There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: Attic months
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2. Re: The Christmas Invasion
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3. Re: The Christmas Invasion
From: Peter Bleackley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
6. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
7. Re: A book report...
From: Adam Walker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
8. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: taliesin the storyteller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
9. Re: Hyperborean
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
10. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
11. Re: What is language?
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
12. Re: Conlangs gathering?
From: Steg Belsky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
13. Re: Conlangs gathering?
From: Arthaey Angosii <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
14. Re: Multiples of Pi
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
15. Re: Multiples of Pi
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
16. Re: Conlangs gathering?
From: Kris Kowal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
17. Re: Multiples of Pi
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
18. Re: Going NOMAIL
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
19. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
20. Re: Attic months
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
21. Khangaþyagon Babel Text
From: Peter Bleackley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
22. S11 website update
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
23. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
24. Re: Attic months
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
25. Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 1
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 11:54:43 -0500
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Attic months
On 1/3/06, R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> The earlier systems appear to have used an 8 year cycle of 99 lunations,
> i.e. three years in the cycle had an extra intercalated month.
... hence the alternating 49- and 50-month intervals between
Olympiads. No matter how your particular city state arranged the
months into years, everyone could see and count the moon phases, so
they neatly sidestepped the calendrical differences that way. But if
you happen to have a system that makes each of those intervals exactly
four years, so much the better...
> But while the Metonic cycle caught on (it is still used for the modern
> Hebrew calendar and for determining Easter in both the Old and the New
> style calendars), the Callipic cycle did not catch on. I guess a 76 year
> cycle was felt just too long for practical use.
Perhaps, but the new-style calendar has a 400-year cycle, so I'd
expect 76 to be manageable.
>It seems that in the classical pronunciations, the mid vowels /e/ and
/o/ had,as
> in Middle English, _two_ long pronunciations, one high & the other low.
And they were phonemically distinct? I didn't know that - about Mid.
English either.
> For a reasonable description of ancient Greek pronunciation, I suggest
> Sidney Allen's "Vox Graeca"
That sounds like a winner; I own his _Vox_Latina_. But shouldn't the
title of the Greek one be in Greek instead of Latin? :)
> But better still IMO, if you read French...
Not well enough for a technical nonfiction book to be anything but a
long laborious exercise in avoiding RSI from frequent
dictionary-flipping. :)
> >>In modern Greek such nouns become masculines ending -ώναÏ
> > And how is Zeta pronounced in modern Greek?
>
> [z]
>
> But the final letter of -á½½Î½Î±Ï is sigma [s].
Oh. <squints> So it is. These are new eyeglasses, too. The only
difference in this font is the little serif at the top of the zeta,
but even so.
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 2
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 16:56:02 +0000
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Christmas Invasion
Peter Bleackley wrote:
[snip]
> It would be interesting to track down a copy of the script and analyse
> the Sycoraxian dialogue, but unfortunately it may take a while to do
> this - I've tried contacting the BBC's Doctor Who website, but
> unfortunately they aren't able to track down and transcribe the script.
Odd - as Sycorax actually appeared in the subtitles. (We had the
subtitles on, as there was other human noise going on in our sitting
room :-)
--
Ray
==================================
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 17:03:28 +0000
From: Peter Bleackley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Christmas Invasion
At 16:56 03/01/2006, you wrote:
>Peter Bleackley wrote:
>[snip]
>>It would be interesting to track down a copy of the script and analyse
>>the Sycoraxian dialogue, but unfortunately it may take a while to do this
>>- I've tried contacting the BBC's Doctor Who website, but unfortunately
>>they aren't able to track down and transcribe the script.
>
>Odd - as Sycorax actually appeared in the subtitles. (We had the subtitles
>on, as there was other human noise going on in our sitting room :-)
Yes, the subtitlers would have access to the script.
Pete
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Message: 4
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 19:31:39 +0200
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
Roger Mills wrote:
>
>John Vertical wrote:
> > First off, I confess that I not sure if you'll recognize "numeral" as a
> > word for the class of "number words" (never seen it used in that way
> > in English; only Finnish.)
>
>I'm not totally sure what you're getting at here, but-- in Engl., I feel
>that "numeral" refers mainly to the written form of the number, and it
>sounds rather grade-school-ish at that: "All right, children, write down
>the numeral "five"...." in which case it's simply a synomyn for "number"
>but with rather limited usage.
