Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

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Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by YoungConlanger »

Those who usually see me here have seen some sentences in Proto-Pehian (what I just renamed Pehia to) - full on with glosses & pronunciation. Proto-Pehian is no way near completion, & it's still in a relatively drafty stage, but now I think I've outlined enough of it to present you here.

Disclaimer:
I'm a novice, I do not deny this, & I never claimed, nor claim to know enough linguistic concepts to make a good conlang. From the feedback of other people & compared to other projects I do realize my language is very generic & nooby for a naturalistic language, but IMHO I'm proud that I can make at least something that works like a language. Still, I'm trying my best for the language to be a bit alien/unlike other languages, especially English & Russian (the ones I know), & to not turn it into a "kitchen sink" I'd trash later. The reason I post it here is for people to be able see the conlang from inside-out, so they can use it & say how good are my language elements. I welcome feedback & criticism, & also ideas on how to improve this conlang!

Disclaimer II:
Proto-Pehian isn't near even to the point I consider it "usable", & everything here (maybe except phonology & vocab) is subject to change. I may do it in twisted ways that render previous Pehia sentences ungrammatical, so I'm not going to delete previous outlines I've made.

Ideas list:
№1: the Santa Barbara of demonstratives & 3rd person pronouns
№2: Literary Pehia is a pidgin.

To be posted:
How clauses work (oh dear how would I flesh this part out)
Stuff from posts after this
Phonology:
Proto-Pehian phonology:

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Consonants	Labial		Dental		Alveolar	Retro­flex		Palatal		Velar
Nasal		/m/ [m]				/n/ [n]
Plosive		/p/ [p] /b/ [b]			/t/ [t] /d/ [d]				[c]²		/k/ [k] /g/ [ɡ]
Fricative	/f/ [f] [v]⁵ ⁶	/th/ [θ]	/s/ [s] /z/ [z]	/c/ [ʂ] /zh/ [ʐ]	[ç]²		/x/ [x] /gh/ [ɣ]⁵
Trill 						/r/ [r]
Liquids		/w/ [w]				/l/ [ɫ] [ʎ]³				/j/ [j]
Pulmonic					/q/ [t͡ɬ]

Vowels		Front		Central		Back
Close		/i/ [i]		/y/ [ɨ]¹
Mid 		/e/ [ɛ] [e]²	[ə]⁴		/o/ [o]
Open				/a/ [a]
Stress pattern: penultimate if a word ends on a vowel, or final if it ends on a consonant.
Syllable structure: (C)V(C), where C is any consonant, V is any vowel.
Only vowels, nasals, fricatives & liquids can end words.
¹phonemic only word initially, merged with /i/ elsewhere.
²[k] & [x] palatalize to [c] & [ç] before [ɛ], which itself becomes [e]
³a word final allophone of /l/
⁴[a] & [ɛ] weaken to [ə] in unstressed syllables
⁵[f] & [x] become vocalized ([v] [ɣ]) between vowels
⁶[w] becomes [v] word initially

Sound changes:
I'm not very good at sound changes that result in a language sounding like the way I want to, so I first made Proto-Pehian's phonology, & then analyzed it & solo-brainstormed on what changes could've led to this phonology. Basically, I reconstructed PKP's phonology from Proto-Pehian.

Proto-Kesto-Pehian phonology:

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Consonants	Labial		Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal		Velar
Nasal		/m/		/n/
Plain plosive	/p/		/t/						/k/
Asp. plosive	/pʰ/		/tʰ/						/kʰ/
Fricative			/s/		/ʂ/
Trill				/r/
Liquids		/w/		/ɫ/				/j/

Vowels		Front		Central		Back
Close				/ɨː/ /ɨ/
Mid		/eː/ /e/	/ə/		/oː/ /o/
Open				/äː/ /ä/
I know-I know, looks very regular, but that's because it's a very general representation of it because many sounds were in pretty free variation, which what actually made sound changes & its split happen. & yes, it's not the usual "upside down pyramid" vowel system.

