Round 198 | Språkspelet

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Andy Ayres Merci, Sarah :D! Ok, here's the audio for this round. I tired of people comparing my dulcet tones to the bloodcurdling intonations of paranormal beings, so here's another voice to listen to :p. I have improved the sound quality of the original recording, and reduced the tempo a little to better aid understanding:

https://db.tt/4yIwrpPv

Good luck! If a co-host is needed, let me now; otherwise, I'll be back tomorrow

Zev Brȹk If you improved the sound quality, I hate to imagine what the original was like...

Andy Ayres Gee, thanks :/

Zev Brȹk It's ok, it adds to the challenge! Mine didn't have great audio quality either.

Andy Ayres The original had lots and lots of cassette noise, luckily managed to get rid of that. It sounded like it was recorded at the sea :)! This is pretty clear at least. If it's really a bother, I'll record myself reading it out when I get home tomorrow, though I can't guarantee perfect native accentuation if so!

Mikkel Ramzuiv Pittmann Wilson I think I might be disappearing from Spillet for some time. Perhaps tag me again in two months? Just life's too busy

Andy Ayres I can guarantee to those thinking of getting involved in the challenge that both the vocab and structures used here are pretty basic and shouldn't be difficult to find

Sarah Karoline I hear "ano" which is Czech...

Jake Kissinger Hmm. I think I heard a sound like shch, definitely /X/. It sounds rather Russian to me, but that's coming from someone who doesn't speak any Slavic languages; it could be a Murder in the Rue Morgue situation.

Sarah Karoline Sorry to see you disappear Mikkel I hope you return

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter Sounds Hungarian for me actually, but I heard some Slavics

Sarah Karoline The rest sounds Russian...

Andy Ayres It's not a Slavic language, I'm afraid, folks, though there is one phonological thing that you can hear that is very similar to Russian!

Jake Kissinger Good to know!

Wrik Chatterjee The prosody sounded North Germanic, but the words themselves seemed almost Tamazight or maybe Semitic. So I got pretty much nothing.

Sarah Karoline Oops.... hahaha

Sarah Karoline (I can still hear "ano"... )

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter "Mindfucked", I heard a bit of Albanian, Hungarian, Greek and Hebrew with Slavic blended finely through it, is it another multilingual recording? ><'

Wrik Chatterjee Hebrew? So I'm not by myself with my Afro-Asiatic leanings?

Andy Ayres I can promise you that there's only one language on show here, Vincensiu! It's not Finno-Ugric, Semitic, Germanic, Greek or Albanian though :o. Though, I haven't done a multilingual recording yet... I will have to think about that concept for a future round perhaps! *strokes Alan the cat*

Wrik Chatterjee So it is Tamazight! Is it Kabyle or Tuareg? Somehow this doesn't add up.

Andy Ayres Not Tamazight either, Wrik -I just didn't remember to note that down in the "not" list!

Sarah Karoline Thank you for the hint... it's Alanese!

*Seaches for the Dictionary of Doom*

Sarah Karoline On a serious note, I feel I must ask if it's Welsh...

Wrik Chatterjee So is it Cushitic, Chadic, or even Omotic? Or am I looking in the wrong place entirely?

Andy Ayres My response to both of you: go north! Sarah - not entirely unclose!

Wrik Chatterjee Breton? Manx?

Sarah Karoline I was going to suggest Cornish..

Andy Ayres Breton would be going south-east from Welsh - but Manx is even closer! Very warm!

Wrik Chatterjee Scottish Gaelic?

Andy Ayres Almost! It's a Gaelic variant, but not that of Scotland or Mann

Wrik Chatterjee Irish? That exhausts the Insular Celtic list.

Andy Ayres Correct. It's Irish!

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter Or could it be an endemic ancient language spoken in Orkney island by 20 isolated tribe?

Andy Ayres Ádh mór oraibh :D!

Wrik Chatterjee Well, great. Did you have to pick a language which has an orthography that's so, well, whimsical?

Jake Kissinger Eírinn go braugh! This'll be interesting!
I have no clue if I'm spelling that right, BTW.

Andy Ayres Believe me, Manx and Scottish Gaelic are even worse. Or perhaps you'd have rathered another round with Chinese characters

:D.

The evil Sprogspelet feline, Alan, told me that my previous round - text, and with a very phonemic orthography - was not evil enough. To avoid him leaving me and venturing again off into the woods of Stokarta, I had to step things up a notch :D.

Andy Ayres Very close, Jake! "Éirinn go Brách" or the more modern "Éire go Brách" :D. Glad you find the challenge interesting :D.

Sarah Karoline My translation: He tried to tame me. He tried to tell me my opinion was not worthy. He even dared to call me by name. Never call me by my name lest you wish to be interred in perpetual darkness with only your screams for company". (Alan the Cat) "Yay!"
---
Sorry, I couldn't resist some creative writing....

Andy Ayres Awesome stuff, Sarah :D.

Sarah Karoline I'm still listening to the recording and trying to "unczech" Irish!

My creative writing was of poor standar....ajajaj

Jake Kissinger So many vowel digraphs & trigraphs…

Wrik Chatterjee and now you all know that I don't actually look like a Lythronax...

Jake Kissinger Wrik & I are working together at the moment. I hope that's not cheating; we view it as extensive stjälcuri.

Wrik Chatterjee Like Sumerian and Akkadian. I'm Sumerian and Jake is Akkadian.

