It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart,

so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place.

It pulls up the rotten roots,

so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. ― Rumi

[Note: This update is still in proposal stage]

Background

Two years ago, the beta version of Toaq was published. This means two years of data and two years of work on the lexicon. The original beta design started out with a set of 680 possible monosyllabic root forms, which was then extended more and more by allowing additional syllable endings, eventually approaching a number slightly above 800 possible syllables. But the more roots got assigned, the more apparent it became that that number was still too small. The effect was that many very important concepts could not receive appropriate root forms. Even more additional (mostly unfavorable) syllable endings had to be introduced to make enough room for all the core concepts with yet unassigned forms. But it was clear that this was not a satisfactory solution.



After a lot of back and forth on possible ways to extend root space in a more sustainable way and after much number juggling, we converged on the addition of three two new phonemes: two one vowel phoneme and one consonant phoneme.



The new vowel

The new vowel phoneme is named /ə/, spelled ⟨y⟩. Its canonical allophones are as follows:

/ə/ Allophones: [ə], [ɯ], [ɤ] The most important phonological rules are*: /ə/ -> [ə] / [+vowel] _ /ə/ -> [ɯ] / [+consonant] _

(*These rules are optional. It is acceptable to choose freely from among [ə], [ɯ], [ɤ].)

The new phoneme participates in a variety of new diphthongs, which will be listed below along with the other syllable endings.

A new consonant

The new consonant phoneme is the affricate /d͡z/, spelled ⟨z⟩, which is the voiced counterpart of the already existing /t͡sʰ/. Not only does it add almost 70 root forms, but those root forms include the highly valuable CV, Cai, Cao and CVq shapes.

This is the new complete list of consonants:

Labial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal Nasals m n ŋ (only coda) Plosives pʰ b tʰ d kʰ g ʔ Affricates t͡sʰ d͡z t͡ɕʰ d͡ʑ Fricatives f s ɕ h Taps ɾ Laterals l

Syllable endings

This is the complete list of syllable endings:

Ending Group Phonemic spelling Canonical phonetic realization a /a/

/aŋ/

/ai/

/ao/

/aə/ [a]

[aŋ]

[aɪ]

[aːʊ]

[aːə] / [a:ɯ] u /u/

/uə/

/uəŋ/

/uŋ/

/ua/

uaŋ/

/ui/

/uo/

/uoŋ/

/ue/

/uai/

/ueŋ/

/uao/ [uː]

[uːə]

[uːəŋ]

[ʊŋ]

[uːɐ]

[uːɐŋ]

[ʊɪ]

[uːo]

[uːɔŋ]

[uːɛ]

[uːɐɪ]

[uːɛŋ]

[uaːʊ] i /i/

/iə/

/iəŋ/

/iŋ/

/ia/

/iaŋ/

/iu/

/io/

/ioŋ/

/ie/

/ieŋ/

/iai/

/iɯ/

/iao/ [iː]

[iːə]

[iːəŋ]

[ɪŋ]

[iːɐ]

[iːɐŋ]

[iːu]

[iːo]

[iːɔŋ]

[iːɛ]

[iːɛŋ]

[iːɐɪ]

[iːy]

[iaːʊ] o /o/

/oə/

/oəŋ/

/oŋ/

/oa/

/oaŋ/

/oi/

/oai/

/oe/

/oeŋ/

/ou/ [oː]

[oːə]

[oːəŋ]

[ɔŋ]

[oːɐ]

[oːɐŋ]

[ɔɪ]

[oːɐɪ]

[oːɛ]

[oːɛŋ]

[ɔʊ] e /e/

/eə/

/eəŋ/

/eŋ/

/ea/

/eaŋ/

/ei/

/eai/

/eo/

/eoŋ/ [ɛː]

[eːə]

[eːəŋ]

[ɛŋ]

[eːɐ]

[eːɐŋ]

[ɛɪ]

[eːɐɪ]

[eːʊ]

[eːɔŋ] ə /ə/

/əŋ/

/əa/

/əaŋ/

/əi/

/əo/

/əai/ [ɯː]

[ɯŋ]

[ɯːɐ]

[ɯːɐŋ]

[ɯɪ]

[ɯːʊ]

[ɯːaɪ]

The number of possible monosyllabic roots this inventory yields is 1121 (This number may change, however, as the exact set of endings is not finalized).

New glyphs will also be added to the the native Toaq script.