How about making [ŋ] the word-initial allophone of /g/?gestaltist wrote:Davush wrote:I don't know whether I want to introduce /ŋ/ into Qutrussan? I would probably romanise it as <ṇ>. If yes, should I also allow it word-initially? I tend to put it in conlangs a lot, but it feels a bit out of place in Qutrussan. Words like ṇuthur /ŋuθur/ sound nice though. If I do, I think /i u/ will have centralised/merged with /ǝ/ before it in the not-so-distant past, so things like yŭṇ /jǝŋ/ and rĭṇ /rǝŋ/.
That's a good solution. Perhaps they will be in free variation, or this allophone only occurs in certain dialects. I'm also thinking of romanizing /f/ as <ph> hinting that /f θ x~h/ came from earlier /pʰ tʰ kʰ/. I could also introduce <ch> /x/ as contrastive with <h> /h~ħ/, or perhaps this merger (x~h~ħ) happened early on leaving <ph, th, h> as the outcome.