Jefferson wrote: > OK. I've reached the end of the write-ups for the Persona of the MidSea > Tarot (http://www.picotech.net/~jeff_wilson63/rpg/Exq_Tarot.html) and will > be starting on the Arcana here soon. The arcana all have some notes > associated with them, and I'd welcome any comments about major aspects of > existence which I might have forgotten to include in the Tarot. Other > comments would also be welcome, of course (and I'm still looking for help > with the pictures for the ephemera). > > I've also started on an ideographic language and glyph system based on the > MidSea Tarot; the Glyphica Arcana > (http://www.picotech.net/~jeff_wilson63/myths/BabelTarot.html). Comments > on this would be appreciated as well. > As far as the Tarot goes, no comments as yet. For the glyphica, VOS word order is *very* uncommon in human languages (which does add to the 'alienness' of a language)[1]. It's a clever idea and fills a gap in our world-building. The only other comment is that some of the images don't seem to display properly. [1] As an aside, the most common word order patterns are SOV(~40%), SVO(~40%) and VSO(~15%). The remaining possibilities, VOS, OVS, and OSV account for the remaining 5%. Some sample sentences: SOV: John fish ate. SVO: John ate fish. VSO: Ate John fish. OVS: Fish ate John. VOS: Ate fish John. OSV: Fish John ate. OSV is perhaps better known as Yoda-speak. Since the Glyphica is a rather special purpose language, the next bit might not be totally relevant, but here it is. Besides the ordering of verbs, subjects, and objects, the other ordering that grammarians are concerned with is that of adjectives, nouns, and relative clauses. Some samples: NAR: men big who eat quiche ANR: big men who eat quiche ARN: big quiche who eat men* NRA: men who eat quiche big* RNA: quiche eat who men big RAN: quiche eat who big men. ARN and NRA are starred because *no* human language uses those orderings. If you're really keen on languages, check out http://www.zompist.com/kit.html I've had it in my bookmarks for 10 years, at least. Andrew ---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send mail to celandra-off@phoenyx.net.