Jake Kissinger We are pretty confident about the first word, because it sounds like teir /tɛr/, which means "to say," & Irish is verb-initial. One word, the third, we think, sounds a lot like the word for "reason," which is a cognate, reasán, reasún, reasón, something like that.

Jake Kissinger Also, the last word in the first sentence sounds a bit like the Irish word for republic or free state, like in Saorstát Éireann. Maybe that's just my imagination, though.

Jake Kissinger Réasún is reason.

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter Keep the hard work

I'll stjalcuri in the last minute :p

Wrik Chatterjee Maybe it sounds Russian because it's so palatalized; something sounds like /t͡ʃ/, but it's probably a very, very palatalized /tʲ/. Something else sounds like /d͡ʒ/, but is probably a very, very palatalized /ðʲ/.

Wrik Chatterjee http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_phonology#Allophones

Robbin Michels Is this the end of the round?

Wrik Chatterjee It's the end of the Mandarin round. We're on a round in Irish.

Jake Kissinger Speaking of the Mandarin round, if I may digress & ask a question of Zev, you said that the last audio was written in one language and read in another. How was it written?

Zev Brȹk It was written in Classical Chinese (aka Literary Chinese aka Middle Chinese) by the 10th-century poet Li Yu, and sung in Modern Standard Mandarin by Teresa Teng.

Jake Kissinger Oh, OK; how would that look different from modern traditional Chinese characters? I suppose it would be pronounced rather differently.

Zev Brȹk It looks the same; that's the whole point. The written form has stayed stable while the vernacular has evolved, and thus it still looks quite antique to a Chinese reader, but can be sung like anything composed today, in a pronunciation incomprehensible to Li Yu, were he to hear it himself.

Christian James Meredith It's like bruking Middle English-esque wordship mid a comtemporary speech outworking.

Christian James Meredith Or like reciting Shakespeare without the same vowel and consonant system as that era.

Jake Kissinger Ah, I see; really, then, it's a lot like what we do do with Shakespeare in English.
Thanks for clearing that up; back to Gaelige!

Wrik Chatterjee A word that sounds like /sɛvatʲ/ is said twice, we think. We found "seibhte" in a dictionary. Does the aforementioned word she said mean "general" in the military sense; can two sounds be reversed like "bubble"in English?

Jake Kissinger ...Or theatre.

Jake Kissinger ...Or basically every -er in British orthography.

Wrik Chatterjee For the second sentence we have "vulnerable general [something] [something] cock-a-doodle-doo (or the sound a rooster makes) [something] general [something] [something]"

Andy Ayres How do folk! It's not even 6 am here, and I'm preparing to leave for the excursion - now you see why I had to go to bed early. Though that failed as I could not fall asleep, lay in bed most of the night with my eyes open, and now I'm going off on an energetic day with about 4 hours sleep :p. Let's see how you've done so far! I don't think coöperation like this is against the rules at all :). The only question is, if a collaborative effort gets you the win, who would host?

Jake Kissinger Which, for whatever reason, isn't verb initial & makes little sense. Basically, we don't have that much yet.

Jake Kissinger We thought of that, Andy; we didn't figure it that likely that we'll win, so we said we'd just cross that bridge when we come to it. It could come to the point where we have a disagreement about the final translation, eventually, in which case we would each post what we think.

Andy Ayres The first verb that you hear isn't quite say /tɛr/ - it's something even more common :). The word you're hearing is very similar to /sɛvat/ - it begins /sɛv/, but no t - listen to the second "sɛv**" and you might get a clearer picture of what the final part is." No reason or republic, vulnerable or general. With one or two minor exceptions, the words here are very common

Jake Kissinger For possible orthographic representation we have “Teir feilum réasún temóriug múing suarstín. Neatach seibhte ce gugail ghorbh bheorstinseo seibhte eágustina uarstinteo” for the first 2 sentences. IDK if any of that makes any sense, but there ya go; that could potentially be of assistance.

Jake Kissinger Oh, OK; we'll try to change that in light of your hints!

Andy Ayres That's pretty close, guys. I'm impressed :D. Especially feilum, which is one character away from resolution (whether it is a character to be added, or removed, I can't tell - if you get this word, a LOT of the context of the text will become clear :D.) Réasún is in the text, but the word separation is incorrect - part of the following word is actually part of réasún____. Ce is right, but spelt slightly different. A lot of words are really close but should be separated or attached to a neighbouring word. I'll leave you with that cryptic clue as I'm off on the road now! I will give a more detailed analysis when I get back.

Jake Kissinger ¡Vaya con Dios a Guadalupe!

Andy Ayres ¡Gracias, Jake! Intentaré a sacar algunas fotos y las publicaré aquí

Andy Ayres Evening folks! Had a great day in Guadalupe; the journey's left me quite knackered, but it was definitely worth it! A little tip for anyone interested in the round - listening for palatalisation and velarisation will be key to deciding the orthographical representation of the sounds :). Hope everyone's doing well and making headway! If you'd like, you can send me a phonetic account of what you've got so far, e.g. in IPA and I can tell you how close you are if that helps :).

Andy Ayres Good morning, folks. I thought I'd freshen the round up a bit by adding a recording of yours truly reading the text - albeit in an accent inspired by a different dialect than the one of the original recording, my knock-off attempt of doing my grand-dad's Irish Gaelic accent.

The first recording that I made, is a little fast - https://db.tt/l8ZgLzS3. The second is rather slower, and may help with ascertaining word divisions as well as with a few words that I find the recorded lady pronounces strangely: https://db.tt/dd7Pz7Dh.

