Okay, i’m back. I’ve updated the lexicon thus far and made a few slight corrections. Since the malt§έgj orthography is now pretty firmly established in somewhat standard characters, i see no reason to continue using the Chrysanthi Unicode font, as proud as i may be thereof; Times New Roman is capable of producing all the characters i need, and is somewhat more compact.
So, to continue...
...e ðac pul úla ðlai o§ mέlεm a, cwégir pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx harέc pul u naxád ac vlaj mέlεm u a§, lεf naxád batár yen u gwárxo a§.
Thursday, November 22, 2001
04.20.01.11.21.21.52
Malt§έgj Project Part IV
I’ve gotten a bit caught up in Baraq lately, so i figured it would be a nice change to revisit malt§έgj for a bit. I figured a good start would be a translation, so here, from Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet, “On Love:”
On Love
Then said Almitra, "Speak to us of Love." And he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there fell a stillness upon them. And with a great voice he said: When love beckons to you follow him, Though his ways are hard and steep. And when his wings enfold you yield to him, Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you. And when he speaks to you believe in him, Though his voice may shatter your dreams as the north wind lays waste the garden. For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you. Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning. Even as he ascends to your heights and caresses your tenderest branches that quiver in the sun, So shall he descend to your roots and shake them in their clinging to the earth. ... All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart. But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure, then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor, Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears... [abridged]
nos dyd ðac almítra, “mεn ðac jalc að ðblεucþ έloi.” e dyd bran pul ul talp mεs e dyd culóm ut ul ga§ág a, e dyd t§ơ§ am wára parþ ap. e dyd ðac pul am harέc bórga oc: lơ bad t§ơ§ ðblεucþ úla ðlai o§ mέlεm að, mεn grol§ pul it, mal lơ εc ac bweð pul u xa§ e tεlx. e lơ t§ơ§ ac fwi pul u úla ðlai o§ mέlεm εð, mεn gεlc mέlεm pul a, mal lơ dyd nag patáx ul styx huct mέlεm að, úla, rac stáfad calc pul u ac áro§ e.
Okay, i’m already exhausted from that. But i’ve made up quite a few new words, and possibly encountered some new grammar to talk about and rearrange and ponder, so i’ll be back later.
Wednesday, October 31, 2001
[Editor's Notes]
That brings us to the end of "Section III" of the project, as well as the end of the files that were preserved in PDF format. Part IV remains only as a word document, and as such may contain some errors where fonts and certain characters are concerned (if any were used there).
Monday, October 22, 2001
04.20.01.10.22.12.40
Just a few comments. I attempted to make a malt§έgj version of my website, which generated a few new words:
I also updated the website on malt§έgj verbs, which may be useful to include here. Most of this has already been stated, but it can’t hurt to clarify:
Wow, it’s nice to know that I can do that with my web pages in case I need to PDFify them. Anyway, the malt§έgj version of the webpage itself was a brutal disaster, so I’ll spare you that one. Why is this thing suddenly back on auto-correct? Grrr… Remind me to start beating my lab monitors.
Oh, i’m not sure if i ever put the word lơt§εg in the lexicon. It means “important.”
Okay, we’re almost twice the length we should be here, so it’s time to wrap up chapter three of the malt§έgj project. Bjólεt nad mέlεm a!
| clyc | click (as in “click here”) |
| mlacþ | ready, finished |
| dwεg | new |
| blími | word |
I also updated the website on malt§έgj verbs, which may be useful to include here. Most of this has already been stated, but it can’t hurt to clarify:
[Editor's Note: I'm really not going to bother to try to recreate the website's style sheets and special effects here on my blog. I was just excited at the time to have learned how to do it. I'm fairly over it now.]
ul iþ T§έcmað Malt§έgj u Scrav u ac Blími The title of this page is actually somewhat inaccurate, as verbs are not conjugated in the malt§έgj language, but a brief explanation of verbs is in order in any case. There are no special endings to indicate person, tense, or number in malt§έgj, however there are certain particles as in asian languages which denote tense. Number and person are indicated by the pronoun (which is not optional as it is in some languages where person and number are indicated by a suffix).
When particles are used in combination, there is a set order to them, most of which is common sense. You may use the table below to remember the order. dyd - nag - cwarþ - blai - rac - lơ - §lþ |
Wow, it’s nice to know that I can do that with my web pages in case I need to PDFify them. Anyway, the malt§έgj version of the webpage itself was a brutal disaster, so I’ll spare you that one. Why is this thing suddenly back on auto-correct? Grrr… Remind me to start beating my lab monitors.
Oh, i’m not sure if i ever put the word lơt§εg in the lexicon. It means “important.”
Okay, we’re almost twice the length we should be here, so it’s time to wrap up chapter three of the malt§έgj project. Bjólεt nad mέlεm a!
Monday, September 17, 2001
04.20.01.09.17.16.40
I think i’ve finally succeeded in completely getting rid of all affixes and making this what i set out to create: a language where words exist in and of themselves without mutating, morphing, changing, shifting, or anything else. Kind of like chinese, in a way, but much more malt§έgjèsque! Of course that does away with my ever so poetic mlàwarán, but such is life.
All prepositions are now to be considered separate words. I know, there goes the whole idea that started this language in the first place, but oh well. I’ll probably be adding some consonants to a few of them as well. Prepositions will, however, still follow the word they modify. The prefix ac- for the plural will now become a separate particle, but will not be needed if a number is included in the sentence.
