New CBB

yay

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constructedlanguages.net

I don't see why getting rid of number could be so special

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Banami bhjaddhos rafi mau cy vyaja cecerror.
Fools do not see the sun nor sail the seas
-Azenti Proverb

Having number is not so special either.

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constructedlanguages.net

The most special is both have it and lack it.

Like Siwa!

I used to have number marking on prepositions, but I scrapped it.

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constructedlanguages.net

Instead of having number, a conlang could simply use a lot of number words that may show some agreement with certain noun types.

Should I post my Arroe verb system, even though some sections (mostly acknowledgements and background info, not really content) are incomplete?

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"Wait for the starvation of glaciers, chicken hamburger Noel Weber Arthur."

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Of course you should.

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Ikasmu ati'uki nai uraiur.
Hinai nimuśim naimi nai sasamiur urukani. Śi'ama nai huhumiur na ni'amuśim nai sasamiur.
Pumaki nimuśim śima'a na ami nimuśim ara'a. Hini nihrasum i'aku tumra urukani na nihrasum sanik hraspir.

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I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.

New conlang is head-final, somewhat agglutinating, with grammatical number indicated only by some verbs and a telicity distinction.
Yay or nay?

I'm wracking my brains for ways to make Adari interesting. Here's a few:

-Distinct subjunctive/indicative stems for verbs (think like Latin's preset/perfect stem distinction, but for mood)

-A periphrastic imperfect formed by using a verb (not sure what maybe-maybe "to be") and a gerund of another verb (yes, this is what English does to form its progresive, but remeber that itself was from the Celtic languages of Britian)

-3 noun classes: Land, Sea, and Intagible/Concepts

-Periphrastic passive....somehow.

-Distinction between perfect and imperfect stems (I'm taking Solarius's statement that Adari feels Slavic and running with it). This gives 6 principal parts: Infinitive, Perfect, Imperfect, Subjunctive, Imperfect Subjunctive, Perfect Subjunctive.

-Use of the subjunctive to mean only ideas (hypothetical or not), and purpose, never for just "if statements". In an Adari sentence that means "If X, then y", Y will be in the subjunctive, not X.

What do you think?

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Banami bhjaddhos rafi mau cy vyaja cecerror.
Fools do not see the sun nor sail the seas
-Azenti Proverb

You could merge tense with evidentiality, like Tariana.

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"Wait for the starvation of glaciers, chicken hamburger Noel Weber Arthur."

= | = | =

I was thinking of having the subjunctive be used to mean future tense as well. After all, the future is merely an idea no matter what. You can say "I will go to the store" but that doesn't make it fact until you actually do it (which would make it present tense).

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Banami bhjaddhos rafi mau cy vyaja cecerror.
Fools do not see the sun nor sail the seas
-Azenti Proverb

See my reply to your post about this in another thread.

"Subjunctive" doesn't mean what you think it means; "dubitative" means what you think "subjunctive" means.

It makes sense to have all future tense be irrealis; but if you do that, you won't want to call that mood "subjunctive".

For mood to be called "subjunctive" it must be available to mark most or all subordinate clauses as subordinate.

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I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.

So position of agreement affixes: Agent before patient and both prefixes, or patient before agent and one a prefix, other a suffix?

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Up in blue sky silly blimp goes by
Where it come from where it go
Ziggy-Zaggy it fly high

If your conlang's ancestor-language was SOV (or APV) then it should be Agent-before-Patient-both-Prefixes.
If your conlang's ancestor-language was SVO (or AVP) then it should be Agent-Prefix, Patient-Suffix.

OTOH if your conlang's ancestor-language was VOS (or VPA) then it should be Patient-before-Agent-both-Suffixes.

Or at least that's my guess, which is based on complete ignorance of your con-diachronics.

Assuming the pattern I guessed above holds, a Patient-Prefix, Agent-Suffix system would imply an ancestor that was OVS (or PVA); and those are rare among real-life natlangs. But they do exist; and besides, I don't even know if your intend your conlang to be a human conlang.

http://wals.info/chapter/104 has 192 languages in which both the person of A and the person of P are marked on the verb.
In 20 of them the AP-person marker is a fused marker (like Marc Okrand's "pronominal prefix" for Klingon verbs).
In another 19, both orders of A and P person-markers occur. Among the other 153, most (96 of them) have the A person-marker before the P person-marker; but that includes situations in which they are both prefixes (so that the P marker comes closer to the verb-stem), situations in which they are both suffixes (so that the A marker comes closer to the verb-stem), and situations in which the A marker is a prefix and the P marker is a suffix.
The remaining 57 have the P person-marker before the A person-marker; but, again, that includes three possibilities; both prefixes (so the A is closest to the stem), both suffixes (so the P is closest to the stem), and a P prefix but an A suffix.

I do not know how to find out whether A-P-stem is more common than P-stem-A or not.

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I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.

I know how I could get either if pressed to justify it and either way is sufficiently attested for me, but what I want is simply some opinions on which of the two is more aesthetic.

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Up in blue sky silly blimp goes by
Where it come from where it go
Ziggy-Zaggy it fly high

Oh.

Well, then.

I prefer A-P-stem or A-stem-P above all other arrangements.
That's me.

_________________
I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.

_________________
Ikasmu ati'uki nai uraiur.
Hinai nimuśim naimi nai sasamiur urukani. Śi'ama nai huhumiur na ni'amuśim nai sasamiur.
Pumaki nimuśim śima'a na ami nimuśim ara'a. Hini nihrasum i'aku tumra urukani na nihrasum sanik hraspir.

If you could put the patient before the agent, and make the patient be a suffix and the agent be a prefix, I'd very much like to see it.

_________________
I am not responsible for the accuracy of my sources; they're responsible for their own mistakes, if any, and also responsible for defending their own statements if you disagree with them.