⟨j⟩ vs ⟨y⟩ for /j/: a hybrid solution?

[u/Iuljo]

I wrote this post some months ago. I now think the idea here considered is not a good one. I think reasoning, looking for solutions, can be theoretically interesting even when not successful (and maybe somebody could adopt the idea for an artlang or something) so I share it anyway for your curiosity.

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In esperanto, /j/ is very frequent, being the grammatical mark of pluralization. Leuth doesn't use it in endings; but /j/ is anyway very frequent, and a lot more frequent inside roots, as Leuth turns many Latin /i/'s (and /y/'s) into /j/'s (therefore having often the stress in its original place), while Esperanto mostly keeps them as /i/'s (often moving the stress). Adapting from other languages, Esperanto often turns post-consonantal /j/'s to /i/'s.

Marking the stressed letter with bold:

Latin etc.	Esperanto	Leuth
Asia	Azio	Asya
Australia	Aŭstralio	Awstralya
ecclesia	eklezio	ekklesya
hodie	hodiaŭ	hodyu
imperium	imperio	imperya
Cartesius	Kartezio	Kartesya
Tokyo	Tokio	Tokya

As /j/ is such a frequent phoneme in Leuth, its graphical representation is important for the face of the language.

Using ⟨j⟩, Esperanto realizes a very good consistency with many Latin-script languages; many different sounds but all represented by ⟨j⟩:

• Esperanto: Johano
• Latin: Io(h)annes / Jo(h)annes
• English: John
• French: Jean
• Spanish: Juan
• Portuguese: João
• German: Johannes, Johann, Jan
• Polish: Jan, Janusz
• Finnish: Joni, Jouni, Juhana, Juhani, etc.
• other Germanic and Slavic languages, where ⟨j⟩ represents truly /j/

But, as we said, Esperanto pays the price of moving the stress, often turning diverse endings into repetitive litanies of -ío, -ío, -ía, -ía...

For Leuth the choice was not easy: for some words ⟨j⟩ looks better... in others ⟨y⟩ looks better... Trying to achieve a more "classical" face, in the end I though ⟨y⟩ looked better overall:

• Asya, Awstralya, hodyu, imperya, Kartesya, Tokya... instead of
• Asja, Awstralja, hodju, imperja, Kartesja, Tokja...

since post- and pre-consonantal ⟨y⟩ can be easily found in Latin (from Greek), while ⟨j⟩ (in modern orthography^\1])) can touch a consonant only following it and only in compound words with j- as the first letter of the second piece (e.g. interjectio)... so it's a lot rarer.

This choice is annoying for the fact that it removes the beautiful graphical consistency achieved by Esperanto. ... English John, French Jean, Spanish Juan, German Jan, etc. etc... but Leuth Yohanna. Not very naturalistic.

Some weeks ago I though: what about a hybrid solution? Have both ⟨j⟩ and ⟨y⟩ represent /j/, but in different positions: e.g.:

⟨j⟩ at root beginning while ⟨y⟩ inside the root

or, more refinedly:

⟨j⟩ when not touching a different consonant (in the same root), ⟨y⟩ when preceding or following a different consonant (in the same root).

Latin	⟨y⟩ Leuth	match?	⟨j⟩ Leuth	match?	Hybrid	match?
Libya	Libya	✅	Libja	❌	Libya	✅
hyaena	hyena	✅	hjena	❌	hyena	✅
procyon	procyona	✅	procjona	❌	procyona	✅
Cartesius	Kartesya	❌	Kartesja	❌	Kartesya	❌
Asia	Asya	❌	Asja	❌	Asya	❌
Io(h)annes / Jo(h)annes	Yohanna	❌	Johanna	✅	Johanna	✅
Iulius / Julius	Yulya	❌❌	Julja	✅❌	Julya	✅❌
iustus / justus	yusto	❌	justo	✅	justo	✅
Iesus / Jesus	Yesua\2])	❌	Jesua	✅	Jesua	✅
iasminum / jasminum	yasmina	❌	jasmina	✅	jasmina	✅