The short list of particles thus far, which is certain to grow as the language expands and i find new and exciting things to do with them, is as follows:
So let’s talk sentence structure for a minute here. I know we’ve been through this before, but i just want to solidify some things. Okay, basic structure is VSO, but depending on prepositions can be VOS. Let’s add to that. PVSO has become apparent in dealing with the verbs, but should there be an order to the particles themselves? Actually, that’s something that has to be determined by the individual particle i suppose. For instance, dyd must precede cwarþ, because otherwise it wouldn’t make any sense. That would be like the difference between ‘he had gone’ and ‘he has went.’ I think i would like to see §lþ remain close to the verb, though, so we’ll say tentatively that §lþ must directly precede the verb. Ach, i’m starting to have flashbacks to those notorious ‘donkey tables’ in 9th grade french class... at least that’s what my teacher called them. She was a little weird though. (Ya know, cause the pronouns end in ‘y – en’...get it?...Ya know where you do the direct object pronouns and they go ‘me/te/se – le/la/les – lui/leurs – y – en’...okay, nevermind.)
Okay, so...
dyd - lơ – nag - cwarþ – blai – rac - §lþ - V – ac - S – ac - O
I’m not exactly sure why i put lơ where i did, but it seemed to make some sort of sense at the time.
Okay, nuff o dat. Let’s talk prepositions for a moment. They have heretofore all had an initial vowel so that they could be easily tacked onto the ends of nouns and pronouns. But now that i have sundered them, i think some can stand a few consonants to weight them down a little. We wouldn’t want any prepositions floating around on us, now, would we? But actually, that’s something i’ll work on gradually, because most of them seem to work quite nicely as they are. I still particularly like έloì.
Speaking of prepositions, i’ve decided to give one of them a bit of a rest. I’m still being way too anal about ‘u,’ and i have to get over this compulsion to genetivize everything! I mean, we can still keep it around for special occasions, but a simple combining of nouns can work just as well. I think i’ll keep it around for direct possession for the time being. So ‘the dlatci language’ will lose it’s u (dlát§i glơd) but ‘the man’s house’ will keep it (hanác u márga).
Back to particles, though, there are many particles to be found right in amongst the prepositions, like the lovely way we turn hunger into hungry with a simple oc or εm. Not sure what my point was, but i thought it was nice.
All prepositions are now to be considered separate words. I know, there goes the whole idea that started this language in the first place, but oh well. I’ll probably be adding some consonants to a few of them as well. Prepositions will, however, still follow the word they modify. The prefix ac- for the plural will now become a separate particle, but will not be needed if a number is included in the sentence.
The short list of particles thus far, which is certain to grow as the language expands and i find new and exciting things to do with them, is as follows:
| dyd | past | dyd narám jơg | i wrote |
| cwarþ | perfect | cwarþ narám jơg | i have written |
| blai | progressive | blai narám jơg | i am writing |
| nag | future | nag narám jơg | i will write |
| lơ | subjunctive | lơ narám jơg | (that) i (may) write |
| rac | passive | dyd rac narám clag | the book was written |
| §lþ | interrogative | §lþ dyd narám pul clag að? | did he write the book? |
| ac | plural | dyd narám pul lεxέt ac clag (but) dyd narám pul dan clag | he wrote many books. he wrote seven books. |
So let’s talk sentence structure for a minute here. I know we’ve been through this before, but i just want to solidify some things. Okay, basic structure is VSO, but depending on prepositions can be VOS. Let’s add to that. PVSO has become apparent in dealing with the verbs, but should there be an order to the particles themselves? Actually, that’s something that has to be determined by the individual particle i suppose. For instance, dyd must precede cwarþ, because otherwise it wouldn’t make any sense. That would be like the difference between ‘he had gone’ and ‘he has went.’ I think i would like to see §lþ remain close to the verb, though, so we’ll say tentatively that §lþ must directly precede the verb. Ach, i’m starting to have flashbacks to those notorious ‘donkey tables’ in 9th grade french class... at least that’s what my teacher called them. She was a little weird though. (Ya know, cause the pronouns end in ‘y – en’...get it?...Ya know where you do the direct object pronouns and they go ‘me/te/se – le/la/les – lui/leurs – y – en’...okay, nevermind.)
Okay, so...
dyd - lơ – nag - cwarþ – blai – rac - §lþ - V – ac - S – ac - O
I’m not exactly sure why i put lơ where i did, but it seemed to make some sort of sense at the time.
Okay, nuff o dat. Let’s talk prepositions for a moment. They have heretofore all had an initial vowel so that they could be easily tacked onto the ends of nouns and pronouns. But now that i have sundered them, i think some can stand a few consonants to weight them down a little. We wouldn’t want any prepositions floating around on us, now, would we? But actually, that’s something i’ll work on gradually, because most of them seem to work quite nicely as they are. I still particularly like έloì.
Speaking of prepositions, i’ve decided to give one of them a bit of a rest. I’m still being way too anal about ‘u,’ and i have to get over this compulsion to genetivize everything! I mean, we can still keep it around for special occasions, but a simple combining of nouns can work just as well. I think i’ll keep it around for direct possession for the time being. So ‘the dlatci language’ will lose it’s u (dlát§i glơd) but ‘the man’s house’ will keep it (hanác u márga).
Back to particles, though, there are many particles to be found right in amongst the prepositions, like the lovely way we turn hunger into hungry with a simple oc or εm. Not sure what my point was, but i thought it was nice.
Tuesday, September 4, 2001
04.20.01.09.04.11.30
One more revision i would like to make today, concerning the subject of those nifty little esperantoèsque combination pronoun/adjective combinations i came up with. I wanted them to work something like dlatci, where a combination of them would generate new words, but in a language like malt§εgj they complicate things a bit too much. Hence, i’m splitting the words in two and they should still work just as nicely as they do in any other language.
