Altlang Ideas Discussion

A forum for all topics related to constructed languages
Cavaliers327
cuneiform
cuneiform
Posts: 132
Joined: 14 Mar 2017 23:21

Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Cavaliers327 »

Hey, everyone I started this thread to just to have a discussion about about cool new ideas for (realistic) romlangs( not bogolangs or graftlangs) and altlangs in general.


I was just thinking about what if the Roman Empire succesfully conquered Hibernia(Ireland) and completely colonized it. Irish as a language would become extinct ( it would survive on in Scotland), but its legacy on the local dialect of Vulgar Latin would be enormous. The Roman Empire would fall just like OTL(Our Time Line) and Hibernia would be independent for centuries. Then, they would be raided by Danes and other Scandinavian groups who would conquer the land and would be assimilated by the Hiberno-Roman culture. These conquerors would have huge impact on the language because of L2 language learning and then these changes would spread to the rest of the populace. What do you guys think of this idea? For now, I will tentatively call it Lingua Hibernisca .



Do you have any ideas about altlangs or romlangs in general. Soon, I will have more time to post on threads and I will post the Proto-LH sketch as well as continue to collablang thread. Does anyone have any suggestions with how I should go with my language? What grammars to reference etcera? Do I begin with Old Irish or Primitive Irish? Also are there any good resources for Primitive & or Old Irish?
User avatar
spanick
roman
roman
Posts: 1336
Joined: 11 May 2017 01:47
Location: California

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by spanick »

Well since the Roman conquest was basically finished by the first century and the earliest records of Primitive Irish are from the fourth century, you might have to use a lot of creativity here. I’m not sure what the pre-Primitive Irish language would’ve been but I’m pretty sure it’s unattested.

You could have a lot of fun studying Proto-Celtic, Primitive Irish and Old Irish to influence your Romance language.
Ælfwine
roman
roman
Posts: 940
Joined: 21 Sep 2015 01:28
Location: New Jersey

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Ælfwine »

A lot of alt history ideas for romlangs is on the teach and share guides thread. Last couple of pages, I think.

Starting at the fourth century should be fine, most Latin was uniform up until that point anyway. Just introduce Vulgar Latin changes before primitive irish ones.

If you want something more realistic, instead of grafting a set of sound changes from one language to another, try introducing unique sound changes that modify the phonology of your language to the substrate. For example, in my Irish Norse conlang, I introduced a fortis lenis contrast through a series of palatalizations and other vowel changes that made it phonemic.

Outside of the usual locations, I'm quite interested in the potential Eastern Europe has for romance languages. A romlang in Upper Moesia could be fairly Greek influenced. Acording to my book, the populace mostly spoke Greek, but Latin was the language of administration and also well understood.
My Blog

A-posteriori, alternative history nerd
Salmoneus
MVP
MVP
Posts: 3031
Joined: 19 Sep 2011 19:37

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Salmoneus »

spanick wrote: 22 Mar 2018 04:34 Well since the Roman conquest was basically finished by the first century and the earliest records of Primitive Irish are from the fourth century, you might have to use a lot of creativity here. I’m not sure what the pre-Primitive Irish language would’ve been but I’m pretty sure it’s unattested.

You could have a lot of fun studying Proto-Celtic, Primitive Irish and Old Irish to influence your Romance language.
You would indeed be dealing with something between Proto-Celtic and Primitive Irish. And actually, Primitive Irish is extremely close to Proto-Celtic anyway (although *p had already been lost). One thing to note, however, is that there's a lot of suspicion surrounding Primitive Irish: the development of Old Irish is awfully dramatic, and awfully fast. So there's a theory that actually at the time of "Primitive Irish", people were already speaking something quite a long way toward Old Irish, but the druids (or whoever) writing their ogham inscriptions were doing so in an intentionally archaic way, and that the development of Old Irish is at least in part a sociological shift that replaced the old scribal class and introduced more vernacular writing. But I'm not an expert, so I don't know to what extent that's true. If it were very true, you could have something Old Irish-y influence your language, so long as the Roman invasion is VERY late. Otherwise, it might mean that a moderately late invasion (say, Antonine) might encounter Primitive Irish, even if it wasn't being written down yet. Before that, though, you're dealing with pre-Primitive Irish.
User avatar
Shemtov
runic
runic
Posts: 3285
Joined: 29 Apr 2013 04:06