In the spoiler are sound changes that lead from PKP to Proto-Pehian. Changes in this color indicate a common family-wide change, this color means that a similar change also happens in another separating language, uncolored means a change that is unique to the Proto-Pehian branch. (I hope colorblind people here will be able to distinguish these)
Spoiler:
Aspirated plosives mutation:
pʰ -> ɸ
kʰ -> x

Plosives become voiced before long vowels:
PVː -> BVː

[ ə ] mutation between two liquids:
ə -> ɨ / L_L

[ ə ] gets lost except between two [ r ]:
ə -> ∅ / _ / r_r

Plosive pairs become plosive-fricative ones:
P1P2 -> F1P2

Nasal & fricative pairs reduce to a single consonant:
{N1N2,F1F2} -> {N1,F2}

Short [ ɨ ] reduces to [ j ] before another vowel if unstressed:
ɨ -> j / V_[ -stress ] / _ː
Development of [ θ ]:
stʰ -> θtʰ -> θː -> θ
Long [ ɨ ] brightens:
ɨː -> iː

[ ɸ ] becomes labiodental:
ɸ -> f
[ tʰ ] becomes [ t͡ɬ ]:
tʰ -> t͡ɬ

[ s ], [ ʂ ] & [ x ] become voiced before long vowels:
{sʂx}Vː -> {zʐɣ}Vː

Vowel length loss, voiced consonants become phonemic:
Vː -> V
[ä] changes quality:
ä -> a

[ k ], [ ɡ ] & [ x ] palatalize to [ c ], [ ɟ ] & [ ç ] before [ e ]:
ke, ɡe, xe -> ce, ɟe, çe
[ ɫ ] becomes [ ʎ ] word finally:
ɫ -> ʎ / _#
[ e ] lowers, except before palatal consonants:
e -> ɛ / _ / C[ palatal ]_

[ a ] [ ɛ ] & [ ɨ ] weaken to [ ə ] in unstressed syllables:
a, ɛ, ɨ -> ə / _[ -stress ]

[ i ] & [ ɨ ] merge, except at the start of a word:
ɨ -> i / _[ +stress ] / #_
i -> ɨ / _[ -stress ] / #_
[ f ] & [ x ] become voiced between vowels:
f, x -> v, ɣ / V_V
[ w ] becomes [ v ] word initially: (the last common sound change, meaning both languages are practically by themselves by now)
w -> v / #_

Word order:
Proto-Pehian has a Subject-Verb-Object word order, & it's very strict - to the point that passive sentences like "O gets Ved by S" are forbidden. Passive constructions do exist, but they're used only when the subject is omitted/unknown. That is, you can reverse "A person (someone) feeds me" into "I am/get fed":

Gho sarota re ---> Re komace sarota
human feed 1SG ---> 1SG get feed
Spoiler:
(yes, this is very English, but at least it's natural & could've been developed naturally, so "Coincedence? - I think IS")
But you can't do the same trick to turn "She makes an instrument" into "An instrument is made by her" (because there's no "by" or anything similar that expresses "by" in this context):

Sea jerma sonoka -x-> *Sonoka komace jerma ??! sei
3SG.FEM create tool -x-> *tool get create by(?) 3SG.FEM

So remember - in Proto-Pehian nothing can stop the SVO.
But the passive constructions you were talking about-..!
They still obey the almighty SVO. They just always lack an object, that's it. Look:
Re komace sarota
|  |_____| |____|
S   V    V

The order of all words relater to the noun are:
<Adpositions> <Numbers> <Demonstratives> <Noun> <Adjectives> <Possessors> <Relative clauses>
The sentence that fully illustrates this order:
Thi lei zhe den opo-no re-la zhe sejo doj-io thi barko otoki-jo.
in five this artificial_place good-NEUT 1SG-GEN this 3PL be-PLUR in near birch_tree-PLUR
"In these five good houses of mine that are near birches."