Wrik Chatterjee Is the second word, which we transcribed as "feilum" and sounds like /fɛlum/ have anything to do with a festival of some kind? Féil is "festival," like "midsummer festival."

Jake Kissinger Also, is there any chance that these are 4 sentences of a quote from something and the last brief word or two identifies the source document or the name of the person who said that? That was just a hunch I had.

Wrik Chatterjee Hence the final word or two might be a proper name.

Christian James Meredith I may have to take a stab at this when I'm showered and whatnot

Wrik Chatterjee Another possible breakthrough-is the second word (the one that sounds a little like /fɛlum/ and that we transcribed as "feilum") actually "feilm," which means farm? If so, we've cleared up context quite a bit.

Wrik Chatterjee Is the fourth word "mór," which means "big?"

Jake Kissinger ...And the variation on réasún is réasúnta, “reasonable.”

Wrik Chatterjee A word that's repeated in the second and third sentences that we first thought sounded like "Nietzsche" now has an /l/ (something like /ɲe:ltʲət/). Are we getting warmer?

Arief Wibowo Just curious, can everybody help me test if you can access our Live page. I am making few minor adjustments to it

Here's a mini self-check questions to help the test:
1. Open http://sprogspelet.arwi.im/live/ , can you can see a Facebook button/icon?
2. Click on that button, do you get redirected to log in with Facebook?
3. After the log in, do you get redirected back to the Live page?
4. On the Live page, can you see the all comments/messages of this round? (at least, the last 3 comments by Wrik-Jake-Wrik)
5. (if you have speakers) can you hear a "welcoming" beep, and subsequently hear "new post" beep when new post come in?

Please let me know if and only if you answered "No" to any of the questions above.

You may silently ignore this message if you answered "Yes" to all, as not to pollute the ongoing round

(I will still know if it works... Mwahaha)

Thanks, Språkspelers!

Anna Robbins "Contents can and will act immature" LOL

Yes, Arief, everything checks out for me

and I tested the site from my mobile, hehehe.

As for the rest of what I had to say, I would love to join this round (I have a fondness for Irish), but I'm forcing myself to concentrate on my lovely circuitry, so I'll most likely pop in to check progress, but not participate

have a good one, Språkspelars!

Andy Ayres Good progress, Wrik and Jake! Glad to see things moving forward :). The second word is feilm/feirm (the lady says it as the former, being from Connacht), so that should really help with a lot of the words. It's not unusual for an epenthetic schwa to be inserted after an l/r and before a following consonant. The fourth word is mór. The third word is réasúnta! The "Nietzsche" is not a name or, for that matter, a single word - but your transcription of /ɲe:ltʲət/ is close. I'll fill in some of the gaps: nʲ_l __əd.

Everything's working fine for me too, Arief!

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter 24+ hours and no input, So let me defibrillate this round.
zzzzzap zzzzzap

Here's what I heard combined with some of other's attempt:
Ter feilum reasunta mor enguichi wordien ilschin scevic
kegewil kelior viel riel isvich
ar gusti nivsur metzior
ar ne, nyechig bord neheryeg
thorb i wardi keglior mortzhin
agskeniart kive

Sadly being very unfamiliar with Irish, I can't contribute much in this round...

Wrik Chatterjee In all seriousness, does a proper name come up anywhere in this recording?

Andy Ayres You know I'm hands-on, Vincensiu, but it's difficult to give feedback when there was nothing to give feedback on. At work until 10 pm over here, don't have much time to give detailed responses until then... and it's difficult to give accurate feedback without IPA, as I might give misguiding advice. I'll try later though when I'm not in front of a bunch of kids. But a proper name does indeed come up, more than once ;).

Дайте Нефть Из Баку I knew this way of sprogspelare would make casualties sooner or later. Maybe you could give the written text to make things quicker? Andy?

Jake Kissinger Well, Wrik & I have both been contributing but we have school & can't always be working on it as much as we'd like. I feel like there may be a few others working on it (Christian?) as well, just more quietly than us. I think Wrik & myself are not too far from getting it without the written text, which would surely be solved in a matter of hours.

Andy Ayres Is it really the case that transcribing Mandarin audio into Chinese characters - one of the most complex and multifaceted writing systems in the world - was possible with minimal need for assistance, but that slightly eccentric Gaelic, with an alphabet that can be cracked with a bit of reading about orthography rules, and all the help and reviews you could want, is impossible? I really hope not! I could post the text, but that would really undermine the achievement of the people working steadily towards cracking it :/.

A review is upcoming!

Andy Ayres It was a little difficult, as I'm not exactly sure what sounds are being represented by this transcription, but here's a review. It should hopefully help with word separation and with identifying some patterns.

[] incorrect, () close {} word separation error __ missing word/s or sound/s

T[er] FEILM RÉASÚNTA MÓR {e[n]gui(ch)i_} w(o)r(d)ien _il[schin] s[ce]vi[c]
kegewil (k)elior (v)iel {[r](ie)[l] isvich}
{a[r] gus(t)i ni[vsur] [m]e[tz]io[r]}
ar n[e], {ny[echig]} bo[rd] [neheryeg]
{[th](o)[r]b_ i} wa[rdi] (k)e[g]lior ___ m(o)rtzhin
{ag_s[ke]niart} ki[v]e

Billy James Brightraven These transcription systems are really becoming something these days...

Christian James Meredith Chinese is cinch when you've got a dictionary for it though. Irish is slightly harder to find info and decode the grammar IMO.