As I was afraid. Still, nobody seems to know another word for "number
words". Finnish grammar (as taught at high school level) traditionally
distinguishes "numerals" as a part-of-speech of their own, but maybe you
Indo-Europeans don't really need a separate class.
>One does not hear, "There was a _numeral_ of people at the party..."
Nor "Did you see the adjective noun?"
[Unless we're talking about the band with that name. :b]
> > Does any
> > language have ordinals as the unmarked series instead?
>
>Don't know, but it seems somehow counter-intuitive.
I guess. But give me one natlang with no counterintuitive features. :)
> > There are also often a handful of numbers which have an original name in
> > addition to a derived one. Most of the ones I know have been used as
>units
> > of measure (eg. Finnish "tiu" is a unit of 20 eggs), but are there
>others?
>
>Perhaps these: Ml/Indonesian has a non-derived term for "-teen", belas;
>almost all related langs. AFAIK use a combo of ten + unit. Javanese,
>uniquely AFAIK, has a special term for 20. All other decades, there and in
>AFAIK all related langs., use Unit + ten. A sub-family in Eastern Indo.
>has special words for "10 ears of grain" and "10 pigs", unrelated to the
>word for 10. Fijian has: vola 'war canoe', vola-vola '100 war canoes', and
>possibly others of that ilk. (ObConlang: Kash does not yet have such
>things, but ought to....archaic, however; their analogues for dozen/gross
>refer to quantities of ten/hundred resp.)
Yeah, like that. Thanks!
Finnish also has "tikkuri" (10 squirrel hides), "kerpo" (31 lampreys - why
31? I have totally no idea) and borrowals for "dozen" and "gross".
> > Also I might add the golden [ratio]....
>
>The golden is 8:5, right? derived from the Fibonacci series? Kash has
>that-- moyot nakuweyu "Nakuweyu pattern" named after the Gwr version of
>Mr. Fibonacci who first formalized the concept, also called moyot maci <
>Gwr maq dzi "ten five [octal]". But only because I once read a book on
>Fibonacci and got fascinated by the whole idea; the Greeks and all that;
>also it's used in some (rather far-out) stock-market analysis :-))
>
> > and silver ratios (the latter is sqrt(2)) to uwjge...
>
>Please explain more fully. WTF is "uwjge"???? (Is my math. ignorance
>showing, or is that a typo of some sort..........:-)) )
1) The golden ratio (which others have already explained more fully) can be
used to form a "golden" rectangle. It has the property that you can remove a
square from it with the proportions remaining the same. The lesser known
"silver" rectangle, instead, can be cut in half with the proportions (1 to
sqrt(2)) remaining the same. This is actually just the normal A-sized paper.
An alternative definition instead has it remaining the same in proportions
after the removal of a 1x2 rectangle; this produces a related ratio of
1+sqrt(2).
2) uwjge (/'u\wGgE/) is my primary conlang. Being personal/artlang rather
than fictional diachronic, I could just borrow the usual names for pi et al,
but naming them "natively" instead also sounds tempting. And yes, the "freak
typo" outlook of the name is intentional. ;)
>Beyond that, the Kash have a word for "pi"-- onjiyur [on'dZijur] < om
>'basis' + ciyur 'circle', called omi by mathematicians and symbolized with
>the letter "m". We also have words for the basic geometric figures (no
>solids yet, however), basically "side + (number)".
>
>Was this at all on-topic? :-)))
Of course. Myself, I'm actually lexicalizing 2pi instead (which, from a
mathematical viewpoint, is more logical.)
John Vertical
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Message: 5
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 12:50:58 -0500
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
> Myself, I'm actually lexicalizing 2pi instead (which, from a
> mathematical viewpoint, is more logical.)
Debatable. You could make a case for Ï/2 as well, since after all a
circle is completely symmetric and you can start with a right angle
quadrant and replicate it three more times to get one. But Ï by
itself is the most directly measurable value, as the ratio of a
circle's circumference to its diameter. Radii are, in general,
tricker to measure on physical circles due to the necessity of
identifying the precise center; it's easier to measure the diameter -
a chord is the diameter when its length hits a maximum - and then
halve that value to get the radius.
