* Lars Marius Garshol | | So it seems these situations can be captured in this way: | | 2: Script has no derived-from relationship, but at least one | influenced-by relationship | | 3: Script has a derived-from relationship, and zero or more | influenced-by relationships
* Kenneth Whistler | | This is about what I was driving at. Although I might still quibble | with your terminology a bit. Features that are borrowed from alien | systems are still "derived from" those alien systems. Certainly, but then it is the _features_ that are derived from the alien system, and not the entire writing system. To put it another way, there isn't sufficient grounds for asserting a derived-from relationship between the _systems_, only between specific features of the systems. | That is, you can trace a direct historic relationship of descent | from the *other* system. >From features of the other system to features of the system in question, yes, but not between the systems themselves. (Otherwise it would be impossible to claim that the new writing system is a new design.) | The key distinction is between featural changes that result from | changes motivated internally in the system (e.g., changes in letter | forms due to handwriting practice, which might result in mergers or | splits in forms, or reorganization of a system), and changes which | represent direct lifting of features from an external system. The | former a historical linguist would characterize as "genetic", and | the latter as "borrowings". Exactly. This is how I understand it as well. --Lars M.