Jake Kissinger TBH I haven't actually really given it a go, I'm too distracted by other things hahaha.

Christian James Meredith Actually, what am I saying. Irish grammar isn't that hard. It's the bloody orthography.

See, I'm even forgetting my pet peaves. Next I'll say that Swedish is easy or something.

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter When I see an extremely difficult round, I have a faith that Andy will beat the shit out of the round to solve it. But when the cryptic round is hosted by Andy,
We don't have any warrior...

Billy James Brightraven Broad with broad, slender with slender!

Arief Wibowo I am a work-ridden warrior... Had I not have 2 systems to finish as soon as possible, I would've joined the stuggle!

Sarah Karoline I haven't had much chance to login into FB in general, so this is the reason for my absence this last week. I haven't abandoned the game

Christian James Meredith Vincensiu he's the hero we all want but don't deserve

Christian James Meredith Ok, before I attempt this, a very important question for Andy:
Is your voice naturally that deep?

Christian James Meredith OK:
Tá feilim réasúnta (lies! PIE *-nt- > -d- in Irisih!

) mór an múinte? (can't make out the rest)

(skipping everything here coz hard to pick morphemes, and I can't remember Irish orthography for the life of me)

Agus (skipping again)

... caora.

Agus = and, caora = sheep, tá = coupla, mór = big, and all I can find for Feilim is something to do with an alternate name for Ireland. Réasúnta = reasonable, too.

Christian James Meredith Now for pseudo IPA/XSAMPA/Gibberish:

/ta: fjeljim re:@sunt@ mo:r an mwintj@ wortjin. ni:l sh@t s@vish keg@ wi:l g@ ljo:r/lja:r fjeljim je:@ri s@vish. agus di:nj@ woshlinshja. Ar nøi ni:l sh@d boxt@ herj@t. ta: bi: wonj@ g@ ljo/a:rig mortjin ag@s njard ki:r@/

Guessing sh@t's should actually be SIAD (they), g@'s should be GO (that (subjunctive), until). There's apparently another feilim in there.

I'm guessing nøi is NAOI (nine).

s@vish should be something like simhis or sibhis or something like that, but I can't figure it out so maybe it's "sibh" (you) with something else. Possibly emphatic, but I would assume that would be "shivshe" rather. I really dunno.

Not sure but I suspect the word "cloud" might be in there (néal).

I find Scottish Gaelic easier to decode, "w"s in Irish Gaelic really throw me off!

Дайте Нефть Из Баку Ka mate, ka mate! Ka ora, ka ora!

Arief Wibowo Дайте Нефть Из Баку: Tenei te tangata puhuruhuru!

Christian James Meredith Ah, didn't realise it was Maori (/other Pn language) at first, until I saw "tangata"

Andy Ayres Afternoon folks! Prepare for at least one long, "click see more" post :p. I am relieved and delighted in equal measure to see the game move forward a bit! Just got back from working the morning. Lunch with the boss, come home, check sprogspelet for a little while, brief siesta, check it again, go to work at 4 again, come back at half ten, and then probably work through the exhaustion until at least midnight on other things. Living la vida loca.

Vincensiu: I'm glad that my resilience (to be complimentary)/obsessive desire to solve things (to be truthful :p) has helped out :D.

Christian: I like the Batman reference! I guess I'd be The Incredible Linguo if I were a superhero - but instead of doing futile things like saving damsels in distress and stopping crime, I intervene in difficult languages. Chinese isn't difficult with a dictionary? Mon dieu ! It's bloody hard with no tones. For each syllable, I had up to 60-70 different options for what could fit, sometimes even more! As for my voice, yes, it is how it is. Do you really think that I would go to the effort of learning how to change my voice, just so that I could get showered with questions exactly like this, and such compliments as "your voice is cryptlike", "your voice scares me", "you sound like a mummy coming back to life in an icy tomb", "are you a walker?", and so forth? I could do without all of that shite - hence my reluctance to post me talking initially - but would feel like a fraud if I didn't talk in my natural speaking voice. I can speak both lower and much higher, with some effort. I can sing from baritone up to counter-tenor... one party trick of mine when younger was to do a duet with myself, or to introduce myself in my ordinary speaking voice, and then sing three octaves higher :p.

Billy: Exactly! Irish orthography is easy if you take into account palatalisation and velarisation. Then, all the "useless vowels" actually serve a purpose and don't seem so random.

Sarah and Arief. Glad you're both still around! Your presence has been missed, but I know what it's like to be too ridden with work to contribute. Hopefully you might get a chance to get stuck in to this round at some stage :).

Next post: Actual info on the round :p

Andy Ayres Christian's first post: TÁ (yes!) FEILM RÉASÚNTA MÓR A[N] MUINT[E]_. Huzzah! Agus and caor[a] are correct too! Feilm is just a Connacht way of saying feirm (farm). In my recording, I say feirm rather than the frankly odd feilm :p. Agus = and, caor[a] = sheep, just a different word ending ;); tá = copula; mór = big. réasúnta = reasonable :D.

Now, to decode the XSAMPA/IPA blend ;).

Christian James Meredith Andy haha. I just can't picture your face and that voice for some reason. But being Australian, my voice is pretty high pitched compared to yours anyway, so it's hard to adjust! (e.g., I read most comments in my head for Caucasian males in a variation of my voice, so I'm "used" to everyone speaking a bit higher pitched than normal).

(It's said that we Australians like our rising intonation and speak out the front of our mouths - anyone know what the latter is called in proper linguistic terminology?)

Anyway, back to la game.

