10-03-2016, 08:46 PM
JKP: agreed, and that is problematic. I'm still working on it, so everything is subject to change, but these are some ways I would compensate for that:
1) Allow several glyphs to represent two or more closely related sounds, like /l/ and /r/ (that's one I'm fairly certain about).
2) Some glyphs are "single", so it's not totally divided by two.
3) I see the bench glyphs as ligatures. Various "hats" on the benches represent various sounds. There are two or three different "hats" and one standard, which turns this into three or four ligatures.
4) A large number of vowels is not required for every language, just look at Spanish for example.
5) This one is not easy to explain, I hope I can make clear what I mean. I think at least part of the manuscript contains a transcription of Indic languages for Greek speakers (or other "outsiders" who were familiar with Greek). When transcribing a language based on sound alone ("sounds like...") I think you'll often lose some sounds. Kind of like the English dental fricative "th" is just not heard by people who don't have it in their own language. Here people hear "th" as /t/ or /d/, so if they would transcribe English (and if "th" was a single glyph), this glyph would be lost.
1) Allow several glyphs to represent two or more closely related sounds, like /l/ and /r/ (that's one I'm fairly certain about).
2) Some glyphs are "single", so it's not totally divided by two.
3) I see the bench glyphs as ligatures. Various "hats" on the benches represent various sounds. There are two or three different "hats" and one standard, which turns this into three or four ligatures.
4) A large number of vowels is not required for every language, just look at Spanish for example.
5) This one is not easy to explain, I hope I can make clear what I mean. I think at least part of the manuscript contains a transcription of Indic languages for Greek speakers (or other "outsiders" who were familiar with Greek). When transcribing a language based on sound alone ("sounds like...") I think you'll often lose some sounds. Kind of like the English dental fricative "th" is just not heard by people who don't have it in their own language. Here people hear "th" as /t/ or /d/, so if they would transcribe English (and if "th" was a single glyph), this glyph would be lost.