Here are two samples of English text, pulled from sources that you probably know and certainly have heard of, and written in a conscript. Can you read them? I've deleted a few spaces to make it at least nontrivial.
(I'm trying to gauge whether the derivation is too transparent, so I'll give y'all this: its associated language is spoken in OTL Hungary and has a Latin loan stratum about the size of Albanian's. They probably haven't been in Hungary for very long, but the language is at least Indo-European.)
(After someone gets it, I'll post the general history of the script and the country.)
A script challenge
Re: A script challenge
Firstly: This is a very nice script to look at. Some familiar shapes from Latin, Cyrillic and Armenian, but jumbled together, so it looks different from all of them. It is also neither too uniform or too heterogeneous for comfort.
I've gone ahead and made a facsimile of the first text, so it is easier to analyse. I have assigned each glyph a letter, that is similar in appearance, but some of them have had to be mirrored or turned or simplified. I may have mistyped some of the letters, especially all those p's, ƿ's and v's (which I would have assigned the letter ꝩ 'vend', but it is not very well supported in fonts).
At first I was afraid there were ligatures involved. For example the letter I've called w (line 1, glyph 6) looks like a ligature of т and v. But after transcribing this, it seems the possible ligatures are so frequent they must be letters in their own right.
Speaking of frequency, let's see the letters by frequency:
That's how far I've come so far. I'm off to lunch.
I've gone ahead and made a facsimile of the first text, so it is easier to analyse. I have assigned each glyph a letter, that is similar in appearance, but some of them have had to be mirrored or turned or simplified. I may have mistyped some of the letters, especially all those p's, ƿ's and v's (which I would have assigned the letter ꝩ 'vend', but it is not very well supported in fonts).
Code: Select all
пшpıpwлφɥʔm лпhɤɴлpıпшpƕ
ı7ƿıφлɴƨpшmлvı зտпopтıтлч
7oηıƨdчп wлтɥчıʔıφлчƿƣpηwıγ
hƣпφdpшφ7ıηwшɴ пıwплp
лpлwտ ƣpη7oлmɤɴ лɴлcwл
тƣoտw лпwıտu wлuштvл7
ƣpηıφплч m7шɯлp7oıƕ wлчdƨ
лпpшγտ ƣpηлп pшγտƨnαη
шp7лıʔлч wшɴ шηımлp7vшmтшφ7
7owлɥтıpлpƨ лпɴƣpφαıpη vıφпαıvƨ
wƣ7wшɯoη ηıφчшv wлφdƨлƨ
ıƕıɴтшчwшɴ 7owлuштտvшɯлp
Speaking of frequency, let's see the letters by frequency:
Spoiler:
Last edited by CMunk on 14 Feb 2018 18:02, edited 1 time in total.
Native: | Fluent: | Less than fluent: , , | Beginner: , :fao:,
Creating: Jwar Nong, Mhmmz
Creating: Jwar Nong, Mhmmz
Re: A script challenge
Text number two would look like this:
This text has some different frequencies:
The combined frequencies of both texts are:
Of course it now hits me that there are 32 different symbols, so there must be some ligatures involved.
Code: Select all
ƣpηwлчɥvηuƣη ƿıhɥчη wлтıтлч
ıƨпop ƣpηwшdvƣп пopчƣcnпıηƨ
ƣpηwımwшƿınıp7oηo ƣpηpƣo
pлuıcпıчƿı vım7vшpη зvлɴwшɴ
пıγwшhƣп ıɴƣηƨıpη7oηo nɥ7o
чшʔлm nɥηƣop ƣpηwшʔ
φлpзƣopη wшʔ чƣcnпıηƨ wƣ7wш
ɴшpα7 лpηտm7ƣpη пopлpлwտƨu
hтıγ mɥwлчɥvη mφƣʔտηwшɴ
лƿvdηзvлɴwшpƕ лтαpwлзшmлп
dчwıտu ƣpηwшчшз7dз
7oƿıчηwлmıʔı
Spoiler:
Spoiler:
Native: | Fluent: | Less than fluent: , , | Beginner: , :fao:,
Creating: Jwar Nong, Mhmmz
Creating: Jwar Nong, Mhmmz
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- greek
- Posts: 674
- Joined: 14 Aug 2010 13:28
Re: A script challenge
Must there be? It's the same in principle as writing English in Cyrillic. Cyrillic has more than 26 letters, but they aren't all ligatures...
(There are no font-level ligatures. There may be a few characters that are ligatural in origin.)
(There are no font-level ligatures. There may be a few characters that are ligatural in origin.)
Re: A script challenge
This is much harder than I expected, and probably harder than you expected too ... I havent even really gotten anywhere. What I can get of this, which may be all wrong, is this:
1) Some letters seem to function both as vowels and consonants, so the script probably does not consistently write a schwa vowel. (That, or all of the seemingly impossible word clusters are in fact word boundaries.)
2) The digraph ТЧ + Ш is very common. This probably represent a consonant + vowel sequence such as /šə/ that is very common in English.
3) The script does not seem to be based on any script found today in Europe, or even on an older one such as the ancient Hungarian runic alphabet. Some letterforms are like those of Armenian but that wouldnt make sense if it were spoken in Hungary so I assume the development is parallel.
Would you give further hints if nobody comes up with the correct answer soon?
1) Some letters seem to function both as vowels and consonants, so the script probably does not consistently write a schwa vowel. (That, or all of the seemingly impossible word clusters are in fact word boundaries.)
2) The digraph ТЧ + Ш is very common. This probably represent a consonant + vowel sequence such as /šə/ that is very common in English.
3) The script does not seem to be based on any script found today in Europe, or even on an older one such as the ancient Hungarian runic alphabet. Some letterforms are like those of Armenian but that wouldnt make sense if it were spoken in Hungary so I assume the development is parallel.
Would you give further hints if nobody comes up with the correct answer soon?
Kavunupupis, šiŋuputata.
When I see you pointing at me, I know I'm in trouble. (Play)
When I see you pointing at me, I know I'm in trouble. (Play)
Re: A script challenge
Solution:
I went about this the wrong way, so I'd assume your script is safe enough...
I started by looking at letter frequencies and identifying repeating patterns and common words, and worked myself from there. There are a bunch of typos/spelling conventions in the text that didn't help with that
This is my solution (originally based on CMunks version, in case of discrepancies with the original). The transcription is pretty ad hoc.
There goes my morning... So much for being productive with what I should have been doing!
Spoiler:
I went about this the wrong way, so I'd assume your script is safe enough...
I started by looking at letter frequencies and identifying repeating patterns and common words, and worked myself from there. There are a bunch of typos/spelling conventions in the text that didn't help with that
This is my solution (originally based on CMunks version, in case of discrepancies with the original). The transcription is pretty ad hoc.
Spoiler:
There goes my morning... So much for being productive with what I should have been doing!
- eldin raigmore
- korean
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- Joined: 14 Aug 2010 19:38
- Location: SouthEast Michigan
Re: A script challenge
Ordinarily to decipher a substitution cipher one wants a “contact chart” ( showing the frequency of digraphs) as well as the frequency of each single character.
Apparently either Aszev didn’t need one or made one himself.
Apparently either Aszev didn’t need one or made one himself.
My minicity is http://gonabebig1day.myminicity.com/xml