So we got a couple new words out of all that.
I decided to keep mlímiὲm, ulímiὲm, and blímiὲm just because they’re kinda cool. I replaced the ðr- prefix with the appropriate demonstrative adjectives, of which there are now four to choose from: ul, úli, úla, and úlot.
On second thought, these can still be written as one word, they’re just not going to have the strange mutation thing going on. Hence: mlàwarán, mlaumára, mlàuhanác or mlauláð, mlauðlái mlaucþíð, &c. Notice the lovely way in which i have sculpted the contraction of mlau arán into mlàwarán, the u being replaced by a volutuous w! Pure poetry!
| ml+ | ðr+ | bl+ | → | mlau | ul, úli, úla... | blεg |
| mlága | ðrága | blága | mlau arán | ul arán | blεg arán | |
| mlaix | ðraix | blaix | mlau mára | ul mára | blεg mára | |
| mlεð | ðrεð | blεð | mlau hanác | ul hanác | blεg hanác | |
| mlímiὲm | ðrímiὲm | blímiὲm | mlímiὲm | ulímiὲm | blímiὲm | |
| mlơc | ðrơc | blơc | mlau | ul | blεg | |
| mlúmwe | ðrúmwe | blúmwe | mlau ðlai | ul ðlai | blεg ðlai | |
| mlýcþid | ðrýcþid | blýcþid | mlau cþið | ul cþið | blεg cþið |
So we got a couple new words out of all that.
| mlau | what, which |
| blεg | no, none (already means “no” also) |
| ðlai | time |
| cþið | manner, way |
I decided to keep mlímiὲm, ulímiὲm, and blímiὲm just because they’re kinda cool. I replaced the ðr- prefix with the appropriate demonstrative adjectives, of which there are now four to choose from: ul, úli, úla, and úlot.
On second thought, these can still be written as one word, they’re just not going to have the strange mutation thing going on. Hence: mlàwarán, mlaumára, mlàuhanác or mlauláð, mlauðlái mlaucþíð, &c. Notice the lovely way in which i have sculpted the contraction of mlau arán into mlàwarán, the u being replaced by a volutuous w! Pure poetry!
Saturday, September 1, 2001
04.20.01.09.01.17.39
On the subject of adjectives, there are several which don’t actually exist, but relative nouns can be made adjectives by adding the suffix –oc (with). Hence, as with the “I’m cold, I’m hungry” phrases i was working on before these wacky numbers got into the mix, one could say “Hunger is upon me” (lauc jớgεm) or adjectify the noun, “I am with hunger” (jơg láucoc). This will be the case for very many words which have both forms.
It just occurred to me that i do actually use the letter h in a couple of words, so for the record, h is still with us. I kinda like it, sometimes, depending on what letters are accompanying it.
It just occurred to me that i do actually use the letter h in a couple of words, so for the record, h is still with us. I kinda like it, sometimes, depending on what letters are accompanying it.
Friday, August 31, 2001
04.20.01.08.31.12.26
A couple of thoughts here. Foremost being why am i sitting at home writing up linguistical ideas on my birthday instead of, like, having a life? That’s easy—because i’m a dork. Moving on, then, i had a couple of ideas about phrases and a little grammar.
Words containing prepositions, that is, nouns or pronouns to which prepositions are affixed, will no longer require the use of a verb. “The book is on the table,” can quite easily be expressed with “tέflðàp ul clag” or even “tέflðàp clag” if i do indeed decide to kill off the definite article, as i am seriously considering.
In fact, yes, let’s tangentially go there for a moment. I think it seems perfectly fair to dispose of the definite article altogether and use other demonstrative adjectives and numbers to indicate if necessary. “uli,” “ula,” and “ulot” will suffice quite nicely if an article is needed. So consider “ul” to be a thing of the past, although now that opens us up stylistically to the use of the word “ul” as a contraction of any of the aforementioned three, or for use when no specific one of those is directly indicated, which is essence, i suppose, is the definite article anyway, so for now let’s just leave it at “the definite article exists, but is not necessary in most cases.” There, that was easy.
Anyway, back to prepositions not needing a verb, i would point out that although they no longer use “εc,” their tense can still be indicated with the use of “dyd,” “cwarþ,” “blai,” “lơ,” and “nag,” or combinations thereof. So to say “the book would have been on the table” it is now possible to say “dyd nag cwarþ tέflðàp clag.”
Finally, the other thought that was intruding my cluttered mind was that of certain phrases which seem to mutate in every language they encounter. You know, that old “i am hungry, i am cold, i am tired” category of idioms. You can find everything from “i am hungry” (English), to “i have hunger” (French, German), to “hunger is with me” (Welsh), and many more. In malt§έgj, this particular idiom will be prepositional in nature, something to the effect of “hunger/cold/tiredness is upon me.”
I am hungry - lauc jớgεm
Are you tired? - §lþ mέlεmὲm tarác?
Words containing prepositions, that is, nouns or pronouns to which prepositions are affixed, will no longer require the use of a verb. “The book is on the table,” can quite easily be expressed with “tέflðàp ul clag” or even “tέflðàp clag” if i do indeed decide to kill off the definite article, as i am seriously considering.
In fact, yes, let’s tangentially go there for a moment. I think it seems perfectly fair to dispose of the definite article altogether and use other demonstrative adjectives and numbers to indicate if necessary. “uli,” “ula,” and “ulot” will suffice quite nicely if an article is needed. So consider “ul” to be a thing of the past, although now that opens us up stylistically to the use of the word “ul” as a contraction of any of the aforementioned three, or for use when no specific one of those is directly indicated, which is essence, i suppose, is the definite article anyway, so for now let’s just leave it at “the definite article exists, but is not necessary in most cases.” There, that was easy.