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 6
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 19:38:45 +0200
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
R A Brown wrote:
>John Vertical wrote:
> > is the Latin prefix sesqui- really a *root* morpheme?
>
>No, it is not a root morpheme. In fact in Latin _sesqui_ or _sesque_ could
>be a separate word, but it is nearly always prefixed as sesqui-. As the
>prefix means "more by one half". It almost certainly derives from _semis
>que_ (and a half) thus: /se:miskwe/ --> */se:mskwe/ --> /se:skwe/ or
>/se:skwi/.
OIC. Thanks.
>But it developed an interesting use when prefixed to ordinals, cf.
>sesquitertius = containing one and a third (four thirds)
>sesquioctauus = containing one and one eighth.
>etc
This is very interesting. A similarly functioning word of "one minus 1/x"
could theoretically also be devised, which would easily yield words for 2/3,
3/4, 99% etc... :)
John Vertical
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Message: 7
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 11:24:43 -0800
From: Adam Walker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: A book report...
--- caeruleancentaur <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> --- In [email protected], "Mark J. Reed"
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Roy Andrew
> Miller's "Japanese and the Other Altaic Languages."
> If anyone is
> interested in it, please let me know.
I have and read that one. It was interesting.
Adam
Jin xividjilud djal suñu ed falud ul Jozevu pomu instanchid ul andjelu djul
Dominu sivi, ed idavi achibid jun al su sposa. Ed nun aved cuñuxud ad sivi
ancha nadud jan ad ul sua huiju primodjindu ed cuamad il su numi ul Jezu.
Machu 1:24-25
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Message: 8
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 20:41:21 +0100
From: taliesin the storyteller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
* John Vertical said on 2006-01-02 22:15:36 +0100
> I've been thinking about numerals lately. Particularily, of all the
> possible different types of them. So here goes loads of rambling on the
> topic. Feel free to steal and/or shoot down any ideas contained. Commenting
> on them I even welcome. :)
Older stuff about the same thing:
Numbers in Kernu, from 1998:
http://ccil.org/~cowan/sessiwn/msg00454.html
Numbers in Esperanto:
http://www.geocities.com/theconlang/esperant/lesson07.htm
t.
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Message: 9
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 20:41:04 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Hyperborean
Quoting Jörg Rhiemeier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Hallo!
>
> Ray Brown wrote:
>
> > Isaac Penzev wrote:
> > > R A Brown wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >>In modern times the adjective 'Hyperborean' has been applied to a group
> > >>of languages spoken in northeastern Siberia.
> > >
> > >
> > > Hmm. Aren't they more often called 'Paleosiberian' or 'Paleoasian'?
> >
> > I believe so - my source was Mario Pei "The World's Chief Languages",
> > 1949. But the Library of Congress apparently still uses the older term:
> > PM Hyperborean, Indian, and artificial languages
> >
> > In the list quoted yesterday by Jefferson Wilson there is no mention of
> > 'Paleosiberian' or 'Paleoasian'
> >
> > A quick Google on 'hyperborean' will soon show many different latter-day
> > uses; I guess the terms 'Pal(a)eosiberian' and 'Pal(a)eoasian' have been
> > adopted to avoid confusion with some of these other uses.
>
> Yep. Losts of crackpots using this term for all sorts of figments
> of their imagination, including some very unpalatable ones.
>
> And northeastern Siberia probably doesn't have the least to do
> with the Hyperborea of the ancients at all (where's the friendly
> temperate climate and all that?); IMHO, "Hyperborea" refers to
> pre-Celtic Britain. Which also means that the term "Hyperborean"
> applies better to - Albic ;-) But I will stick to the name "Albic":
> it is shorter, it is unambiguous, it is better.
The Swedish 17th C historian Olof Rudbeck thought it refered to Scandinavia, and
claimed the word was derived from Scandinavian _yverboren_ "highborn". He
should've taken more Greek classes, but you'll still occasionally hear
_yverboren_ as joking characterization of overly patriotic folks.
Andreas
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Message: 10
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 20:42:11 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
Quoting John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Roger Mills wrote:
> >
> >John Vertical wrote:
> > > First off, I confess that I not sure if you'll recognize "numeral" as a
> > > word for the class of "number words" (never seen it used in that way
> > > in English; only Finnish.)
