From: Peter T. Daniels
Message: 5441
Date: 2005-08-20
>Janine Scancarelli published at least two major articles on the fit of
> --- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter T. Daniels" <grammatim@...>
> wrote:
> > suzmccarth wrote:
> >
> > Sequoyah's order for Cherokee is quite random (see WWS), likely
> > reflecting the order he happened to invent the symbols in. The
> standard
> > syllabary chart (does it go back to Samuel Worcester?) is simply
> in the
> > order of the roman alphabet, consonants vertical, vowels
> horizontal.
>
> Yes, I have just been reading the Cherokee chapter and Worcester
> helped out very early on. It is also interesting that, as you
> suggested a few days ago, the syllabary is not systematic in its
> representation of syllables. In the 'a' column, there are 15
> consonants, most other columns have 12 and 'v' has 11.So it can
> never be represented in such a complete matrix as Cree, Tamil and
> Japanese(?). The Cherokee syllabary has never been modified from the
> original 85 syllables. It significantly underrepresents and is also
> non systematic in its organization.
> On the other hand the Tamil 'syllabary' represents syllables that doIt's associated primarily with the sacred sphere. One would not alter it
> not exist phonologically. Cree has a big difference in frequency of
> syllables and in any one lg/dlct there may be unused syllables but
> across communities it is possible that all syllables are used at
> some time. I'll try to check on that.
>
> I find the static inventory of Cherokee is somewhat unusual, quite a
> unique characteristic.