The spoiler below is older stuff that I think is now kind-of obsolete but just in case.
Spoiler:
Before nouns come:
Adpositions - thi den in artificial_place "In the city/village"
Demonstratives - zhe gho this human "This person/That dude"
Numbers - lei sonoka five tool "Five tools"
After nouns come:
Possessors - sonoka rela tool 1SG-POSS "My tool"
Adjectives - gho oponi human good-MASC "A good person"
Relative clauses - egizh zhe sei sedorno cari gela ifoja opono man 3SG.MASC PST.PF-eat wolf have hearing good-NEUT "The man that ate a wolf has a good hearing."
Grammar:
Nouns:
All nouns belong to one of the four noun classes: masculine animate, feminine animate, genderless animate & inanimate. Nouns have 3 numbers: singular, dual (when there's two of a noun) & plural; & four cases: nominative, dative, genitive/possessive & instrumental. Here's the postfix table:

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		Singular	Dual		Plural
Nominative	<unmarked>	-(a)ma		-(i/j)o
Dative		-(k)ipi		-(a)makipi	-(i/j)okipi
Gen./Poss.	-(l)a		-(a)mala	-(i/j)ola
Instrumental	-(n)e		-(a)mane	-(i/j)one
Pronouns:
3rd person pronouns have to agree by noun class w/ the words they refer to.

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Pronouns	Singular	Dual		Plural
1st person	re		rema		nel
2nd person	ga		gama		xa
3rd p. masc.	sei		sema		sejo
3rd p. fem.	sea		sema		sejo
3rd p. neut.	seo		seom		sejo
Verbs:
Verbs can be transitive or intransitive, & have 3 tenses: past, present & future; 2 aspects: perfective, imperfective (both apply only to past tense); & 3 moods: imperative (applies only to the present tense), negative & reflexive (transitive verbs only). Mood prefixes come before the tense prefixes. You can make transitive verbs from intransitive via derivational morphology. Verbs have to agree w/ the subject by number.

Code: Select all

			Singular	Dual		Plural
Past Perfective		s(e)-		s(e)-(m)a	s(e)-(i/j)o
Past Imperfective	i(k)-		i(k)-(m)a	i(k)-(i/j)o
Present			<unmarked>	-(m)a		-(i/j)o
Future			j(o)-		j(o)-(m)a	j(o)-(i/j)o

Imperative mood		k(i)-
Negative mood		k(o)-
Reflexive mood		<verb> subject_pronoun
Adjectives:
Adjectives have to agree with a noun by its noun class. All adjectives can modify a verb (become adverbs) by taking no postfix.

Code: Select all

Masculine	-(n)i
Feminine	-(n)a
Neuter		-(n)o
Adverbal	<unmarked>
Spoiler:
Previously, adjectives became adverbs by taking a special adverbal postfix instead of a noun class one.

Code: Select all

Adverbal	-(k)e
Noun class agreement:
TL;DW, here's a noun agreement table:

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		How adjectives agree	How pronouns agree
Masc.-Animate	<adj>-MASC		3SG.MASC
Fem.-Animate	<adj>-FEM		3SG.FEM
Genderless-An.	<adj>-MASC / <adj>-FEM	3SG.NEUT
Neut.-Inanimate	<adj>-NEUT		SG.NEUT
Vocabulary & Derivational morphology:
There's the door to the dictionary. (it's on Google Spreadsheets)
Here's the full derivational morphology table:

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Root			<root>
Person/Doer of X	<root>-(a)gho
Natural place of X	<root>-(a)l
Constructed place of X	<root>-(e)n
Tool for doing X	<root>-(o)noka
Diminutive		<root>-(n)ino
To noun			<root>-(i/j)a
To adjective		<root>-(o)j
To transitive verb	<root>-(i)ka
Intrans. verb to trans.	<root>-(a)se
Last edited by YoungConlanger on 15 Jan 2025 11:50, edited 5 times in total.
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Re: Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by HolyHandGrenade! »

This doesn’t look bad. I am wondering why imperative, negation, and reflexive are all aspects. Aspect represents how an event is framed in time. Imperative is usually a mood, negation is sometimes classified as a mood and sometimes as its own thing, and reflexive is usually a voice, called the middle voice. Also, how are direct objects expressed? I’m curious to see some more detail about the case system and how each case is used.
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Re: Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by Creyeditor »

This looks very promising [:)]
Here are a few questions:
  • What is the order between Adpositions, Numbers, and Demonstratives? Is it thi zhe lei den or thi lei zhe den or zhe thi lei den or lei thi zhe den or ...?
  • The same question for relative clauses, adjectives and possessors.
  • Is Sonoka komace jerma a valid sentence?
  • How does the reflexive voice work?
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Questions already? They the answers, here they come!

