Trokh (for ship and people naming)

[robject]

Sounds good to me!

 

[kk7]

I only spotted this thread now, thanks to its resurrection -- I wish I'd seen it earlier, 'cuz it is awesome.

Robject, I really like the choice of Bantu x Semitic for the basis of nouns & concordance/agreement! Have you looked at all at Polynesian languages for working up verb phrase behavior and syntax? I admit: the only reason I say that is because Trokh is so vowel-heavy that it always reminded me of Eastern Polynesian languages

I'm reminded, reading this, of how inadequate the phonology and transcription system is that we've inherited. The word you give for "little", /-aea/ [*] -- is that two syllables, /a.ea/, or three, /a.e.a/? Both are perfectly permissible given the generation system we have, but would be pronounced differently, I think.

(Aside: Phonology isn't my favorite topic in real-linguistics or con-linguistics, but w/r/t the latter, it's really hard to come up with something useful and not-silly if you slight it. Grrrr.)

I'm a little taken aback or confused by your use of 'synthetic' to describe this Trokh -- as far as I can see, the morphology is rather analytic, a bit into the fusional side of the spectrum. Writing things together is an orthographic feature; it doesn't have anything to do with the structure of the language. If it did, Chinese would be perhaps the most synthetic language ever

Regarding direct/indirect objects: If the goal is to make Trokh be a synthetic, or at least 'polypersonal' (to borrow the Russian term) language, I'd suggest that you incorporate some kind of pronoun-affixation to the verb -- a suffix, probably? It could be a variant form of the basic noun-class markers you've already introduced; and simply indicate the presence of a type of object. Then, in a full utterance, the noun phrase of the object would be marked by the corresponding noun class marker. E.g.

fiuiktuliy yapiysa

fi-ui-ktul-iy ya-piysa
1sNEG-HABITUAL-'pounce'-PREY.OBJECT PREY-'pizza'

"I don't pounce on pizza"
(Where /-iy/ is my nonce example of an object pronoun/concordance marker, and /piysa/ an ad hoc loanword from Galanglic)

I hope this is still on a burner (a LIT burner) with you; I'd really enjoy seeing more Traveller fan activity in areas like this! If I can provide anything -- RW reference material, videos of cute cats seeming to talk, etc. -- I'm there!

@ Maksim Smelchak: May I suggest the Language Construction Kit? It's not specific to Traveller, but I think it's by far the best vade mecum to inventing languages out there today; and beyond that, it can be a great introduction to the field of linguistics -- work through it and it's like taking Linguistics 101![**]. There are two follow-up volumes on more complicated or specific topics, which I haven't read. Zompist (Mark Rosenfelder) is, I think, one of the best public conlangers to date; by which I mean, he creates languages that are very thorough, with as much attention to the usually-neglected areas of syntax and discourse/pragmatic levels; despite being a techie by profession, he firmly situates his languages within (imaginary) communities of speakers with histories and not as abstract codes for information flow; and especially, he writes this well and clearly and smoothly. And, as far as I know, he's never had any formal education in linguistics or anthropology at all.[***]


[*] I write it with a preceding dash to indicate that it's a lexical stem that requires a concordance prefix to be a word -- it's a habit I learned while reading about Siouxan languages, and I think a good one.
[**] Given the parlous, non-existent, or actively hostile-to-it state of linguistics education in (at least) the Anglosphere, this is setting a very low bar, I admit.
[***]And I'm not a shill! Or even, really, a fan!

 

[robject]

I admit I've started using those pronoun suffixes at the end of the verbs. I need to redefine them as concords.

I haven't been splitting up those vowel clusters into syllables. In a perfect world it just wouldn't matter, "because". And I've stopped prefixing the noun case with the verb.

And while I intended for the language to be highly synthetic, it hasn't turned out that way, partly because I didn't use synthetic languages as models.

