Conlang problems game

[nmn]

Here you basicly make a problem out of a set of rules and words you think of at the moment and leave it to the others to solve it.

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We have cognates from five related languages in random order. Not all cognates are shown. Determine the geneanalogical tree of the languages and reconstruct the missing cognates. Also derive the words for the protolanguage.

-mavatɕɛ kosi tɛtɕɛ atɛla vahi karɛ hatɕi
-kare laʔi ʃiro tʃeʔe atʃela vaj mavaʔe
-køsi tetɕe ve.i tɕere etɕi mavetɕe
-mavatʃe ʃiɾo tʃejtʃe qowʃi latʃi atʃejla vaj
-haʃi xɔwʃi tʃejʃe ʃiɾɔ atʃejla vahi xaɾe laʃi

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Below are infinitives and past participles in a language's orthography. Fill in the gaps.

infinitive - past participle

deto - dekun
ralso - ralxun
modo - mogun
paremso - paremxun
zalazo - zalazgun
vieviso - vieviskun
tahalzo - tahalgzun
karato - ???
lazo - ???
sorso - ???
??? - keregun
??? - lieskun
??? - avazgun
??? - onokun

[decem]

Spoiler:

deto - dekun
ralso - ralxun
modo - mogun
paremso - paremxun
zalazo - zalazgun
vieviso - vieviskun
tahalzo - tahalgzun
karato - karakun
lazo - lazgun
sorso - sorxun/sorskun
kereko - keregun
lieso - lieskun
avazo - avazgun
onoto - onokun

[nmn]

Please wrap your solution in the spoiler tag

Code: Select all

[spoiler] here [/spoiler]

since some might want to try on their own. Not that yours is entirely correct.

[decem]

Please wrap your solution in the spoiler tag

Code: Select all

[spoiler] here [/spoiler]

since some might want to try on their own. Not that yours is entirely correct.

Awfully sorry old chap. I've put it in a spoiler. Was much of it correct?

[Zumir]

Spoiler:

karato - karakun
lazo - lazgun
sorso - sorsxun
keredo - keregun
lieso - lieskun
avszo - avazgun
onoto - onokun

Awesome idea, by the way!

[nmn]

Please wrap your solution in the spoiler tag

Code: Select all

[spoiler] here [/spoiler]

since some might want to try on their own. Not that yours is entirely correct.

Awfully sorry old chap. I've put it in a spoiler. Was much of it correct?

You have two mistakes - there every form has only one corresponding. Zumir also has two mistakes, though one of his looks more like a typo.
Seeing you are interested, here's another problem. You can also make yours.

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Below are given several nouns in a conlang and their correspondances in English in random order. Define the matching pairs of words:

khow, kast, raek, zvoiste, khowste, kazdoi, kasca, zvoi, snhaw, khowca, raekca
man, hut, beast, river, giant, stream, animal, house, snake, dwarf, village

What do these words mean in English?:
snhawste, raegdoi, zvoidoi, snhawca, zvoica, kasste

If kangi is the word for book in that conlang, what would be the word for library?

[Irohuro]

This is as far as I've gotten on the first problem:

Spoiler:

words in green are derived to match the other languages, the languages are in the same order as in OP

L1-mavatɕɛ kosi tɛtɕɛ atɛla vahi karɛ hatɕi tɕiro
L2-mavaʔe kosi tʃeʔe atʃela vaj kare laʔi ʃiro
L3- mavetɕe køsi tetɕe etela/atela ve.i tɕere etɕi tɕirø
L4-mavatʃe qowʃi tʃejtʃe atʃejla vaj qaɾe latʃi ʃiɾo
L5-mavaʃe xɔwʃi tʃejʃe atʃejla vahi xaɾe laʃi ʃiɾɔ

L1, and L3 form one branch, and L2, L4, and L5 form a second branch.

[nmn]

In general you are in the right direction; however you have missed a word from L5 that's included in the OP - nothing is superfluous. Better include it in your reconstruction.
Some hints:

Spoiler:

only if you don't want to finish it entirely by yourself:
-you need to reconsider under what circumstances do the vowel changes in L3 occur. And keep in mind that it's nothing overly complicated - quite the contrary, the reason is very simple
-you have mixed up two words - you have one false friend in your reconstruction
-in three of the languages, there is one phoneme, which you consider it to be two; look at the other two langs for consistencies

[CMunk]

My try at the latest one:

Spoiler:

English words in semantic order:
hut
house
village

dwarf
man
giant

stream
river

animal
beast

snake

Conlang words in morphemic order:
khow
khow-ste
khow-ca

kast
kaz-doi
kas-ca

raek
raek-ca

zvoi
zvoi-ste

snhaw

My thoughts:
Snhaw is alone and so is 'snake'. They must be a pair.
The -ca suffix is in both groups of three and the one common feature of the triplets of English words is a diminutive word ('hut' and 'dwarf', respectively)
The -ca suffix is also attatched to raek, and the only pair with a diminutive is 'river' - 'stream', so raek must mean 'river'.
That leaves one English pair and one conlang pair which must be coupled: zvoi is 'animal'
-ste must mean something like "big and dangerous" if it makes an 'animal' a 'beast'. So I believe khow is a 'man'.
That makes kast a 'house' and -doi a suffix meaning "group of".

Pairing them up
snhaw 'snake'

raek 'river'
raekca 'stream'

zvoi 'animal'
zvoiste 'beast'

khow 'man'
khowca 'dwarf'
khowste 'giant'

kast 'house'
kasca 'hut'
kazdoi 'village'

-ca diminutive
-ste augmentative
-doi collective

The other words:
snhawste 'big snake', maybe 'python'
raegdoi 'group of rivers', maybe 'river delta'
zvoidoi 'group of animals', or 'flock'
snhawca 'little snake', maybe 'mamba'
zvoica 'little animal', maybe 'cub'
kasste 'big house', maybe 'mansion' or 'castle' or 'skyscraper'

The word for library might be kangidoi

[nmn]

My try at the latest one:

Spoiler:

English words in semantic order:
hut
house
village

dwarf
man
giant

stream
river

animal
beast

snake

Conlang words in morphemic order:
khow
khow-ste
khow-ca

kast
kaz-doi
kas-ca

raek
raek-ca

zvoi
zvoi-ste

snhaw

My thoughts:
Snhaw is alone and so is 'snake'. They must be a pair.
The -ca suffix is in both groups of three and the one common feature of the triplets of English words is a diminutive word ('hut' and 'dwarf', respectively)
The -ca suffix is also attatched to raek, and the only pair with a diminutive is 'river' - 'stream', so raek must mean 'river'.
That leaves one English pair and one conlang pair which must be coupled: zvoi is 'animal'
-ste must mean something like "big and dangerous" if it makes an 'animal' a 'beast'. So I believe khow is a 'man'.
That makes kast a 'house' and -doi a suffix meaning "group of".

Pairing them up
snhaw 'snake'

raek 'river'
raekca 'stream'

zvoi 'animal'
zvoiste 'beast'

khow 'man'
khowca 'dwarf'
khowste 'giant'

kast 'house'
kasca 'hut'
kazdoi 'village'

-ca diminutive
-ste augmentative
-doi collective

The other words:
snhawste 'big snake', maybe 'python'
raegdoi 'group of rivers', maybe 'river delta'
zvoidoi 'group of animals', or 'flock'
snhawca 'little snake', maybe 'mamba'
zvoica 'little animal', maybe 'cub'
kasste 'big house', maybe 'mansion' or 'castle' or 'skyscraper'

The word for library might be kangidoi

Everything is correct. Infact I hadn't set any right answers on the words translation, i was just curious what will others come up with.

[Keenir]

Here you basicly make a problem out of a set of rules and words you think of at the moment and leave it to the others to solve it.

interesting.

one question - if its a game, when do others get to take a turn issuing a problem?

[nmn]

Here you basicly make a problem out of a set of rules and words you think of at the moment and leave it to the others to solve it.

interesting.

one question - if its a game, when do others get to take a turn issuing a problem?

Whenever they want - there are no turns here. Say person A posts a problem. Person B can post a problem directly after them even without looking at A's problem. Person C could then post a problem without solving person B's but he could solve person A's problem. They could also use their already existing conlangs to post problems.

[cedh]

We have cognates from five related languages in random order. Not all cognates are shown. Determine the geneanalogical tree of the languages and reconstruct the missing cognates. Also derive the words for the protolanguage.

-mavatɕɛ kosi tɛtɕɛ atɛla vahi karɛ hatɕi
-kare laʔi ʃiro tʃeʔe atʃela vaj mavaʔe
-køsi tetɕe ve.i tɕere etɕi mavetɕe
-mavatʃe ʃiɾo tʃejtʃe qowʃi latʃi atʃejla vaj
-haʃi xɔwʃi tʃejʃe ʃiɾɔ atʃejla vahi xaɾe laʃi

Spoiler:

Words in green are "missing cognates".