> >
> >I'm not totally sure what you're getting at here, but-- in Engl., I feel
> >that "numeral" refers mainly to the written form of the number, and it
> >sounds rather grade-school-ish at that: "All right, children, write down
> >the numeral "five"...." in which case it's simply a synomyn for "number"
> >but with rather limited usage.
>
> As I was afraid. Still, nobody seems to know another word for "number
> words". Finnish grammar (as taught at high school level) traditionally
> distinguishes "numerals" as a part-of-speech of their own, but maybe you
> Indo-Europeans don't really need a separate class.
FWIW, they're counted as separate part-of-speech in Swedish, usually called
_räkneord_ "counting words".
Andreas
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Message: 11
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 20:35:19 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: What is language?
Quoting R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Andreas Johansson wrote:
> [snip]
> > Making individual sounds is the easy part - the tricky one is controling
> > breathing so precisely you can chop an outbreath into a long sequence of
> > phonemes. Modern humans have a bunch of extra nerves to the breathing
> > musculature to faciliate this - early members of our genus, like H.
> erectus,
> > apparently had not, and so presumably were not prone to chattering. Then
> you
> > also need a brain capable of processing all this short sounds more-or-less
> in
> > real time.
>
> I wonder whether that fact the vocal tract had become capable of
> producing such a wide range of different sounds did not, in part at
> least, act as stimulus to development of extra bunch of nerves & greater
> brain power. Just a thought.
This seems a very reasonable idea. Certainly, there would have much less payback
for such neural development if the sunk larynx hadn't been in place.
Andreas
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Message: 12
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 15:21:59 -0500
From: Steg Belsky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Conlangs gathering?
On Jan 3, 2006, at 2:54 PM, Arthaey Angosii wrote:
> Emaelivpeith Sai Emrys:
>> What this means is that I will have access to funding. Possibly major
>> funding, if the ASUC thinks it's worth it.
>> ... so... Who would be interested in attending a conlangs convention
>> at UC Berkeley, if it were held sometime between now and June?
> Depending on exactly when it was scheduled, I'd drive up from the
> central coast to attend. :) Keep us posted!
> --
> AA
> http://conlang.arthaey.com/
Luckily the system hasn't actually NOMAIL'd me yet, so i'd be very
interested!
-Stephen (Steg)
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Message: 13
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 11:54:26 -0800
From: Arthaey Angosii <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Conlangs gathering?
Emaelivpeith Sai Emrys:
> What this means is that I will have access to funding. Possibly major
> funding, if the ASUC thinks it's worth it.
>
> ... so... Who would be interested in attending a conlangs convention
> at UC Berkeley, if it were held sometime between now and June?
Depending on exactly when it was scheduled, I'd drive up from the
central coast to attend. :) Keep us posted!
--
AA
http://conlang.arthaey.com/
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Message: 14
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 23:19:58 +0200
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Multiples of Pi
Mark J. Reed wrote:
>
> > Myself, I'm actually lexicalizing 2pi instead (which, from a
> > mathematical viewpoint, is more logical.)
>
>Debatable. You could make a case for π/2 as well, since after all a
>circle is completely symmetric and you can start with a right angle
>quadrant and replicate it three more times to get one. But π by
>itself is the most directly measurable value, as the ratio of a
>circle's circumference to its diameter. Radii are, in general,
>tricker to measure on physical circles due to the necessity of
>identifying the precise center; it's easier to measure the diameter -
>a chord is the diameter when its length hits a maximum - and then
>halve that value to get the radius.
*Mathematical* viewpoint. It is essentially impossible to measure pi by more
than about 10 decimals; but in whatever mathematical context the number
comes up, more often that not it'll be preceded by a multiplier of 2. You
can read more here:
http://www.math.utah.edu/~palais/pi.html
I already have a name for it - I'm calling it "py" (or maybe "pu" would be
better English, since I'm working by analogy from mu & nu.)
John Vertical
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Message: 15
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 16:55:48 -0500
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Multiples of Pi
On 1/3/06, John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> *Mathematical* viewpoint.
So is this a loglang? If not, how are you postulating the leap
directly to mathematical logic in vocabulary development?
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 16
Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 14:36:30 -0800
From: Kris Kowal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Conlangs gathering?
> Depending on exactly when it was scheduled, I'd drive up from the
> central coast to attend. :) Keep us posted!