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Shemtov »

Inspired by "Chinese Altaic", I am thinking of a group of Dardic-speakers (Most like old Kashmiri) moving north to Turkmenistan and the Wakkhan Corridor and became Turkicified.
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
User avatar
Creyeditor
MVP
MVP
Posts: 5091
Joined: 14 Aug 2012 19:32

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Creyeditor »

I was thinking of an Indo-European altlang that developed into a triconsonantal root lang. Maybe if it moved into the right direction? It looks to likely to not make a conlang of it. So much ablaut.
Creyeditor
"Thoughts are free."
Produce, Analyze, Manipulate
1 :deu: 2 :eng: 3 :idn: 4 :fra: 4 :esp:
:con: Ook & Omlűt & Nautli languages & Sperenjas
[<3] Papuan languages, Morphophonology, Lexical Semantics [<3]
Ælfwine
roman
roman
Posts: 940
Joined: 21 Sep 2015 01:28
Location: New Jersey

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Ælfwine »

Creyeditor wrote: 22 Mar 2018 21:30 I was thinking of an Indo-European altlang that developed into a triconsonantal root lang. Maybe if it moved into the right direction? It looks to likely to not make a conlang of it. So much ablaut.
Ask Isfendil. That sounds like it could easily exist in North Africa.
My Blog

A-posteriori, alternative history nerd
Cavaliers327
cuneiform
cuneiform
Posts: 132
Joined: 14 Mar 2017 23:21

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Cavaliers327 »

Salmoneus wrote: 22 Mar 2018 15:23
spanick wrote: 22 Mar 2018 04:34 Well since the Roman conquest was basically finished by the first century and the earliest records of Primitive Irish are from the fourth century, you might have to use a lot of creativity here. I’m not sure what the pre-Primitive Irish language would’ve been but I’m pretty sure it’s unattested.

You could have a lot of fun studying Proto-Celtic, Primitive Irish and Old Irish to influence your Romance language.
You would indeed be dealing with something between Proto-Celtic and Primitive Irish. And actually, Primitive Irish is extremely close to Proto-Celtic anyway (although *p had already been lost). One thing to note, however, is that there's a lot of suspicion surrounding Primitive Irish: the development of Old Irish is awfully dramatic, and awfully fast. So there's a theory that actually at the time of "Primitive Irish", people were already speaking something quite a long way toward Old Irish, but the druids (or whoever) writing their ogham inscriptions were doing so in an intentionally archaic way, and that the development of Old Irish is at least in part a sociological shift that replaced the old scribal class and introduced more vernacular writing. But I'm not an expert, so I don't know to what extent that's true. If it were very true, you could have something Old Irish-y influence your language, so long as the Roman invasion is VERY late. Otherwise, it might mean that a moderately late invasion (say, Antonine) might encounter Primitive Irish, even if it wasn't being written down yet. Before that, though, you're dealing with pre-Primitive Irish.



