[15:17] <dhok> now I want to get back to that romance language spoken in the Azores that loses contact with the mainland by 400 AD
[15:17] <dhok> and retreats back to the neolithic
[15:18] <dhok> so it doesn't participate in many of the pan-Romance changes that occur in the early Middle Ages
[15:18] <dhok> like breaking of *ɛ *ɔ (tbf Portuguese didn't do that one either)
[15:19] <dhok> you could probably keep a small case distinction too
[15:19] <travisb> you want to preserve [ts] for VL /t_j k_j/, don't you?
[15:19] <dhok> you caught me
[15:19] <dhok> but I was also gonna have t d -> ts / _i u
[15:20] <guitarplayer> Mördscher
[15:20] <Caroline> Do Hawai'ians pronounce kitty as titty
[15:20] <dhok> perhaps only after you have a Portuguese-style raising of final vowels
[15:20] <dhok> so you'd have reflexes like <çu> for *tu and <gaç> for *cattus
[15:21] <travisb> why don't you do something like preserve [p t k] for VL /p t k/, something only found in small island within western Romance?
[15:21] <dhok> where's that small island?
[15:22] <dhok> you mean no intervocalic voicing?
[15:22] <dhok> ...hmm
[15:22] <travisb> Aragonese and some Occitan dialects
[15:22] <travisb> yeah
[15:22] <travisb> *islands
[15:22] <dhok> "High Aragonese dialects (alto aragonés), along with some dialects of Gascon, have preserved the voicelessness of many intervocalic stop consonants, e.g. CLETAM > cleta ("sheep hurdle", Cat. cleda, Fr. claie), CUCULLIATAM > cocullata ("crested lark", Sp. cogujada, Cat. cogullada)"
[15:22] <dhok> ooooh
[15:22] <dhok> that's cool
[15:23] <dhok> isn't gascon also the only dialect of western romance that did *k -> tʃ instead of ts
[15:23] <dhok> or was that picard?
[15:23] <travisb> wouldn't know
[15:24] <dhok> there's one of them in northern France anyways
[15:24] <dhok> the real question is
[15:24] <dhok> what did VL look like in about 300 AD?
[15:24] <dhok> that's something that's hard to find out for romlangs- if you are setting a language in Hungary or Iberia you can more or less figure out what it'll look like
[15:25] <dhok> because it fits on the dialect continuum
[15:25] <travisb> wouldn't the Azores be settled from Africa rather than from Europe, so that makes that what did *African* VL look in about 300 AD
[15:25] <dhok> but if you have a dialect of VL in the Azores and then in the 4th century it drops off the map...
[15:25] <dhok> oh well at that point you're conjecturing more than not
[15:26] <travisb> since very little is known about African Romance
[15:26] <dhok> yeah
[15:27] <travisb> it's like a Romance language set in Hungary - all we know about Pannonian Romance is some placenames and some loanwords in Hungarian
[15:27] <dhok> usually, I ask Dewrad, but Dewrad has a marked dislike of wacky romlangs because it's too easy to make Brithenig 2.0
[15:27] <dhok> and brithenig is stupid
[15:28] <dhok> you actually probably could get a brithenig on the Azores, but for a totally different reason: isolated speech communities cut off from a wider context tend to develop baroque features
[15:29] <dhok> rather than "language X spoken in region Y becomes language Y with a lexicon from X," which is an unsophisticated way of doing this
[15:32] <dhok> imo, wacky or conservative a posteriori languages are just fine if you can justify them
[15:32] <dhok> consider
[15:32] <dhok> if Sardinian didn't exist
[15:32] <dhok> anyone who tried to invent it would be laughed out of town
[15:32] <Caroline> http://i.imgur.com/bN2cSsy.jpg
[15:33] <Caroline> So does this count as indecent exposure
[15:33] <Caroline> I mean
[15:33] <Caroline> You can't see his bits
[15:33] <dhok> caroline: saw that on r/justneckbeardthings earlier
[15:37] <dhok> anyways, travisb, the real question, to my mind, is
[15:38] <dhok> the real question isn't "what can I keep from Latin", it's "what CAN'T I"
[15:38] <dhok> for all we know, for example, maybe North African Romance maintained the passive
[15:38] <dhok> but we'll never know, probably
[15:39] <dhok> were there passives found in the graffiti at Pompeii?
