Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:57 pm
Travis B. wrote: ↑Tue Jan 11, 2022 8:13 pm
(I have decided to leave ambiguities in the orthography after alll, as putting in "silent" characters makes it look uglier. Also, I no longer mark pitch accent orthographically.)
The Roman alphabet can be a bit... unfortunate, perhaps... in its lack of letters. The quest for a non-ugly orthography can be an arduous one. Not marking pitch is probably the right call. It doesn't look like it's extremely important to the overall meaning being conveyed, and using underlining like that is kind-of odd-looking.
The big thing with pitch is that if there were fewer vowel qualities I'd mark pitch accent with diacritics... but due to the use of diacritics to vowel quality (to reduce the complexity of marking consonant quality) vowel letters are already very diacritic-heavy. Of course, I have also chosen to make marking of consonant quality ambiguous, because using vowels to mark consonant quality required adding lots of "silent vowels" to hint when consonant quality differed from the adjacent vowels' quality.
Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:57 pm
I have decided that definiteness is henceforth abolished. If one wants a definite-like effect, one should precede a noun with the appropriate demonstrative agreeing with it in gender and number.
Alas, poor definiteness
I was not using it consistently, and marking much on nouns seems against the overall style of this language, which seems focused on big, complex verbs and simple nouns (with "cases" being essentially just postpositional clitics, especially now that I have eliminated the distinction between ergative/accusative and absolutive/nominative cases).
Rounin Ryuuji wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 7:57 pm
Gëba nughmy sik'a läkäri mokhomijekene.
[ɣəꜜba nuɣʷmɨ ɕikʼa ʎækʰærʲi moꜜxʷomijekʰeɲe]
/ɣə́ba nɨɣʷ-mɨ ɕɨkʼa ʎakʰa=rʲɨ mə́xʷə-mɨ-jə-kʰə-ɲə/
sky.B ten.thousand-3.SG.E thing.E mankind.A=DAT give-3.SG.E-PST.PFV-RETRO-3.SG.B
Leka sik'a gëbäri mokhomijekëläsä.
[ʎekʰa ɕikʼa ɣəꜜbærʲi moꜜxʷomijekʰəlæɕæ]
/ʎakʰa ɕɨkʼa ɣə́ba=rʲɨ mə́xʷə-mɨ-jə-kʰə-la-ɕa/
mankind.A thing.E sky.B=DAT give-3.SG.E-PST.PFV-RETRO-3.SG.A-NEG
Q'omysa. Q'omysa. Q'omysa. Q'omysa. Q'omysa. Q'omysa. Q'omysa.
[qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa qʷʼomɨsa]
/qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa qʷʼəmɨ-sa/
be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS be.dead-CAUS
So, what's this mean? I'm not very good at reading glosses yet.
It's the Seven Kill Stele. To quote the wiki:
天生萬物以養人 Heaven brings forth innumerable things to nurture man.
人無一善以報天 Man has nothing good with which to recompense Heaven.
殺殺殺殺殺殺殺 Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill. Kill.
Of course my version simplifies it a good bit.