  -gV(DV)     -gV(gV)     -NTHV(DHV)
  3I  -lV(rnwV)   -dV(lV)     -DHV(DHV)
 3II  -LHV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
3III  -dnV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
 3IV  -ghV(DHV)   -dnV(dnV)   -dnV(ntV)
Series three (IO):

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      singular  plural
   1  -ntV      -ndV
   2  -gwV      -LV
  3I  -rV       -dV
 3II  -lV       -rgwV
3III  -gngV     -ngkwV
 3IV  -RHV      -NTHV
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

If I say something about it here, I'll have more incentive to actually work on it, so here goes:

Long-term, my aim is to produce an atlas of isoglosses for the Tumbleweed family, using 65 example languages spread out across the linguistic area, as shown in the map below - currently all unnamed, and the keenest-eyed of you will notice two that I've forgotten to lavel and will remedy later. For each language shown, there's probably at least one other one not shown, reflecting a total of maybe 150 languages.

Image

The initial capital represents an areal grouping; C = central, G = Gk!xogk!o Plains, E = eastern, N = north coast, B = Bay, P = peripheral; these aren't genetic groupings but they do share a number of isoglosses.

In the atlas, I'll go through a large number of isoglosses with about 3 related ones per page, showing their extent and including some examples in various languages, as well as stuff like different orders between languages and ambiguous cases. Then at the end I'll have a brief phonological and morphological description of each language, a list of the changes they underwent, as well as a short example wordlist.

Is this by far the most ambitious project of mine yet? Yes, indeed it is. Most likely it will never be completed, but I can always dream.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

Reading up on Australian pronoun systems has made me want to do something wacky with PT pronouns. European languages can be analysed as having a singular/plural contrast, while Australian languages often have a minimal/augmented contrast, which are important differences when considering clusivity. For instance, in Gurindji:

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     MIN        UNIT AUG   AUG
1    ŋayu       ŋayirra    ŋantipa
1+2  ŋali       ŋaliwula   ŋaliwa
2    njuntu     njunpula   njurrulu
3    njantu     njanpula   njarrulu
This means that the 1incl ŋali is semantically a dual - 'you and I' - but structurally patterns with the other singular pronouns as a minimal pronoun. The unit-augmented forms ŋayirra, njunpula and njanpula are all (semantic) duals, but the unit-augmented 1incl ŋaliwula is a semantic trial.

Proto-Tumbleweed does something similar, although it generates a greater degree of clusivity distinctions. There are two different augmentations - listener-augmented (2AUG), and non-listener augmented (N-2AUG). 2AUG adds one or more listeners to the group referred to by the pronoun, while N-2AUG adds one or more non-listeners - either the speaker, or third persons. This is combined with a basic 1 vs. 2 vs. 1+2 person contrast, with the resulting nine forms:

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     MIN         2AUG       N-2AUG
1    gngayigi    gngawigi   gngayinyi
2    warhaga     warhanha   warhadarhanha
1+2  diyigi     (gngawigi)  diwinyi
The minimal forms are simple; gngayigi "me", warhaga "you" and diyigi "you and I". The listener-augmented forms are roughly gngawigi "me and you all", warhanha "you all". Note that semantically, the 1.2AUG and 1+2.2AUG forms are identical. The non-listener-augmented forms are gngayinyi "us", warhadarhanha "you and them", diwinyi "us and you (sg)."

Many descendants reanalyse this as a simple MIN/AUG system as follows:

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     MIN        AUG
1    gngayigi   gngayinyi
2    warhaga    warhanha
2+1  diyigi     gngawigi
2+3  diwinyi   (various)
For instance, Bwirrkngu has the following:

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     MIN       AUG
1    kngayi    kngaydnhi
2    ghuwa     ghuwbmi
2+1  dyayi     kngadyi
2+3  dyidnhi   dyidnhidnhi
Others (e.g. Gurrgilaynggan below) merge the 2+3 with the 2 forms, 2+3 being a highly marked form:

Code: Select all

     MIN      AUG
1    gay      gayn
2    wulhaa   wulhan
1+2  rdii     gawuy
While some maintain the original analysis, like Buwat’uwa:

Code: Select all

     MIN     2AUG     N-2AUG
1    gayk    gawk     gaydy
2    udhək   udhənh   udhəgarhnh
1+2  giyk      –      giwdy
And others show much simpler systems, like Dyidugarrarla and Nyunhakatu