L1 - mavatɕɛ kosi tɛtɕɛ atɛla vahi karɛ hatɕi *latɕi *siro
L2 - mavaʔe *koʃi tʃeʔe atʃela vaj kare *(h)aʔi laʔi ʃiro
L3 - mavetɕe køsi tetɕe *etela ve.i tɕere etɕi *letɕi *siro
L4 - mavatʃe qowʃi tʃejtʃe atʃejla vaj *qaɾe *(h)atʃi latʃi ʃiɾo
L5 - *mavaʃe xɔwʃi tʃejʃe atʃejla vahi xaɾe haʃi laʃi ʃiɾɔ

Protoforms: *mavace *kosi *tece *atela *vahi *kare *haci *laci *siro

- The correspondences for the consonants *m, *v, *l, and *r are unproblematic (although a reflex for *m is not attested in L5, and a reflex for *l is not attested in L3; the "missing cognates" assume they survived unchanged).
- *h survives in L1 and L5; it's zero in the other three languages medially but we don't know whether it was lost or retained word-initially in L2 and L4.
- *s *t were palatalised to [ʃ tʃ] in L2, L4 and L5 (in all attested instances followed by a front vowel); strictly speaking we don't know whether the initial sound in the last word was the same proto-phoneme but the existing correspondences give no reason to posit a separate *ʃ.
- Original *c (probably [tɕ], but I'm choosing a simpler representation) merged with *t (before front vowels...) in L4, with *s in L5, and with *k before front vowels in L3; it's clearly a different segment in the protolanguage though.
- *k seems to have split reflexes [k]~[tɕ] in L3 based on the following vowel, but the exact conditions are unclear from this small amount of data (both relevant vowel instances were umlauted, and both were originally non-front, so it might be the rounding on *o > [ø] which prevented palatalization.
- Backing of *k to [q] in L4 happened before a back vowel; since *a is not prototypically back we can't know whether the "missing cognate" in L4 should be *qaɾe or *kaɾe.
- *a *o were fronted to [e ø] in L3 when the following syllable contained original *i *e.
- In L4 and L5, the mid vowels *e *o were diphthongised in non-final syllables.
- Otherwise, all vowels stayed intact in all languages (apart from minor shifts like *e > [ɛ] in L1, *o > [ɔ] in L5, and *i > [j] after a vowel in L2 and L4).

L2, L4, and L5 clearly form a genetic subgroup, marked by the palatalisation of coronal consonants. Within this group L2 and L4 share the loss of medial *h, while L4 and L5 share the lenition of *r > [ɾ] and the diphthongization of mid vowels, and also have a much more similar treatment of *c, so if there's another subdivision in this group then it's L4 and L5 vs. L3.
L1 and L3 might form another branch, but L1 is the most conservative of all languages and has virtually no real innovation in common with any other language, whereas L3 has two major innovations of its own (*k > [tɕ] and vowel umlaut), so I'd tend to classify both L1 and L3 as primary branches of the family even though they may have split from each other later than Proto-L2-L4-L5 split from either.

[Ear of the Sphinx]

Something similar to that by nmn:

There are five sets of cognates. Find regular correspondences and group the languages to three subfamilies.

Language I
/mhu sanĩ twu njə lwu kfə̃ bamo həpú ŋũ ká tù mã jwo mawo nawõ fədə hawu tsa waɡaj jĩ wá mfa dapew fəlaw ɡõ ffì jò wal məka lõ ɡfé wlù kəɡe waɡí/

Language II
/muɦ sini səw niʑ wuw həvə pum həvək ŋə ɕat səf mu juw muɦ nəɦə fud həɦ saz wuɡa ɕi hak muv tiviw fuzuw ku fivif ɕəh har muʑ rə kivit fərəh hiɡ widʑik/

Language III
/mhu sanin twú njɨ lwu kfɨ́n pàmə hɨpúʔ ŋun káʔ túh mən jwə majə najən fɨtɨ̀ haju tsə wakàj jin jaʔ mfa tàpə́w fɨləw kòn ffih jəh jal mɨkə́ lən kfə̀ʔ wluh kɨ́kə̀ wakìʔ/

Language IV
/meɦu senim twu neɡi lewu kfim pemo hfuh ŋuŋ kas tuf men jewo meɡo neɡoŋ fsi heɡi teze wekaj jin ɡah meva tepew vdew kom fevif joh ɡal mke loŋ kfes bluh khe wekih/

Language V
/mohɯ ʃenim hɯwɯ neʃi wowɯ hɯhɯm pomɯ hɯɸɯk ŋɯŋ ʃat huh mon jowo moho nohoŋ hotɯ hohɯ haso woka ʃin hak moho tʃeɸe hoho kom hehih ʃeh haw moʃe woŋ kihet ɸɯwɯh hike wetʃik/