> --
> AA
> http://conlang.arthaey.com/
Also depending, we central coastians could carpool.
--
KK
http://cixar.com/~kris.kowal/
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Message: 17
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 00:30:35 +0200
From: John Vertical <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Multiples of Pi
Mark J. Reed wrote:
>So is this a loglang? If not, how are you postulating the leap
>directly to mathematical logic in vocabulary development?
It certainly has some loglangish features. But the 2pi versus 1pi issue
could certainly also arise by other ways. If I understood correctly, your
point was along the lines that it's easier to measure the diameter than the
radius of a circle. However, this only holds true for a pre-given circle; if
you're going to draw it yourself instead, you'll presumably use a compass &
thus already have the radius at your disposal.
The number has likely been developed only twice in history (Near East, and
China) so it might be just a coïncidence that it was defined as
circumference : radius both times.
John Vertical
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Message: 18
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 11:59:13 +0100
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Going NOMAIL
On Tue, 03 Jan 2006, Henrik Theiling wrote:
> Hi Steg!
<snip>
> That's quite something!
>
> Hope to see you back soon!
What he said.
Carsten
--
"Miranayam cepauarà naranoaris."
(Calvin nay Hobbes)
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Message: 19
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 11:59:33 +0100
From: Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
On Mon, 02 Jan 2006, 22:15 CET, John Vertical wrote:
> Hm, what I'm proposing might be a little hard to grasp
> from the previous paragraph, so I'll construct an example
> using English and base 2. So suppose the cardinal series
> goes "one, two, onety-one..."; but meanwhile, the ordinal
> series goes "first, second, firsty-first..." rather than
> "...onety-first...". That is, NO ordinals would be derived
> from the corresponding cardinals - but rather simpler
> ordinals in a way similar, but perhaps not identical, to
> how more complex cardinals are derived from simpler
> cardinals.
So what you have are two (or more) independent counting
systems? E.g. one, two, three for the ordinals but aigh,
wir, dorn for the ordinals (making up random
English-sounding words)?
> One could then split the class of numerals into
> "cardinal-derived" vs. "ordinal-derived" - maybe even
> contrasting other series purely by their roots. This is
> almost trivial to extend into mathematical series (half
> vs. halfth), but it might be possible to carry it over to
> grammatical series too - eg. contrasting the
> (cardinal-derived) word "trio" with an (ordinal-derived)
> word meaning maybe something along the lines of "third
> member of a trio".
What about "fourth member of a quartet", "fifth member of a
quintet" etc. then? Would they have the same name?
> ..And speaking of negative numbers, why doesn't -1 have a
> name on its own, but i does?
I assume i = imaginary number? We haven't had that in Maths
yet, though, but I heard of it. Why should -1 have a name of
its own? Maybe like "one missing", "two missing", "three
missing" etc. and "first missing", "second missing", ... ?
Why then only -1? OK, you often use -1 and when forming
negative values, you actually multiply numbers with -1 but
don't write '-1·n' but only '-n' instead.
> There are also often a handful of numbers which have an
> original name in addition to a derived one. Most of the
> ones I know have been used as units of measure (eg.
> Finnish "tiu" is a unit of 20 eggs), but are there others?
Sure, the "dozen", which is a unit of twelve. English also
has the "score", which also means 20 items. In German, a
"Zentner" is a weight of 50 kg, but you only use that word
with weights of sacks of concrete powder, potatoes, sand and
the like usually. "Zentner" is certainly derived from Lat.
'centum' = 100, but its value is 50 [fifty].
> might add the golden and silver ratios (the latter is
> sqrt(2)) to uwjge...
Uwjge is your conlang, isn't it?
> So what other numerals are there? English has at least the
> "group numerals" (single, duo, trio...), the "repeat
> numerals" (once, twice, thrice...)
But English only has up to 'thrice' there AFAIK, I've never
seen 'fource' and 'fifce' etc. yet. Would only add to the
confusion between -teen and -ty since there's also -th and
-ce then :-)
That's my 2 ct for today,
Carsten
--
Keywords: numbers
"Miranayam cepauarà naranoaris."
(Calvin nay Hobbes)
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Message: 20
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 11:30:22 +0000
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Attic months
Mark J. Reed wrote:
> On 1/3/06, R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>>The earlier systems appear to have used an 8 year cycle of 99 lunations,
>>i.e. three years in the cycle had an extra intercalated month.
