nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Signs and symbols: Writing systems (hieroglyphs, nail writing) and Signed Toki Pona; unofficial scripts too
Signoj kaj simboloj: Skribsistemoj (hieroglifoj, ungoskribado) kaj la Tokipona Signolingvo; ankaŭ por neoficialaj skribsistemoj
janMato
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

jan Akesimun wrote: Not very pona I guess, but maybe something good will come of having at least 17 ways of communicating in tp.
- I'm biased because I proposed it, but the military alphabet solves a practical problem without adding words or resorting to proper modifiers. I hoping the proper modifier based spelling systems die out in usage.

- All the syllabaries and single symbol per word systems solve a real problem-- phonetic spelling is unnecessarily verbose and Twitter and Toki Lili are popular forums for toki pona where you can't say much in 140 letters, but you can say a reasonable amount in 70-140 words (depending on if you use spaces).

- I think that the potential for small languages in the medical field is very interesting. When I go deaf, I will first teach my friends and family toki pona sign language-- they are more likely to succeed. ASL is a real language, probably similar to Chinese in complexity (minus the tones).

- Since toki pona is a recreational language, tengar and all the other pretty fonts are good for their goal-- entertainment.

'd put toki pona braille in the category of a recreational font-- should my eyes get poked out, I'll use ordinary braille.
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jan Ote
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by jan Ote »

janMato wrote: the military alphabet solves a practical problem without adding words or resorting to proper modifiers.
It's a very good spelling system, but - regardless of being called 'an alphabet' - it's not a script, a writing system. That's why I haven't included it in the list of writing systems for toki pona. Additionally, I haven't listed proposed writings that were not completed, e.g. smiley talk, Chinese characters or Kanji at the time of creating the page.
janMato
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

jan Ote wrote:smiley talk, ....
Smiley's still aren't finished and the license on smiley images isn't clear-- it looks like they guy got images from somewhere else.

Yup, character word names isn't really a writing system.
leoboiko
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by leoboiko »

What, no one has done Runic yet?
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

toki pona can be transliterated into any alphabetic system with 14 letters.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/vikings/runes.html <-- This works for runes, albeit with GIF output. I'll keep looking for a ttf rune font so I can add it to my website.

This is a huge page of links that will transliterate into tons of phonetic systems: http://www.omniglot.com/links/yournamein.htm

Phonetic Egyptian Hieroglyphs:
http://www.harcourtschool.com/activity/ ... +toki+Keme
leoboiko
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by leoboiko »

Yes, but one has to choose one of Elder Futhark, Medieval etc., then choose which runes the (assumed) historical usage matches Toki Pona phonemes most closely, and propose that as a system for TP. I know, that hardly counts as “work”, but it’s a teensy bit of work nonetheless. Here’s a simple proposal using Elder Fuþark.

Table

Reconstructed Proto-Germanic rune names taken from Wikipedia.

Edit: If you can’t see runes in this post, try installing a font like Junicode.

Code: Select all

/p/     ᛈ       perþo
/t/     ᛏ       tīwaz
/k/     ᚲ       kaunan
/s/     ᛊ       sōwilō
/m/     ᛗ       mannaz
/n/     ᚾ       naudiz
/l/     ᛚ       laguz
/j/     ᛃ       jēra
/w/     ᚹ       wunjō

/a/     ᚨ       ansuz
/e/     ᛖ       ehwaz
/i/     ᛁ       īsaz
/o/     ᛟ       ōþalan
/u/     ᚢ       ūruz
[/size]

Sample Texts
mi sitelen kepeken sitelen Luno. ni li musi tawa mi.
ᛗᛁ᛬ᛊᛁᛏᛖᛚᛖᚾ᛬ᚲᛖᛈᛖᚲᛖᚾ᛬ᛊᛁᛏᛖᛚᛖᚾ᛭ᛚᚢᚾᛟ᛭ ᛫ ᚾᛁ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛗᚢᛊᛁ᛬ᛏᚨᚹᚨ᛬ᛗᛁ


Please forgive my Toki Pona, I’m still learning. I rendered “runes” as “Luno”, following the Proto-Germanic etymology *Runo.

An excerpt from the Edda, with clumsy Toki Pona version by me:
Hot art thou, fire! | too fierce by far;
Get ye now gone, ye flames!
The mantle is burnt, | though I bear it aloft,
And the fire scorches the fur.
seli o, sina seli! sina wawa mute!
sina o pini! seli o!
mi kama e ni: len li lon sewi. taso len li pakala seli.
seli li seli kin e selo.
ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛟ᛬ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ ᛫ ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᚹᚨᚹᚨ᛬ᛗᚢᛏᛖ ᛫
ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᛟ᛬ᛈᛁᚾᛁ ᛫ ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛟ ᛫
ᛗᛁ᛬ᚲᚨᛗᚨ᛬ᛖ᛬ᚾᛁ᛬ᛚᛖᚾ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛚᛟᚾ᛬ᛊᛖᚹᛁ ᛫ ᛏᚨᛊᛟ᛬ᛚᛖᚾ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛈᚨᚲᚨᛚᚨ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ ᛫
ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᚲᛁᚾ᛬ᛖ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛟ ᛫


Same text, but justified (which kinds of ruins the verses, since my translation has no regular metric):

ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛟ᛬ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛫ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᚹᚨᚹᚨ᛬ᛗᚢᛏ
ᛖ᛫ᛊᛁᚾᚨ᛬ᛟ᛬ᛈᛁᚾᛁ᛫ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛟ᛫ᛗᛁ᛬ᚲᚨᛗᚨ᛬ᛖ
᛬ᚾᛁ᛬ᛚᛖᚾ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛚᛟᚾ᛬ᛊᛖᚹᛁ᛫ᛏᚨᛊᛟ᛬ᛚᛖᚾ᛬ᛚ
ᛁ᛬ᛈᚨᚲᚨᛚᚨ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛫ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᛚᛁ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛁ᛬ᚲᛁᚾ
᛬ᛖ᛬ᛊᛖᛚᛟ᛫


Punctuation and conventions

I’m no runologist, and I’m not familiar with historical punctuation usage in runic alphabets, so I came up with punctuation rules that feel “runey” to me. Plase consider this a suggestion and improve as you see fit.