 

[aramis]

*** Rob, do you have a template for developing languages? A sort of Con-Lang layout? ***

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

One tool you may wish to have handy is the Dolch High Frequency Words (Dolch 220 {non-nouns} and Dolch 95 {nouns}) or Fry 1000 Lists. Gives you a basis for a lexicon. Similar lists for other languages exist, but I don't know them. With the two dolch lists, you've got 300 common words that need to be covered. (Some are particularly unique.) A few can intentionally be left out - the a/an particles, the verbs of being (am/is/were/are/will_be/shall)

Dolch 220:

Spoiler:

always, am, an, and, any, are , around, as, ask, at , ate, away, be, because, been, before, best, better, big, black, blue, both, bring, brown, but, buy, by, call, came, can, carry, clean, cold, come, could, cut, did, do, does, done, don't, down, draw, drink, eat, eight, every, fall, far, fast, find, first, five, fly, for, found, four, from, full, funny, gave, get, give, go, goes, going, good, got, green, grow, had, has, have, he, help, her, here, him, his, hold, hot, how, hurt, I, if, in, into, is, it, its, jump, just, keep, kind, know, laugh, let, light, like, little, live, long, look, made, make, many, may, me, much, must, my, myself, never, new, no, not, now, of, off, old, on, once, one, only, open, or, our, out, over, own, pick, play, please, pretty, pull, put, ran, read, red, ride, right, round, run, said, saw, say, see, seven, shall, she, show, sing, sit, six, sleep, small, so, some, soon, start, stop, take, tell, ten, thank, that, the, their, them, then, there, these, they, think, this, those, three, to, today, together, too, try, two, under, up , upon, us, use, very, walk, want, warm, was, wash, we, well, went, were, what, when, where, which, white, who, why, will, wish, with , work, would, write, yellow, yes, you, your

Dolch 95 nouns:

Spoiler:

apple, baby, back, ball, bear, bed, bell, bird, birthday, boat, box, boy, bread, brother, cake, car, cat, chair, chicken, children, Christmas, coat, corn, cow, day, dog, doll, door, duck, egg, eye, farm, farmer, father, feet, fire, fish, floor, flower, game, garden, girl, good-bye, grass, ground, hand, head, hill, home, horse, house, kitty, leg, letter, man, men, milk money, morning, mother, name, nest, night, paper, party, picture, pig, rabbit, rain, ring, robin, Santa Claus, school, seed, sheep, shoe, sister, snow, song, squirrel, stick, street, sun, table, thing, time, top, toy, tree, watch, water, way, wind, window, wood

Dolch nouns removing the terranocentric ones

Spoiler:

baby, back, ball, bed, bell, bird, birthday, boat, box, boy, bread, brother, cake, car, chair, children, coat, day, doll, door, egg, eye, farm, farmer, father, feet, fire, floor, flower, game, garden, girl, good-bye, grass, ground, hand, head, hill, home, house, leg, letter, man, men, money, morning, mother, name, nest, night, paper, party, picture, pig, rabbit, rain, ring, school, seed, shoe, sister, snow, song, stick, street, sun, table, thing, time, top, toy, tree, watch, water, way, wind, window, wood

And some replacements for the missing ones:
vermin-species
guard-beast-species
hunting-beast-species
riding-beast-species
food-beast-species (x2+)
food-producing-beast-species (x4)
major-holiday

Most should have an animal/plant/protozoan distinction set, and generic words for each.

Note also - some of these have multiple overlapping meanings, som of which are divisible.

EG: Watch
- the noun referring to the body who keep watch
- the noun referring to a wearable timepiece
- the unit of time.
These likely remain confounded - they are inherently interrelated - but could be distinct words due to linguistic divergence and convergences.

 

[maksimsmelchak]

One tool you may wish to have handy is the Dolch High Frequency Words (Dolch 220 {non-nouns} and Dolch 95 {nouns}) or Fry 1000 Lists. Gives you a basis for a lexicon. Similar lists for other languages exist, but I don't know them. With the two dolch lists, you've got 300 common words that need to be covered. (Some are particularly unique.)

Thanks, Aramis. Those are great tools that I've enjoyed before. I have been enjoying Con-Langing for many years. Appreciate the tip.

*** Are you interested in the efforts? ***

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[kk7]

I haven't been splitting up those vowel clusters into syllables. In a perfect world it just wouldn't matter, "because".

I think that we're on the same page with that issue It's just that on a practical level, if the goal is to create a productive 'naming language' for fans & writers of Traveller to use, some kind of practical, functional, obvious and handy pronunciation system cries out to be set up.

Back in January I was cat-sitting an astoundingly chatty old cat -- he truly couldn't take (or observe) any action without muttering and meeping about the affairs of the world. I've been thinking about him while I (finally) read this thread.