Code: Select all

        Dyidugarrarla:          Nyunhakatu:
        Sing      Plur          Sing 
1 exc   ŋadyika   ŋadyinyi      nyadha   nyadhinha
  inc   –         rtadyika      –        kadha
2       ŋureka    ŋurema        nyura    nyurima
NB - all of this is subject to change, and none of the descendants will stay the same. The diachronics will occur somewhere in the family but these are just exemplar languages.
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by VaptuantaDoi »

What if I gave PT this:

(1)

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 b   bm  d   dn  dl  ɖ   ɖɳ  ɖɭ  ɟ   ɟɲ  ɟʎ  g   gŋ  gʟ  gʷ  gŋʷ gʟʷ ɢ   ɢɴ  ɢʷ  ɢɴʷ
 mp  mpm̥ nt  ntn̥ ntɬ ɳʈ  ɳʈɳ̊ ɳʈɭ̥ ɲc  ɲcɲ̊ ɲcʎ̥ ŋk  ŋkŋ̊ ŋkʟ̥ ŋkʷ ŋkŋ̊ʷŋkʟ̥ʷɴq  ɴqɴ̥ ɴqʷ ɴqɴ̥ʷ
 mb  m   nd  n   ndl ɳɖ  ɳ   ɳɖɭ ɲɟ  ɲ   ɲɟʎ ŋg  ŋ   ŋgʟ ŋgʷ ŋʷ  ŋgʟʷɴɢ  ɴ   ɴɢʷ ɴʷ
 p’  pm̥’ t’  tn̥’ tɬ’ ʈʂ’ ʈɳ̊’ ʈɭ̥’ c’  cɲ̊’ cʎ̥’ k’  kŋ̊’ kʟ̥’ kʷ’ kŋ̊ʷ’kʟ̥ʷ’q’  qɴ̥’ qʷ’ qɴ̥ʷ’
 gʘ      gǀ      gǁ  g‼      gǁ̢  gǂ
 ŋ̊ʘ      ŋ̊ǀ      ŋ̊ǁ  ŋ̊‼      ŋ̊ǁ̢  ŋ̊ǂ
 ŋʘ      ŋǀ      ŋǁ  ŋ‼      ŋǁ̢  ŋǂ
 kʘˀ     kǀˀ     kǁˀ k‼ˀ     kǁ̢ˀ kǂˀ
Would that perhaps be too far? It is delightfully hideous. The vowel system can be /i ɑ~o/. How would I romanise such a thing? Fairly easily with the exception of /ŋ/ and /ɴ/; I can't use <ng rng> because those are /ŋg ɴɢ/. And I don't want to use any diacritics. I guess ⟨q qn⟩ /ŋ ɴ/ is a thing, but using Ro as natlang precedent is not best form.

b bm d dn dl rd rdn rdl yd ydn ydl g gn gl gw gnw glw rg rgn rgw rgnw
mp mpm nt ntn ntl rnt rntn rntl ynt yntn yntl nk nkn nkl nkw nknw nklw rnk rnkn rnkw rnknw
mb m nd n ndl rnd rn rndl ynd yn yndl ng ? ngl ngw nw nglw rng ? rngw rnw
p pm t tn tl rt rtn rtl yt ytn ytl k kn kl kw knw klw rk rkn rkw rknw
b! ! !l r! r!l y!
mp! nt! nt!l rnt! rnt!l ynt!
m! n! n!l rn! rn!l yn!
p! t! t!l rt! rt!l yt!

Maybe there needs to be a more Arrernte-style pervasive rounding contrast:

(2)

