Page 188 of 204

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2025 2:23 pm
by Man in Space
I didn't have a way to render “Heligoland” as a loan in the logograms, but here’s the motto of Heligoland translated into Common Caber and written in the qan van (start at bottom left, read in boustrophedon—i.e., LTR, RTL, LTR, RTL—from bottom to top):

Image

Tac qexo mihgŏ, ba irx fe ba rsad.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
mihgŏ
green
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
rsad
land

‘Green is the land.’

Tac qexo qŭcŭ, ba irx fe ba giar.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
qŭcŭ
red
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
giar
cliff

‘Red is the cliff.’

Tac qexo barŭs, ba irx fe ba nŭqin.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
barŭs
white
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
nŭqin
sand

‘White is the sand.’

Tac qexac, bac irxoc fe Çerŭgrenj.
tac
EX
qexac
DET.PL
ba
DEF
-oc
PL
irx
color
-oc
PL
fe
GEN
Çerŭgrenj
Heligoland

‘These are the colors of Heligoland.’

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2025 4:44 pm
by Raphael
Man in Space wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 2:23 pm I didn't have a way to render “Heligoland” as a loan in the logograms, but here’s the motto of Heligoland translated into Common Caber and written in the qan van (start at bottom left, read in boustrophedon—i.e., LTR, RTL, LTR, RTL—from bottom to top):

Image

Tac qexo mihgŏ, ba irx fe ba rsad.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
mihgŏ
green
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
rsad
land

‘Green is the land.’

Tac qexo qŭcŭ, ba irx fe ba giar.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
qŭcŭ
red
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
giar
cliff

‘Red is the cliff.’

Tac qexo barŭs, ba irx fe ba nŭqin.
tac
EX
qexo
DET
barŭs
white
ba
DEF
irx
color
fe
GEN
ba
DEF
nŭqin
sand

‘White is the sand.’

Tac qexac, bac irxoc fe Çerŭgrenj.
tac
EX
qexac
DET.PL
ba
DEF
-oc
PL
irx
color
-oc
PL
fe
GEN
Çerŭgrenj
Heligoland

‘These are the colors of Heligoland.’
May I ask what drew your attention to Heligoland in the first place?

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2025 5:24 pm
by Man in Space
Raphael wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 4:44 pmMay I ask what drew your attention to Heligoland in the first place?
A translation challenge over at the Other Place, and also an appreciation for Massive Attack.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Sep 14, 2025 4:51 am
by Raphael
Man in Space wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 5:24 pm
Raphael wrote: Sat Sep 13, 2025 4:44 pmMay I ask what drew your attention to Heligoland in the first place?
A translation challenge over at the Other Place, and also an appreciation for Massive Attack.
Ah, thank you.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Sep 14, 2025 9:47 pm
by rotting bones
I think ChatGPT 5 is better than 4o at writing sentences in my Standard Galactic conlang, but it's still hallucinating weird grammar and now it seems to be having trouble displaying some Unicode characters.
zø=te=ra, v=ky=te geuš=te s=vətžeu=te=ga gøihet-ri rəš=i, k=žəneumkə=te jøsø-ša-t re ve; ako zayjə=i ne-mižø-l mi, to k=høi tøs-b ve.

Interlinear gloss
zø=te=ra core=DEF=TOP,
v=ky=te geuš=te LOC=city=DEF lab=DEF
s=vətžeu=te=ga INST=sensor=DEF=FOC
gøihet-ri analyze-SS.CVB
rəš=i engineer=PL,
k=žəneumkə=te ALL=committee=DEF
jøsø-ša-t show-FUT-TOP.CONCORD
re ve EVID.REP ILLOC.POL;
ako if
zayjə=i alarm=PL
ne-mižø-l NEG-lie-PST
mi EVID.DIR,
to then
k=høi ALL=north
tøs-b go-IRR
ve ILLOC.POL.

Translation:
“As for the core, after the engineers analyzed it at the city lab with the (new) sensor (that part is in focus), they’ll show it to the committee—reportedly, politely. If the alarms hadn’t lied, then we would go north (counterfactually).”

What it shows off (at a glance): topic =ra, definiteness =te, proclitics for roles (v= locative, s= instrumental, k= allative), focus =ga, SS converb -ri, plural =i (animate), FUT -ša, topic-concord -t, evidential re/mi, polite illocution ve, and the conditional frame ako … to … with bound negation ne- and irrealis -b.