Andy Ayres You've done a brilliant job, Christian! Bravo! As well as getting most of the sounds right, you've distinguished all but a couple of the word boundaries. Knew this wasn't impossible :P! I am cheered :D.

taː fʲelʲim reːəsʊntə moːr an mwintʲ[ə_] wɔrtʲɪn. niːl ʃə(t) s(ə)vɪʃ {kegə} wiːl gə lʲɔːr {fʲelɪm jeːəri} səvɪʃ. agʊs diːnʲə {wɔʃl(ɪ)nʃʲ(a)}. ɑr nøi niːl ʃəd {bɔxtə} _ (h)erjə(t). taː b_iː wonjə gə {ljɔr[ɪ]g} mɔrtʲɪn agəs nʲar(d) kiːrʲə

[] no () almost {} fix word boundaries _ missing - the rest correct

Tips:
* Some of those /ɔ/-sounding vowels could well be á rather than o

* {bɔxtə} _ (h)erjə(t) is a difficult one; it's actually four words, but one of the words is not really pronounced at all, either in the lady's recording or mine. If you get the meaning of the last word, the three last words out of four's meanings will be clear. It could also be transcribed without the little monosyllabic and monoletral (made up word :P) word that isn't pronounced here, as both are acceptable alternatives to each other.
* You know it's about a farm - this will help immensely with a fair bit of the vocab
* What sounds like a final sh/zh could be a dialectical pronunciation of a palatalised r... could be

Christian James Meredith Oh, a hint (on farm!), gracias!

That's why I couldn't get it though, I knew one of youse was going for an "r" instead of an "l" so I was trying to figure it out, but now I know why.

Is "caora" something like "caoire" or like that? (genitive or plural?).

Hopefully someone can go through my horrific XSAMPA/IPA/English-fonetick-spi:ch and pull a few goodies outa it.

Christian James Meredith Darn you Irishmen-who-stayed-behind and somehow thought a: > O: was a clever idea!

Thanks for the clarification and IPA-icisation, I'm off for the night but hopefully someone can blitz it in my stead.

Andy Ayres Well, to your original post, I say, "Ní mar a shíltear a bhítear.." you can't judge a book by its cover. You have people who are more youthful than me with voices like Morgan Freeman :p. You are used to high pitches and up-talking... if you came to Birmingham you would be surprised... we àlways spèak lìke thìs (downstep). I've got more clues, but I'll separate them so that they aren't lost to those who don't click see more

Andy Ayres * It is the plural of caora, but the plural isn't caoire ;).

*You DO hear SIAD more than once there!

*The gë is usually "go" indeed! But it may have a different meaning to what you think sometimes ;).

* s@vish is s_ibhi_... recall what I said about sh/zh, and slender with slender, broad with broad... you're hearing sɪvʲɪrʲ~sɪvʲɪʒ, so you need to put something to stop the s before the i from becoming more of a sh. It's not related to sibh; a clue - it's an adjective.

* Not naoi, but it is n_oi__

Thanks for bringing the game forward, Christian! I knew it could be done and that I hadn't unleashed something unsolvable! As you go off to sleep and I go for a probably unsuccessful siesta, I bid you goodnight (God, bid you sounds so formal... but I like it anyway :P).

Jake Kissinger Christian, you haven't really given it much of a go, eh? I'm afraid of how fast you must solve these when you actually do! Fortunately, I think Wrik & I will have time today to take advantage of Australia's night & make further progress.

Jake Kissinger I actually like Irish orthography alright; it's clearer than English, at least. Lenition is a little weird, but no more than English digraphs like ch, sh, th, & ph, the latter of which is the same in Irish. I also like when that's written with a dot in uncial. Eclipsis is a lot weirder (In fact, let me ask, is there any in this excerpt? That could complicate things.), but at least there are clear rules for that, too. The vowels are strange & seem kind of arbitrary, but so do English vowels. As to the broad/slender distinction, in Romance languages & English (at least) the C & G both sound different before E or I; this comes from palatalization. Irish just applies a similar rule more consistently.

Jake Kissinger Also: an R can sound like a French J? This is perhaps more like the Mandarin round than I realized! There are sometimes hints of some kind of J in the Mandarin R, as in words like 日。

Andy Ayres Surreptitious brief login :p. That's the spirit, Jake! It's a beautiful orthography - it's logical too, but logical in its own way, a way that takes a little time to get used to :D. There is eclipsis in this text at least once, as you might expect. R > ɾʲ or rʲ to ʐ/ʒ is not too uncommon amongst world languages - think of Polish rz, which evolved from palatalised r

Christian James Meredith Andy yeah I've heard a Brummy (but he had a more neutralised accent) in real life before, they sound very sure and confident, but not in an arrogant way haha.

Christian James Meredith Jake well, I changed my mind after saying I haven't given it a go

Now I've given it a go. NO ONE CAN COMPLAIN NOW ò_ó

But back to seriousness, Andy thanks for the hints and whatnot, and thanks for the info with R > SH sound. Blimey, first "nt" and next a fricativised version of palatal r? What do you fellows think you are, Turkish Latin speakers?

Christian James Meredith On Mandarin R > J, refer to "Japan", where they *did* think R was a J sound

(Pinyin's "r" is sort of more accurate here, but they only went half way - they didn't make "ch" into "tr", "zh" into "dr" or "sh" into "sr" :-/ )

Christian James Meredith Also, I'm guessing "soibhir" knowing what I do about Irish orthgraphy. Oi > [i] and ui > [i].