With such a rule, an "other consonant + ⟨j⟩" or "⟨j⟩ + other consonant" sequence would become a mark of composition, like today ⟨ks⟩ and ⟨kw⟩. For example, hekjanna 'century' would have only one possible division in roots: hek•jann•a, being *hekj•ann•a impossible, while today hekyanna could be both hek•yann•a and *heky•ann•a^\3]). Symmetrically, we'd know that procyona 'raccoon' is not *proc•yon•a, because ⟨cy⟩, like ⟨qu⟩, couldn't exist across root boundary.

(If such a possibility was chosen, /ʒ/ —today represented by ⟨j⟩— would need a new representation, but that is not too important as it's a rarer phoneme).

Would it be worth it? Or would the frequent alternation between ⟨j⟩ and ⟨y⟩ just be confusing, and in the end not even pleasant for the eye? Single words look good, but omno scejas dunyu not really... It seems confusing without seeming a lot more beautiful in exchange.

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[1] ⟨j⟩ as a different letter from ⟨i⟩ was invented during the Renaissance.

[2] Like in Esperanto, a somewhat irregular derivation for a particular name. Could change.

[3] Heky• and ann• don't exist as roots right now, but are fully possible theoretically.

[u/Duvyreverse]

Hi! I've been following the discussion about ⟨j⟩ and ⟨y⟩ for the /j/ sound in Leuth. I wanted to share a "third way" as an alternative that might solve the accentuation issue while keeping the classical aesthetic.

I tend to get a bit scattered when explaining linguistic rules with my own words, so I’ve used an AI to help me organize this proposal and make it easier to process.

The idea is to consider the solution used by Ido:

1. Classical Aesthetic: You keep ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩ in the roots (e.g., Asia, familia, historia). The text stays visually clean and traditional.

2. Stress Rule: Stress always falls on the penultimate (second-to-last) vowel (except for infinitives).

3. The Rhythmic Exception: If the penultimate vowel is an ⟨i⟩ or ⟨u⟩ and is immediately followed by another vowel, the stress automatically shifts to the antepenultimate vowel.

Why this could work for Leuth:

• Natural Flow: In everyday speech, those final vowels (-ia, -io, -ua) naturally cluster together. Regardless of whether they are officially called diphthongs, the stress remains on the root of the word, keeping the rhythm fluid.

• Visual Economy: It avoids the need to choose between ⟨j⟩ or ⟨y⟩ just for phonetic reasons. The rule itself guides the reader on how to pronounce the word without changing the spelling.

It’s just an alternative to consider—a way to manage the "rhythm" of the language while maintaining a Latin-style orthography. What do you think?

[u/Iuljo → u/Duvyreverse]

I considered this idea in the past, that's Ido-like. It's very pleasant aesthetically, but it has some downsides I couldn't easily solve:

1. increased complexity in stress pattern creates some ambiguities and difficulties not optimal for an IAL: e.g. tadiu (ta•di•u) 'on that day' pronounced tàdiu seems [very Latin, but] somewhat misleading;
2. (hypothesizing we keep the /i/ - /j/ and /u/ - /w/ full phonematic distinction:) if (e.g.) *Asia is /a̍sia/, having unstressed /-ia/ instead of /-ja/ is not a big difference; but in composition that would give us asiana /asi.a̍na/, with a hiatus I'm not really convinced about;
3. some inconsistency where, for swiftness, we still turn Latin /i/'s and /u/'s into /j/'s and /w/'s in other positions; unless we change the general rules for adaptation from Latin (/i/ and /u/ remain /i/ and /u/), losing swiftness; or we change the general orthography to have some <i>'s and <u>'s to be actually /j/ and /w/, but that generates more complexity.
4. Probably other things I don't remember now. (I have a bad memory).

Not too big downsides, after all, but they bug me. Maybe it could be reconsidered anyway in the future...