Anyway, back to prepositions not needing a verb, i would point out that although they no longer use “εc,” their tense can still be indicated with the use of “dyd,” “cwarþ,” “blai,” “lơ,” and “nag,” or combinations thereof. So to say “the book would have been on the table” it is now possible to say “dyd nag cwarþ tέflðàp clag.”
Finally, the other thought that was intruding my cluttered mind was that of certain phrases which seem to mutate in every language they encounter. You know, that old “i am hungry, i am cold, i am tired” category of idioms. You can find everything from “i am hungry” (English), to “i have hunger” (French, German), to “hunger is with me” (Welsh), and many more. In malt§έgj, this particular idiom will be prepositional in nature, something to the effect of “hunger/cold/tiredness is upon me.”
I am hungry - lauc jớgεm
Are you tired? - §lþ mέlεmὲm tarác?
| I am... { | hot | heat | } ...is upon me. ⇒ | faurx | } ...jớgεm. | |
| cold | cold | níli | ||||
| hungry | hunger | lauc | ||||
| thirsty | thirst | ðεwft | ||||
| tired | fatigue | tarác | ||||
| ashamed | shame | ðlεxt | ||||
| stupid | stupidity | dódup | ||||
| wet | wetness | úlac |
04.20.01.08.31.12.26
I just noticed that there was a whole slew of words that i missed in the lexicon from part two of the project (04.20.00.12.07.13.25). The following corrections have been made:
Well, first things first. I’ve added the particle rac to the list, which basically makes a verb into a passive adjective. (Could one say that this is a particle which passifies verbs?) I had previously used this as a suffix, but i would rather come up with a particle to keep words simple.
As far as the hanác/lað situation, henceforth hanác will be the noun and lað the pronoun.
Okay, moving on. A few new words i came up with.
Also, whilst i was exiled to the kitchen table for yet another round of computer D&D, i came up with numbers. Well, the basic ones anyway.
I haven’t come up with any beyond 1000 yet, but my intention is to change the standard format a little bit by having each approaching decimal proceed to one place before the next, instead of in threes as do in most languages. Perhaps that’s badly phrased, but i’m not quite sure of the proper terms when talking about numbers. That is to say, most languages go up through ten and a hundred and start over... hence ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million, ten million, hundred million, billion, ten billion, hundred billion, trillion... and so on. Malt§έgj will be unique in that each new number will proceed to the number before it, so... ten, hundred, ten hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, ten hundred thousand, million, ten million, hundred million, ten hundred million, thousand million, ten thousand million, hundred thousand million, ten hundred thousand million... A bit like binary, really, only with ten digits. Hence there’s a lovely little conservation of numbers which mathematicians and scientists are bound to love for discussing such eternally relevant subjects such as the mass of the sun in grams or the distance between earth and the most recently discovered quasar in millimetres or perhaps the number of electrons in your average can of Mountain Dew. I’ve drawn up a little chart, because some conversion is needed, but please forgive any errors in my standard nomenclature, because to be honest, after vigintillion i started making it up. I’ve also heard nonillion, nontillion, and novillion for 1030. I’ve added some pointers to show just how astronomically big these numbers actually are.
I didn’t actually notice this until i was in the process of creating the above table, but it’s more like binary than i thought. Notice that each new number falls on a binary power of ten (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128...). From this, we can assume that “sextillion,” if we should ever need a number quite that large, would be 1 x 10256. Or, in very tiny numbers:
Septillion, it then follows, is 1 x 10512. I’m not going to write that out, however.
Well, that was fun, however useless it may have been. I just have this strange obsession to conserve numbers, like i’m going to run out of them one day if i don’t. It’s not so bad, though, since they gave me those nice purple pills to take with the green ones.
| cwὲstrióþ | thank you |
| rac blynþ | to be named, to be called |
| blynþ | to call |
| rac | passive particle |
| aþ | silence |
| ráta | child |
| bórga | big |
| pέlci | small |
| rátacàþ | son/daughter |
| blocþ | battle |
| clớgεx | to slay, to kill |
| vεlc | old |
| gú§e | story, tale |
| hanác | man (i’ll consider in a moment how to reconcile this with lað) |
| tεmtið | early, long-ago |
| glácsi | remember |
Well, first things first. I’ve added the particle rac to the list, which basically makes a verb into a passive adjective. (Could one say that this is a particle which passifies verbs?) I had previously used this as a suffix, but i would rather come up with a particle to keep words simple.
As far as the hanác/lað situation, henceforth hanác will be the noun and lað the pronoun.
Okay, moving on. A few new words i came up with.
| patáx | to be able, can, could |
| ðrέpnid | to be allowed, may |
| na§ | must, to be necessary |
| mέlεx | to be likely, probably |
| ðráupnir | to become |
| cwέgir | to believe |
| mwil | bread |
| -ála | between |
Also, whilst i was exiled to the kitchen table for yet another round of computer D&D, i came up with numbers. Well, the basic ones anyway.