 

[kk7]

I don't mean to diss Aramis, but I feel strongly that the resource he mentioned is not a resource to make a non-silly conlang with. Looking at that and thinking, "OK, let's go!" is a bad, bad start.

That's a road to what we old and snotty conlangers call a "relex" -- a totally alien and unique language that just so happens to be based on the lexical and semantic web of the author's native language. (Re-lexification > relex, as we said back in the 1990s)

If Traveller is about traveling, going places you and I can't go, then those places should be worth visiting, and exploring, and learning. Less nerdery, more freaky experience!

 

[aramis]

I don't mean to diss Aramis, but I feel strongly that the resource he mentioned is not a resource to make a non-silly conlang with. Looking at that and thinking, "OK, let's go!" is a bad, bad start.

That's a road to what we old and snotty conlangers call a "relex" -- a totally alien and unique language that just so happens to be based on the lexical and semantic web of the author's native language. (Re-lexification > relex, as we said back in the 1990s)

If Traveller is about traveling, going places you and I can't go, then those places should be worth visiting, and exploring, and learning. Less nerdery, more freaky experience!

Considering that, aside from gramatical particles and specific nouns for species not present, EVERY natural language has comparable words for most of these lists. It's a good point for startign your lexicon; I'll admit the lexicon isn't the first thing to consider (since it's at least requisite on phoneme sets and frequencies), but if your conlang lacks comparables for most of them, it lacks a functional vocabulary. I've compared russian lists for high frequency words, and there's considerable overlap; likewise Spanish and Hmong. (The joys of working in elementary schools.)

Simply put - they're useful as a check to see that you've actually got a functional language, because if you have them covered (and many may be several words due to several meanings in English), you have a reasonable functional vocabulary base adequate to at least elementary school level verbal and/or written expression.

Another great starting point for a lexicon is the 1800 common ideograms of Japanese... which by themselves are more than 3000 discrete meanings... before looking at diglyph words. As with the Dolch list, it's commonly presented in grade order, which also corresponds nicely to importance and frequency... Provided one excises the culturally specific ones (Dog and Cat are shockingly common in English, but may or may not have an alien equivalent).

Also note: the Gvegh word list in AM:V pretty much looks to include most of the Dolch list... plus such specific nouns needed for the story.

 

[robject]

Marc does the same thing when I put some effort into Oynprith or Vilani or Zdetl etc: he suggests a swadesh list or Basic English or similar. It's because he wants to help, and the intent is very practical.

But let's face it, "making vocabulary" is not very fun. Moreover, there's a different feel to words that were built explicitly to be "used" in a certain context. It's nicer when a word "falls out" naturally as the language forms. The word lists are a target, but are not the marching orders themselves.

 

[robject]

It's just that on a practical level....

"Practical" appears (only to me) to be mis-used in that sentence. At least in my experience, players greatly relish attempting to pronounce Aslan words, and there's no effort to be precise beyond sounding like cats in heat.

I've already gone beyond what I intended -- momentum sometimes pulls me along -- but I'm not a long-distance conlanger.

Anyway, I really would prefer that Trokh be "highly synthetic" and I've started thinking about native aboriginal pre-Columbian arctic northern North American/Siberian languages again... e.g.

Polysynthetic languages typically have long "sentence-words" such as the Yupik word tuntussuqatarniksaitengqiggtuq which means "He had not yet said again that he was going to hunt reindeer." The word consists of the morphemes tuntu-ssur-qatar-ni-ksaite-ngqiggte-uq with the meanings, reindeer-hunt-future-say-negation-again-third.person.singular.indicative; and except for the morpheme tuntu "reindeer", none of the other morphemes can appear in isolation.

As far as I can tell, the important rule is that "none of the other morphemes can appear in isolation". SO maybe I can "adjust" my current draft just a bit and not have to "start over". Really it doesn't look that hard. In fact, all of it except the subject noun is just inflecting a verb with five billion suffixes -- little word-particles. Kind of like Klingon.

So in this Trokh nouns have a class, which is fine -- head-marking is arguably used in synthetic languages. Object noun incorporation into the inflected verb seems "fake" to me, which means I'm not understanding something. In other words (assuming there's no "'") is there any real difference between writing tuntussuqatarniksaitengqiggtuq and
tuntu'ssuqatar'niksaitengqiggtuq? I can't see one, even if the verb inflects based on the noun -- except if the first verb inflects in a certain way because it's part of a subordinate or relative clause (or whatever it is).