Post by YoungConlanger »

HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 02:26 This doesn’t look bad.
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19 This looks very promising [:)]
*wipes sweat from his forehead*
HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 02:26 I am wondering why imperative, negation, and reflexive are all aspects. Aspect represents how an event is framed in time. Imperative is usually a mood, negation is sometimes classified as a mood and sometimes as its own thing, and reflexive is usually a voice, called the middle voice.
My bad terminology usage. Yes, Imperative & Negative are moods actually.
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19
  • How does the reflexive voice work?
Reflexive is basically an analytic structure (can I even call it like that?) that basically makes a transitive verb take the same thing as a subject & an object. For example:
Re opoka re
1SG improve 1SG
"I improve myself [I make myself a better person(?)]"
HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 02:26 Also, how are direct objects expressed? I’m curious to see some more detail about the case system and how each case is used.
Uhhhh... I'm struggling to understand what're you asking me. I'll suppose I'll say this:
Because Proto-Pehian has a rock-hard SVO word order, (direct) objects are unmarked & determined by their position in the sentence. Compare:
Re tetase kisa / Kisa tetase re
1SG kill animal / animal kill 1SG
"I kill an animal" / "An animal kills me"
Indirect objects are marked by the dative case:
Sea se-pexi seo sei-kipi.
3SG.FEM PST.PF-speak 3SG.NEUT 3SG.MASC-DAT
"She told this to him."
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19
  • What is the order between Adpositions, Numbers, and Demonstratives? Is it thi zhe lei den or thi lei zhe den or zhe thi lei den or lei thi zhe den or ...?
Wow I didn't even think of that! I'm tempted to do it just like in English or Russian but I think I'll make it weird this time...
Let's say, Adpositions, then Numbers, then Demonstratives, then a noun. So it's thi lei zhe den "in those 5 cities/houses".
Spoiler:
Proto-Pehian has 2 words for "place": fal & den. Fal is any location that is natural & of untouched nature (forests, plains, mountains, Victoria Falls), & den is any place that was built by humans &/or is artificial (villages, cities, campsites, your local KFC)
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19
  • The same question for relative clauses, adjectives and possessors.
I suppose Noun, then Adjectives, then Possessors, then Relative clauses: den opono rela zhe re sekomace yrata thi seo "My good house where I was born"
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19
  • Is Sonoka komace jerma a valid sentence?
Yes, passive clauses are only used when subject is ommited. & Sonoka komace jerma means "[The/a] tool is created."
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Re: Questions already? They the answers, here they come!

Post by HolyHandGrenade! »

YoungConlanger wrote: 03 Jan 2025 15:49
Creyeditor wrote: 03 Jan 2025 09:19
  • How does the reflexive voice work?
Reflexive is basically an analytic structure (can I even call it like that?) that basically makes a transitive verb take the same thing as a subject & an object. For example:
Re opoka re
1SG improve 1SG
"I improve myself [I make myself a better person(?)]"
HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 02:26 Also, how are direct objects expressed? I’m curious to see some more detail about the case system and how each case is used.
Uhhhh... I'm struggling to understand what're you asking me. I'll suppose I'll say this:
Because Proto-Pehian has a rock-hard SVO word order, (direct) objects are unmarked & determined by their position in the sentence. Compare:
Re tetase kisa / Kisa tetase re
1SG kill animal / animal kill 1SG
"I kill an animal" / "An animal kills me"
Indirect objects are marked by the dative case:
Sea se-pexi seo sei-kipi.
3SG.FEM PST.PF-speak 3SG.NEUT 3SG.MASC-DAT
"She told this to him."
The thing is, no grammatical feature can be described in one word, such as “instrumental”, or even a sentence. For example, reflexives. The exact usage is very language specific. For example, in Spanish, you can say stuff like “El padre se enojó” literally “the father angered himself”, but would be translated “the father got angry”. Or “Me pongo la camisa” literally “I put myself a shirt” but translated as “I put a shirt on”. English’s reflexive is much more limited. Now, I understand you’re a beginner and the language is still in its early stages, I don’t expect you to have much, but this is just something to be thinking about down the road.
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Idea №1: the Santa Barbara of demonstratives & 3rd person pronouns