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 b   bm  bʷ  bmʷ d   dn  dl  dʷ  dnʷ dlʷ ɖ   ɖɳ  ɖɭ  ɖʷ  ɖɳʷ ɖɭʷ ɟ   ɟɲ  ɟʎ  ɟʷ  ɟɲʷ ɟʎʷ g   gŋ  gʟ  gʷ  gŋʷ gʟʷ ɢ   ɢɴ  ɢʷ  ɢɴʷ
 mp  mpm̥ mpʷ mpm̥ʷnt  ntn̥ ntɬ ntʷ ntn̥ʷntɬʷɳʈ  ɳʈɳ̥ ɳʈɭ̥ ɳʈʷ ɳʈɳ̥ʷɳʈɭ̥ʷɲc  ɲcɲ̥ ɲcʎ̥ ɲcʷ ɲcɲ̥ʷɲcʎ̥ʷŋk  ŋkŋ̥ ŋkʟ̥ ŋkʷ ŋkŋ̥ʷŋkʟ̥ʷɴq  ɴqɴ̥ ɴqʷ ɴqɴ̥ʷ
 mb  m   mbʷ mʷ  nd  n   ndl ndʷ nʷ  ndlʷɳɖ  ɳ   ɳɖɭ ɳɖʷ ɳʷ  ɳɖɭʷɲɟ  ɲ   ɲɟʎ ɲɟʷ ɲʷ  ɲɟʎʷŋg  ŋ   ŋgʟ ŋgʷ ŋʷ  ŋgʟʷɴɢ  ɴ   ɴɢʷ ɴʷ
 p’  pm̥’ pʷ’ pm̥ʷ’t’  tn̥’ tɬ’ tʷ’ tn̥ʷ’tɬʷ’ʈʂ’ ʈɳ̊’ ʈɭ̥’ ʈʂʷ’ʈɳ̊ʷ’ʈɭ̥ʷ’c’  cɲ̊’ cʎ̥’ cʷ’ cɲ̊ʷ’cʎ̥ʷ’k’  kŋ̊’ kʟ̥’ kʷ’ kŋ̊ʷ’kʟ̥ʷ’q’  qɴ̥’ qʷ’ qɴ̥ʷ’
 gʘ      gʘʷ     gǀ      gǁ  gǀʷ     gǁʷ g‼      gǁ̢  g‼ʷ     gǁ̢ʷ gǂ          gǂʷ
 ŋ̊ʘ      ŋ̊ʘʷ     ŋ̊ǀ      ŋ̊ǁ  ŋ̊ǀʷ     ŋ̊ǁʷ ŋ̊‼      ŋ̊ǁ̢  ŋ̊‼ʷ     ŋ̊ǁ̢ʷ ŋ̊ǂ          ŋ̊ǂʷ
 ŋʘ      ŋʘʷ     ŋǀ      ŋǁ  ŋǀʷ     ŋǁʷ ŋ‼      ŋǁ̢  ŋ‼ʷ     ŋǁ̢ʷ ŋǂ          ŋǂʷ
 kʘˀ     kʘʷˀ    kǀˀ     kǁˀ kǀʷˀ    kǁʷˀk‼ˀ     kǁ̢ˀ k‼ʷˀ    kǁ̢ʷˀkǂˀ         kǂʷˀ
Or instead a bunch of affricates:

(3)

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 b   bm  bβ  d   dn  dl  dz  ɖ   ɖɳ  ɖɭ  ɖʐ  ɟ   ɟɲ  ɟʎ  ɟʑ  g   gŋ  gʟ  gɣ  gʷ  gŋʷ gʟʷ ɢ   ɢɴ  ɢʁ  ɢʷ  ɢɴʷ
 mp  mpm̥ mpɸ nt  ntn̥ ntɬ nts ɳʈ  ɳʈɳ̊ ɳʈɭ̥ ɳʈʂ ɲc  ɲcɲ̊ ɲcʎ̥ ɲcɕ ŋk  ŋkŋ̊ ŋkʟ̥ ŋkx ŋkʷ ŋkŋ̊ʷŋkʟ̥ʷɴq  ɴqɴ̥ ɴqχ ɴqʷ ɴqɴ̥ʷ
 mb  m   mbβ nd  n   ndl ndz ɳɖ  ɳ   ɳɖɭ ɳɖʐ ɲɟ  ɲ   ɲɟʎ ɲɟʑ ŋg  ŋ   ŋgʟ ŋgɣ ŋgʷ ŋʷ  ŋgʟʷɴɢ  ɴ   ɴɢʁ ɴɢʷ ɴʷ
 p’  pm̥’ pɸ’ t’  tn̥’ tɬ’ ts’ ʈʂ’ ʈɳ̊’ ʈɭ̥’ ʈʂ’ c’  cɲ̊’ cʎ̥’ cɕ’ k’  kŋ̊’ kʟ̥’ kx’ kʷ’ kŋ̊ʷ’kʟ̥ʷ’q’  qɴ̥’ qχ’ qʷ’ qɴ̥ʷ’
 gʘ      gʘx gǀ      gǁ  gǁx g‼      gǁ̢  g‼x gǂ          gǂx
 ŋ̊ʘ      ŋ̊ʘx ŋ̊ǀ      ŋ̊ǁ  ŋ̊ǁx ŋ̊‼      ŋ̊ǁ̢  ŋ̊‼x ŋ̊ǂ          ŋ̊ǂx
 ŋʘ      ŋʘx ŋǀ      ŋǁ  ŋǁx ŋ‼      ŋǁ̢  ŋ‼x ŋǂ          ŋǂx 
 kʘˀ     kʘxˀkǀˀ     kǁˀ kǁxˀk‼ˀ     kǁ̢ˀ k‼xˀkǂˀ         kǂxˀ 
Or perhaps some voicing contours:

(4)

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 b   bm  bβ   d   dn  dl  dz   ɖ   ɖɳ  ɖɭ  ɖʐ   ɟ   ɟɲ  ɟʎ  ɟʑ   g   gŋ  gʟ  gɣ  gʷ  gŋʷ  gʟʷ  ɢ   ɢɴ  ɢʁ  ɢʷ  ɢɴʷ
 mp  mpm̥ mpɸ  nt  ntn̥ ntɬ nts  ɳʈ  ɳʈɳ̊ ɳʈɭ̥ ɳʈʂ  ɲc  ɲcɲ̊ ɲcʎ̥ ɲcɕ  ŋk  ŋkŋ̊ ŋkʟ̥ ŋkx ŋkʷ ŋkŋ̊ʷ ŋkʟ̥ʷ ɴq  ɴqɴ̥ ɴqχ ɴqʷ ɴqɴ̥ʷ
 mb  m   mbβ  nd  n   ndl ndz  ɳɖ  ɳ   ɳɖɭ ɳɖʐ  ɲɟ  ɲ   ɲɟʎ ɲɟʑ  ŋg  ŋ   ŋgʟ ŋgɣ ŋgʷ ŋʷ   ŋgʟʷ ɴɢ  ɴ   ɴɢʁ ɴɢʷ ɴʷ
 p’  pm̥’ pɸ’  tθ’ tn̥’ tɬ’ ts’  ʈ’  ʈɳ̊’ ʈɭ̥’ ʈʂ’  c’  cɲ̊’ cʎ̥’ cɕ’  k’  kŋ̊’ kʟ̥’ kx’ kʷ’ kŋ̊ʷ’ kʟ̥ʷ’ q’  qɴ̥’ qχ’ qʷ’ qɴ̥ʷ’
 bpʰ bpm̥ʰbpɸʰ dtʰ dtn̥ʰdtɬʰdtsʰ ɖʈʰ ɖʈɳ̊ʰɖʈɭ̥ʰɖʈʂʰ ɟcʰ ɟcɲ̊ʰɟcʎ̥ʰɟcɕʰ gkʰ gkŋ̊ʰgkʟ̥ʰgkxʰgkʷʰgkŋ̊ʷʰʁkʟ̥ʷʰɢqʰ ɢqɴ̥ʰɢqχʰɢqʷʰɢqɴ̥ʷʰ
 bp’ bpm̥’bpɸ’ dtθ’dtn̥’dtɬ’dts’ ɖʈ’ ɖʈɳ̊’ɖʈɭ̥’ɖʈʂ’ ɟc’ ɟcɲ̊’ɟcʎ̥’ɟcɕ’ gk’ gkŋ̊’gkʟ̥’gkx’gkʷ’gkŋ̊ʷ’ʁkʟ̥ʷ’ɢq’ ɢqɴ̥’ɢqχ’ɢqʷ’ɢqɴ̥ʷ’
 gʘ      gʘx  gǀ      gǁ  gǁx  g‼      gǁ̢  g‼x  gǂ          gǂx
 ŋ̊ʘ      ŋ̊ʘx  ŋ̊ǀ      ŋ̊ǁ  ŋ̊ǁx  ŋ̊‼      ŋ̊ǁ̢  ŋ̊‼x  ŋ̊ǂ          ŋ̊ǂx
 ŋʘ      ŋʘx  ŋǀ      ŋǁ  ŋǁx  ŋ‼      ŋǁ̢  ŋ‼x  ŋǂ          ŋǂx 
 kʘˀ     kʘxˀ kǀˀ     kǁˀ kǁxˀ k‼ˀ     kǁ̢ˀ k‼xˀ kǂˀ         kǂxˀ 
 gkʘʰ    gkʘxʰgkǀʰ    gkǁʰgkǁxʰgk‼ʰ    gkǁ̢ʰgk‼xʰgkǂʰ        gkǂxʰ
 gkʘˀ    gkʘxˀgkǀˀ    gkǁˀgkǁxˀgk‼ˀ    gkǁ̢ˀgk‼xˀgkǂˀ        gkǂxˀ
Or the holy grail of all of them:

(5)

Code: Select all

 b    bm   bβ    bʷ   bmʷ   bβʷ    d    dn   dl   dz    dʷ    dnʷ   dlʷ   dzʷ    ɖ    ɖɳ   ɖɭ   ɖʐ    ɖʷ    ɖɳʷ   ɖɭʷ   ɖʐʷ    ɟ    ɟɲ   ɟʎ   ɟʑ    ɟʷ    ɟɲʷ   ɟʎʷ   ɟʑʷ   g    gŋ   gʟ   gɣ   gʷ   gŋʷ   gʟʷ   gɣʷ  ɢ    ɢɴ   ɢʁ   ɢʷ   ɢɴʷ   ɢʁʷ
 mp   mpm̥  mpɸ   mpʷ  mpm̥ʷ  mpɸʷ   nt   ntn̥  ntɬ  nts   ntʷ   ntn̥ʷ  ntɬʷ  ntsʷ   ɳʈ   ɳʈɳ̊  ɳʈɭ̥  ɳʈʂ   ɳʈʷ   ɳʈɳ̊ʷ  ɳʈɭ̥ʷ  ɳʈʂʷ   ɲc   ɲcɲ̊  ɲcʎ̥  ɲcɕ   ɲcʷ   ɲcɲ̊ʷ  ɲcʎ̥ʷ  ɲcɕʷ  ŋk   ŋkŋ̊  ŋkʟ̥  ŋkx  ŋkʷ  ŋkŋ̊ʷ  ŋkʟ̥ʷ  ŋkxʷ ɴq   ɴqɴ̥  ɴqχ  ɴqʷ  ɴqɴ̥ʷ  ɴqχʷ
 mb   m    mbβ   mbʷ  mʷ    mbβʷ   nd   n    ndl  ndz   ndʷ   nʷ    ndlʷ  ndzʷ   ɳɖ   ɳ    ɳɖɭ  ɳɖʐ   ɳɖʷ   ɳʷ    ɳɖɭʷ  ɳɖʐʷ   ɲɟ   ɲ    ɲɟʎ  ɲɟʑ   ɲɟʷ   ɲʷ    ɲɟʎʷ  ɲɟʑʷ  ŋg   ŋ    ŋgʟ  ŋgɣ  ŋgʷ  ŋʷ    ŋgʟʷ  ŋgɣʷ ɴɢ   ɴ    ɴɢʁ  ɴɢʷ  ɴʷ    ɴɢʁʷ
 p’   pm̥’  mpɸ’  pʷ’  pm̥ʷ’  pɸʷ’   tθ’  tn̥’  tɬ’  ts’   tθʷ’  tn̥ʷ’  tɬʷ’  tsʷ’   ʈ’   ʈɳ̊’  ʈɭ̥’  ʈʂ’   ʈʷ’   ʈɳ̊ʷ’  ʈɭ̥ʷ’  ʈʂʷ’   c’   cɲ̊’  cʎ̥’  cɕ’   cʷ’   cɲ̊ʷ’  cʎ̥’ʷ  cɕʷ’  k’   kŋ̊’  kʟ̥’  kx’  kʷ’  kŋ̊ʷ’  kʟ̥ʷ’  kxʷ’ q’   qɴ̥’  qχ’  qʷ’  qɴ̥ʷ’  qχʷ’
 bpʰ  bpm̥ʰ bpɸʰ  bpʷʰ bpm̥ʷʰ bpɸʷʰ  dtʰ  dtn̥ʰ dtɬʰ dtsʰ  dtʷʰ  dtn̥ʷʰ dtɬʷʰ dtsʷʰ  ɖʈʰ  ɖʈɳ̊ʰ ɖʈɭ̥ʰ ɖʈʂʰ  ɖʈʷʰ  ɖʈɳ̊ʷʰ ɖʈɭ̥ʷʰ ɖʈʂʷʰ  ɟcʰ  ɟcɲ̊ʰ ɟcʎ̥ʰ ɟcɕʰ  ɟcʷʰ  ɟcɲ̊ʷʰ ɟcʎ̥ʷʰ ɟcɕʷʰ gkʰ  gkŋ̊ʰ gkʟ̥ʰ gkxʰ gkʷʰ gkŋ̊ʷʰ gkʟ̥ʷʰ gkxʷʰɢqʰ  ɢqɴ̥ʰ ɢqχʰ ɢqʷʰ ɢqɴ̥ʷʰ ɢqχʷʰ