| 1 | am | 10 | (am) sεþ |
| 2 | dai | 11 | (am) sεþ am |
| 3 | tran | 12 | (am) sεþ dai |
| 4 | jamp | 20 | dai acsέþ |
| 5 | frεm | 30 | tran acsέþ |
| 6 | §e | 100 | (am) sam |
| 7 | dan | 200 | dai acsám |
| 8 | rεlc | 300 | tran acsám |
| 9 | nen | 1000 | §εp |
I haven’t come up with any beyond 1000 yet, but my intention is to change the standard format a little bit by having each approaching decimal proceed to one place before the next, instead of in threes as do in most languages. Perhaps that’s badly phrased, but i’m not quite sure of the proper terms when talking about numbers. That is to say, most languages go up through ten and a hundred and start over... hence ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million, ten million, hundred million, billion, ten billion, hundred billion, trillion... and so on. Malt§έgj will be unique in that each new number will proceed to the number before it, so... ten, hundred, ten hundred, thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, ten hundred thousand, million, ten million, hundred million, ten hundred million, thousand million, ten thousand million, hundred thousand million, ten hundred thousand million... A bit like binary, really, only with ten digits. Hence there’s a lovely little conservation of numbers which mathematicians and scientists are bound to love for discussing such eternally relevant subjects such as the mass of the sun in grams or the distance between earth and the most recently discovered quasar in millimetres or perhaps the number of electrons in your average can of Mountain Dew. I’ve drawn up a little chart, because some conversion is needed, but please forgive any errors in my standard nomenclature, because to be honest, after vigintillion i started making it up. I’ve also heard nonillion, nontillion, and novillion for 1030. I’ve added some pointers to show just how astronomically big these numbers actually are.
[still preparing chart... please try again later]
I didn’t actually notice this until i was in the process of creating the above table, but it’s more like binary than i thought. Notice that each new number falls on a binary power of ten (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128...). From this, we can assume that “sextillion,” if we should ever need a number quite that large, would be 1 x 10256. Or, in very tiny numbers:
10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
Septillion, it then follows, is 1 x 10512. I’m not going to write that out, however.
Well, that was fun, however useless it may have been. I just have this strange obsession to conserve numbers, like i’m going to run out of them one day if i don’t. It’s not so bad, though, since they gave me those nice purple pills to take with the green ones.
Sunday, August 26, 2001
04.20.01.08.26.15.20
Thinking back on this new VSO thing i’ve got going on, i realize that the contraction “parεc” is no longer useful. Which means i can finally get rid of that obnoxious “parac”! Paj sounds a little nicer anyway. And this only having one pronoun for he and she is getting old. It seemed a noble idea at the time, but it isn’t terribly practical. So he can stay pul, it can be paj, and she is now pel. The pronoun “one” can be assimilated by the new word lað.
04.20.01.08.26.13.16
I’m just working on the lexicon a bit, and i think i’m going to switch ʒ back to j. Sure, it looks a little prettier, but j is easier and would keep me from having to realphabetize quite a bit. For the record, ε now comes before e alphabetically, and ơ comes just after o, so the new alphabetical order is:
a b c d ð ε e f g i j l m n o ơ p r s § t þ u v w x ÿ y z
(a b k d ð ε e f g i ʒ l m n o ɔ p r s ʃ t θ u v w χ ɪ y z)
04.20.01.08.25.21.37
Just a brief note (in pen, no less, since at the moment i am being deprived of my computer in favour of a dungeons and dragons game of which my roommate is fond) about a few new things i’ve thought of.
First of all, the word mó§ara (ground) never made it into the lexicon due to some oversight. This has been (or rather, when i get back to my computer, will be) corrected.
Secondly, i wanted to expound somewhat on the idea of degrees of comparison of adjectives. There are now six degrees, and they have an interesting little sentence structure. These are represented by inserting interesting little adverbs in front of the adjective, which follows not the noun in question, but the nominative (usually) noun to which it is being compared. These are a slight modification of the system i developed in the second part of the malt§έgʒ project in section 04.20.00.12.07.13.25. They are:
Hence:
She was the prettiest of all her sisters.
Dyd εc pul pulu àcadína náran dið.
(did be she her sisters most pretty)
The nights are worse than the mornings.
Ec ul àcberí§ ul àctεmέt nan xrơx.
(are the nights the mornings more bad)
Noöne is as good as my mom.
Ec blεð ʒớgu máðra áman bʒólεt.
(is noöne my mother as good)
I am not as pretty as she.
Ec ʒơg pul lεxέt pan dið.
(am i she much less pretty)
He is the unluckiest man I have ever seen.
Ec pul ul lað pálan crơlx calcáð cwarþ εn culóm ʒơg.
(is he the man least lucky which have ever see i)
New Words
First of all, the word mó§ara (ground) never made it into the lexicon due to some oversight. This has been (or rather, when i get back to my computer, will be) corrected.
Secondly, i wanted to expound somewhat on the idea of degrees of comparison of adjectives. There are now six degrees, and they have an interesting little sentence structure. These are represented by inserting interesting little adverbs in front of the adjective, which follows not the noun in question, but the nominative (usually) noun to which it is being compared. These are a slight modification of the system i developed in the second part of the malt§έgʒ project in section 04.20.00.12.07.13.25. They are:
| Negative superlative | (least) | pálan |
| Negative comparative | (less) | pan |
| Positive | (-) | - |
| Equative | (as...as) | áman |
| Comparative | (more, -er) | nan |
| Superlative | (most, -est) | náran |
Hence:
She was the prettiest of all her sisters.
Dyd εc pul pulu àcadína náran dið.
(did be she her sisters most pretty)
The nights are worse than the mornings.
Ec ul àcberí§ ul àctεmέt nan xrơx.
(are the nights the mornings more bad)
Noöne is as good as my mom.
Ec blεð ʒớgu máðra áman bʒólεt.
(is noöne my mother as good)
I am not as pretty as she.
Ec ʒơg pul lεxέt pan dið.
(am i she much less pretty)
He is the unluckiest man I have ever seen.
Ec pul ul lað pálan crơlx calcáð cwarþ εn culóm ʒơg.
