The CBB

I am a bit confused. I did try to reconstruct (a), (b), and (c) and was really confident about each of the groupings and reconstructions until I realized that they do not match up at all. So I'm going to give my guess for (a) first and then wait and see if I come up with any idea to link the reconst...

I enjoyed the post on seperable verbs. Maybe you could say that the separated form is kind of a present tense antipassive? It only occurs in the absence of an overt object in the present tense. Two related questions: Can adverbs come in between the parts of a separable verb? What is the passive form...

I am a bit confused. Gothic is an East Germanic language. It is not a Celtic language. Or is the facepalm because Nat Geo History magazine did such an obvious mistake.

DV82LECM wrote: ↑

09 Feb 2019 20:29

Oh, and why is "monkey" ONE syllable? Care to show the evolution of THAT one?

I would suspect it's cognate to English ape, but I would also be really happy to see the derivation.

I had two new ideas, this time about syntax really. I will use pseudo english, because I haven't made up my mind about phonology and lexicon yet. The first idea is a conlang based on the following premises: 1. Every verb has to be overtly adjacent to its arguments. 2. All words are either nouns (can...

Sorry for bothering you and jumping ahead, but today I was wondering how passives will be formed in Zhér·dûn. It seems to me that Germanic languages use a variety of auxiliary verbs/light verbs. German uses sein to be , werden to become , and bekommen to get . English uses at least to be and to get ...

I am curious. What usage are you referring to? Me, as a native German speaker, I have difficulties to think of what you mean, since at least the second one overlaps with what you mention later in the post, IIUC. Looking at it from a German perspective you're definitely right in that "es sind" in th...

Phonotactics/Notes 1. /b d g/ are devoiced word initially and unreleased word finally. 2. /k h g ŋ h/ are palatal [c h ɟ ɲ ç/ before /i(:) e(:) j/. 3. /l̪/ is palatalized [l̪ j ] adjacent to /i(:) e(:) j/, and velarized [ɫ̪] adjacent to /u(:) o(:) a(:) w/. If /l̪/ is adjacent to a velarizating envi...

There Means there in 3 common expressions: Dat givt - There is/are (identical in usage to German es gibt) Dat sind - There are (identical in usage to German es sind) I am curious. What usage are you referring to? Me, as a native German speaker, I have difficulties to think of what you mean, since a...

ŗahrih raçnann Phonology b d c m n ɲ ʀ ɾ ç h ɺ ʎ s' p' t' q' i u e o a Allophones I suck at allophones and would appreciate help on this one. Maybe I'm to late, but there is another way of "fixing" the consonant inventory, without adding or substracting phonemes. You can use allophony. Let me show ...

Will there be a topic/focus marker for nouns? I am asking because: most Germanic languages use intonation for this purpose. This is rather complicated in a tone language -- not impossible to do, but definitely advanced conlanging. (almost) all natlangs have some way to indicate information structure...

Heartlangs don't need conpeople.

Wow, thanks for the detailed replay. I really like the idea of clusters creating a neutral tone. I also like the idea of neutral low sequences becoming falling, etc. This looks a lot like dissimilation to me

@ixals

Could you explain the tonogenesis a bit more. I really enjoy reading about it and I have to admit that I don't fully understand that part of the sound changes section. Maybe a table with the syllables types in the proto languages that correspond to each of the tones now?

Better late than never: Here is the ranking: The winner is Sangi Overall ranking 1. Sangi, 10 points 2. Shimo, 5 points 3. Grand, 3 points 4. cedh, 1 point In each round, you could get points for the best guess and the best grouping. The winner got 2 points and the runner up got 1 point. For the Bes...

Why do people always say bad things about natlangs in this thread? I just want to say that I would really enjoy the crazyness of the languages of Vanuatu if they were conlangs. They are so nicely crafted.

And even though people often claim that Northern German varieties of German do still have the preterite forms in spoken language, I and the people I talk to usually have it only for a closed class of verbs, like modal verbs and so on.

Thanks for letting me know. I had a busier January than expected, but I will probably manage to write it up in the next two weeks.

What kind of clothing would people wear in the mountains? I expect maybe something thick for higher altitudes, but what about lower altitudes or at the base of the range or in valleys? Don't forget that high altitudes in the tropics are still pretty warm. The mountain dwelling people on the island ...

Is it naturalistic for a language with person and/or gender agreement on a verb for the verb to agree to the person/gender of the possessor when it would agree with a possessed noun? I.E Pora ra kyebra. dog-nom.sg def run-pres-3sg.an The dog runs Eli pora kyebre. 1sg.Gen dog-nom.sg run-pres-1sg And...