Text can be broken in lines or just run continuously, in which case it should be typeset so that all lines have approximately the same width. Words are separated by a double punctuation mark (᛬) instead of spaces, like in the Codex Runicus. Sentences are separated by an interpunct (᛫), optionally surrounded by spaces.

There’s no equivalent for “!”, “?”, “:” and “,”, so these are ommited. That means you lose some information compared to the standard toki pona alphabet, and need (even) more context.

Proper names are surrounded by cross-puncts (᛭): “ ᛃᚨᚾ᛭ᚲᛖᚾ᛭ ”. The cross-punct substitutes a double-punct (word separator), but not a sentence separator. Though the double-punct is only used between two words, the cross-punct is always on both sides of a proper name, even if there’s no next word.

Disclaimer: I don’t actually know runes, Proto-Germanic, or Toki Pona for that matter.
Last edited by leoboiko on Tue Dec 28, 2010 8:35 am, edited 5 times in total.
janMato
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

Cool! By any chance do you know what encoding you posted? (Is that some true type font, unicode, etc?) I'm seeing all squares. I'll definitely implement a transliterator for this once the details are worked out.

Also I don't see Thor's rune (Thurisaz). Maybe if we could add some digraphs to avoid snubbing the wrong god and getting struck down with lightning.
leoboiko
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by leoboiko »

Oh, sorry. I’m using Unicode runes; you should see them as long as you have an Unicode font covering that alphabet (some free fonts that do include Junicode and Code2000).

Thurisaz is the rune for the /θ/ sound, as in English “think”… or, well, “Thor” (it’s actually the source of the old English letter thorn, or þorn, before they changed it to “th”). Since toki pona doesn’t has a /θ/ sound, it doesn’t need it. The rune for a regular /t/ is ᛏ, Tīwaz.

AFAIK, for the ancients the rune names were just names, not mystical “meanings” as new-age dudes came to think. So I don’t think old Þórr will mind my not including the letter of his name. (It’s true that the people of old ascribed magical properties to runic inscriptions, but the magic was in the words, not in the alphabet. Inscriptions in the Latin alphabet were just as magical.)
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

leoboiko wrote:Oh, sorry. I’m using Unicode runes; you should see them as long as you have an Unicode font covering that alphabet (some free fonts that do include Junicode and Code2000).

Thurisaz is the rune for the /θ/ sound, as in English “think”… or, well, “Thor” (it’s actually the source of the old English letter thorn, or þorn, before they changed it to “th”). Since toki pona doesn’t has a /θ/ sound, it doesn’t need it. The rune for a regular /t/ is ᛏ, Tīwaz.
leoboiko wrote:AFAIK, for the ancients the rune names were just names, not mystical “meanings” as new-age dudes came to think.
Asatru is actually a new religion that started in the 1970 in the US (mostly from ren-faire re-enactors), and in Iceland (because to date people still have some syncretic Christian-Heathen beliefs). Many Asatruar are reconstructionists that take pains to find archeological and historical support for their use of runes-- for example, there some weak support for historical use of the runes for drawing lots, for writing curses and the like. It's Wicca that is a new-age mostly-made-up religion (not to put down Wicca, any religion that works in nudism and witches must be fun). In any case runes for magic, regardless to historical accuracy, is now a modern living tradition, same as Wicca.

Interestingly, modern Asatruar don't like spaces " " or "blank runes" because there is no support for them in history, so I guess a runic tp would be without spaces between the words.
leoboiko wrote:So I don’t think old Þórr will mind my not including the letter of his name.
I'm not sure I'd want to take the risk. I'd map the 14 letters to the 24 elder Futhark with 10 letters being mapped 2 or more times to one tp phoneme, the same way that c and k often have the same phoneme in English. Without the other 10 letters, we'd have to adapt runic spells as well.
leoboiko wrote:(It’s true that the people of old ascribed magical properties to runic inscriptions, but the magic was in the words, not in the alphabet. Inscriptions in the Latin alphabet were just as magical.)
I see your point, but ancient peoples didn't make fine distinctions between words, alphabets and language. More precise to say, they made a lot fewer fine distinctions about anything. toki pona has a very ancient feel in this respect because generally you are unable to make fine distinctions, even when you want to and are trying to be clever.
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Re: nasin sitelen ali pi toki pona

Post by janMato »

I created a toki pona to rune transliterator using your proposal

http://tokipona.net/tp/Runes.aspx

I have some minor typos and stuff to fix but it mostly works.

I, or someone, still needs to map the remaining 10 letters to toki pona letters. One interesting possibility is that if t and th were the same sound, then one could pick from the options at random, giving some words many, many different possible spellings.
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