Post by YoungConlanger »

Proto-Pehian's parent lang is Proto-Kesto-Pehian, & it didn't have any 3rd person pronouns, but had two demonstratives: [se] - this & [ʂeː] that. People referred to others by their name or by phrases like "this person" [se xoː]. In the Pehian dialect those phrases became lexicalized/grammaralized & turned into the 3rd person pronouns, meanwhile losing "this" as a separate word.

This speaks that the word for "that" will be the new "this", & at first it is, but on the contrary, the Pehian dialect speakers will start to compulsively use the forming 3rd person pronouns as a new way to refer to any objects, not just people (because they'll still remember the word "[se]", if not being separate, having its own meaning at least), so now the [ʂeː] descendant [ʐɛ] undergoes a semantic (grammatic???) bleaching & cannot function as a standalone word anymore (i.e. it can't be used in phrases like "This is a rock", but can be used in constructions like "this rock", "this tool").

Wait, what if... There's also Proto-Voramic branching off Proto-Pehian very early on, what if in Voramic languages pronouns become the only way to refer to any object w/out naming it, [ʐɛ] becomes even more bleached, losing its function of a demonstrative & becoming a definite article? I think that'll be interesting...

END OF IDEA
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Re: Questions already? They the answers, here they come!

Post by YoungConlanger »

HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 16:19 The thing is, no grammatical feature can be described in one word, such as “instrumental”, or even a sentence. For example, reflexives. The exact usage is very language specific. (...) Now, I understand you’re a beginner and the language is still in its early stages, I don’t expect you to have much, but this is just something to be thinking about down the road.
Yeah I'm still a bit striggling w/ cases, Proto-Pehian has only 4 & the table doesn't look natural even to me.
Maybe I should indeed expand not just on the meaning of cases, but on cases overall.
I just hope my mind can make another one of those Santa Barbaras like in the post above so I can come up w/ something nice regarding other grammatical features, being relatively not too hard meanwhile.
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Re: Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by YoungConlanger »

Alright I've left this thread stagnate for a few days, here's a dictionary of all root words, & here's the full planned family of languages (open the spoiler):
Spoiler:
Light-colored blocks represent dead languages (those that do not exist anymore)
(all language names except for Pehia, Hafician & branch names are placeholders (kind of))
Image
Edit: Post scriptum:
Here's also the full derivational morphology table I use:

Code: Select all

Root			<root>
Person/Doer of X	<root>-(a)gho
Natural place of X	<root>-(a)l
Constructed place of X	<root>-(e)n
Tool for doing X	<root>-(o)noka
Diminutive		<root>-(n)ino
To noun			<root>-(i/j)a
To adjective		<root>-(o)j
To transitive verb	<root>-(i)ka
Intrans. verb to trans.	<root>-(a)se
Edit: № 2 I've sneaked in & switched the family tree for a better one that also shows (dead) protolanguages
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Re: Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by WeepingElf »

That looks like an ambitious project, and makes me curious. I like big conlang families like this!
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Re: Proto-Pehian (a rough draft)

Post by YoungConlanger »

WeepingElf wrote: 05 Jan 2025 12:50 That looks like an ambitious project, and makes me curious. I like big conlang families like this!
Ehh, I doubt I'll even outline all the protolanguages TBH. But I still try, because honestly, I aim it to be my personal conlang (i.e. I do this just for the sake of it), who knows maybe I'll cipher stuff w/ it or use it as a secret language of my friends (I doubt the latter because they're not as weird as I am)
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Idea №2: Literary Pehia is a pidgin.

Post by YoungConlanger »

Right now what I really plan to make behind the "Literary Pehia" is some kind of common written language to which inter-ethnical communications naturally settled, & then standardized & perscribed. I really want it to seem like it was developed naturally, so at early stages it should look closely like the scriber's native language, & then over time it develops its own identity.

