I postulate that there are basically four varieties of scripts, or written languages. (This is how they are used on Earth. If you want to use another definition of Alphabetic Scripts, I fear that I cannot follow you.)
There are of course many written languages (if not most) that fall between these. Real world Hebrew, for instance, is falls somewhere between syllabic and alphabetic script, as it has no vowels, and therefore does not always differentiate between syllables in spelling. Cuneiform writing was used by several different languages and varied from an almost pure logographic to a logosyllabic script (and has in fact also been used as a Syllabic script by later msytics).
Pure Logographic scripts are (and have been) very rare in the real world; even Chinese has ways to represent syllables.
Nor are modern languages written with Latin alphabet(s) purely Alphabetical.
The "a" character in English, for instance, can represent more than one sound
(as in "that" versus "father"). We also use several ideograms; &, . , =, ?, %,
§, ;-)
The most pure alphabetical script would be something like the International
Phonetic Transcription.
A script does not become alphabetic by being composed out of smaller components. It is alphabetical by virtue of describing how to make the sounds (that build up the syllables) that is the spoken word.
The Chinese sign for Rider is the sign of a man superimposed on a horse (if I remember it correctly). This does not make chinese an alphabetical script.
Now, I think that Gloranthan Western script is Logographic, or perhaps rather Logosyllabic, vary much like later cuneiform writing.
The main content of a cuneiform logograph is an idea or concept, say "Mountain". Sometimes this is used for its syllabic content, which is often dependent on the speaker. An English speaker could use the same character to represent the syllable "Mou", while a Swedish speaker who reads it still understands it as "(the concept) Mountain" but pronounces it "Berg" and would read the syllable as "Ber".
You see: A character represents an idea/concept, but can, depending on the reader, represent different syllables.
This is wildly different from an alphabetic script where one character represents one sound. Now this varies a little with the language spoken, but are on the whole similar. The Latin alphabet is not exactly uniform throughout all languages where it is used, but on the whole is quite similar. An "A" is basically the same sound no matter who speaks, it is never pronounced like a "B".
What do we know about Western written language?
They "All share the same written language, termed Western, though the spoken languages differ. Hence, literate Westerners can always communicate by writing." (Glorantha Box, Book of Glorantha, p.35)
Western script is very old, as I understand it the oldest in Glorantha, indeed even older than western spoken languages. Written languages seem to have a tendency to start out as pictographic and quickly evolve to logographic as you add symbols for abstract concepts.
It has not been reformed. _All_ literate westerners share the same written language, even ageless Brithini. The Blue Book of Zzabur and the Abiding Book are legible by all Westerners.
The Western written language was first used by the Tadeniti, who did not have a
spoken language. Without a spoken language, why should their script represent
the sounds of a spoken language?
Peter Metcalfe:
> They had a thought language.
> Even ideas require simpler concepts and propositions on which
> to ground them.
But a character representing a thought (concept) (or the building block of a concept, whatever that is) is an ideo-gram. It does not represent the sound used to speak out the word, which is what an alphabetical script would do.
A modern form of Logographic script, which has good use in computer programming, is of course Symbolic Logic. (W = ~A = L) and many more expressions I doubt I can transfere by way of e-mail.
I think that the Tadeniti were given the Written Language by God (or one of his
prophets/saints/whatever). And that each character represented a concept, which
is not just the building blocks of the language, but also the building blocks
of the World.
I think this is what makes sorcery possible. You have symbols that
_accurately_ represents parts of the world, as well as symbols that represent
transformations. Rather like Runes.
And rather apt, in my eyes, for the Kingdom of Logic.
Later, when the written language had spread to people who had a spoken language
as well, such as the Kachasti, characters were sometimes used for a syllabic
value.
As time passed spoken languages started to sound different (and were
perhaps different from the beginning) in locations remote from each other.
People still ised the same script, where the character for "mountain" still
meant "mountain". But the syllables it represented were different.
Sometimes they even represented the original syllables, sometimes not.
The script was basically unchanged. Oh, at first you drew the Mountain character like *this*, and at other times and places like *this*. But they are still recognizable as the same character, the difference being more like the differnece between different typefaces.
I do not think that Western is an alphabetic script, and that all literate
Westerners learn the Western equivalent of Latin (Brithini?), as the Glorantha
Box firmly states that litarate Westerners only can communicate by writing.
Had they all learned Brithini they would, like medieval Europeans, been able to
communicate with each other by speaking it. Yes, they would consider the others
to have very funny ways of pronouncing it, but it could be done.
The alphabetical script tells you basically how to speak it out loud, then you
must translete the word.
(No, this is not always true for modern readers, we can often skip the
subvocalizing part, as we are so used to reading.)
I also Refute the argument that Westerners must use Alphabetical script because Medieval Westerners used such a script, or because the Bible, or the Koran, is written using (more or less) alphabetical scripts. There are many similarities between Orlanth and Thor. Does this make Orlanth ride a chariot drawn by goats?
Me:
> >You are not implying, I hope, that Auld Wyrmish is alphabetic, or
> >even syllabic. That seems very odd for a language that is largely
> >unpronounceable by humans ;-)
>
Peter Metcalfe:
> I am so implying. I have pointed out before that the 25%
> limit on Auld Wyrmish only applies to the spoken form and to
> not the written form, which is stated to have been invented
> by "clever humans".
Yes, but again, how do you write alphabetically a word which you cannot pronounce. A word, which, indeed, does not even have a phonetical component?
End of The Glorantha Digest V7 #765
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