Spoiler:

Language Proto-I-III
/mhu sanin twu njɨ lwu kfɨn bamo hɨpuʔ ŋun kaʔ tuh mən jwo maɰo naɰon fɨdɨ haɰu tsə waɡaj jin ɰaʔ mfa dapew fɨləw ɡon ffih joh ɰal mɨkə lon ɡfeʔ wluh kɨɡe waɡiʔ/

[nmn]

I find it very curious how of 34 words neither one is met twice in that text. Here's my attempt:

Spoiler:

full size
Consonants were relatively easy to be worked out.
-for the alternation k/j, k is before a, j otherwise Same with g/dʑ and k/tʃ
-the grey relations seem not to depend on their position
-the yellow ones were quite tricky to be found out
Vowes are an entire different story. At first, there seemed to be more exceptions than rules. Then I found the relations for the first vowels of the 2-syll words (or where it was a two syllable), but there 1 and 3 OTOH and 2,4 5 OTO seem to be completely unrelated. The second vowel of the 2 syll words is somewhat irregular and the one in monosyl words - completely. In some instances it seems that a (random) vowel was inserted to prevent certain consonant clusters, but then we have a word begining with ff- .I'm pretty confident with what I've found out so far, though.

As for the families, 1 and 3 with no doubt are in one family, given how many relationships they share. Of 2, 4 and 5, I don't know which one is the isolate, but I'd tentatively go for 5, since only it has ɯ.

k instead of h may be due to assimilation
where I have written ? after y, I'm curious did you mean y or j?
also, I think the normal reflexes s and t have changes to postalveloar due to palatalisation.

cedh, everything you say is true, save for one

Spoiler:

hint: what made you think consonants are treated differently when in word initial and non-word initial position?

[Ear of the Sphinx]

Pretty nice.
Also, I found some mistakes in the sets. Now they're fixed and marked in bold.

And added the words in the protolanguage of the group you've found out.

Hint for the other group:

Spoiler:

Umlaut.

[nmn]

The mistakes fixed some irregularities in the consonants, but I still can't say anything else about the vowels. However now I strongly suspect that

Spoiler:

the first vowel of the bisyllabic words was exclusively ə and it developed independantly in the 1-3 and 2-4-5 protolangs.

[Ear of the Sphinx]

So then another hint, the other proto-language:

Spoiler:

/mohɯ senim θɯwɯ neɕi lowɯ xɯfɯm pomɯ hɯɸɯk ŋɯŋ ɕat θɯf mon jowo moxɤ nɤxɤŋ fotɯ hɤxɯ θasɤ wokaj ɕin xak mofo teɸew foθow kom fefif ɕɤh xal moɕɤ lɤŋ kifet ɸɯlɯh xike wetɕik/

[CMunk]

These are some numerals from a conlang. What is the system?

3 - min
5 - sup
9 - potwak
13 - suttwak
14 - rontwak
18 - hangkwak
21 - wempo
22 - wengham
25 - wensup
31 - wemmintwak
32 - wenlatwak
36 - wengkwak
46 - penrom
47 - pengklif
50 - penghantwak
52 - penlatwak
63 - kemmin
69 - kempotwak
77 - kempokwak
84 - tenla
99 - temmingkwak

How are these numbers expressed?

4, 6, 14, 42, 59, 92

What do these numerals mean?

po, twak, pokwak, pemmingkwak, kenghantwak, teng

[nmn]

these numbers were a piece of cake

Spoiler:

We can see that the numerals are made of three parts: (wen, pen, ken, ten) + po, ham, min, sup, rom, klif, la + (twak, kwak)
sup - 5 ; suttwak - 13 > twak adds 8
potwak - 9; kempotwak - 69 > kem adds 60
wenlatwak - 32; penlatwak - 52 > wen adds 20, pen adds 40
it's safe to assume that the base is 20
wen - 20
pen - 40
ken - 60
ten - 80
po - 1
(g)han - 2 (50 pen-ghan-twak)
min - 3
la - 4 (52 pen-la-twak)
sup - 5
ron - 6 (14 ron-twak)
(g)klif - 7 (47 pen - gklif)
twak - +8
kwak - + 16 (< min ~ tem-mingkwak)

po - 1, twak - 8, pokwak - 17, pemmingkwak - 59, kenghantwak - 70, teng - 80
4 - la, 6 - ron, 14 - rontwak (by definition), 42 - penla, 59 - pemmingkwak, 92 - tenlatwak
104 - tentwakkwak :p