Mini lexicon (from the script in this run):
zø ‘core’, ky ‘city’, geuš ‘lab’, vətžeu ‘sensor’, rəš ‘engineer’, žəneumkə ‘committee’, zayjə ‘alarm’, høi ‘north’; gøihet ‘analyze’, jøsø ‘show’, mižø ‘lie’, tøs ‘go’.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Mon Sep 15, 2025 1:57 am
by jal
rotting bones wrote: Sun Sep 14, 2025 9:47 pmI think ChatGPT 5 is better than 4o at writing sentences in my Standard Galactic conlang, but it's still hallucinating weird grammar and now it seems to be having trouble displaying some Unicode characters.
I once specifically crafter a grammar for ChatGPT4 to translate, and it wasn't too bad at it, but not too good either. Haven't tried ChatGPT 5 yet.

The description (should be in a monospaced font, the tables look ugly like this):
More: show
The following is the concise description of a conlang named "Rebisi".

Description of features:
1. Rebisi is SOV;
2. Rebisi is a fusional language, using suffixes;
3. Rebisi has nouns, adjectives, verbs and prepositions;
4. Rebisi lacks articles;
5. Rebisi has nominal gender;
6. Rebisi has grammatical number;
7. Rebisi has two verbal tenses: present and past.

Nouns:

1. Rebisi has four noun cases: nominative, accusative, dative and locative;
2. Rebisi has two grammatical genders: feminine and masculine;
3. Nouns are declined for the following:
a. grammatical number (singular and plural);
b. grammatical case.
4. In the below table, the suffixes for the Rebisi nominal declension are shown. It shows the four noun cases as columns, and the genders, both singular and plural, as rows. The nominative forms for the singular are not given, as they are equal to the base form of the word.

| nominative | accusative | dative | locative
-------------------+------------+------------+--------+---------
Masculine singular | - | -e | -el | -o
Feminine singular | - | -ay | -al | -a
Masculine plural | -om | -em | -elem | -emo
Feminine plural | -au | -aya | -ayam | -ayo

5. If a noun ends with a vowel (that is, one of "a", "e", "i", "o" or "u"), that vowel is removed before applying the suffix. For example, "mense" (a masculine word) becomes "menso" in the locative singular, as the final vowel "e" is replaced by the suffix "o".

6. If a noun does not end with a vowel, the suffix is directly applied. For example, "stul" (a masculine word) becomes "stulo" in the locative singular, as the suffix "o" is applied directly.

Adjectives:

1. Adjectives agree with their noun in number and case;
2. In the below table, the suffixes for the Rebisi adjectival declension are shown. It shows the four noun cases as columns, and the genders, both singular and plural, as rows. As can be seen, for all cases except the nominative, the singular and plural forms are identical.

nominative | accusative | dative | locative
-------------------+------------+------------+--------+---------
Masculine singular | -e | -em | -el | -o
Feminine singular | -a | -ay | -al | -a
Masculine plural | -ea | -em | -el | -o
Feminine plural | -au | -ay | -al | -a

Verbs:

1. Verbs have two tenses, present tense and past tense;
2. Verbs are conjugated for tense and number, and gender in the singular;
3. The verb agrees with the subject for number and gender;
4. In the below table, the suffixes for the Rebisi verbal conjugations are shown. It shows the tenses as columns, and the genders, both singular and plural, as rows. Note that the plural form does not make a distinction between masculine and feminine.

| present | past
-------------------+---------+----------
Masculine singular | -o | -one
Feminine singular | -a | -ane
Plural (masc+fem) | -am | -anam

Prepositions:

1. Prepositions govern a noun case, i.e. the case of the noun that comes after the preposition depends on the inherent property of the preposition.
a. For example, "into the room" is translated as "ina syambe", where "ina" means "into", and "syambe" is the accusative masculine singular of "syambe", meaning "room", as the preposition "ina" governs the accusative case.

Word order:

1. Rebisi is an SOV language;
2. Adjectives follow the noun.
a. For example, in the nominative case, "the tall table" is "mense aye", as "mense" is the masculine nominative singular noun for "table", and "aye" is the masculine nominative singular adjective for "tall";
3. Prepositions preceed the noun;
a. E.g. "in the room" is "deda syambo", where "deda" is a preposition meaning "in", and "syambo" is the locative singular of the masculine noun "syambe", meaning "room";
4. Prepositional phrases preceed the verb;
5. Prepositional phrases come after any objects;

Noun case uses:

1. The nominative is used for subjects;
2. The accusative case is used for direct objects and with certain prepositions;
3. The dative case is used for indirect objects;
4. The locative case is used with certain prepositions.