[15:40] <travisb> so you can essentially create a language that split from Vulgar Latin in the early centuries CE completely independently of Romance
[15:40] <travisb> such that you can create a language that is descended from Vulgar Latin but *isn't* Romance in the sense we know today
[15:41] <dhok> Hmmm
[15:42] <dhok> of course you'd have to figure out some way to make it interesting and not-Latin
[15:42] <dhok> but not-Latin on its own terms
[15:42] <travisb> one thing you could definitely have is loans from Berber
[15:43] <dhok> that assumes you're settling from North Africa
[15:43] <travisb> yeah
[15:43] <dhok> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta_do_mar
[15:44] <dhok> this is relevant
[15:44] <@Brel> "This monstrosity must be torn down immediately!" claims local harridan and book-club member, Naki Pushkin. "The trees in the garden spell a frightening word from the balcony; and the tower looks like a - a - well, you know!"
[15:44] <@Brel> all the more reason to keep it
[15:44] <dhok> because it might be that the reason the Azores are Portuguese rather than Berber is that it's way easier to get there from Portugal
[15:44] <@Brel> we need fertility symbols in our city
[15:45] <cntr> 01:50 <Caroline> Do Hawai'ians pronounce kitty as titty
[15:45] <cntr> most dialects would say "kitty"
[15:45] <cntr> [kiti]
[15:45] <@Brel> yeah, Hawaiian lost /t/ not /k/
[15:46] <cntr> actually, they might say [kiki]
[15:46] <dhok> though there are some dialects of Hawai'ian that merged k -> t, not t -> k
[15:47] <dhok> so they have [t] where the rest of the islands have [k]
[15:47] <Radius> not quite
[15:47] <Radius> hawaiian had k > ? across all dialects
[15:48] <Radius> this left /t/, which backed to [k] in most dialects but not the westernmost ones
[15:48] <dhok> oh right
[15:48] <dhok> woops
[15:48] <Radius> however
[15:49] <Radius> the so-called /k/ can be pronounced in all sorts of ways, since there are no other lingual obstruents to contrast with, and [k] varies freely with [t] and [tS] and voiced versions of those and sometimes even fricative versions
[15:49] <Radius> and so even though it's not contrastive, these days they tend to preserve English consonant values
[15:51] <dhok> hmm
[15:51] <dhok> you could do something wacky like that in Azorean
[15:51] <dhok> maybe pull an Arapaho and do *k -> ʔ, *p -> k
[15:52] <dhok> which actually sounds like a terrible idea but w/e
[15:52] <dhok> if you're living on small, isolated islands all sorts of things can happen
[15:52] <dhok> then uh
[15:53] <dhok> *g -> ŋ (presumably tʃ dʒ as allophones of *k *g were already around by 300? oh, wait, sardinian didn't so nvm)
[15:53] <dhok> su ŋakku 'the cat'
[15:53] <dhok> er
[15:53] <dhok> su ʔattu
[15:54] <travisb> the thing is that Vulgar Latin may not have been uniform in 300 CE
[15:54] <dhok> right
[15:55] <dhok> well if you're colonizing from North Africa you just need a plausible VL
[15:55] <dhok> not an actual VL
[15:55] <travisb> if you're descending Azorean from Western Romance, it probably already had tS dZ for *k_j *g_j
[15:55] <dhok> because you don't realy know what that would be
[15:55] <dhok> hmm
[15:55] <dhok> but you could certainly go from NAfrica, which might be closer to Sardinain
[15:55] <dhok> ...which is a shot in the dark but as good a shot as any
[15:56] <travisb> most things I've written assume that African Romance was closer to Sardinian, yes
[15:57] <dhok> so, colonize the azores from North Africa
[15:58] <dhok> this basically feels like cheating
[15:58] <travisb> about the volta do mar, it'd probably be more intuitive for some people to do it by accident from Africa than from Portugal
[15:58] <travisb> because to go from Portugal they'd have to go against the wind, whereas to go from Africa they'd have to go perpendicular to the wind
[15:59] <dhok> hmmm
[15:59] <dhok> yes, you're probably correct
[16:01] <dhok> i'm thinking a direct/oblique case distinction and maintenance of the Latin future?
