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| '''Pronounced /'tQ.lEn/.'''
| | {|border=1 align=right cellpadding=4 cellspacing=0 width=300 style="margin: 0 0 1em 1em; background: #f9f9f9; border: 1px #aaaaaa solid; border-collapse: collapse; font-size: 95%; |
| | | |colspan="2" bgcolor="#0000CC" color="#FFFFFF" align="center" |<font color="#FFFFFF"><big>'''Taalen'''</big></font> |
| =History= | | |- |
| ==External== | | |valign="top"|Spoken in: |
| I started working on Taalen in the summer of 2000. Anticipating grad school, and unhappy with where Aelya was going, I started over. There's a lot of Aelya's aesthetic in Taalen - one might say that Aelya evolved into Taalen, but not definitely not in a diachronic way!
| | || Sovrandas /soˈvran.dəs/ |
| | | |- |
| It has been heavily inspired by the Celtic and Uralic languages, as well as Native American languages of various families.
| | |valign="top"|Timeline/Universe: |
| | | || The Coil (the Crux universe) |
| ==Internal==
| | |- |
| There will be a proto-language and sister languages, but nothing has been developed in any detail yet.
| | |valign="top"|Total speakers: |
| | | || 2.8 million (or something) |
| | | |- |
| =Phonology=
| | |valign="top"|Genealogical classification: |
| ==Consonants==
| | || Súren branch of the Sovrandian family |
| Taalen's phonetic inventory is fairly simple, and should be familiar to any English speaker, with a few exceptions. The voiceless nasals, bilabial fricatives as well as palatal and velar fricatives, and the lateral fricatives are likely familiar from languages such as Welsh, Japanese, and German. The palatal plosive is unusual, and most easily approximated by English speakers with /ts/. The dental approximant is the standard English <r>, and the dental flap can be heard in English words like <water> /wa4.r=/. Note also the presence of a syllabic resonant
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| {| cellpadding="5"
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| ! || Bilabial || Labiodental || Dental || Alveolar || Postalveolar || Palatal || Velar || Glottal
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| |- align="center"
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| | '''Plosive''' || /p/ /b/ || || || /t/ /d/ || || /c/ || /k/ /g/
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| |- align="center"
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| | '''Nasal''' || /m_0/ /m/ || || || /n_0/ /n/ || || || /N_0/ /N/
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| |- align="center"
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| | '''Fricative''' || /p\/ /B/ || /f/ /v/ || /T/ /D/ || /s/ || /S/ || /C/ || /x/ /G/ || /h/ | |
| |- align="center"
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| | '''Approx.''' || || /w/ || || /r\/ || || /j/
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| |- align="center" | |
| | '''Tap''' || || || || /4/
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| |- align="center" | |
| | '''Lat. App.''' || || || || /l/ || ||
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| |- align="center" | |
| | '''Lat. Fric.''' || || || || /K/ /K\/
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| |} | |
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| As in English, the voiceless stops are usually aspirated (/p_h t_h k_h/) initially, but also when geminate.
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| Some resonants may also be syllabic: /m=/ /n=/ /r\=/ /l=/ as in <bottom>, <button>, <butter>, and <bottle>.
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| ==Vowels==
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| Basic description/intro will be here.
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| {| cellpadding="5"
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| ! || '''Front''' || '''Central''' || '''Back'''
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| |- align="center" | |
| | '''Close''' || /i/ /I/ || || /U/ /u/ || | |
| |- align="center"
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| | '''Close-mid''' || /e/ /2/ || || /o/ ||
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| |- align="center" | |
| | '''Open-mid''' || /E/ /{/ || /V/ or /@/ || || | |
| |- align="center"
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| | '''Open''' || /a/ || || /Q/||
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| |} | | |} |
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| ==Diphthongs==
| | '''Pronounced /'tɑ.lɛn/.''' <br> |
| Taalen only possesses five diphthongs, all rising: /aI/ /eI/ /oI/ /aU/ and /oU/.
| | From ''tal'' 'tree' + ''ra'' 'speak' + ''-en'' agentive suffix: 'Treespeaker', used metonymically. If compounded currently instead of anciently, this results in ''tallen'', which is used to indicate the individual Treespeaker (roughly equivalent to a shaman) as opposed to the language. |
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| ==Allophones==
| | [[Category: Conlangs]] |
| */h/, /C/, and /x/ are allophonic, the last two appearing only near a front vowel, and a consonant or finally, respectively.