 bp’  bpm̥’ bpɸ’  bpʷ’ bpm̥ʷ’ bpɸʷ’  dtθ’ dtn̥’ dtɬ’ dts’  dtθʷ’ dtn̥ʷ’ dtɬʷ’ dtsʷ’  ɖʈ’  ɖʈɳ̊’ ɖʈɭ̥’ ɖʈʂ’  ɖʈʷ’  ɖʈɳ̊ʷ’ ɖʈɭ̥ʷ’ ɖʈʂʷ’  ɟc’  ɟcɲ̊’ ɟcʎ̥’ ɟcɕ’  ɟcʷ’  ɟcɲ̊ʷ’ ɟcʎ̥ʷ’ ɟcɕʷ’ gk’  gkŋ̊’ gkʟ̥’ gkx’ gkʷ’ gkŋ̊ʷ’ gkʟ̥ʷ’ gkxʷ’ɢq’  ɢqɴ̥’ ɢqχ’ ɢqʷ’ ɢqɴ̥ʷ’ ɢqχʷ’
 gʘ        gʘx   gʘʷ        gʘxʷ   gǀ        gǁ   gǀx   gǀʷ         gǁʷ   gǀxʷ   g‼        gǁ̢   g‼x   g‼ʷ         gǁ̢ʷ   g‼xʷ   gǂ             gǂx   gǂʷ               gǂxʷ
 ŋ̊ʘ        ŋ̊ʘx   ŋ̊ʘʷ        ŋ̊ʘxʷ   ŋ̊ǀ        ŋ̊ǁ   ŋ̊ǀx   ŋ̊ǀʷ         ŋ̊ǁʷ   ŋ̊ǀxʷ   ŋ̊‼        ŋ̊ǁ̢   ŋ̊‼x   ŋ̊‼ʷ         ŋ̊ǁ̢ʷ   ŋ̊‼xʷ   ŋ̊ǂ             ŋ̊ǂx   ŋ̊ǂʷ               ŋ̊ǂxʷ
 ŋʘ        ŋʘx   ŋʘʷ        ŋʘxʷ   ŋǀ        ŋǁ   ŋǀx   ŋǀʷ         ŋǁʷ   ŋǀxʷ   ŋ‼        ŋǁ̢   ŋ‼x   ŋ‼ʷ         ŋǁ̢ʷ   ŋ‼xʷ   ŋǂ             ŋǂx   ŋǂʷ               ŋǂxʷ
 kʘˀ       kʘxˀ  kʘʷˀ       kʘxʷˀ  kǀˀ       kǁˀ  kǀxˀ  kǀʷˀ        kǁʷˀ  kǀxʷˀ  k‼ˀ       kǁ̢ˀ  k‼xˀ  k‼ʷˀ        kǁ̢ʷˀ  k‼xʷˀ  kǂˀ            kǂxˀ  kǂʷˀ              kǂxʷˀ
 gkʘʰ      gkʘxʰ gkʘʷʰ      gkʘxʷʰ gkǀʰ      gkǁʰ gkǀxʰ gkǀʷʰ       gkǁʷʰ gkǀxʷʰ gk‼ʰ      gkǁ̢ʰ gk‼xʰ gk‼ʷʰ       gkǁ̢ʷʰ gk‼xʷʰ gkǂʰ           gkǂxʰ gkǂʷʰ             gkǂxʷʰ
 gkʘˀ      gkʘxˀ gkʘʷˀ      gkʘxʷˀ gkǀˀ      gkǁˀ gkǀxˀ gkǀʷˀ       gkǁʷˀ gkǀxʷˀ gk‼ˀ      gkǁ̢ˀ gk‼xˀ gk‼ʷˀ       gkǁ̢ʷˀ gk‼xʷˀ gkǂˀ           gkǂxˀ gkǂʷˀ             gkǂxʷˀ
Of course this needs a romanisation:

b bm bv bw bmw bvw d dn dl dz dw dnw dlw dzw rd rdn rdl rdz rdw rdnw rdlw rdzw yd ydn ydl ydz ydw ydnw ydlw ydzy g gn gl gx gw gnw glw gxw rg rgn rgx rgw rgnw rgxw
mp mpm mpf mpw mpmw mpfw nt ntn ntl nts ntw ntnw ntlw ntsw rnt rntn rntl rnts rntw rntnw rntlw rntsw ynt yntn yntl ynts yntw yntnw yntlw yntsw nk nkn nkl nkx nkw nknw nklw nkxw rnk rnkn rnkx rnkw rnknw rnkxw
mb m mbv mbw mbmw mbvw nd n ndl ndz ndw ndnw ndlw ndzw rnd rn rndl rndz rndw rnw rndlw rndzw ynd yn yndl yndz yndw ynw yndlw yndzy ng q ngl ngx ngw qw nglw ngxw rng rq rngx rngw rqw rngxw
p pm pf pw pmw pfw t tn tl ts tw tnw tlw tsw rt rtn rtl rts rtw rtnw rtlw rtsw yt ytn ytl yts ytw ytnw ytlw ytsw k kn kl kx kw knw klw kxw rk rkn rkx rkw rknw rkxw
bph bpmh bpfh bpwh bpmwh bpfwh dth dtnh dtlh dtsh dtwh dtnwh dtlwh dtswh rdth rdtnh rdtlh rdtsh rdtwh rdtnwh rdtlwh rtdswh ydth ydtnh ydtlh ydtsh ydtwh ydtnwh ydtlwh ydtsyh gkh gknh gklh gkxh gkwh gknwh gklwh gkxwh rgkh rgknh rgkxh rgkwh rgknwh rgkxwh
bp bpm bpf bpw bpmw bpfw dt dtn dtl dts dtw dtnw dtlw dtsw rdt rdtn rdtl rdts rdtw rdtnw rdtlw rtdsw ydt ydtn ydtl ydts ydtw ydtnw ydtlw ydtsy gk gkn gkl gkx gkw gknw gklw gkxw rgk rgkn rgkx rgkw rgknw rgkxw
b! b!f b!w b!fw ! !l !s !w !lw !sw r! r!l r!s r!w r!lw r!sw y! y!s y!w y!sw
mp! mp!f mp!w mp!fw nt! nt!l nt!s nt!w nt!lw nt!sw rnt! rnt!l rnt!s rnt!w rnt!lw rnt!sw ynt! ynt!s ynt!w ynt!sw
m! m!f m!w m!fw n! n!l n!s n!w n!lw n!sw rn! rn!l rn!s rn!w rn!lw rn!sw yn! yn!s yn!w yn!sw
p! p!f p!w p!fw t! t!l t!s t!w t!lw t!sw rt! rt!l rt!s rt!w rt!lw rt!sw yt! yt!s yt!w yt!sw
bp!h bp!fh bp!wh bp!fwh dt!h dt!lh dt!sh dt!wh dt!lwh dt!swh rdt!h rdt!lh rdt!sh rdt!wh rdt!lwh rdt!swh ydt!h ydt!sh ydt!wh ydt!swh
bp! bp!f bp!w bp!fw dt! dt!l dt!s dt!w dt!lw dt!sw rdt! rdt!l rdt!s rdt!w rdt!lw rdt!sw ydt! ydt!s ydt!w ydt!sw


I can't decide whether my favourite thing about this inventory is the use of heptagraphs like ⟨ydt!swh⟩ /gkǂxʷʰ/, or the fact that it has as many retroflexes as Ubykh has consonants.



Which one of these do you guys prefer? I like (1), but (5) would be an interesting challenge (it does have 382 consonants which is daunting), albeit perhaps a tad on the not-super-naturalistic side.
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Arayaz
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Re: Project Tumbleweed

Post by Arayaz »

VaptuantaDoi wrote: 09 Feb 2024 00:04Which one of these do you guys prefer? I like (1), but (5) would be an interesting challenge (it does have 382 consonants which is daunting), albeit perhaps a tad on the not-super-naturalistic side.
A fan of (2) myself, but (5) would be very, very fun
Proud member of the myopic-trans-southerner-Viossa-girl-with-two-cats-who-joined-on-September-6th-2022 gang

:con: Ruykkarraber languages, Izre, Ngama, Areyaxi languages, ???, 2c2ef0
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