(24-09-2016, 06:00 PM)Emma May Smith wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.These questions aside, how we work out syllable structure will depend on what characters we assign to be vowels (or capable of forming a syllable nucleus). Once we make the first argument for those sound values both the structure of the syllable, and possible sounds for other characters, soon follow. I would argue that o, a, and y are vowel sounds, but am interested in hearing counter proposal (and arguments).
I tend to think:
- a, e, and o are vowels
- i is a modifier of the previous vowel, as is e (when there's more than one)
- y is a syllabic consonant (capable of serving both as ordinary consonant and syllable nucleus), as are possibly some other letters (l, ch, Sh)
(24-09-2016, 07:57 PM)-JKP- wrote: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to view.In the VMS, the "a" glyphs are positioned somewhat where you would expect them to be if the "a" and "o" are vowels and the letters around them that look more like consonants are actually consonants.
The EVA-y (the number 9), does not behave this way, however. It behaves exactly as you would expect it to behave if it were the Latin 9-abbreviation glyph. In Latin (and other languages that use Latin abbreviations)—it is found frequently at the ends of words, sometimes at the beginning of words, and occasionally (not often) in the middle of words. In other words, it doesn't behave like a typical vowel and is found at the ends of words much too frequently for most natural languages.
What I suspect is that a Latin scribe was creating a script for a language that had a sound that only (or mostly) occurs at the beginnings and ends of words, so the symbol y seemed to him an appropriate choice to represent it.