(is he the man least lucky which have ever see i)
New Words
| dið | pretty, beautiful |
| lað | man, person |
| εn | ever |
Saturday, August 25, 2001
04.20.01.08.25.16.24
Now, to continue. Some new words for the lexicon. I’m kiping these from my nifty little welsh dictionary, but i’m trying to avoid using the same meanings. I’m just taking words and plugging them into definitions that suit them, or in some cases doing some free association. I am going to start with words already extant in the main lexicon so the malt§égȡ column doesn’t look quite so barren.
| again | εlέm |
| against | -arác |
| air | fálasà |
| almost | cwirþ |
| alone | amát |
| already | dýdu |
| always | gwéðul |
| amount | mára |
| answer | péxεd |
| any | ðέfni |
| arm | tεlp |
| ask | ðεlέx |
| at all | (blεg) parúc |
| away | nέt§ni |
| back | nem |
| bad | xrơx |
| barely | iláux |
04.20.01.08.25.13.59
Malt§égj Revision I – Project III
Some aspects are getting a little too complicated and others are drastically oversimplified, and the language as a whole is losing a bit of the flair I set out to achieve to begin with. There are a few sounds i have to add and a few that have to be gotten rid of. The definite article and demonstrative pronouns have to either become separable, change form, or just shrivel up and blow away, because it seems redundant to have more than one suffix on a word. The language as a whole has gotten far too a priori to the point that it is difficult to expand the vocabulary. The entire point, however, is that the language be as a priori as possible, but i’m thinking i need to start stealing some words or at least some sounds, because just sitting there thinking up new and exciting words is too exhausting. The alphabet has to go, because as cute as it is, the original runes were far too un-malt§égj-looking (they had a sort of korean cuneiform feel to them), and the later accepted runes which i’ve been using for malt§égj for the last few months are just tacky and awkward and wrong. And that whole vowel diacritic thing, which i like in theory, is really obnoxious in practice. Some of the words that do exist are far too complicated, and i have to get over this predilection for putting as many consonants together as i can without the aid of a vowel. The actual sound i would like to hear from Malt§égj is somewhat akin to that of welsh, only without that dreadful ll sound they have, and with a little more regularity of y’s and u’s. Or perhaps a little like russian, only with a few more vowels and some simpler words. I’ve even thought of adding in mutations, but i need to simplify the language quite a bit before i start re-complicating it.
The best way i can think of to perform this revision is to start over at the beginning and weed out what i don’t want, change what i don’t like, and then add new concepts once i get a firm idea of what i actually have here.
So from the beginning...
As, ul cwarco...
In those words alone i’ve modified quite a bit. First of all, let’s try the definite article as separate words before the noun for the time being, while i decide if i want to keep them at all.
Articles
Articles precede the noun they modify, as do numerals and demonstrative adjectives. All other adjectives will follow the noun. Nice little switch there, eh?
| ul | the (definite article) |
| am | a, an, one (indefinite article) |
| uli | this |
| ula | that (i didn’t like ulo) |
| ulot | the other (cf. aquello in spanish) |
This will also help to standardize the relationship between these and words like calc and mlăc.
Going back a step further...
Orthography
The orthography of the malt§égj langauge has gotten totally out of hand. And then some! It’s just like Mr. Fiedler always said, “Simplify and clarify.” So let’s revisit the actual sounds we use and then think about how we want to represent them.
| b | v | d | z | g | ʒ | ð | γ | voiced consonants |
| p | f | t | s | k | ʃ | θ | x | unvoiced consonants |
| m | n | l | r | nasals and liquids | ||||
| a | ɔ | o | u | i | ε | ɪ | vowels | |
| w | j | h | glides and aspirants |
For the time being, until a really cool idea for an alphabet comes to me that isn’t farcically complicated or otherwise unmanageable, a simple latin orthography is going to have to do. Since the sounds depicted above are rather clinical-looking, the following will be our new orthography:
| b | v | d | z | g | ʒ | ð | ɤ | |
| p | f | t | s | c | § | þ | x | |
| m | n | l | r | |||||
| a | ơ | o | u | i | e | y | ε | |
| w | j | h |
That seems æsthetic enough for me for the moment. I probably won’t be using the ɤ or the h, since they were only add-ins to balance out my little aleph rune anyway, which has gone the way of the dodo. I’m not sure why i chose the ơ to replace the ɔ sound; i think it might be partly because i just happen to like it and partly because the unicode standard contains grave and acute accents for this character, which brings me to my next point.
One of the things about the former orthography that i particularly did like was the addition of acute and grave diacritics to indicate stress. And given the non-standard stress of the language, these become quite necessary elements for pronunciation. So that rule will continue: In words of more than one syllable, an acute accent will indicate the stress; in words of more than two syllables a grave accent will indicate a secondary stress unless the middle syllable of a trisyllabic word is primarily stressed.
I would also like to add another vowel, if i may. (Of course i may—it’s my bloody language; i’ll do with it as i please!) I would like a definite distinction between e and ε. So i suppose i’ll have to use ε for now, and if i can’t find a decent looking diacritic for it i’ll just have to create one! Generally speaking, however, an e appearing at the end of a word will keep the e sound, while most others, with a few exceptions, will be ε. I’m also toying with the idea of adding additional vowels for ə or ʌ, oe, and maybe ʉ, but all in good time. I am afraid they might detract from the desired sound of the language.
As far as adding the aleph character to unsupported vowels, as i already mentioned that is now a thing of the past. All characters will be supported on their own in a latin-based context anyway.