>
>
> ... hence the alternating 49- and 50-month intervals between
> Olympiads. No matter how your particular city state arranged the
> months into years, everyone could see and count the moon phases, so
> they neatly sidestepped the calendrical differences that way.
Yep.
[snip]
>>But while the Metonic cycle caught on (it is still used for the modern
>>Hebrew calendar and for determining Easter in both the Old and the New
>>style calendars), the Callipic cycle did not catch on. I guess a 76 year
>>cycle was felt just too long for practical use.
>
>
> Perhaps, but the new-style calendar has a 400-year cycle, so I'd
> expect 76 to be manageable.
Yes, but in the new-style calendar it's only a matter of intercalating a
single day every so often, and the rule is pretty simple: "A year is a
leap year if it is evenly divisible by 4 and is not evenly divisible by
100, or is evenly divisible by 400."
But with the Metonic & Callipic cycles it's a question of intercalating
a whole month, and knowing whether the intercalated month is of 29 or 30
days. One has to know where one is in the cycle. Even in the Metonic
cycle, one has to know whether it is the 3rd, 5th, 8th, 11th, 16th or
19th year as those will contain 13 months, while the rest have only 12.
Although I haven't been able to discover details, presumably the
Callipic cycle was not just four consecutive Metonic cycles; there must
have been differences in each of the four 19-year periods, otherwise
there'd be no point in having the longer cycle. So presumably one would
not merely need to know where one was in a 19-year period, but also
which of the four 19-year periods one was in.
Even the 19-year Metonic period seems more complicated than our 400-year
new-style cycle. The extra complication of the Callipic must have been
felt by most not worth the gain in accuracy.
>
>>It seems that in the classical pronunciations, the mid vowels /e/ and
>
> /o/ had,as
>
>>in Middle English, _two_ long pronunciations, one high & the other low.
>
>
> And they were phonemically distinct? I didn't know that - about Mid.
> English either.
Yes - apparently so. The higher sounds were spelled |ee| and |oo| or just
|e| and |o| in unblocked syllables, whereas the lower sounds were spelled
|ea| and |oa| respectively.
>
>>For a reasonable description of ancient Greek pronunciation, I suggest
>>Sidney Allen's "Vox Graeca"
>
> That sounds like a winner; I own his _Vox_Latina_. But shouldn't the
> title of the Greek one be in Greek instead of Latin? :)
Ἡ á¼Î»Î»Î·Î½Î¹Îºá½´ ÏÏνή ?
>
>>But better still IMO, if you read French...
>
>
> Not well enough for a technical nonfiction book to be anything but a
> long laborious exercise in avoiding RSI from frequent
> dictionary-flipping. :)
Sounds like me with German :)
--
Ray
==================================
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==================================
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY
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Message: 21
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 12:41:31 +0000
From: Peter Bleackley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Khangaþyagon Babel Text
I've just posted my Babel Text at
http://www.artlangs.com/index.php?module=v4bJournal&func=journal_view&uid=88&mode=detail
where it nestles alongside what I hope is a reasonably thorough description
of the grammar. Please have a look. Feedback is welcome.
Pete
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Message: 22
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 05:42:50 +0100
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: S11 website update
Hi!
I updated my website about S11 a bit, mainly for phonotactics and syntax.
http://www.kunstsprachen.de/s11/
Phonotactics:
http://www.kunstsprachen.de/s11/s_02.html
Syntax:
http://www.kunstsprachen.de/s11/s_03.html
A bison grammar is available (mainly for fun -- without the other C++
files, it is quite unusable, but the rest will only be released when
the parser is somewhat complete):
http://www.kunstsprachen.de/s11/s11.y
Hope you enjoy! I'm currently still on my holidays so I will
hopefully have plenty of time to continue the work on S11.
**Henrik
PS: The name 'Tesäfköm' violates the phonotactics now, so I'll have
to come up with a different name. I'll postpone this until I
start working on the lexicon.
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Message: 23
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 15:26:11 +0100
From: Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
Hi!
Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>...
> Sure, the "dozen", which is a unit of twelve. English also
> has the "score", which also means 20 items. In German, a
> "Zentner" is a weight of 50 kg, but you only use that word
> with weights of sacks of concrete powder, potatoes, sand and
> the like usually. "Zentner" is certainly derived from Lat.