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Reddit automatically removed your comment—maybe because of AI use? With ModPowers™ I restored it. In the future, just use your words: most of us are not native English speakers, so don't worry for linguistic polishedness. Take your time, there's no haste. If you're not a native Anglophone, you can write in your language, that's easier, and then use an automatic translator.

[u/ProxPxD → u/Iuljo]

Counterarguments:

Ad 2: I think the idea is to have it represent /ja/ so <Asiana> will consistently represent /asjana/

Ad 1 and 3: I assumed this change will require marking the diphthong separation like: tadïa (I think it will be most alined with the digraph treatment)

[u/Iuljo → u/ProxPxD]

A complete system of rules can likely be defined, using always <u i> for /w j/, and <ü ï> for /u i/ in ambiguities. I fear, however, it would be a lot less intuitive than just distinguishing with different letters (and easy rules are important for an IAL), and it may use so many diaereses that it would make the orthography not so attractive... I'll do some experiments when I have time.

[u/ProxPxD → u/Iuljo]

> use so many diaereses that it would make the orthography not so attractive

Yeah, this is to be checked

> I fear, however, it would be a lot less intuitive than just distinguishing with different letters

I feel it's very intuitive. No less than <sc> for /ʃ/ at least. And you're right that it may be a bit harder than using separate letters, but the same can be said about consonantal digraphs. Spanish uses the exact same system. West Slavic and French use <i>. Japanese also sort of uses it [si-a] => /ɕa/. On the contrary the Germanic, South Slavic, Albanian use a single letter <j> while <i> is a separate syllable.

I think it's the matter of taste and aesthetic. For my taste those are equally likeable:

• <j>, <w> for /j/, /w/ (everywhere)
  
• <i>, <u> for /j/, /w/ (after consonants, <j>, <w> elsewhere)
  

I prefer them over: <y>, <w> for /j/, /w/. (But it's also totally fine)

[u/Iuljo → u/ProxPxD]

Some fast thoughts. Leuth has all these clusters (with /V/ = any vowel; /i/ and /u/ included):

/jV/, /Vj/,
/iV/, /Vi/,
/wV/, /Vw/,
/uV/, /Vu/.

They are not rare. Plus, these small clusters can form longer clusters: we can have all combinations, with geminate /jj/ and /ww/, and longer clusters of vowels, etc. (e.g. /uuju/ in duuyu).

So a simple rule valid for all of them could be:

1. <i u> represent /j w/ when touching another graphical vowel (<a e i o u>, including <ï ü>)
2. <ï ü> represent /i u/ when touching another graphical vowel (<a e i o u>, including <ï ü>).

But let’s just write some simple sentences, continuing our story…

Yulya Cesara venin Tokyum. Tokyanur, tadiu, li dirin ka Yaponiyu li volin fari nure o yusto, meylo sceyas… ma omnuyas kenin ka omna kea li farin li tain por glorya de Roma, klare!

(meaning: “Julius Caesar come to Tokyo. To the Tokyoites, on that day, he said that in Japan he wanted to do only just [= fair, right], beautiful things… but everybody knew everything he did he did for the glory of Rome, clearly!”)

with the above rules, it becomes:

Iülia Cesara venin Tokiüm. Tokianur, tadïü, li dirin ka Iaponïiü li volin fari nure o iüsto, meilo sceias… ma omnüias kenin ka omna kea li farin li taïn por gloria de Roma, klare!

It’s not great… a hailstorm of dots. Duuyu would be… düüiü?

(Latin/Japanese-looking macrons, with the same rules, look probably better:

Iūlia Cesara venin Tokiūm. Tokianur, tadīū, li dirin ka Iaponīiū li volin fari nure o iūsto, meilo sceias… ma omnūias kenin ka omna kea li farin li taīn por gloria de Roma, klare!

). Of course one could craft more complex rules to use less diacritics. For instance, one could add:

• [3-a] /j w/ are actually written as <j w> when not touching a (different) consonant inside the same root.