[16:01] <dhok> but probably not the passive
[16:02] <dhok> then, you'd have a big plosive shift
[16:02] <dhok> where *g -> ŋ
[16:02] <travisb> preserving latin case distinctions is a less "out there" thing to do, since they are still present in eastern Romance, and were preserved until a relatively late date in western Romance
[16:02] <dhok> right
[16:03] <dhok> so *g -> ŋ, and then *k -> ʔ with *p -> k to fill in the gap
[16:03] <dhok> you can have /b/ without /p/ so that can be left alone, but I'm not sure what you would do with *d
[16:04] <travisb> preserve d rather than having d > D
[16:04] <dhok> because /b d t k ʔ/ is a strange plosive system
[16:04] <dhok> very strange
[16:04] <travisb> nah /b d t k ?/ isn't that strange
[16:04] <dhok> hmm ok
[16:04] <travisb> if any lenis stop is to be missing it's /g/
[16:04] <dhok> then uh
[16:05] <travisb> if any fortis stop is to be missing it's /p/
[16:05] <dhok> you could preserve Latin *w as /w/ instead of /v/?
[16:05] <travisb> how early did w > B happen though?
[16:05] <dhok> hmm good point
[16:05] <dhok> pretty early, I think
[16:05] <travisb> IIRC this was something that happened essentially in Vulgar Latin
[16:06] <dhok> there's a joke that "blessed are the Spaniards, for whom to drink is to live"
[16:06] <dhok> that dates back pretty early
[16:06] <dhok> at least to the late Empire, I think
[16:06] <travisb> well w > B happened in all of Romance, not just Ibero-Romance
[16:08] <dhok> right
[16:08] <travisb> and I'm not sure about that joke, because B > b occurred relatively late in Ibero-Romance
[16:08] <travisb> whoops
[16:08] <travisb> b > B
[16:08] <travisb> e.g. Ladino still hasn't had b > B
[16:08] <dhok> you could easily merge *b and *w, certainly
[16:09] <dhok> (as Spanish did)
[16:09] <dhok> so this leaves you with a consonant inventory of what
[16:09] <travisb> what I meant is that the final merger of *b and *w happened relatively late in Castilian
[16:09] <dhok>  /t k ʔ b~β d m n ŋ f s r l j/
[16:09] <travisb> because Old Castilian still had /b B/
[16:09] <dhok> you can't get away with preserving *h can yo
[16:09] <dhok> u
[16:09] <dhok> huh
[16:10] <travisb> if you're going to have /h/ you're gonna have to get it from somewhere else than *h, because *h was uniformly lost in Romance
[16:10] <dhok> but this isn't romance...it's a sister language
[16:11] <dhok> but depending on how early it was lost
[16:11] <dhok> i agree it's really unlikely to survive
[16:11] <travisb> well IIRC *h was lost quite early
[16:11] <dhok> you could have *s -> h
[16:11] <dhok> but then where do you get /s/
[16:11] <dhok> since you don't have a θ or a /ts/ to get it from
[16:11] <travisb> you could do *s > h or *f > h, both of which happened in Romance varieties
[16:11] <travisb> do it conditionally
[16:11] <dhok> yeah
[16:12] <dhok> is /f h/ even a workable fricative system
[16:12] <travisb> well there are Castilian varieties that still preserve /h/ from *f
[16:12] <dhok> but they have /s/ too
[16:12] <dhok> or they have /θ/
[16:12] <dhok> i know arapaho has /θ ʃ h/ as a fricative inventory
[16:12] <travisb> well IIRC these are southwestern varieties
[16:13] <travisb> so they might also have *s > h in codas
[16:13] <dhok> yeah
[16:13] <dhok> ...if you have *s -> h then some weird shit would happen with inflection, but that's OK
[16:14] <dhok> also initial sC clusters
[16:14] <travisb> do *s > h conditionally
[16:14] <dhok> right
[16:14] <travisb> you could copy Castilian and do it only in codas
[16:14] <dhok> eh
[16:15] <travisb> but then that might be copying Castilian too much
[16:15] <dhok> could copy Greek and do it only before a vowel
[16:15] <travisb> yeah
[16:15] <dhok> so this gives you what
[16:16] <travisb> what're you going to do with *t_j *k_j *g_j?