> 'centum' = 100, but its value is 50 [fifty].
Well, of course, 1 Zentner = 100 Pfund. So there you are.
**Henrik
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Message: 24
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 09:30:54 -0500
From: "Mark J. Reed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Attic months
On 1/4/06, R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > Perhaps, but the new-style calendar has a 400-year cycle, so I'd
> > expect 76 to be manageable.
>
> Yes, but in the new-style calendar it's only a matter of intercalating a
> single day every so often, and the rule is pretty simple: "A year is a
> leap year if it is evenly divisible by 4 and is not evenly divisible by
> 100, or is evenly divisible by 400."
True. The Gregorian rule is designed to be easy to remember
(relatively!) rather than mathematically optimal. To distribute the
leap years as evenly as possible, since there are 97 leap years in 400
years, a leap year would happen every time the year number hit the
first integer >= an even multiple of 400/97 =~ 4.1237. So the leap
years would normally be 4 years apart but every once in a while they'd
be 5 years apart instead. In the current system, thanks to the
non-leap centennial years, there are occasional 8-year gaps between
leap years.
> But with the Metonic & Callipic cycles it's a question of intercalating
> a whole month, and knowing whether the intercalated month is of 29 or 30
> days. One has to know where one is in the cycle. Even in the Metonic
> cycle, one has to know whether it is the 3rd, 5th, 8th, 11th, 16th or
> 19th year as those will contain 13 months, while the rest have only 12.
True. Figuring out where you are in a 400-year cycle is pretty easy -
dividing the century by 4 is a lot simpler than dividing the whole
year number by 19 (or 76 or...).
Because of which, a version of the Gregorian calendar with
evenly-distributed leap years wouldn't be that bad, even for human
brains. In any given 400 year cycle, the first leap year would be the
5th, then every 4 years from that through the 33rd; then there's a
5-year gap, so the 37th year is not leap but the 38th is, and then the
42nd, 46th, etc, through the 66th, then another gap to the 71st, and
so on. So every 33 years there's a 5-year gap; in between, every 4th
year is leap; and at the very end of the 400-year cycle there's no
gap, so instead of skipping 5 years from 396, you have a typical
4-year gap and year 400 is leap. Then you go back to the start of the
cycle.
So 2004, as the 4th year of the current cycle, would have been a
common year, but last year would have been leap.
Well, you do have to sort of divide a number between 1 and 400 by 33.
But that's still easier than the Metonic cycle. :)
> Although I haven't been able to discover details, presumably the
> Callipic cycle was not just four consecutive Metonic cycles; there must
> have been differences in each of the four 19-year periods, otherwise
> there'd be no point in having the longer cycle.
Based on some quick Internet research: if all you're using the cycle
for is to figure out when to intercalate a month, the Callipic cycle
is no improvement over the Metonic; it's just four Metonic cycles back
to back. If, however, you're using the cycle to figure out whether
each month is full or hollow (instead of using direct observation of
the moon), then the Callipic cycle is more accurate, as it includes
one less day than four back-to-back Metonic cycles. (27,759 days vs
4x6,940 = 27,760 days).
> >>For a reasonable description of ancient Greek pronunciation, I suggest
> >>Sidney Allen's "Vox Graeca"
> >
> > That sounds like a winner; I own his _Vox_Latina_. But shouldn't the
> > title of the Greek one be in Greek instead of Latin? :)
>
> Ἡ á¼Î»Î»Î·Î½Î¹Îºá½´ ÏÏνή ?
If you say so. It looks Greek to me. :)
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Message: 25
Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 14:55:07 +0000
From: R A Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: [Theory] Types of numerals
Henrik Theiling wrote:
> Hi!
>
> Carsten Becker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
>>...
>>Sure, the "dozen", which is a unit of twelve. English also
>>has the "score", which also means 20 items.
..and the "gross" which means 144 (or a dozen dozens :)
Also a "grand gross" is 12x12x12 = 1728.
When I was a youngster, a "couple" invariably meant 'two, a group of
two'. But in contemporary usage it now more often means 'a few' - seems
to me a needless loss of precision.
--
Ray
==================================
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==================================
MAKE POVERTY HISTORY
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