Skrintha:
here are lists of fairly related words in English which begin with the same first and/or second letter:- ghoul, ghost, gnome, gargoyle, goblin, gremlin, ghastly glow, gleam, glitter, glisten, glare, glimmer, glance (of chemistry!) flicker, flare (Ger. Glanz, (glaenzen), gluehen...) sniff, sneeze, snore, snort, snuff, snuffle, snivel, snout, snot, snook [my favorite!], smell .....These elements like GL, SN are called phonaesthemes. They are peculiar in that they have independent meaning but combine to form roots (combining either with other phonaesthemes (cf. shine, shimmer, glimmer, glitter, flitter, flimmer, jitter) or with a cranberry morph (e.g. _ine_ in shine). [Note incidentally than phonaesthemes needn't be word-initial.]
In English they are technically not productive, in the sense that if you take two phonaesthemes and form a novel root, one can only make an informed guess as to its meaning. But, that said, if you read through the OED looking at "autochthonous" words with no etymon from outside English, the vast majority contain phonaesthemes.
I believe that some languages have more straightforwardly productive phonaesthemes used typically in forming expressives - words with an adverbial function and putatively onomatopoeic.
Shades of Ro in the psyche of English (Germanic) speaking natives...?Only pale shades of Ro, though. I may be mistaken on this, but as I recall, each letter of a Ro word represents a taxonomic node, and the meanings of a given letter are determined by which class they are subclassifying. To make up some examples illustrating this:
I wonder whether the above is somehow related to the alliterative tendency in earlier forms of English literature/poesy as evidenced in say the "Beowulf". (the tendency to rhyme is a relatively recent one I think). cf. also the Icelandic Eddas for their alliterations.Some of the onset clusters, e.g. CL and GL go back to Proto-Indo- European (though not necessarily as phonaesthemes). And some phonaesthemes are rhymes, not onsets. And some English phonaesthemes are not of Germanic origin (e.g. V-, as in violent, vehement, vituperative, vile,...). So your explanation is not too persuasive. But at the same time, English is more phonaestheme-rich than at least the other major well-known Western European lgs, which does call for an explanation.
If you're interested in correlations of alliterative versus rhyme- based verse forms with other features of grammar, I recommend an article by Patricia Don(n)egan and David Stampe in a volume of the proceedings of the Chicago Linguistic Society from the early 1980s, who discuss these matters with respect to the differences between Munda and Mon-Khmer within Austroasiatic. Their paper is very speculative, but imaginative and entertaining.
Would anyone know other such lists or other words to these lists!?I'm not aware of any thorough compilation of lists based on a comprehensive trawl of a full-length dictionary (and I've looked for one). It's rather a neglected area, only really appealing to Gerard Manley Hopkins fans and other misfits. But it's easy to find for oneself a non-comprehensive list just by browsing through the dictionary (or through a rhyming dictionary, for rhyme phonaesthemes).
Has anyone implemented such list formation for related words into their conlangs?Livagian makes a fair bit of use of phonaesthemes and of sound symbolism, and heavy use of Ro-like paradigms, though they differ from Ro in that they are not as taxonomic and in that there are many paradigms in the lexicon.
Copyright © 1997, Jack Durst,
Last updated: 7 May, 1997