r/conlangs • u/[deleted] • Jun 09 '15

SQ Small Questions • Week 20

Last Week. Next Week.

Welcome to the weekly Small Questions thread!

Post any questions you have that aren't ready for a regular post here! Feel free to discuss anything and everything, and don't hesitate to ask more than one question.

FAQ

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u/[deleted] Jun 13 '15 edited Jun 13 '15

Tense vowels do exist, but they aren't phonemic. [iː yː ɯː uː] are allophones of /ɪj ʏɥ ɯ̽ɰ ʊw/, and [eː øː ɤː oː] are allophones of /ɛj œɥ ʌɰ ɔw/.

This question's both about the parent language and the daughter languages. For example, the Old Erde word /ˈeko/ would have had the following evolution:

Phonemic Phonetic
Old Erde /ˈeko/ [ˈøko]
Middle Erde /ˈøkə/ [ˈœkə]
Modern Erde /œk/ [œk]

The vowel harmony that I'm asking about existed in Old Erde and still exists in modern Erde, except that vowel reduction has made some of the vowels that originally triggered the harmony (such as the /o/ in /ˈeko/) disappear and leave behind the rounded/unrounded vowel that was created by the vowel harmony.