From these premises, i will rewrite the lexicon... again...
| Malt§égʒ | English |
| -a | prp. to, towards, at |
| adína | n. sister |
| -að | prp. to, at (accusative preposition) |
| -alm | prp. without |
| -alx | prp. on, on the side of |
| am | adj. one, art. a, an |
| -ap | prp. on, on top of |
| apþán | v.t. to know |
| áptεn | n. evening |
| -arán | n. -ary, place |
| -av | prp. after |
| avíl | n. year |
| badʒ | v.t. to have |
| bará | n. afternoon |
| baracóþ | v.i. to collapse |
| bεrí§ | n. night |
| bʒólεt | adj. good, holy |
| blơc | prn. nothing |
| blága | adv. nowhere |
| blai | v.i. to be doing (progressive particle) |
| blaix | adv. none |
| blεð | prn. noöne |
| blεg | itj. no, not |
| blεucþ | n. winter |
| blímiὲm | adv. for no reason |
| bliv | v.i. to think |
| blot | n. god |
| blúmwe | adv. never |
| blýcþid | adv. in no way |
| bocúra | adj. favourite |
| bul | v.t. to study |
| bvláca | n. chair, stool |
| calc | adj. which, that |
| cfidʒ | n. autumn, fall |
| clag | n. book |
| clágaran | n. library |
| clεg | cjt. that (subordinate conjunction) |
| crớga | adv. very |
| crơlx | n. luck |
| culm | v.t. to see |
| cúlui | adj. all |
| cwarc | n. beginning |
| cwarþ | prt. to have (perfect particle) |
| cwεlm | adj., n. true, truth |
| cwὲstriέm | itj. please |
| dʒε§t | n. rule |
| dʒέ§tin | n. ruler |
| dʒogó§ | v.i. to ought, should |
| dyd | prt. did (past particle) |
| ðac | v.t. to say, to tell |
| ðblεucþ | n. love |
| ðblέucþin | n. lover |
| ðrơc | prn. that, that thing |
| ðrága | adv. there, in that place |
| ðraix | adv. that much, that many |
| ðrεð | prn. that person |
| ðrímiὲm | adv. for that reason, because |
| ðrúmwe | adv. then, at that time |
| ðrýcþid | adv. that way, in that manner |
| -e | prp. in |
| e | cjt. and |
| εc | v.i. to be |
| -éci | prp. until |
| -εð | prp. around, about |
| -έloi | prp. about, of |
| -εm | prp. over, above |
| fram | v.t. to steal |
| frans | n. france |
| fransuglớd | n. french |
| fránsu | adj. french |
| frεm | adj. five |
| gam | itj. yes |
| gapác | n. fire |
| ga§ág | n. people, race |
| gðrantþ | n. spring |
| gεlc | v.t. to give |
| gʒobʒ | n. summer |
| gʒot | v.t. to want |
| glớca | v.i. to hope |
| glơd | n. language |
| grớlaga | n. giant, etin |
| gráva | adj. renowned |
| guþέx | v.t. to like |
| -i | prp. for |
| -ið | prp. before |
| -id benþ | prp. ago |
| -íla | prp. small |
| -íli | prp. next to, beside |
| -it | prp. behind |
| -iþ | prp. under, beneath |
| ʒơg | prn. I |
| ʒalc | prn. we |
| lơ | v.i. should (subjunctive particle) |
| latínuglờd | n. latin |
| lεxέt | adj. much, many |
| mága | n. yeast |
| mal | cjt. but, however |
| mála | v.i. to sit (down) |
| málci | n. dwarf |
| malt§έgʒ | n. maltschegj language |
| márga | n. house |
| maxát | v.t. to make, to create |
| mέlεm | prn. you. Note: informal but acceptable in most situations. |
| mεlmíne | prn. You. Note: only used in very formal situations like mandarin 您. |
| mlơc | adj. which |
| mlága | adv. where |
| mlaix | adj. how much/many |
| mlεð | prn. who |
| mlímiὲm | adv. why |
| mlúmwe | adv. when |
| mlýcþid | adv. how |
| nad | n. day |
| nafí§ | n. metal, steel |
| nag | v.i. will, shall (future particle) |
| narám | v.t. to write |
| naxád | n. end |
| naxád | v.t. to break |
| nen | adj. nine |
| -o | prp. from |
| -oc | prp. with |
| -om | prp. before, in front of |
| páðru | n. father |
| párac | prn. it |
| parþ | prn. they |
| pul | prn. he, she, one |
| rεb | cjt. but |
| rélεb | cjt. or |
| scrav | v.t. to do |
| sεm | adv. together |
| som | n. solstice/equinox |
| svarð | n. blood |
| §lþ | prt. whether, did...?, what, (Esp.) ĉu, (Mand.) 嗎 (interrogative particle) |
| tamέc | v.t. to need |
| tέflðu | n. table |
| tεmέt | n. morning |
| t§ơ§ | v.i. to come |
| t§εcmádð | v.t. to bring |
| t§oc | v.i. to go |
| -u | prp. of |
| ul | art. the |
| úla | adj. that |
| úli | adj. this |
| úlot | adj. the other, over there, Sp. aquello |
| -ut | prp. out, out of |
| vέrcþid | v.t. to give birth to, to beget |
| vέrcþidrac | adj. born |
| víctro | n. tree |
| vi§iví§i | cjt. maybe |
| vlơd | v.i. to be willing, would |
| xram | adv. tomorrow |
| yácni | adj. black |
All in all not a bad transition, and much more reader-friendly!