Thanks for the info & advice! I really appreciate. I am going to with something between Proto-Celtic and Primitive Irish as the substrate. I am not going to make a graftlang, but I can use the substrate to add phonemic inter-dental fricatives and f replacing p in most places through a gradual process.
User avatar
Creyeditor
MVP
MVP
Posts: 5091
Joined: 14 Aug 2012 19:32

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Creyeditor »

Ælfwine wrote: 22 Mar 2018 21:31
Creyeditor wrote: 22 Mar 2018 21:30 I was thinking of an Indo-European altlang that developed into a triconsonantal root lang. Maybe if it moved into the right direction? It looks to likely to not make a conlang of it. So much ablaut.
Ask Isfendil. That sounds like it could easily exist in North Africa.
Did s/he already work on something similar?
Creyeditor
"Thoughts are free."
Produce, Analyze, Manipulate
1 :deu: 2 :eng: 3 :idn: 4 :fra: 4 :esp:
:con: Ook & Omlűt & Nautli languages & Sperenjas
[<3] Papuan languages, Morphophonology, Lexical Semantics [<3]
User avatar
Isfendil
greek
greek
Posts: 668
Joined: 19 Feb 2016 03:47

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Isfendil »

Creyeditor wrote: 23 Mar 2018 23:25
Ælfwine wrote: 22 Mar 2018 21:31
Creyeditor wrote: 22 Mar 2018 21:30 I was thinking of an Indo-European altlang that developed into a triconsonantal root lang. Maybe if it moved into the right direction? It looks to likely to not make a conlang of it. So much ablaut.
Ask Isfendil. That sounds like it could easily exist in North Africa.
Did s/he already work on something similar?
{he/him}
I attempted such a language, yes. The thing is, beyond alternation between one or two vowels, PIE's nonconcatenative elements are kinda.... Not grammatically important. They're an extra redundancy. I'd imagine they'd regularize and become productive phonological processes but they don't actually carry inherent morphological value like semitic patterns do, they're just secondary markers.

Also PIE itself kinda was phasing ablaut out, replacing it with thematic inflection because it was much easier to deal with.

Oh also it'd almost certainly be biconsonantal not triconsonantal.
User avatar
loglorn
mayan
mayan
Posts: 1728
Joined: 17 Mar 2014 03:22

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by loglorn »

Maybe if you couple that with intense derivation based on prefixes and weaken word final elements you could make ablaut both primary and triconsonantal.
Diachronic Conlanging is the path to happiness, given time. [;)]

Gigxkpoyan Languages: CHÍFJAEŚÍ RETLA TLAPTHUV DÄLDLEN CJUŚËKNJU ṢATT

Other langs: Søsøzatli Kamëzet
Cavaliers327
cuneiform
cuneiform
Posts: 132
Joined: 14 Mar 2017 23:21

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Cavaliers327 »

Does anyone know of a good list of sound changes from Proto-Celtic to Primitive Irish to Old Irish? That would be much appreciated.
User avatar
k1234567890y
mayan
mayan
Posts: 2400
Joined: 04 Jan 2014 04:47
Contact:

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by k1234567890y »

Some ideas:

- a descendant of Old Japanese spoken in Borneo or Sulawesi, with most of the speakers being Christian and the rest of them being Muslim, and the speakers don't identify themselves with Japanese people.
- a descendant of Old Korean or Middle Korean with substantial Persian and Arabic influence and is written in Arabic script.
- a Romance language in North Africa with substantial Arabic and Berber influence and is written in Arabic script.
- a dialect of Modern English spoken on the Chukchi peninsula and the Kamchatka peninsula and is written in a phonemic Cyrillic script and has influences from Siberian languages and uses Russian for technical terms.
- a Polynesian language spoken as the international lingua franca after a post-apocalyptic setting in which the 1962 Cuban Crisis ended up as World War III, and all Chinese languages and Germanic languages have became extinct.
I prefer to not be referred to with masculine pronouns and nouns such as “he/him/his”.
User avatar
Creyeditor
MVP
MVP
Posts: 5091
Joined: 14 Aug 2012 19:32

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Creyeditor »

I did a tonal romlang. It's a bit bogo-y, but I really like it.
Creyeditor
"Thoughts are free."
Produce, Analyze, Manipulate
1 :deu: 2 :eng: 3 :idn: 4 :fra: 4 :esp:
:con: Ook & Omlűt & Nautli languages & Sperenjas
[<3] Papuan languages, Morphophonology, Lexical Semantics [<3]
User avatar
k1234567890y
mayan
mayan
Posts: 2400
Joined: 04 Jan 2014 04:47
Contact:

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by k1234567890y »

Creyeditor wrote: 10 Apr 2018 20:33 I did a tonal romlang. It's a bit bogo-y, but I really like it.
nice (:

I have ever had an idea of a tonal High German dialect...but it is not a part of althistory
I prefer to not be referred to with masculine pronouns and nouns such as “he/him/his”.
User avatar
Shemtov
runic
runic
Posts: 3285
Joined: 29 Apr 2013 04:06

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Shemtov »

What about a successful Mongol invasion of Tsushima, which became Mongolic-speaking, with a Japanese substrate, that became heavier as it became a tribute kingdom during the 16th century Japanese Invasion of Korea (Possibly even Japan gaining control for a few years, before forcing it into a tribute status?) and then annexation during the Meiji Restoration?
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
User avatar
k1234567890y
mayan
mayan
Posts: 2400
Joined: 04 Jan 2014 04:47
Contact:

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by k1234567890y »

Shemtov wrote: 10 Apr 2018 22:56 What about a successful Mongol invasion of Tsushima, which became Mongolic-speaking, with a Japanese substrate, that became heavier as it became a tribute kingdom during the 16th century Japanese Invasion of Korea (Possibly even Japan gaining control for a few years, before forcing it into a tribute status?) and then annexation during the Meiji Restoration?
that sounds like a good idea (: but I guess in this scenario, a large amount of Mongolian people also immigrated onto the island following the conquest, and they would marry with the females of the original population.
I prefer to not be referred to with masculine pronouns and nouns such as “he/him/his”.
User avatar
Shemtov
runic
runic
Posts: 3285
Joined: 29 Apr 2013 04:06

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Shemtov »

k1234567890y wrote: 10 Apr 2018 23:13
Shemtov wrote: 10 Apr 2018 22:56 What about a successful Mongol invasion of Tsushima, which became Mongolic-speaking, with a Japanese substrate, that became heavier as it became a tribute kingdom during the 16th century Japanese Invasion of Korea (Possibly even Japan gaining control for a few years, before forcing it into a tribute status?) and then annexation during the Meiji Restoration?
that sounds like a good idea (: but I guess in this scenario, a large amount of Mongolian people also immigrated onto the island following the conquest, and they would marry with the females of the original population.
My College library has a book on Mongolic as an E-Book. I downloaded it on my phone; It has a chapter of Classical Mongol- so I can start from there.
Many children make up, or begin to make up, imaginary languages. I have been at it since I could write.
-JRR Tolkien
User avatar
k1234567890y
mayan
mayan
Posts: 2400
Joined: 04 Jan 2014 04:47
Contact:

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by k1234567890y »

that's nice (:

an even crazier idea: European Yucatec Mayan and European Nahuatl. which was spoken in West Europe by Mesoamerican colonizers of Spain, French, England and Ireland following a asteroid wiping out much of the West Europe in 1491.
I prefer to not be referred to with masculine pronouns and nouns such as “he/him/his”.
Ælfwine
roman
roman
Posts: 940
Joined: 21 Sep 2015 01:28
Location: New Jersey

Re: Altlang Ideas Discussion

Post by Ælfwine »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vzQ_HwO792o

So I learned two things from watching this cool video.

1.) The Chinese and Romans were aware of each other.
2.) The Chinese actually sent an envoy to seek out Rome

So my idea of an altlang would be, what if the Romans not only defeated their Asiatic rivals to the east, but managed to expand to the borders of the Han Empire, within 300 years? And a language grew out of that? It's probably a bit too ambitious of a project, and I certainly have enough on my plate in terms of rom-langs, but still— what if?
My Blog

A-posteriori, alternative history nerd
Post Reply