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Northeadish: Difference between revisions
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===Assimilation and Insertion of [ð]=== | ===Assimilation and Insertion of [ð]=== | ||
The letter ‹ð› is slippery. It appears in the darnedest places. In addition to its refusal to go away when it is unvoiced, as above, it also pops up as a result of two specific sound changes when other letters get near /r/. | |||
Do you have one of those friends who just wants everyone to get along and goes around trying to make everyone happy? In the Northeadish alphabet, ‹ð› is that friend. Meanwhile, ‹r› is that friend that you all sort of have to be nice to but no one really likes. ‹d› and ‹n› in particular can’t stand to be around ‹r›. Whenever ‹d› finds itself stuck talking to ‹r›, it usually just kind of walks away, leaving ‹ð› to take over the conversation. ‹n›, on the other hand, is ready to punch it out with ‹r›, and ‹ð› is always rushing in to break things up. At least that’s how I like to think of them, but some might say I’m spending too much time with my letters. | |||
====Change of [d] to [ð]: d → ð / __r==== | |||
This means simply that the letter ‹d› becomes ‹ð› when followed by ‹r› or ‹ʀ›. While this is an historical sound change in the language, it is persistent, which means that it is still going on in the language and may appear without warning in inflections. So, in other words, some words are permanently and irrevocably altered (e.g. *''fader'' ‘father’ → /fadr̩/ → ''faðʀ'': this word will never be written with a ‹d› in any form), while others will dither depending on what tense or case they may find themselves in (e.g. ''ænd'' ‘end’, but ''ænðʀ'' ‘ends’). | |||
====Insertion of [ð]: Ø → ð / n__r==== | |||
Very similar to the above rule, this means simply that whenever ‹n› finds itself next to ‹r› or ‹ʀ›, ‹ð› magically appears between then. Once again, some of these are permanent sound changes (e.g. *''þunraz'' ‘thunder’ → /þunr̩/ → ''þunðʀ'', which will never become **''þunʀ'' again), while others are variable (e.g. ''mīn'' ‘mine’, but with dative feminine ending ‘-ʀ’ → ''mīnðʀ''). (We actually had a variant of this rule in English, too, which is no longer persistent, but which gave us words like ''thunder'' from the same PGmc. *''þunraz''.) | |||