Kernowek Standard

Kernowek Standard (KS, Standard Cornish) is a variety of revived Cornish which serves also as a proposed set of revisions to the Standard Written Form. It has two specifications, the first of which was published as a draft proposal in March 2007, and the second of which was published as a practical orthography in May 2012.

Kernowak Standard (KS1)

Its first iteration, then spelt Kernowak Standard and now designated KS1, was developed gradually by a group called UdnFormScrefys ('Single Written Form'), it was published as a proposal in a series of revisions, Revision 11 of which was released to the Cornish Language Commission on 26 March 2007.^[1] Its principal authors were Michael Everson, Neil Kennedy, and Nicholas Williams. The orthography was meant to adhere to two basic requirements which the group identified: to be based on orthographic forms attested in the Cornish literary scribal tradition, and to have an unambiguous relationship between spelling and sounds. To embrace both Middle and Late Cornish forms, Kernowek Standard took as its foundation the late Middle Cornish play Creation of the World by William Jordan (1611). On 14 October 2007, Kernowek Standard was designated to provide a key source of input into the Standard Written Form for Cornish in official contexts (SWF), along with Kernewek Kemmyn.^[2]

Kernowek Standard (KS)

After the publication of the specification of the Standard Written Form,^[3] members of UdnFormScrefys, after scrutinising the published description, decided to form a new, public group, called Spellyans ('Spelling'). This group undertook to study the published SWF, to determine what shortcomings it might have, and to propose and implement solutions to those shortcomings.^[4] This investigation identified a number of inconsistencies, ambiguities, and errors, and public discussion on the archived Spellyans discussion list led to the publication of a number of texts in the resulting orthography, called KS (and not KS2), culminating in the publication of the Bible in Cornish and in a comprehensive grammar, Desky Kernowek^[5] on 1 May 2012.

KS differs from the Standard Written Form in several respects. It uses diacritics to mark unpredictable vowel length or quality. While rejecting digraphs such as hw, kw and iw on the grounds that they are not found in the scribal tradition, KS uses some others such as ai and au which were not included in the SWF. KS and the SWF also differ in their treatment of unstressed vowels and in the spelling of a number of individual words. Both KS and the SWF share a common phonology, however.

Derogations from the Standard Written Form

KS is a proposal for a number of changes to be made to the Standard Written Form of Cornish in 2013, when that orthography comes under review. The creators of KS argue that a number of orthographic issues remain with the SWF resulting in inaccurate pronunciation, and propose the following changes:

Distribution of ⟨i⟩ and ⟨y⟩

The proponents of Kernowek Standard argue that the SWF inherited an inconsistency from Kernewek Kemmyn with regard to the distribution of the letters ⟨i⟩ and ⟨y⟩ outside monosyllables. For example, the SWF currently has palys 'palace' and conis 'work', but it also has kegin 'kitchen' and kemmyn 'common', even though the final sound is the same. KS makes the following proposal:

• Use ⟨i⟩ in initial position in all words apart from the pronoun y 'they' [iː] and the particles yn [ən], ytho [əˈθo], y(th) [ə(θ)], yma [əˈma], and ymowns [əˈmoʊns]. The adverbial particle yn [ən] (which causes mutation) and the preposition in [ɪn] (which does not cause mutation) are distinguished.
• Use ⟨i⟩ for [iː] and ⟨y⟩ for [ɪ] in stressed monosyllables (as in the SWF); derivatives of the words in ⟨i⟩ retain the ⟨i⟩ even when the vowel shortens when additional syllables are added, as in the SWF.
• Use ⟨y⟩ for all short /i/ in unstressed final syllables: palys, conys, kegyn and kemmyn.
• Use ⟨î⟩ for stressed [iː] in polysyllables: exîlys 'exiled'.
• Use ⟨y⟩ in final position in monosyllables and polysyllables (replacing the variant graphs ⟨i⟩ and ⟨ei⟩: e.g. chi/chei 'house', whi/whei 'you', to become chy, why).

Quantity and quality of ⟨u⟩

The proponents of Kernowek Standard also argue that the SWF is ambiguous and inconsistent in its use of ⟨u⟩, which can be pronounced a number of ways. KS proposes the following change:

• Use ⟨û⟩ for /uː/, e.g. frût 'fruit', to prevent confusion with another ⟨u⟩ sound that can be pronounced either /iː/ or /yː/ (e.g. tus 'people')
• Use ⟨ù⟩ for short /ʊ/, e.g. pùb 'every', also to prevent confusion with the ⟨u⟩ above

Restoration of ⟨ai⟩ and ⟨au⟩

KS proposes to restore two digraphs to the SWF:

• ⟨ai⟩ [eː] to distinguish from ⟨ay⟩ [aɪ] and ⟨ey⟩ /əɪ/ – e.g. trailya 'to translate' (pronounced [ˈtreːljə], not as treylya [ˈtrəɪljə] or traylya [ˈtraɪljə])
• ⟨au⟩ /ɔ/ ([ɔː]~[ɔ]) to distinguish from ⟨aw⟩ /aʊ/ – e.g. Australya 'Australia' (pronounced [ɔˈstræljə], not [aʊˈstræljə])

Use of ⟨f⟩ and ⟨th⟩ in unstressed final syllables

The SWF uses the graphs ⟨ev⟩ and ⟨edh⟩ in final unstressed position, which Michael Everson and Nicholas Williams argue results in wrong pronunciation. For example KS uses genef ("with me") [ˈɡənəf]~[ˈɡənə] and myterneth ("kings") [mɪˈtɛɹnəθ], as opposed to [ˈɡənəv] and [mɪˈtɛɹnəð]. KS also argues against what they call an inconsistency between menydh 'mountain' (Welsh mynydd) and nowyth 'new' (Welsh newydd). Most speakers of Cornish pronounce final ⟨dh⟩ as [θ] voiceless dental fricative in such words.^{[citation needed]}

References

External links

• Creacon of the World from Wikisource
• Alys in Pow an Anethow, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland in Cornish, the first book published in KS.
• An Beybel Sans, the first complete translation of the Bible in Cornish, published in 2011.