Monday 8 May 2017

Brobdingnagian language

(?) approximate, guessed

Brobdingnag - (name of a country) : not mentioned
Grildrig - a tiny man : Part 2, Chapter 2 (2,2)
Glumdalclitch - a little nurse : 2,2
splacnuck - a six-foot long animal : 2,2
grulrud - town crier : 2,2
Lorbrulgrud - Pride of the Universe : 2,2
Slardral - gentleman usher : 2,3
relplum scalcath - freak of nature, unrestrained person
glomglung - a unit of measurement; three glomglungs correspond to 54 English miles (86.9 kilometres) : 2,4
Flanflasnic - a city "within eighteen English miles of the seaside" (28.97 kilometres) : 2,8



The limited phonology of Brobdingnagian might be due to Gulliver not recording much of that language, unlike his record of the Lilliputian language.

The possible phonemes of Brobdingnagian are:

Vowels:

a, ei, o, u (for /ʌ/ and possibly /u/)

a is most likely pronounced as /a/ (especially before l or r), or perhaps as /æ/ in words such as "splacnuck", and "Flanflasnic".

i and o are used less frequently, while e only appears in one word: "relplum scalcath"

u, from its usage in the transcription used by Swift for Brobdingnagian, appears to be pronounced as /ʌ/. One possible exception is the word "grulrud", in which the first u might be pronounced as /u/.

Alternatively, a represents a long /aː/ while u represents a short /a/. so the vowels might instead be listed as a, e, i, o.

Consonants:

b, c/-ck, d, f, g, l, m, n, -ngp, r, s, tch, -th

c or -ck is pronounced as /k/

-ng is most likely pronounced as /ŋ/

tch represents the /t͡ʃ/ sound.

th is most likely pronounced as /θ/

Consonant clusters:

Consonant clusters frequently appear in Brobdingnagian words.

bdbr, cl, cndr, fl, gl, gr, lclcl, ldr, lgr, lpl, md, mglnfl, ngn, rbr, sc, sl, spl

Phonotactics:

Brobdingnagian words and names tend to end in consonants, such as: c/ck, d, g, l, m, ng, tch, or th.

d and g tend to be the more common consonant endings.

(This information is gathered from "Gulliver's Travels", by Jonathan Swift, from a copy published by Collins Classics.)

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