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PDF File- I've removed the link here as it is outdated. There'll be a more up to date one further down the thread.

Skarihe [sˠɑˈɾiː] (or Sarian in English)

New conlang, I've started to make a PDF on it, though so far just the phonology and some orthography. Still a long way off! I decided to make a PDF for this one because I'm just sort of making it up as I go along.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

What is the history behind the 'deep' orthography? Are you planning to do some diachronics?

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constructedlanguages.net

I'm thinking I might develop a history about it, similar to how English spelling developed in the way that it did... but at the moment I'm just doing it because I like complex orthographies I like unusual phonologies too... What do you think of the phonology?

It's mostly just sounds I like, thrown together.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

Sounds scary. Is it intended to do?

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Creyeditor
"Thoughts are free."
Produce, Analyze, Manipulate
1 2 3 4
/w/,/l/;/ɭ/,/f/;/c/,/k/;/t/;;/e/,/u/;/i/

Hmmm... Not really. If it makes you feel better, the word for "fish" is käps /kæ:fs/ (plural kips).

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

I realise that finding and opening the PDF can be a hassle, especially now that the PDF is a bit of a mess anyway and I've changed some things. So here are some snippets:

PHONOLOGY

VOWELS





After velarised sibilants /sˠ/ and /zˠ/ , /ə/ becomes [ɯ], /i/ becomes [əi̯] and /a/ becomes [ɑ]
/i/ in unstressed syllables is often [e], and /a/ and /e/ in unstressed syllables are often [ə]

Orthographic representation:
/a/ <a> - amari "good"
/æ/ <a> <ä> - säluch "tree"
/e/ <e> <i> - keli "to like"
/i/ <i> - sinni "east"
/y/ <ui> - duil "light"
/ɯ/ <eu> <ee> - seuzger "cat"
/u/ <u> <o> - umurr "similar"
/o/ <o> - logo "big"
/ɑ/ <a> <aa> - zaal "snake"
/ə/ <a> <e> - ziker "fire"

CONSONANTS



/p/, /b/ and /ŋ/ do not exist in Sarian words and are only found in loan words, like "inngless" (English). Some more conservative spellings of words use <p> and <b> such as "käps" (fish) and "abbis" (book), but these are now pronounced as /f/ and /v/ respectively.

/sˠ/ and /zˠ/ developped from /sk/ and /zg/ in Proto-Sarian, as this: /sk/ → /sx/ → /s͡x/ → /sˠ/, and /zg/ → /zɣ/ → /z͡ɣ/ → /zˠ/
Similarly with /sʲ/ and /zʲ/, although this was a one-step change from /sj/ and /zj/.

[ɾ] and [r] exist allophonically.
/mn/ > [m:] /nm/ > [n:] - long consonants do exist phonemically, for example in the verb section below I give the example of "kistanna" (I'm seeing) vs "kistana" (I see (habitual))
After /i/, /ħ/ and /x/ become [ç]

Orthographic representation:
Nasals: /m/ <m> ; /n/ <n> ; /ŋ/ <nn>
Fricatives: /f/ <f p> ; /v/ <v b> ; /s/ <s> ; /z/ <z s> ; /sʲ/ <sj si> ; /zʲ/ <zj zi> ; /sˠ/ <sk> ; /zˠ/ <zg> ;
/ʂ/ <ss> ; /ʐ/ <sz> ; /x/ <ch> ; /ħ/ <h>
Plosives: /t/ <t d> ; /d/ <d> ; /k/ <k c> ; /g/ <g>
Trill: /r/ <r>
Approximants: /w/ <u> <w> ; /j/ <j i> ;
Liquids: /ɹ/ <r> ; /l/ <l>

PHONOTACTICS

The basic syllable structure is (C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)

Word-initially, possible triconsonantal clusters include sibilant-fricative-/r/ OR sibilant-plosive-/r/. Possible biconsonantal clusters include any combination that doesn't begin with a fricative (except for velarised or palatal sibilants, because they were classically two separate phonemes). Any single consonant can start a word.

Word-medially, any biconsonontal cluster can appear, except for velarised or palatal sibilants, because they were classically two separate phonemes.

Word-finally, possible triconsonontal clusters involve beginning with /r/ or /ɹ/, then a fricative or /n/, then a stop. Possible biconsonontal clusters here cannot start with a plosive, and cannot end with a liquid or approximant. Any single consonant can end a word.

PHONEME FREQUENCY

I had a short text that I transcribed into phonemes and got the frequency of each phoneme. It isn't entirely accurately representative of the language as a whole, and the margins of error for each phonemes is roughly 2%, but nevertheless, here it is:


Also not all phonemes are included in this because they were either not in the text, or omitted because they were so infrequent.