Dammit, if only I remembered what I did with my "Irish-Germanic" conlang. That had a full-on Irish-esque orthography that at first was just me mucking around but ended up reconstructing the way vowels work by accident

Arief Wibowo The version of Mandarin I learned as a kid in Indonesia is: "jen2" instead of "ren2" (meaning: human), "jou4" instead of "rou4" (meaning: meat)...

Edit: And yes, "ji ben" instead of "ri ben" (Japan)

Andy Ayres Yes, it is soibhir!

Tá feirm réasúnta mór a[n] muint[e] wɔrtʲɪn. niːl siad soibhir...

Christian James Meredith Arief is that a mothertongue of yours or just a unique dialect in the area?

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter I think it is a localised dialect. Only used by people in Medan and surrounding cities.

Arief Wibowo My mothertongue is a mixture of bad Chinese and Indonesian. Considering I was born and raised in Jakarta, it's rather widespread in Indonesia... Indonesian Chinese perhaps?

Oh, my favorite bit, "wo yao ini" (I want this) and "wo yao itu" (I want that)

Wrik Chatterjee Is the word after mór ag, the present participle marker?

Jake Kissinger Is muint_ muintear or muintir, meaning something along the lines of family or clan?

Wrik Chatterjee Or tribe...

Wrik Chatterjee agus tine "and fire" or "and link(s)?"

Jake Kissinger We're using 3 dictionaries & can't find soibhir in any of them. I just realized our dictionaries are kind of old. Two are brittle things from our university's library, one of which was reprinted with additions in 1934. I can't find the date of the other one, but it's pages are yellow and fragile... I didn't really think about this, but I figured that we would be fine since we were also using an online dictionary, but I come to find out it's just an online version of one published in 1904. Then again, you said these are mostly common, basic words that I would think we should still be able to find. Is soibhir some kind of inflected or conjugated form of a word, so we need to look for the basic form? We've found a few words that look like they might be related.

Robbin Michels Is soibhir genitive?

Andy Ayres Hi there folks, very quick log in as I must l leave my house very son; on the way to Aracena any minute.I can help with soibhir and dictionary problem when I return. It's being used like an adjective here. It is ag, agus and muintir and you have found the right meanings :). Not tine though!

Robbin Michels nill
naíl
níl
noíl
nuíl
naoil
nuil
?

Wrik Chatterjee Complete random guess-is there a place name, maybe Worcestershire, in the first line?

Robbin Michels I don't know, I was dropping salvos hoping that one of the guesses are right, volleying.

Jake Kissinger Is the plural of caora caoirigh?

Robbin Michels Yes. http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/caora

Andy Ayres Evening folks. What a weird day! I'll write about it when I have more energy. Until then, I'm feeling benevolent :p, so I'll give you a few clues: soibhir is a variant of saibhir, whose meaning you will find rather more easily :p. Níl is the word you hear before siad: so "níl siad saibhir." There's no place names, but there is a person's name repeated twice in the text, including in the first line. Caoirigh is indeed the word you hear at the end of the text :).

Robbin Michels vóitín?

Christian James Meredith Caoirigh sounds like sheepish.

Wrik Chatterjee Does saibhir mean "fertile," "rich," or "wealthy?"

Robbin Michels My dictionary says "rich"

Jake Kissinger Yeah, I just found that, too.

Jake Kissinger Ortion is a name, but I think it's French. Andy, is the personal name the one that sounds like Ortion or Uartiun or something like that? The first line would then be something about how the Ortion/Uariun family farm is becoming reasonably big.

Wrik Chatterjee Yeah, and we think that this name is repeated in what sounds like Worcestershire after the lady lets out some epistemic angst about Nietzsche the Savage.

Robbin Michels I'm going to throw this as a guess "the big fair farm has the fertile pea" I know I am going to get this wrong, but it doesn't hurt to try.

Jake Kissinger So, we've got "_____'s family farm is becoming reasonably big" for the first sentence and something about wealth later, probably as a result of the reasonably large farm.

Andy Ayres There's no V in Irish orthography, Robbin ;). Jake - the name is so much more common and Irish than that ;). It's a first name; think about initial consonant mutation and palatalisation, those are my clues.

Soibhir/saibhir is indeed rich. I'll help you out a little with the first sentence: "_______'s family has a reasonably big farm". It literally means that there is a reasonably big farm AT family ____'s - that's the way that possession is usually indicated in Irish. Keep that in mind, because it may come in handy more than once in this text ;). That's the first sentence. Then you've got "níl siad saibhir..." as the beginning of a separate, second sentence.

Andy Ayres Afternoon, folks, and greetings from Badajoz in the middle of its carnaval! Here's another little bit of help. It seems the name is a bit of a stumbling block for further progress, so I'll help you out in the hope that it gets things moving again. What you're hearing in the gap is Mháirtín, the mutated form of the name Máirtín, which is also heard in the recording elsewhere. A quick refreshing look at Irish mutation and eclipsis tables will help with a few other words in the text

So here's what we've got so far. "Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Mháirtín. Níl siad soibhir...". "Martin's family has a reasonably big farm. They're not rich..."

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter Hello..... where are all the players??

Helene Wiinholt I haven't really played the last many rounds.

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter I have been absent for a while and now it is quite difficult for me to barge in this round

Christian James Meredith Me and Vincensiu also have just started university, so our minds are aflutter with educational aspirations and learning and discovery.

Billy James Brightraven read: alcohol...