 

[maksimsmelchak]

@ Maksim Smelchak: May I suggest the Language Construction Kit? It's not specific to Traveller, but I think it's by far the best vade mecum to inventing languages out there today; and beyond that, it can be a great introduction to the field of linguistics -- work through it and it's like taking Linguistics 101![**]. There are two follow-up volumes on more complicated or specific topics, which I haven't read. Zompist (Mark Rosenfelder) is, I think, one of the best public conlangers to date; by which I mean, he creates languages that are very thorough, with as much attention to the usually-neglected areas of syntax and discourse/pragmatic levels; despite being a techie by profession, he firmly situates his languages within (imaginary) communities of speakers with histories and not as abstract codes for information flow; and especially, he writes this well and clearly and smoothly. And, as far as I know, he's never had any formal education in linguistics or anthropology at all.[***]

I've seen it and any resource that yields inspiration is a good one.

But, I have academic level linguistics training, several languages under my belt, and a lot more applied linguistics in the working world at several levels.

A friend has the whole series and he loves them.

I haven't ever done more than glance at them although they look useful. I've been pulling out my old linguistics textbooks every time I need in-depth directions when Con-langing...

Thanks for the tip!

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[aramis]

Marc does the same thing when I put some effort into Oynprith or Vilani or Zdetl etc: he suggests a swadesh list or Basic English or similar. It's because he wants to help, and the intent is very practical.

But let's face it, "making vocabulary" is not very fun. Moreover, there's a different feel to words that were built explicitly to be "used" in a certain context. It's nicer when a word "falls out" naturally as the language forms. The word lists are a target, but are not the marching orders themselves.

Making Vocabulary that appears consistent requires root-word trees and such; note that most natural languages are actually inconsistent due to combinations of borrowed words, phonemic shifts, and grammatical shifts.

Which is part of why the ol' Conlanger Tolkien created histories and multiple languages that interacted. It makes his conlangs pop as realistic by having the shifts.

It's also far more work than any but the hardest core are willing to go to.

One of the reasons I suggest the Dolch is that it's commonly organized by academic grade levels - and in looking at the 1800 common ideograms, the progression of words are similar.

 

[maksimsmelchak]

Making Vocabulary that appears consistent requires root-word trees and such; note that most natural languages are actually inconsistent due to combinations of borrowed words, phonemic shifts, and grammatical shifts.

Which is part of why the ol' Conlanger Tolkien created histories and multiple languages that interacted. It makes his conlangs pop as realistic by having the shifts.

It's also far more work than any but the hardest core are willing to go to.

One of the reasons I suggest the Dolch is that it's commonly organized by academic grade levels - and in looking at the 1800 common ideograms, the progression of words are similar.

Great insight.

I used the Dolch in a different capacity. I was an bilingual ESL teacher. It's a good place to start in helping newcomers, both children and adults, to develop functional and useful vocabularies. It surprising how little many ESL textbooks use the same basic principles. Academic publishers can be a bit strange.

I seem to recall that you, Aramis, were studying to go into education and have a musical talent. You may or may not be surprised that many graduate linguistics programs require Con-Lang like assignments. I remember studying a language for a test, finding it very strange and identifiable, and later finding out that it was artificial. And, even odder, I was later assigned to make logical guesses as to how the language might have developed if it had been in use. Pretty interesting. Tolkien probably missed out.

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[aramis]

Great insight.

I used the Dolch in a different capacity. I was an bilingual ESL teacher. It's a good place to start in helping newcomers, both children and adults, to develop functional and useful vocabularies. It surprising how little many ESL textbooks use the same basic principles. Academic publishers can be a bit strange.

I seem to recall that you, Aramis, were studying to go into education and have a musical talent. You may or may not be surprised that many graduate linguistics programs require Con-Lang like assignments. I remember studying a language for a test, finding it very strange and identifiable, and later finding out that it was artificial. And, even odder, I was later assigned to make logical guesses as to how the language might have developed if it had been in use. Pretty interesting. Tolkien probably missed out.