Amount of influence each language will have:
60% of the Ghade language, especially written Ghade, especially religious & spiritual words (the kingdom which spoke Ghade was quite powerful)
20% of Phecia influence, mostly technical, mechanics & astronomy words. (Phecia was a de-facto standart language in which all technologic & mechanical papers & manuscripts were written & shared)
9% of Shocechio influence, most prominently in literature (Shocechio speakers pioneered poetry & novel writing)
1% all other Kesto-Pehian & possibly non-Kesto-Pehian languages.

The life of Literary Pehia step-by-step-ish:
  • A need to facilitate written communication between the speakers of similar, but mutually unintelligible languages, arises.
  • Scribes start to write texts in a unique style use common patterns & simple sentences. They also start to copy each other's words for common things.
  • The style & common vocabulary expand & become complex enough to basically be it's own language.
  • A book describing the state of this written language is written & translated to several major Kesto-Pehian languages. This officially marks the point where Literary Pehia starts to exist.
  • Literary Pehia becomes used more & more, to the point it's used in fields where written Phecia & Shocechio were commonly used. Phecia & Shocechio lose their de-facto statuses of stardart written languages.
  • As Ghade, Phecia & Shocechio develop into other languages, Literary Pehia becomes outdated & archaic. Only prescriptivism allows it to stay practically the same.
  • Due to loss of the prescriptivists' influence (a kingdom fall?), Literary Pehia goes anarchy mode again & experiences an influx of Pehia & Hafician neologisms (Pehia, the daughter of Ghade, retained its influence). This rendered Literary Pehia to Modern Literary Pehia, which is basically Pehia but with some words from other Kesto-Pehian languages.
END OF IDEA
Last edited by YoungConlanger on 15 Jan 2025 11:40, edited 1 time in total.
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Sound changes from Proto-Kesto-Pehian to Proto-Pehian

Post by YoungConlanger »

I'm not very good at sound changes that result in a language sounding like the way I want to, so I first made Proto-Pehian's phonology, & then analyzed it & solo-brainstormed on what changes could've led to this phonology. Basically, I reconstructed PKP's phonology from Proto-Pehian.

Here's Proto-Kesto-Pehian phonology:

Code: Select all

Consonants	Labial		Alveolar	Retroflex	Palatal		Velar
Nasal		/m/		/n/
Plain plosive	/p/		/t/						/k/
Asp. plosive	/pʰ/		/tʰ/						/kʰ/
Fricative			/s/		/ʂ/
Trill				/r/
Liquids		/w/		/ɫ/				/j/

Vowels		Front		Central		Back
Close				/ɨː/ /ɨ/
Mid		/eː/ /e/	/ə/		/oː/ /o/
Open				/äː/ /ä/
I know-I know, looks very regular, but that's because it's a very general representation of it because many sounds were in pretty free variation, which what actually made sound changes & its split happen. & yes, it's not the usual "upside down pyramid" vowel system.

In the spoiler are sound changes that lead from PKP to Proto-Pehian. Changes in this color indicate a common family-wide change, this color means that a similar change also happens in another separating language, uncolored means a change that is unique to the Proto-Pehian branch. (I hope colorblind people here will be able to distinguish these)
Spoiler:
Aspirated plosives mutation:
pʰ -> ɸ
kʰ -> x

Plosives become voiced before long vowels:
PVː -> BVː

[ ə ] mutation between two liquids:
ə -> ɨ / L_L

[ ə ] gets lost except between two [ r ]:
ə -> ∅ / _ / r_r

Plosive pairs become plosive-fricative ones:
P1P2 -> F1P2

Nasal & fricative pairs reduce to a single consonant:
{N1N2,F1F2} -> {N1,F2}

Short [ ɨ ] reduces to [ j ] before another vowel if unstressed:
ɨ -> j / V_[ -stress ] / _ː
Development of [ θ ]:
stʰ -> θtʰ -> θː -> θ
Long [ ɨ ] brightens:
ɨː -> iː