REGIONAL VARIATIONS

The phonology above is the standard for Sarian, and is spoken mostly in the North, in and around the cities of Kacännussess and Kadecenemess, and through to Taliski (although Taliski also has its own dialect). Here are the most prominent variations from the other main dialects (map for reference):

SKARIHE SKAFIRATER (Desert Sarian)
In this dialect spoken in the north west, /ħ/ is dropped when it appears before a stop and /x/ is realised as [χ] (uvular). /y/ merges with /i/ so <duil> is [dil], not /dyl/. /ɹ/ is dropped at the end of words.

AS SEFKA
A dialect spoken in the environs of the southern city As Sefka. Here, the velarised sibilants didn't make it through the latter two stages and so is realised as [sx] and [zɣ]. /e/ is closer to [ɪ] and /a/ → [æ], /ə/ → [ä].

SKARIHE SURRUSTESS (Marsh Sarian)
The dialect spoken in the south western peninsula. The instances of /f/ and /v/ that were /p/ and /b/ in the proto-language have frozen half-way and are realised as [ɸ] and [β]. /a/ → [æ].

SKARIHE SINNI (East Sarian)
This is a dialect spoken along the eastern coast, from Sefka Sinni up to Isfuret. In it, /o/ is raised to [ʊ̙]~[u], and nasal combinations /mn/ and /nm/ don't assimilate as in standard. /k/ and /g/ become [k͡ç] and [g͡ʝ] before /i/ and /y/.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

VERBS

Verbs are declined for number, person, tense, aspect and mood. There are three tenses: past, present and future; there are two aspects (other than the normal form): continuous/progressive and habitual; there are two moods: indicative (indicating something that is) and irrealis (indicating something that would be, could be or any other hypothetical situation). The future irrealis is used for what most of us would think of as 'conditional'.

The following indicates the conjugations for regular verbs:


*Please note, I now acknowledge that what I have called "subjunctive" should really be called "irrealis", as this mood covers all things that aren't real or definitely known. It covers everything that the indicative mood doesn't.

The future is easily formed, simply add ja- onto the present tense form. The conjugations form a pattern of a o e am em e u for the pronouns in most forms.

If you wanted to express one of the other aspects in irrealis, you would use the indicative conjugation, but change it to irrealis by altering the vowel in the main syllable in the root, as seen in this example a -> i. The way the vowel is changed to create irrealis is usually the same as the vowel change would be in a noun to make it plural, for example: here ssat- (indicative) changed to ssit- (irrealis), similar to hal ("word", singular) which changes to hil ("words") in plural.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

what does <ss> stand for?

/ʂ/ usually.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

Those are both imperfective aspects. Shouldn't you also have at least one perfective aspect? Or is "the normal form", whatever that is, a perfective aspect?



If you will consider my advice, I would call that mood "irrealis" instead of "subjunctive".

An "irrealis" mood is any mood that does not indicate a matter-of-fact; this may be either or both clauses of a conditional ("If wishes were horses then beggars would ride.", "If my aunt had balls she'd be my uncle.", etc.), or it may be any hypothetical or any counter-factual (such as something that's entirely possible but isn't known to be true at the time of speaking), and so on; as long as the speaker is communicating that s/he is not committing to the statement actually being a matter-of-fact at the time of speaking.

"Subjunctive", IMO*, should be the label of a verb-form whose main use, or one of whose main uses, is to show that the clause that verb is the nucleus of, is subordinately conjoined to (that is, both dependent on and embedded in) some other clause.

*(I put "in my opinion". The truth is I'm sure I'm right, but I gather I'm supposed to say it's just my opinion. )

Complement clauses (that fill roles usually filled by nouns), relative clauses (that fill roles usually filled by adjectives), and adjunct clauses (that fill roles usually filled by adverbs), are embedded clauses.

Dependent verbs depend for part of their meaning on the verb of the main or matrix or otherwise independent clause they're conjoined to. For instance, in "when Susie gets home she'll see John sitting on the couch", "when Susie got home she saw John sitting on the couch", and "Susie comes home and sees John sitting on the couch", whether John sitting on the couch is future or past or present, depends on the tense of the "sees/saw/will see" verb of which the "sitting" clause is the undergoer; so that clause is a dependent one.

Any clause that is both embedded in and dependent on another clause, is a subordinate clause. And vice-versa; any subordinate clause is both dependent on and embedded in another clause.

A verb-form labeled "subjunctive" should have marking clauses as subordinate as one of its main uses. IMO.*(see above).

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It appears you can't mark both aspect and mood on the same verb simultaneously. Is that so? If so, perhaps you should use the same label for both (or perhaps not). You'd probably have to make up such a label; "aspect or mood" would be good enough and wouldn't strain creativity.