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

Prof. Tolkien is the father of modern Con-lang...
Yeah, I'm a couple classes short of an MA in Elementary Ed. (Phys Ed Methods and Student Teaching, to be specific.) Most of my students when I've long term subbed have been bilingual...

 

[maksimsmelchak]

Prof. Tolkien is the father of modern Con-lang... ]]]

Awesome stuff. Still in awe of it. Master world-building.

Yeah, I'm a couple classes short of an MA in Elementary Ed. (Phys Ed Methods and Student Teaching, to be specific.) Most of my students when I've long term subbed have been bilingual...

When you get a chance, you should get back to it. My Mother, a professor, taught me very early in life that you don't really learn something until you teach it to others... Encouraged me to lead study groups, tutor, etc. I've always benefitted from it. I imagine, with your background, that you've experienced some of the same insights.

I love being bilingual, or to be a little more precise, a polyglot.

*** What kind of training do you need to teach phys. ed.? Any anatomy or physiology? I subbed it back in the day... Music too. Never played so much piano and recorder... ***

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[aramis]

Prof. Tolkien is the father of modern Con-lang... ]]]

Awesome stuff. Still in awe of it. Master world-building.



When you get a chance, you should get back to it. My Mother, a professor, taught me very early in life that you don't really learn something until you teach it to others... Encouraged me to lead study groups, tutor, etc. I've always benefitted from it. I imagine, with your background, that you've experienced some of the same insights.

I love being bilingual, or to be a little more precise, a polyglot.

*** What kind of training do you need to teach phys. ed.? Any anatomy or physiology? I subbed it back in the day... Music too. Never played so much piano and recorder... ***

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

I still sub. Mostly in music and elementary classroom.

Phys Ed Methods is "how to get kids to exercise and enjoy it"... essentially, how to turn PT into games.

 

[kk7]

I'll drop all my comments about any lexicons and their uses. I don't think I'm wrong, yet; yet I'm clearly on the wrong side of the world.

Maksim, please, join into bringing more linguistics and language-speaking to this scene!!! I didn't mean to talk down to you in suggesting Zompist's books; apologies.

I'm again cat-sitting the Chatty Old Man Cat I mentioned before. I've been playing 80s-90s Cantonese-language movies on their big TV -- it's so creepy dead & quiet out here where rich people move. C.O.M.C still can't shut his chow-hole (interesting as that is, when you're thinking about pseudo-feline language); I'm thinking he gets especially squirmy and rapturous when Leslie Cheung is talking or on the screen.

So, any players who get a kick out of pronouncing Trokh names, they're welcome to come talk with this mad bad moggie.

Robject, yes, for sure, bring on more polysynthesis and especially Inuktitut-ish-style conlanging! Actually, in fact, it seems to me now, the explosive expansion of the Aslan species is an interesting and fun match with the startling spread of 'Eskimo' language speakers from each end of 'Europe' to the other, around the globe: Russia to Denmark.

Actually, C.O.M.C. has just been forcibly removed from the big and presumably cutting-edge screen for not just patting at Leslie Cheung, but licking at the screen when his (Cheung's) mouth is moving.

Aslans -- Fteirle -- Trokh-speakers -- you got good basic taste but wow are you weird.

--A regular and normal speaker of Vilani

 

[maksimsmelchak]

Hi Kk7 (Are you K'kree?),

I'll drop all my comments about any lexicons and their uses. I don't think I'm wrong, yet; yet I'm clearly on the wrong side of the world.

Maksim, please, join into bringing more linguistics and language-speaking to this scene!!!

No worries, mate.

I putter around quite a bit on the Wiki. I just updated some linguistic add-ons there.

I didn't mean to talk down to you in suggesting Zompist's books; apologies.

No worries. I am not even slightly offended. I'm a former service man (military) and after having been shot at a number of times, I tend to have a thick skin regarding harmless chat. Words are always better than bullets and I love having that perspective. Give me the sticks and stones... I'll pass on bullets and knives.

The Zompist books are great. Good for the hobbyist.

I'm again cat-sitting the Chatty Old Man Cat (COMC) I mentioned before. I've been playing 80s-90s Cantonese-language movies on their big TV -- it's so creepy dead & quiet out here where rich people move. C.O.M.C still can't shut his chow-hole (interesting as that is, when you're thinking about pseudo-feline language); I'm thinking he gets especially squirmy and rapturous when Leslie Cheung is talking or on the screen.

