Andrew Janssen wrote: > I've done a little more thinking about the Glyphica, and paid a visit to > the Language Construction Kit site. Given that this is a rather arcane > lagnuage, here are some questions to think about: > > Besides marking nouns for plurality and subject/object, do you mark for > direct v. indirect object? Gender? Hopefully yes for direct vs. indirect objects. No for Gender. > Do you have a way of indicating number beyond "one" or "many"? Yes. (Need to write that up.) > Are verbs marked by person, gender, or number? person undecided, gender and number no. > What distinctions do you make with the verbs? > * Tense > * Completion (a/k/a perfection) > * Aspect (single act, act-in-progress, habitual act, repeated act) > * Mood (Indicative/Subjunctive/Negative/Imperative) > * Evidentiality > * Intransitive/Transitive/Reflexive > * Static/Dynamic (describes a state/reports a change in state) > * Deference between speaker & listener I'm playing around with these. I'd like to use most of them but there's a problem with the limited number of potential markers. > As an example, one Austronesian language has 4 past tenses and three > future tenses, plus present tense, allowing them to describe events on a > continuum of remote past, near past, yesterday, last night, this moment, > immediate future, near future, remote future. > > Given that the Glyphica Arcana are tied to magic, I'd say there > definitely needs to be a way of indicating imperative verb forms. > Perhaps the symbols for the Ones of the Ephermera in certain positions? Definitely need an imperative marker. Hopefully it will rather ornate. > The Glyphica remind me a little of the magic glyph tattoos that Weis & > Hickman invented for their Death Gate novel series. One source of inspiration, yes. Jefferson http://www.picotech.net/~jeff_wilson63/rpg/Exq_Main.html ---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send mail to celandra-off@phoenyx.net.