Or you were trying to explain that some sort of apophony is used to mark one of these accidents when you want to mark them both on the same verb at the same time. You didn't illustrate it and I did not clearly understand it; which could be my own fault rather than yours. But if you're planning to get around to illustrate it, I'll look forward to seeing it.

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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.

First of all, thank you very much for your advice, Eldin.

I suppose that one that isn't habitual or continuous, would be the perfective aspect, yes. I'm not quite sure how a perfective aspect can be expressed in the present tense though.


Yes, I think this name would be better suited since this "irrealis" mood basically covers everything that the indicative doesn't.


This section was brief, I shall explain. You can express aspect and mood together in the verb.

As you'll see in the chart, the suffixed conjugations on the irrealis (subjunctive in the chart) are identical to those in the indicative. The difference is in the stem. This occurs in all regular verbs - the verb is expressed in the irrealis form by changing the vowel in the stressed syllable of the stem.

Let's use the verb kisti (to see) as an example:
Kistane [ˈkistane] = he/she/it often sees (3SG Present habitual indicative) "He often sees the postman on his way to work"
Keustane [ˈkɯstane] = (that) he often see(s) (3SG Present habitual irrealis) "I think that he often sees the postman on his way to work"

The reason I talked about the vowel changing for plural nouns is because, it's usually the same vowel change that occurs in the irrealis mood, and it's just a heads up. If you know the vowel changes for plurals, you'll know the vowel changes for irrealis. This bit wasn't important.

I didn't include all of the possible aspect-mood declensions for irrealis because I wanted to get it done quickly, which was maybe a bad move. I hope this makes sense now.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

I really like the idea of different verb stems for the indicative and irrealis. It would be interesting to hear how it evolved, if you work out the diachronics.

Unfortunately, the conjugation table won't display on my phone, but the example you gave with the verb 'to see' was useful.

That's all good.
Thank you.
I understand now: and IMO it's better to put up what you have, even if it's not quite complete yet, and come back to complete it later; than to wait until it's perfect.
You'll just get questions; but the answers will be stuff you intended to put up eventually anyway.

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A verb can be present and perfective if it's a point, temporally speaking, without any duration.
"I (now) knock (just once) on the door", for instance; if some inflection of "knock" means "now knock just once" (say, present tense, semelfactive* aspect -- semelfactive being one of the perfective aspects), then that would be present and perfective.

*("Semelfactive" means something is done just once, especially something that's usually done repeatedly.)

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But perfective aspects don't have to be punctual rather than durational.

Perfective just means that the speaker does not intend to say anything about the internal temporal structure of the event or situation or whatever s/he's talking about. For instance, in particular, s/he isn't going to mention the phase(s) of the event -- the beginning or middle or end.
If the speaker uses the (or a) perfective aspect, s/he is treating the event as "an undifferentiated blob of time". The "blob" may be just a point, or may actually have some duration.

There are usually more imperfective aspects than perfective aspects, because there are more ways to talk about something than there are to say you're not going to talk about it.
Imperfective aspects say something about the internal temporal structure of the event, or at least allow or require something to be said in the clause about the internal temporal structure of the event (or action or whatever).
Perfective aspects just say the speaker is going to keep schtum about such internal temporal structure. The reason may be that there is no such structure, and the aspect the speaker chooses may so indicate; but the aspect may also not give any hint as to the reason it says nothing about the internal temporal structure of the act or whatever that the verb talks about.

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Does that help you see why both perfective and imperfective aspects can be used with past tenses and with future tenses and with present tenses?

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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.

Yes, thank you very much

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

While waiting to come into a class one day, I was doodling on paper and finally came up with the numerals for Sarian. It's a duodecimal (base-12) system. I created a font for them, unfortunately I couldn't make it as curved as I wished because Fontstruct.



I still don't yet have all the words for the numbers 0 to B, so if your name is Janko Gorenc, please don't message me asking for them. I'll give you them when I'm ready.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

I like it.
I couldn't use it for Adpihi's base-twelve numeral system, though, because in Adpihi writing, if you rotate (180 degrees -- not 90 degrees) or reflect a character you get a character with the same meaning. Too many pairs of the characters in your set are 180-degree rotations or reflections of one another.
2,3 4,5 8,9 A,B

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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.

Updated phonology, if you'd care to scroll up.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe

Unless I missed it you say [ɾ] and [r] appear allophonically, but not under what conditions. I was curious about what they were.

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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.

[r] tends to be at the start of a word, and then [ɾ] word medially or finally, although /r/ has been replaced mostly by /ɹ/ through recent sound changes.

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| [ˌdɛt͡ʃɛmaɹiˈetɪs] | | conlang skarihe