So, any players who get a kick out of pronouncing Trokh names, they're welcome to come talk with this mad bad moggie.

*** Are you Chinese? Watching Cantonese flicks? ***

There is more Cantonese in the SF Bay Area than the mainstream dialect... I learned words of it first.

Robject, yes, for sure, bring on more polysynthesis and especially Inuktitut-ish-style conlanging! Actually, in fact, it seems to me now, the explosive expansion of the Aslan species is an interesting and fun match with the startling spread of 'Eskimo' language speakers from each end of 'Europe' to the other, around the globe: Russia to Denmark.

Actually, C.O.M.C. has just been forcibly removed from the big and presumably cutting-edge screen for not just patting at Leslie Cheung, but licking at the screen when his (Cheung's) mouth is moving.

I'm excited to see the Traveller languages further developed.

Aslans -- Fteirle -- Trokh-speakers -- you got good basic taste but wow are you weird.

--A regular and normal speaker of Vilani

Thanks for your chat.

Positive vibes to all!

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.

 

[robject]

Wrote up a bit of polysynthetic Trokh last nite. Then I opened up AM01. Its sole example takes some thinking.

HlyueawifiyAhroay'ifiyWahtoiLayeauiwahfeaktelihlalikhtyeiteyahahtateisiyu

Unmarried first son of the third son of the grandfather of the head of the pride which holds the valley in the fork of the lwahfea River part of clan Wahtoi which is a vassal of clan Aroaye'i itself a vassal of clan Hlyueawi.


My first attempt:

[FONT=&quot]Hlyueawi-fiy + Ahroay'i-fiy + Wahtoi[/FONT][FONT=&quot] + Lay-eau + iwahfea + kteli + hlali + khtyei + te[FONT=&quot]ya[/FONT] + hahta + teisi [FONT=&quot]-[/FONT] yu

[/FONT][FONT=&quot]clan Hlyueawi - over + [/FONT][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]clan Aroaye'i - over + [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]clan Wahtoi + [/FONT][Lay-eau][/FONT] + Iwahfea ri[FONT=&quot]ver + [ktelihlali] + head o[FONT=&quot]f[/FONT] pride + grandfather + third son + first son [FONT=&quot]- [/FONT]is unmarried[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]...leaving Layeau[FONT=&quot] and kteihlali for "val[FONT=&quot]ley" (of?) and "divi[FONT=&quot]sion[/FONT]" (of?)[/FONT] and[FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot] maybe a relative clause ma[FONT=&quot]rker "which".[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT]
[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT][/FONT]

 

[maksimsmelchak]

Wrote up a bit of polysynthetic Trokh last nite. Then I opened up AM01. Its sole example takes some thinking.

HlyueawifiyAhroay'ifiyWahtoiLayeauiwahfeaktelihlalikhtyeiteyahahtateisiyu

Unmarried first son of the third son of the grandfather of the head of the pride which holds the valley in the fork of the lwahfea River part of clan Wahtoi which is a vassal of clan Aroaye'i itself a vassal of clan Hlyueawi.


My first attempt:

[FONT=&quot]Hlyueawi-fiy + Ahroay'i-fiy + Wahtoi[/FONT][FONT=&quot] + Lay-eau + iwahfea + kteli + hlali + khtyei + te[FONT=&quot]ya[/FONT] + hahta + teisi [FONT=&quot]-[/FONT] yu

[/FONT][FONT=&quot]clan Hlyueawi - over + [/FONT][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]clan Aroaye'i - over + [/FONT][/FONT][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]clan Wahtoi + [/FONT][Lay-eau][/FONT] + Iwahfea ri[FONT=&quot]ver + [ktelihlali] + head o[FONT=&quot]f[/FONT] pride + grandfather + third son + first son [FONT=&quot]- [/FONT]is unmarried[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot]...leaving Layeau[FONT=&quot] and kteihlali for "val[FONT=&quot]ley" (of?) and "divi[FONT=&quot]sion[/FONT]" (of?)[/FONT] and[FONT=&quot][FONT=&quot] maybe a relative clause ma[FONT=&quot]rker "which".[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT]
[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT][/FONT]

Sounds very cool. I spent some time doing some Traveller Conlanging recently as well. Working on Oynprith AKA Droyne or Droynish.

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.