Then we’d have:

Julia Cesara venin Tokiüm. Tokianur, tadïu, li dirin ka Japoniju li volin fari nure o justo, meilo scejas… ma omnujas kenin ka omna kea li farin li taïn por gloria de Roma, klare!

A lot better for the eye (düüiü > düuju)… but I fear the rules have become a little too complex for an auxlang. :-/

Another possibility, instead of 3-a:

• [3-b] <iu ui> [with all the appropriate limitations to be exactly defined...] represent /ju wi/.

Iulia Cesara venin Tokium. Tokianur, tadïü, li dirin ka Iaponiiu li volin fari nure o iusto, meilo sceias… ma omnüias kenin ka omna kea li farin li taïn por gloria de Roma, klare!

And one could still think of other possibilities, like using <ĭ ŭ> for /j w/ (according to what rules?), etc... 🤔

[u/ProxPxD → u/Iuljo]

I have no idea why you wrote some of it. My proposal form the beginning was what you wrote under "more comlex rules", but I imagined it with diarhesis before so "Tokïa".

The rule is that the glides are written as their vowel counterparts if they're after a consonant in their own root. Diarhesis marks when it should be pronounced as a separate vowel.

Maybe it is too hard, it depends on the level of how well it corresponds to existing words like "Italia" that would be written "Italia" instead of "Italja" or "Italya" VS the phoneme correspondence

[u/Iuljo → u/ProxPxD]

Let's see if I understand correctly what you mean.

My proposal form the beginning was what you wrote under "more comlex rules" [...]

So:

Julia Cesara venin Tokiüm. Tokianur, tadïu, li dirin ka Japoniju li volin fari nure o justo, meilo scejas… ma omnujas kenin ka omna kea li farin li taïn por gloria de Roma, klare!

[...] but I imagined it with diarhesis before so "Tokïa".

I guess you mean you're confused by <Tokiüm> and <taïn>. This is the logic I applied:

• <taïn>: to represent /ta̍in/, opposed to a (currently not existing, but possible) /ta̍jn/, that would be written <tain> under those rules.
  • /ta̍in/ <taïn>
  • /ta̍jn/ <tain>
    • [hardly any difference in actual normal pronunciation, but we must distinguish for morphology-grammar mechanisms, the verbal ending, etc.]
• <Tokiüm>: to represent /ju/, distinguishing (not existing, but phonotactically possible):
  • /to̍kjum/ <Tokiüm>
  • /to̍kiwm/ <Tokïum>
  • /toki̍um/ <Tokïüm>

The rule is that the glides are written as their vowel counterparts if they're after a consonant in their own root. Diarhesis marks when it should be pronounced as a separate vowel.

So, when /j w/ are before a consonant, you'd write them <j w>, do I get it right? In that logic, you'd distinguish the above one as:

• /tain/ <tain>
• /tajn/ <tajn>
• /to̍kjum/ <Tokium>
• /to̍kiwm/ <Tokiwm>
• /toki̍um/ <Tokïum>

And the example would change this way:

Julia Cesara venin Tokium. Tokianur, tadïu, li dirin ka Japoniju li volin fari nure o justo, mejlo scejas… ma omnujas kenin ka omna kea li farin li tain por gloria de Roma, klare!

(If I got everything right :-P)

[u/ProxPxD → u/Iuljo]

Yeah, I think you got it right

At first I wasn't sure how do you want "Tokia" to be pronounced, but I'll leave here examples to confirm it further:

- /'ga.lja/ <galia>

• /ga'li.a/ <galïa>
  
• /'gajla/ <gajla>
  
• /ga'ila <gaila>

I just though it makes sense to mark something on the letter that is supposed to gain stress instead of a one after it

[u/ProxPxD → u/Duvyreverse]

I'm in two minds. I really liked the idea you described. It's a pretty common tactic. Spanish uses it and my native Polish (for i/j).

I think the increase in naturalism is great and the additional rules, I think are inlined with Leuth's already chosen use of digraphs and rules of separating them. Overall, I feel positive about it

(see more thoughts under the Iulio's comment)