Vocabulary:

Nouns:

Between parenthesis, after the noun, the gender is given (m = masculine, f = feminine):

apple (f) - mala
table (m) - mense
book (f) - kitaba
man (m) - ome
woman (f) - fama
chair(m) - stul
letter (f) - letra
room (m) - syambe

Verbs:

The forms given are the roots, the verbal suffix per the table above are added to it:

to eat - et
to put - set
to see - vor
to sit - sed
to walk - amul
to write - skrif

Adjectives:

Given are the root forms. The adjectival suffixes, per the table above, are added to these:

tall - ay
beautiful - bon
small - tin
heavy - lod
large - bik
long - lun

Prepositions:

Between parenthesis, after the preposition, the noun case it governs (acc = accusative, loc = locative, dat = dative)

on (loc) - sus
in (loc) - deda
into (acc) - ina

---------

Given the above grammar and vocabulary, translate the following English sentences into the language:

- The tall woman puts the book on the table
- The man saw the beautiful woman
- The small women ate apples
- The man sits on the heavy chair
- The apple sat on the large table
- The woman writes a long letter
- The tall man walked into the large room

The answers:
More: show
- fama aya kitabay sus menso seta
- ome famay bonay vorane
- famau tinau malaya etanam
- ome sus stulo lodo sedo
- mala sus menso biko sedane
- fama letray lunay skrifa
- ome aye ina syambe bikem amulone


JAL

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Fri Sep 19, 2025 9:24 pm
by Glass Half Baked
I've attempted this before on a lark, and the result was quite abysmal.

jal's example is pretty much the best case scenario. Each rule is laid out one at a time, with a clear context. This is not generally how grammars operate, because languages tend to be more complex than that. Any grammar document I've given cgpt5 that requires it to actually seek information is a non-starter. A paragraph that explains how to use articles will never result in correct article use, especially if it's not preceded by a hierarchical heading and followed by bullet point summaries. Chat cannot read in the sense that a person can, looking at the whole meaning of a text and extricating conclusions from that. It can only apply maxims. And even then it sucks. By my count, cgpt5 would only keep one or two dozen grammar rules in use at a time. If it "remembered" to use SOV order, it would "forget" that adjectives follow nouns, or something. You can't make it try any harder than a precocious seventh grader to treat a text holistically.

Which makes sense, right? The point of these LLMs is not to actually engage with the material. It's to skim large bodies of text, and spit out little representative pieces of the corpus it skimmed. You can make it draw an anime girl for you, because it's slapping together salient patterns across millions of anime girl drawings. But it can't get the number of fingers right, because it does not know and has no mechanism by which to learn how many fingers a person has. All it knows about anime girl fingers is that the pattern calls for putting another finger next to any existing finger, and repeating that rule eight to fourteen times.

So yeah, give cgpt5 a Sentinelese grammar and ask it to translate into Sentinelese, and you'll get something that looks like a representative sample of what some text in Sentinelese would kind of look like. But it won't give an accurate translation, because that's not what it's trying to do or capable of doing. And your Sentinelese text will have extra fingers.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2025 9:37 pm
by Travis B.
[bɐˈmɑt̪ːo sɔːd̪]
/bɑmɑttu sɑwd/
Bamattu sawd.
ba=mattu sawd
SUBJ.3.S.M.INAN=green land

[kɐˈzurː quːrt̪]
/kɑzurr quːrt/
Kazurr quurt.
ka=zurr quurt
3.S.F.INAN=red cliff

[kɐˈçɛːjr ˈʎæzɐ]
/kɑhæːjr ˈlæzɑ/
Kaheeyr leza.
ka=heeyr leza
3.S.F.INAN=white sand

[ʁɐˈjæzd̪ɐ ˈʃɛːɲɐ çeʎekoˈsɔːze]
/ʁɑjæzdɑ sæjnæ hilikusɑwdi/
Gayezda seyne Hilikusawdi.
ga=yezda seyn-e Hilikusawd-i
3.P.F.INAN=PROX.P.F.INAN color-CONST Heligoland-GEN

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2025 8:06 am
by xxx
†¦´w­
­X«Kㆦ
L†3­h¦¤Ü±FFÝ«K
F†­Ä«K

this land
whose top necessarily green
and sides eroded by the waves, red
and the base white...

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Thu Sep 25, 2025 11:52 pm
by äreo
I managed to make it sort of rhyme in Msérsca by making "cliffs" plural:

Óna wrý.
earth be.green.PRES
Green is the land
Crámi círoëm.
cliff-PL be.red.PRES.PL
Red are the cliffs
Sil xí.
sand be.white.PRES
White is the sand
Sdi’st Heligolande blámi vem.
PROX.PL-say.PASSP Heligoland.GEN color-PL be.3P.PRES.PL
These are the colors of Heligoland

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sat Sep 27, 2025 5:55 am
by bradrn

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Sep 28, 2025 1:28 pm
by Qwynegold
Hi! I'm terrible at syntax. Can someone please tell me if the underlined parts here are olique phrases or content clauses or what?

1SG.F want.PRS COMP 1PL COP like DEM.DIST couple
I want us to be like that couple.

but 1SG.M know.PRS NEG COMP use these.ACC how
But I don't know how to use them.

1SG.M think.PRS COMP DEF.M old tree RPST fall
I think the old tree just fell down!