Andy Ayres Shall I post the written transcription? Was kind of hoping that I wouldn't need to, especially after Christian's X-SAMPA/IPA lovechild transcription was so spot on, but if this round goes on for much longer... :/

Billy James Brightraven Wait, there's an IPA transc.? Count me in

Andy Ayres Huzzah! One moment

Marius Vincenzii Dennischter Ehemmm...
Billy I Actually don't drink alcohol, except in a very very special occasion

Andy Ayres Here's Christian's transcription, which I corrected a little/reviewed:

taː fʲelʲim reːəsʊntə moːr ag mwintʲ[ə_] wɔrtʲɪn. niːl ʃə(t) s(ə)vɪʃ {kegə} wiːl gə lʲɔːr {fʲelɪm jeːəri} səvɪʃ. agʊs diːnʲə {wɔʃl(ɪ)nʃʲ(a)}. ɑr nøi niːl ʃəd {bɔxtə} _ (h)erjə(t). taː b_iː wonjə gə {ljɔr[ɪ]g} mɔrtʲɪn agəs nʲar(d) kiːrʲə

[] no () almost {} fix word boundaries _ missing - the rest correct

Here's what has been found/what I've filled in so far:
Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir...

Andy Ayres Translation progress: "Martin's family has a reasonably big farm. They're not rich." Also agus (and), siad (conjugation of to be), and the final word caoirigh (sheep) have been found successfully.

Billy James Brightraven Hmm, I can't find any info on what /ø/ ought to be transcribed as in Irish. Halps?

Andy Ayres The diphthong there is written "óigh", and is sometimes pronounced as /oi/ or /u(i)/ too

Billy James Brightraven Am I correct in assuming all non-palatalised stops are to be read as velarised ones?

Andy Ayres For the most part, yes, but if you give me one moment, I'll make a closer transcription to move us forward

Andy Ayres Ok, Billy! I'm back. Bloody hell, inserting all those superscripts takes time. But here is an IPA transcription, with the gaps. Hope this helps!

tˠɑː ˈfʲɛɾʲəmʲ ɾʲeˈsˠuntˠə mˠoːɾˠ əgˠ ˈmwintʲɪɾʲ ˈwɑɾʲtʲinʲ. nʲilʲ ʃiədˠ ˈsˠɪvʲɪɾʲ ceː gˠə wɪlʲ gˠə lʲoːɾ ˈfʲɛɾʲəmʲeɾˠi ˈsˠɪvʲɪɾʲ ˈagəsˠ ˈdˠiːnʲə 'uəʃl̠ʲə ənʲˈʃɔ. ɑɾˠ/ɛɾˠ nˠøi nʲilʲ ʃiədˠ bˠɔxtˠ ax ə ˈɛɾʲədˠ tˠɑː bʲeji ˈbˠan̠ʲə gˠə lʲoːɾ əgˠ ˈmɑɾʲtʲinʲ ˈagəsˠ nʲaɾtˠ ˈkˠiːɾʲə

Billy James Brightraven Excellent. Now I can run my replace script.

Billy James Brightraven Orthographical guesstimating:
Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir cé go bhfuil go leór ?feirmer?ui? saibhir agus doín(ə) ?uaisela [etc.]

Andy Ayres Good stuff! () is a minor error - usually a diacritic that needs to be added or removed - [] is wrong, _ is a gap. Here's the first two sentences:

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go le(ó)r feirm(e)_r[u](i) saibhir agus d_o(í)n_ uais[e]l[a] _____.

Billy James Brightraven Again,

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoin uaisle an seo ar nóigh níl sead boicht ach…

Andy Ayres Good! A few letters to add, one letter to remove, and one word boundary to change and it's sorted :).

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoir_ saibhir agus daoin_ uaisle {an seo}. Ar n_óigh níl s[e]ad bo[i]cht ach…

Billy James Brightraven Weird, I have no clue why I've been dropping the e in daoine.

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo. Ar naóigh níl siad bocht ach a fheiread tá be dhi buania go leor ag Máirtín agus neart cuírea.

Billy James Brightraven So far, I've glossed
tá = is
feirm = farm
réasúnta = reasonably
mór = big, large
ag = forms possesive together with forms of bí
muintir = parents, family
níl = contracted form of ni fhuil, "is not"
siad = they
bhfuil = eclipsed form of fuil, "is"
go leor = enough
cé go = even though
feirmeoirí = farmers
saibhir = rich
daoine uaisle = noble people
anseo = here
bocht = poor
fheiread = ferret, lenited, from feiread (if I'm not mistaken)
naóigh = naoch? can't find a translation
ar = on [prep.]

Andy Ayres Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo. < perfect

Ar n_óigh níl siad bocht ach a [fh]eiread. < almost perfect. No a is required before the óigh - it's already broad, so it must be another phenomenon taking place ;).

tá {be_[dh]i__} b[u]a_n[i]_[a] go leor ag Mártín agus n[i]art [kuí]ri[a] < a k in Irish? sacrilege :p

Billy James Brightraven Check my edited post :p

Billy James Brightraven And darn that last word! Back to the sketching board.

Andy Ayres neart's correct. cuírea... well! Luckily, Jake and Wrik (who may want to get into play given that things are nearing the end!) found the last word already: caoirigh :p

Billy James Brightraven Ahhhhhhhh!