[16:16] <dhok> good question
[16:16] <dhok> *k_j *g_j don't have to do anything if they don'twant to, sardinian didn't
[16:17] <travisb> if you're making your language descended from African Romance, I can see *k_j > k and *g_j > g, yes
[16:17] <travisb> what does *t_j do in Sardinian though?
[16:17] <dhok> i'm actually trying to find out
[16:17] <dhok> "/ts/ (or [tts]), a denti-alveolar affricate consonant written tz, corresponds to Italian z or ci- (a natural evolution of /t/ before /i/)."
[16:17] <dhok> so t_j -> ts
[16:18] <dhok> could make that turn into /s/ itself, which is pretty Portuguese-ish, but then we don't have very many other examples of /s/ since we turned it to *h
[16:18] <dhok> er to /h/
[16:20] <dhok> and you could extend this elsewhere before high vowels, too, so you could get çu 'you' or ʔaçu 'cat' (initial ʔ is usually quite rare though...)
[16:20] <travisb> yeah I'd myself go with *t_j > a roo
[16:20] <travisb> whoops
[16:20] <travisb> *t_j > s
[16:20] <dhok> what about the vowels
[16:20] <dhok> just do sardinian, cut the length distinction and call it a day?
[16:21] <dhok> seems boring
[16:22] <dhok> you -could- maintain vowel length but I don't want to do that either
[16:22] <travisb> what options are there to do? there's basically what western romance and northern italian varieties did (with or without diphthongization), there's what southern italian varieties did, there's what sardinian did, and there's what eastern romance did, and then there's doing something completely different
[16:23] <travisb> the thing is how likely is it that vowel length survived in Romance to 300 AD?
[16:23] <travisb> *Vulgar Latin
[16:24] <travisb> in no part of Romance is vowel length preserved; while there have been Romance varieties with vowel length, it's always been new vowel length
[16:24] <dhok> well it must have existed into the early empire at least, because if you compare Sardinian, Romanian and western Romance you end up concluding that you must have at one point had it
[16:25] <dhok> iirc, sicilian had the normal *i e ɛ a ɔ o u system, then had *e -> i and *o -> u
[16:25] <travisb> but did vowel length clearly survive up to 300 CE?
[16:25] <dhok> no.
[16:25] <dhok> unless you want to handwave and say But North Africa
[16:25] <dhok> which I don't much want to
[16:25] <dhok> but you -could- postulate a different vowel development for north africa!
[16:26] <travisb> so southern italian varieties actually group with western romance, with its similarity to sardinian being an independent later innovation
[16:27] <dhok> "Saint Augustine also states that "African ears have no quick perception of the shortness or length of (Latin) vowels""
[16:27] <dhok> so it sounds like we have a Sardinian situation
[16:27] <dhok> right
[16:28] == Yatalac [webchat@3da1d69e.hsd1.il.5aa6454b.net.hmsk] has quit [Ping timeout: 272 seconds]
[16:29] <dhok> i need to go home so I'm copy-pasting this into my scratchpad thread