I'd really enjoy that! And yeah, I agree that coming up independently with stuff that is similar to Tolkein's is damned awesome.
Which reminds me, when I was in a used bookstore in the antique district last week, I picked up a copy of a Tolkein Beastiary that I just couldn't resist. Gorgeous illustrations!
linguistic convergencerfunkOctober 5 2006, 21:33:04 UTC
Thinking like Tolkien, but independently, is rather impressive.
Oh, and I know nothing about IPA, but you should be able to stick Unicode into LJ by specifying decimal unicode numbers as entities just like any other entities (well, with # between the ampersand and the number), and of course hoping for the appropriate font on the other end. But you probably already knew that.
Have I said recently that I love the way your mind works? This sort of entry is *why* I read your journal.
Something I once read, no idea if it's true or not, but supposedly most languages' name for the native speakers of said language translates out to "the People".
Also, it seems like the more fundamental and ancient the word (basic verbs like "to be" "run" and "hide", basic nouns like "child" and "man" and "wolf"), the more likely it is to be irregular. Which is frustrating, because those are exactly the words I want to start building my lexicon with -- and they're the ones most likely to *not* follow the basic rules of grammar.
It only makes sense; the only way, after all, that grammar *can* be developed, is after you have a basic language to start with. Thus, the 500 or so "basic" words in any language, (thank you, Charles Beriltz), are the most likely to be irregular, because there is no *metalanguage* to describe grammar at the time it was developed The rules develop to describe how the language can be used, and only *after* that point can the later additions conform to the rules of grammar.
Artificial languages like Esperanto are the only ones I would expect to conform in all ways to their grammatical rules, because they were developed from having the rules first, and then developing the actual words from that point.
As an aside, developing a language for your artwork puts you in the same category as one of my other favorite artists, M. C. Escher. One of these days when I get a job, I'm going to *have* to get prints of some of this art...[grin]
Not to break your heart or anything, but the first thing I did on reading about an elvish explorer named Llorengil was to break the name down into its recognizable Tolkienic roots, analyzing to lorien (as in Lothlorien) and gil, meaning star. (Or is elen star and gil silver? For once I'm not going to look it up because that would be just skaaaary.)
But yeah. "Gil-galad was an elven king, of him the harpers sadly sing..." and other wasted hours of my misspent youth.
Eh, his name isn't actually possible in my language, because there is no g, and no double l. Particularly poor planning on my part, eh? But, I don't expect he'll ever write it himself.
So, it must be an honorific or trade-name given to him by one of the other races (probably the Gwylo). I guess the other races wrote about him more often than his own people did... they must have thought he was nuts and tried to forget him. Or, maybe his elvish name is the equivalent of 'John Smith'.
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I'll see if I can upload a sample of the script once I come up with enough words to string together as a sentence. ;)
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Which reminds me, when I was in a used bookstore in the antique district last week, I picked up a copy of a Tolkein Beastiary that I just couldn't resist. Gorgeous illustrations!
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Oh, and I know nothing about IPA, but you should be able to stick Unicode into LJ by specifying decimal unicode numbers as entities just like any other entities (well, with # between the ampersand and the number), and of course hoping for the appropriate font on the other end. But you probably already knew that.
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;)
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Something I once read, no idea if it's true or not, but supposedly most languages' name for the native speakers of said language translates out to "the People".
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Also, it seems like the more fundamental and ancient the word (basic verbs like "to be" "run" and "hide", basic nouns like "child" and "man" and "wolf"), the more likely it is to be irregular. Which is frustrating, because those are exactly the words I want to start building my lexicon with -- and they're the ones most likely to *not* follow the basic rules of grammar.
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Artificial languages like Esperanto are the only ones I would expect to conform in all ways to their grammatical rules, because they were developed from having the rules first, and then developing the actual words from that point.
As an aside, developing a language for your artwork puts you in the same category as one of my other favorite artists, M. C. Escher. One of these days when I get a job, I'm going to *have* to get prints of some of this art...[grin]
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But yeah. "Gil-galad was an elven king, of him the harpers sadly sing..." and other wasted hours of my misspent youth.
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So, it must be an honorific or trade-name given to him by one of the other races (probably the Gwylo). I guess the other races wrote about him more often than his own people did... they must have thought he was nuts and tried to forget him. Or, maybe his elvish name is the equivalent of 'John Smith'.
I dunno. I'll make something up. But yeah.
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