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| */f/ and /p\/, as well as /v/ and /B/, are interchangeable.
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| */K/ and /K\/ appear interchangeably as well.
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| */r\/ appears in syllable codas and initially, while /4/ appears intervocalically and after a consonant. Neither ever appears before a consonant.
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| ==Phonotactics==
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| Syllabic onsets may consist of any consonant, in addition to the following clusters: <br>
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| * voiced stops + liquids: /b4 bl d4 dl g4 gl/
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| * /s/ + voiceless stop: /st sp sc/
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| * stop + glide: /pj bj tj dj kj gj/
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| * nasal + glide: /nj Nj mw Nw/ (*/nw mj/ are not allowed)
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| * /sr sv lj/
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| Syllabic nuclei consist of a single vowel or diphthong. Vowels cannot remain in hiatus (*/aE/) but instead become a diphthong or introduce a glide: */i@/ -> /ij@/.
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| The coda of a syllable can only be a continuant (excluding voiceless nasals). Immediately preceding an onset cluster, no coda is allowed. In compounding, codae often vocalize before a cluster: /tam/ + /bran/ -> /taUbr@n/ (with unstressed /a/ -> /@/). Geminate consonants (with onset in the coda of one syllable and release in the onset of the next) are therefore limited to continuants (liquids, voiced nasals, and fricatives).
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| Cross-syllable (i.e. medial) clusters are limited. <br>
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| * nasal + homorganic voiced stop: /mb nd Ng/
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| * nasal + glide: /nj Nj mw Nw/
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| * /l/ + voiced stop: /lb ld lg/
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| * /l/ + heterorganic nasal: /lm lN/
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| * liquid + glide: /lj lw rj rw/
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| * /K/ + voiceless stop: /Kp Kt Kk/
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| * certain fricative + liquid clusters: /f4 v4 T4 D4 S4 x4 G4 Tl Dl/
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| * sibilant + voiceless stop: /sp st sk Sp St Sk/
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| * fricative + homorganic glide: /Cj xw/
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| Words tend to be 3 syllables or less.
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| =Orthography=
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| In general, the phonemes of Taalen are represented in romanisation by their obvious counterparts: <t> is /t/. Exceptions:
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| {| cellpadding="5"
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| ! Rom. || PR || || Rom. || PR || || Rom. || PR
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| |- align="center"
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| | ts || /c/ || || c || /k/ || || mh || /m_0/
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| |- align="center"
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| | nh || /n_0/ || || f or ph || /f/ or /p\/ || || v or bh || /v/ or /B/
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| |- align="center"
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| | th || /T/ || || dh || /D/ || || sh || /S/
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| |- align="center"
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| | h || /h/, /C/ or /x/ || || gh || /G/ || || u || /u/, /U/ or /w/
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| |- align="center"
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| | r || /4/ or /r\/ || || lh || /K/ or /K\/ || || i || /i/ or /I/
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| |- align="center"
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| | y || /j/ or /I/ || || eu || /2/ || || ea || /{/
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| |- align="center"
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| | aa || /Q/ || || ñ or ngh || /N/ || || bh || /v/ or /B/
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| |}
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| The letter <y> is also used to mark syllabicity on the four resonants: <yn> = /n=/, <ym> = /m=/, <yr> = /r\=/, and <yl> = /l=/. It is also used to indicate /V/ and /@/. Other simple vowels <a e o> can also indicate /@/ in unstressed syllables.
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| The digraph <ch> does not appear, replaced in mutation by <h>. <Ngh> is only used outside of a cluster; when in a cluster, it is represented in romanisation by <n>: /Ng/ = <ng>.
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| Because Taalen does not allow stops finally, stems or words ending in stops aspirate them, and mark them with <'> to indicate their origins:
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| {|
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| | <ragh> /'4aG/ 'mist' || <ragha> /'4a.G@/ 'mists'<br>
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| |- align="center"
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| | <rag'h> /'4aG/ 'he carries' || <ragen> /'4a.gEn/ 'I carry'
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| |}
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| Geminate consonants (such as <ll> /l:/) are generally represented by doubling. In the native writing system, a special symbol is used for this (as well as in <aa>). The geminate digraphs are represented by <tth>, <ddh>, <ggh>, <ssh>, and <llh> (<ph> and <bh> only appear as the result of mutation, and thus won't appear geminated).
| | {{Taalen}} |
