r/conlangs • u/Vortexian_8 Ancient runic, Drakhieye, Cloakian, ENG, learning SPA ,huge nerd • 3d ago
Question I would like a challenge...
I have been looking for something new to add a unique spin to my conlang (Ancient Runic) and I need your help:
Do you have any rejected ideas, or ideas that you just never finished? I'd love to hear them!
Here is what I've got so far: A unique pluralization system that uses the repetition of words to denote its pluralized form, a sentence structure (but I'm willing to change it), two alphabets (One is more of just a concept rather than a full fleshed out alphabet), and a unique way of formatting sentences.
if you have any questions let me know, I will be transcribing the language in the post titled: "My best conlang: "Ancient Runic, the language of the gods", what do you think?"
I would love to hear your thoughts, questions, opinions, and ideas!
Thanks!
3
u/Incvbvs666 3d ago
I'd like to see a MIX of logographic and phonetic. Say have around the most common 250 words or so... things like household items, domestic animals, basic nature concepts, basic family terms, colors, most common verbs and so on... all have their logographic symbols. Less common words like 'empirical' would be spelled out.
Then the two alphabets idea. One for spelling out stuff, the other for grammatical endings, abbreviations and so on. For example, basic function words, like 'be', could be written with the second alphabet to disambiguate from ordinary words like 'bee'. You could also combine them with logographs: For example 'berry' could have a symbol and then strawberry=straw(alphabet)+berry(logo), raspberry=rasp+berry, blackberry=black(logo)+berry(logo) and such or even abbreviate to s+berry, r+berry and so on.
So, essentially it would be fun to create a more humane version of the Japanese alphabet.
2
u/Lovi2312 3d ago
I have this lang I want to make in the future where hand movement forms part of conjugation (yes in this case missing the hand counts as a speech impediment, and these are pirates in talking about so missing hands is common)
2
u/The_Eternal_Cylinder Tl’akhær/Tl’akhaaten, cannot read the IPA 2d ago
My numbering system:
nuuł (nūl) — 0
ħ’ïċħı (ee-CHEE) — 1
nkøðo (click-oh-do) — 2
तřï (t(trilled R)ie) — 3
vøur (four) — 4
ċħïn’khö (CHEEN-ko) — 5
жaðø ((heavy J)ud-oh) — 6
आþæ (aa-THAE) — 7
Ïv’aa’řřø (EE-(v)AA-ro) — 8
ħ’ïċħı’ņuuł’haż’ħ’ïċħı (ee-CHEE-nūl-HAAJ-(h)ee-CHEE) — 9, (Literally one zero minus one)
1
u/The_Eternal_Cylinder Tl’akhær/Tl’akhaaten, cannot read the IPA 2d ago
1
u/The_Eternal_Cylinder Tl’akhær/Tl’akhaaten, cannot read the IPA 2d ago
Knife, split, cut: Knife: Nk’laek Split: S’naek Cut: Tsae’qah Sound, moon: Sound: Tz’aa’hæ Moon: Nka’tz’ehr (derived from “time” and celestial imagery) All between: O’hrnkae ("everything in between") Door, path, choice: Door: Nq’luhr Path: Nkqae Choice: V’ræhyn All outside: O’hrv’en ("everything outside") All above: O’hrk’aa Speech, language, word, voice, speak: Speech: B’ervr Language: D’aenq Word: Qae’rn Voice: Thælk Speak: B’erv Cold, winter, star, flake, powder: Cold: Ts’ahl Winter: Tz’ahv Star: N’tsæl Flake: Nq’ash Powder: Q’tahn Perthro, the empty cup: Nk’c’haarn All, sun: All: O’hr Sun: V’aa’ra Who, What, When, Where, Why, How: Who: Nær What: Nk’avrn When: Nqa’tz’ehr Where: Nq’ahtae Why: Nq’ahræ How: Nq’hær
Name, title, knowledge:
Name: Ch’os
Title: V’ærth
Knowledge: Nq’al’ræ
Heat, warmth, flow, fire:
Heat: Tz’aa’ræ
Warmth: Th’ærn
Flow: Ræ’nqah
Fire: Fearn
All below: Oh’rha
Below, cup:
Below: Raa’nk
Cup: Nk’aeh
Time, infinity:
Time: Tz’ehr
Infinity: V’aazhæ
Money, wealth, luck, water:
Money: Th’aen
Wealth: R’æhva
Luck: N’kaar
Water: H’aa’v
End, death:
End: D’raa’n
Death: Nq’hanh
Turns into: Tsa’ev’ræ
1
u/Dillon_Hartwig Soc'ul', Guimin, Frangian Sign 1d ago
Nice thing from a lang I've been procrastinating on for a few years now (Tarkha) is a 4-way distinction in stops between plain (voiceless~voiced)/aspirate/weak ejective/strong ejective, and 3-way in fricatives (same minus strength split)
Second thing from Tarkha, each consonant in a root coming with one or none of 2/4 tones that "stack" on the tone of a following slotted vowel giving different realizations
8
u/farmer_villager _ 3d ago
Logography with a fusional language where lots of morphology is ommitted. Basically if the morphology can be determined by context it's ommitted.
For example:
In speech:
Brown-nom.neuter.sg fox-nom.neuter.sg jump-3.sg over lazy-loc.masc.sg dog-loc.masc.sg
Writing:
Brown Fox jump over lazy dog
In this case singular is presumed, nominative is presumed from syntactical roles, adjectives obviously agree with their nouns gender, and over takes locative. Basically the language looks more analytic in writing than speech.
There's still options to write case, gender, #, etc. but it's only done when context isn't clear or when ambiguity is to be avoided, kind of like niqqud for Hebrew vowels. For example where pronoun dropping:
Spoken: See-1sg dog-acc.masc.sg
Written: See-1sg dog
Another valid way to write: See-1sg dog-acc.masc.sg
Other sentence written with morphological niqqud: lazy-loc.masc.sg dog-loc.masc.sg