The next revision i would like to make is with word order. Again i’m leaning toward the celtic languages here, although that is not my intention. I would like to instate a strict VSO order on this language. Or even VOS, as long as the verb is at the beginning. That way i can still have my nice little –a. ending for direct objects, but i really do like the feel of a VSO sentence. At first i was turned off by this trait in a language because it made me think of Yoda, but now i rather like it. I think this may actually be a subconscious lashing-out at german and all the hours i’ve spent reading on and on trying to find the end of the sentence just so i could find the verb and discover what was actually going on. I mean, seriously, folks, take the following sentence from Heinrich von Kleist:
In St. Jago, der Hauptstadt des Königreichs Chili, stand gerade an dem Augenblicke der großen Erderschütterung vom Jahre 1647, bei welcher viele tausend Menschen ihren Untergang fanden, ein junger, auf ein Verbrechen angeklagter Spanier, namens Jeronimo Rugera, an einem Pfeiler des Gefängnisses, in welches man ihn eingesperrt hatte, und wollte sich erhenken.I mean, as far as cramming a lot of information into a simple sentence, Kleist was the master, but that’s just ridiculous. Note that i’ve highlighted the subject and primary verbs of the sentence, and they’re not exactly next of kin.
Hence, instead of “Jơg dyd gelc mélemà téflðamàð,” (an example I have previously used,) we would have something like “dyd gεlc jơg am téflðàð mέlεmà.”
Hence, instead of “Jơg dyd gelc mélemà téflðamàð,” (an example I have previously used,) we would have something like “dyd gεlc jơg am téflðàð mέlεmà.”
| bvláca | bavláca |
| culm | culóm |
| ðblεucþ | (I’m not sure what to do with these two. I guess they’re all right for now until something better comes along.) |
| ðblέucþin | |
| gðrantþ | granþ |
| t§εcmádð | t§εcmáð |
Thursday, February 15, 2001
Wednesday, February 14, 2001
Malt§egj Project 04.20.01.02.14.14.06
I have completed my little runic font, and it’s actually quite lovely! Observe:
Consonants:
Liquids and Nasals:
Vowels (when a vowel stands alone, it is occupied by q, hence its transliteration as א.):
Consonants:
Liquids and Nasals:
Vowels (when a vowel stands alone, it is occupied by q, hence its transliteration as א.):
[Editor's note: The following two paragraphs are full of characters that can't feasibly be displayed on this blog, so I'll be posting them in their entirety as image files.]
Malt§egj Project 04.20.01.02.14.14.06
That little experiment shows me that i definitely need to work out something with the diphthongs and
streamline the font a bit. Unfortunately, due to space and usage concerns with the font, i’m going to
change the orthography again by a bit; as much as i like using c instead of k, i am going to reinstate k as
the unvoiced uvular plosive, and in turn make c the unvoiced postalveolar fricative, because i’m just plain
sick and tired of typing §.
streamline the font a bit. Unfortunately, due to space and usage concerns with the font, i’m going to
change the orthography again by a bit; as much as i like using c instead of k, i am going to reinstate k as
the unvoiced uvular plosive, and in turn make c the unvoiced postalveolar fricative, because i’m just plain
sick and tired of typing §.
Malt§egj Project 04.20.01.02.14.11.13
I have been neglecting malt§egj for a while now in persuit of other ventures, in particular working on creating a unicode font, which i would more than love to use to write this journal, but for some reason my Adobe Acrobat doesn’t like it and refuses to make any sort of PDF file out of it...just one letter of m font and it gives a big nasty post script error message!
Anyway, last night i played around a bit with some runes for malt§egj They’re quite beautiful! I’m actually rather proud of them. I haven’t completely figured out how i’m going to do the accent mark thing i mentioned in the last section yet, but i do know that the primary accented syllable will be noted by a small vertical line beneath the character. As far as diacrtics above the characters, i’m reserving that right for vowels, a bit like hebrew. Actually, this is my vowel schematic: a = circumflex, å = breve, e = acute, i = dot, o = grave, u = caron, y = diæresis. I’ve also decided, rather arbitrarily, (as if i decide anything in any other way when dealing with malt§egj!), that an exclamation point is a sort of small circle with a vertical line on either side.
In other news, a new rule: Interrogative words and particles precede the verb. In other words, rather than saying “how are you?” the structure would be, “you how are?” (melem mlycþid ec?) I think i may have already decided this at one point, but i don’t remember, so i’m stating it here again. This will also affect the word “§ylþ,” as in “he is well” (pul ec bjolet) versus “is he well?” (pul §ylþ ec bjolet?).
In the meantime, i shall go and make a quick rendition of a font for the runes, and hence i doubt i shall return today.
Anyway, last night i played around a bit with some runes for malt§egj They’re quite beautiful! I’m actually rather proud of them. I haven’t completely figured out how i’m going to do the accent mark thing i mentioned in the last section yet, but i do know that the primary accented syllable will be noted by a small vertical line beneath the character. As far as diacrtics above the characters, i’m reserving that right for vowels, a bit like hebrew. Actually, this is my vowel schematic: a = circumflex, å = breve, e = acute, i = dot, o = grave, u = caron, y = diæresis. I’ve also decided, rather arbitrarily, (as if i decide anything in any other way when dealing with malt§egj!), that an exclamation point is a sort of small circle with a vertical line on either side.
In other news, a new rule: Interrogative words and particles precede the verb. In other words, rather than saying “how are you?” the structure would be, “you how are?” (melem mlycþid ec?) I think i may have already decided this at one point, but i don’t remember, so i’m stating it here again. This will also affect the word “§ylþ,” as in “he is well” (pul ec bjolet) versus “is he well?” (pul §ylþ ec bjolet?).
In the meantime, i shall go and make a quick rendition of a font for the runes, and hence i doubt i shall return today.
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