Andy Ayres tá = is ✔
feirm = farm ✔
réasúnta = reasonably ✔
mór = big, large ✔
ag = forms possesive together with forms of bí ✔
muintir = parents, family ✔
níl = contracted form of ni fhuil, "is not" ✔
siad = they ✔
bhfuil = eclipsed form of fuil, "is" ✔
go leor = enough ✔ (though I'd translate it slightly differently, with the other main sense of the word)
cé go = even though ✔
feirmeoirí = farmers ✔
saibhir = rich ✔
daoine uaisle = noble people ✔ (gentry)
anseo = here ✔
bocht = poor ✔
fheiread = ferret, lenited, from feiread (if I'm not mistaken) X
naóigh = naoch? can't find a translation X
ar = on [prep.] ✔ (but not translated as such - ar n_óigh is a set phrase

Billy James Brightraven n-óigh?

Andy Ayres nope. There's a letter in the gap: n_óigh

Andy Ayres Ar n*óigh is by no means a rare phrase

Billy James Brightraven Hmm, is /ˈbˠan̠ʲə/ = baineadh?

Andy Ayres Whoops. That should readˈvˠan̠ʲə - I instinctively transcribed the root word rather than the mutated word, to give you a little clue. You're getting close: It's bhain_e[adh].

Billy James Brightraven Aha, I think I figured out the verb. Just to find out what form it is in. Is it a form of bain, to cut/harvest?

Andy Ayres I can see why you'd think it would be a verb, but in this phrase ˈvˠan̠ʲə is not a verb, but a noun that is being possessed "...ag Máirtín". In a way, it's modifying the other noun that precedes it

Billy James Brightraven I still can't figure out whatˈɛɾʲədˠ should be transcribed as.

Is there an initial consonant that's been deleted?

Andy Ayres No missing initial, but for what it's worth, a less common but slightly more intuitive pronunciation of the word is /ˈɪɾʲədˠ/, which may help you make a guess at the missing letter. Also, ach a _iread or ach _iread is a relatively common set expression :).

Billy James Brightraven Oh, ach a oiread! I thought you'd approved my []eiread :p

Andy Ayres Yes! Ach (a) oiread it is :D.

Billy James Brightraven Updated glossary:

tá = is
feirm = farm
réasúnta = reasonably
mór = big, large
ag = forms possesive together with forms of bí
agus = and
muintir = parents, family
níl = contracted form of ni fhuil, "is not"
siad = they
bhfuil = eclipsed form of fuil, "is"
go leor = enough, sufficient
cé go = even though
feirmeoirí = farmers
saibhir = rich
daoine uaisle = noble people
anseo = here
bocht = poor
ar = on
ar ndóigh= of course
ceart = fair, just
ach a oiread = either (after negative)
caoirigh = sheep

New guess:

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín.
“Martin's family has a reasonably big farm”

Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo.
“They are not rich, even though there are many rich farmers and gentry here.”

Ar ndóigh níl siad bocht ach a oiread tá be_ghi_ bhain_e go leor ag Máirtín agus neart caoirigh.
“Of course, they aren’t poor either, Martin's harvest is sufficient and there's plenty of sheep.

Andy Ayres Getting very close!

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín. Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo. Ar ndóigh níl siad bocht ach a oiread. - and translation = perfect

Tá be****gh bhain*e go leor ag Máirtín agus neart caoirigh.
Martin's harvest is sufficient = no
and there's plenty of sheep = yes

Billy James Brightraven New guess:

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín.
“Martin's family has a reasonably big farm”

Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo.
“They are not rich, even though there are many rich farmers and gentry here.”

Ar ndóigh níl siad bocht ach a oiread tá beithígh bhainne go leor ag Máirtín agus neart caoirigh.
“Of course, they aren’t poor either, Martin's cow milk is sufficient and there's plenty of sheep.

Better phrased as: Martin has enough cow milk and plenty of sheep.

Andy Ayres So, so close... again, the only issue is the interpretation of beithígh bhainne. Modifier is always after the modified noun and not vice versa in Irish, so bainne (milk) is modifying beithígh. Resolve that, and you've more than likely won the round :D!

Billy James Brightraven Ohhhh.
I amend the final sentence to “Martin's dairy cow is enough and there's plenty of sheep.”

Andy Ayres One minor change required! (Although, you'd have to provide the full translation in a single post for me to approve it as the winner, right?) It's beithígh, not beithíoch ;).

Billy James Brightraven Actually no, Andy! We've had many round victories given by fixing one last word.

but I'll fix it.

Tá feirm réasúnta mór ag muintir Máirtín.
“Martin's family has a reasonably big farm”

Níl siad saibhir, cé go bhfuil go leor feirmeoirí saibhir agus daoine uaisle anseo.
“They are not rich, even though there are many rich farmers and gentry here.”

Ar ndóigh níl siad bocht ach a oiread tá beithígh bhainne go leor ag Máirtín agus neart caoirigh.
“Of course, they aren’t poor either, Martin's dairy cattle is sufficient and there's plenty of sheep.

Andy Ayres Ah, I didn't know, every time I've provided the last word, people have told me that I had to supply the whole translation in order to win :/! Makes more sense for it not the required.

And yes!!!!!!!! We have a winner! At last!

Billy James Brightraven Ah, well, if you're just fixing one word of someone else's post I guess people have seen it fit to ask for the whole stjälcuri'd and corrected post. Not so common with fixing one's own translation though, I'd think… I haven't been too active the last 10 rounds.

and woohoo!

I'll think of something…

Andy Ayres Comhghairdeas leat, a Billy!

Andy Ayres The lack of a mutation after "a" for your name bothers me, but we're supposed to leave non-Irish names alone, safe from the world of lenition and eclipsis :p!

Round
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