[ ɸ ] becomes labiodental:
ɸ -> f
[ tʰ ] becomes [ t͡ɬ ]:
tʰ -> t͡ɬ

[ s ], [ ʂ ] & [ x ] become voiced before long vowels:
{sʂx}Vː -> {zʐɣ}Vː

Vowel length loss, voiced consonants become phonemic:
Vː -> V
[ä] changes quality:
ä -> a

[ k ], [ ɡ ] & [ x ] palatalize to [ c ], [ ɟ ] & [ ç ] before [ e ]:
ke, ɡe, xe -> ce, ɟe, çe
[ ɫ ] becomes [ ʎ ] word finally:
ɫ -> ʎ / _#
[ e ] lowers, except before palatal consonants:
e -> ɛ / _ / C[ palatal ]_

[ a ] [ ɛ ] & [ ɨ ] weaken to [ ə ] in unstressed syllables:
a, ɛ, ɨ -> ə / _[ -stress ]

[ i ] & [ ɨ ] merge, except at the start of a word:
ɨ -> i / _[ +stress ] / #_
i -> ɨ / _[ -stress ] / #_
[ f ] & [ x ] become voiced between vowels:
f, x -> v, ɣ / V_V
[ w ] becomes [ v ] word initially: (the last common sound change, meaning both languages are practically by themselves by now)
w -> v / #_
Edit: I actually went ahead & checked a site that claims to simulate colorblindness, & uploaded a screenshot w/ the sound changes. The colors are good enough, except maybe tritanopic may have a bit of trouble distinguishing family-wide changes from unique ones. I've tweaked the blue a bit, & it seems it's better now.
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Grammar change! Adverbs now take no ending!

Post by YoungConlanger »

This post in the "Yay or Nay?" topic gave me an idea about adjectives' agreement system. If I speak like very early protolang, then the adjectives are supposed to come from verbs, and I plan on, pardon my dog Latin, "double-verb clauses" (what I really mean are contructions like "I need to eat") to work at least in Proto-Kesto-Pehian by just having "modifying" verbs come after the main verb (so like 1SG eat need).

Maybe it'll be different in Proto-Pehian, maybe the same, but once those "proto-adjectivic verbs" become real adjectives, they also become real adverbs, and maybe the adjective agreement develops from having speakers say stuff like (gloss only) man be_good 3SG.MASC, then the pronoun at the end merges.

TL;DR: adjectives now take no postfix if they "agree" w/ a verb & become adverbs.

I feel like I'm going to burn out again. I barely work on Proto-Pehian, especially now that the winter holidays're over & I'm back to school.
Plus, I feel like I have no idea what I'm doing. Again.

Coined a few words, gotta update the main post & the Google Sheets vocabulary list IG.
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Re: No grammatical feature can be described in one word (...) or even a sentence.

Post by YoungConlanger »

HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 16:19 (..) No grammatical feature can be described in one word, such as “instrumental”, or even a sentence. For example, reflexives. The exact usage is very language specific. For example, in Spanish, you can say stuff like “El padre se enojó” literally “the father angered himself”, but would be translated “the father got angry”. Or “Me pongo la camisa” literally “I put myself a shirt” but translated as “I put a shirt on”. English’s reflexive is much more limited. Now, I understand you’re a beginner and the language is still in its early stages, I don’t expect you to have much, but this is just something to be thinking about down the road.
Now that I think about it... Maybe I should not analyze the SUBJECT VERB PRONOUN_REFERRING_TO_SUBJECT structure as like a separate mood or something. Even if I do, the Reflexive is very literal & isn't marked anyhow uniquely - so say Re teta re and you're literally & actually saying 1SG kill 1SG "I am killing myself". The pronoun is not modified in any way! Not even as having an irregular accusative or, 🪣 🕳️, reflexive case. So I guess screw reflexives or actually come up w/ reflexives.
HolyHandGrenade! wrote: 03 Jan 2025 16:19 (..) Now, I understand you’re a beginner and the language is still in its early stages, I don’t expect you to have much, but this is just something to be thinking about down the road.
Think, YoungConlanger, think.
Maybe once I'll transale everything in here I'll figure more neat & detailed descriptions for all of the grammatical features.

P.S. Sorry I didn't reply, I did see your post & I didn't just discard it.
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