F = feminine
M = masculine
COMP = complementizer
RPST = recent past

In this language both the present tense and infinitives are zero marked, so I'm not always sure whether I've been using infinitives or not after the complementizer.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Sep 28, 2025 1:54 pm
by bradrn
Qwynegold wrote: Sun Sep 28, 2025 1:28 pm Hi! I'm terrible at syntax. Can someone please tell me if the underlined parts here are olique phrases or content clauses or what?
I couldn’t hazard any analysis without a lot more information about how these are distributed, and how they compare to other verbal constructions. From the information you’ve given us it’s hard to even tell whether they’re a single construction or not — to me it looks like those sentences could easily contain two different constructions.

Also:
  • ‘Just fell down’ sounds more like a proximal past than a remote past to me.
  • Is there really any point in saying this language has an ‘infinitive’ when said ‘infinitives’ are always indistinguishable from ordinary present tense verbs?

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Sep 28, 2025 11:29 pm
by Glass Half Baked
I would call these complement clauses, or subordinate clauses (or both, if the former is a subtype of the latter).

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Mon Sep 29, 2025 3:47 am
by jal
bradrn wrote: Sun Sep 28, 2025 1:54 pm[*] ‘Just fell down’ sounds more like a proximal past than a remote past to me.
Tbf he explained it as "recent past", using RPST is a bit consfusing.

@Qwynegold you might want to take a look at this Wikipedia list or of course at the Leipzig glossing rules which also has a list.


JAL

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Oct 05, 2025 9:10 pm
by rotting bones
A derivation I'm trying ends up with this phonology:

Consonants

/p t k ʔ b d g/
/ɸ f θ s ʃ χ h v ð z ʒ ɣ/
/m n ŋ/
/l ʁ/
/j w ʎ/

Vowels and diphthongs
/aj ɛ ʌ ow y ə ɨ i u e a/

Is this too many fricatives (e.g. contrasting /ɸ/ and /f/) while there are too few sounds of other types?

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Sun Oct 05, 2025 9:47 pm
by Travis B.
rotting bones wrote: Sun Oct 05, 2025 9:10 pm A derivation I'm trying ends up with this phonology:

Consonants

/p t k ʔ b d g/
/ɸ f θ s ʃ χ h v ð z ʒ ɣ/
/m n ŋ/
/l ʁ/
/j w ʎ/

Vowels and diphthongs
/aj ɛ ʌ ow y ə ɨ i u e a/

Is this too many fricatives (e.g. contrasting /ɸ/ and /f/) while there are too few sounds of other types?
The only doubtful thing about this system I'd say is a contrast between /ɸ/, /f/, and /h/; I'd expect phoneme mergers or dissimilation here.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2025 9:03 pm
by rotting bones
Travis B. wrote: Sun Oct 05, 2025 9:47 pm The only doubtful thing about this system I'd say is a contrast between /ɸ/, /f/, and /h/; I'd expect phoneme mergers or dissimilation here.
Thanks.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2025 9:04 pm
by rotting bones
I wonder if it's obvious which of these sentences are part of a quotation from a different language:

Nō śalalimé rüé; vō paré keíâ, že źíi kerââ. Yiví śelaí rüéé; kparalikeí é, māśalí. Rüé parnenaé śerōéé; nō vō keíí rüé, yiví keí aśerōé é. Kśalinalit í, rüé rié śelaé; kerâ keíâ nō vē é. Šemâ vō paré rüéé; śalaí, keíâ. Ha lyïră no rïrï lo. Ra fă’ï zo lyïră. Lyïrăïykun ka fă’ï. Yiví kparaé, že śeirüéé; nō kerââ, vō śallaé. Keí rié rüé paré; māparé, kźeinayiví í. Nō śalalií rüé; vō paré, rüéé—keíâ.

Re: Conlang Random Thread

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2025 9:16 pm
by Travis B.
rotting bones wrote: Fri Oct 10, 2025 9:04 pm I wonder if it's obvious which of these sentences are part of a quotation from a different language:

Nō śalalimé rüé; vō paré keíâ, že źíi kerââ. Yiví śelaí rüéé; kparalikeí é, māśalí. Rüé parnenaé śerōéé; nō vō keíí rüé, yiví keí aśerōé é. Kśalinalit í, rüé rié śelaé; kerâ keíâ nō vē é. Šemâ vō paré rüéé; śalaí, keíâ. Ha lyïră no rïrï lo. Ra fă’ï zo lyïră. Lyïrăïykun ka fă’ï. Yiví kparaé, že śeirüéé; nō kerââ, vō śallaé. Keí rié rüé paré; māparé, kźeinayiví í. Nō śalalií rüé; vō paré, rüéé—keíâ.
I have bolded the section that looks like it is in a different language from the rest.