Literal semantic constants

Under construction

Literal semantic constant postulates
'	ellipsis, missing
A	fill, load, content, cover, wide, pipe, limbs, female, ox
a	female
B	two, double, hill, rock, boulder, soil, solid, ground, breast
G	angle, transport, transmission, load
C	angle, transmission, load, inherits K
D	passage
E	opening, branch, horizontal arrow
Z	DD, passage, zigzag, double-arrow, forceful passage, strike
H	wall, trunk, limit, field, distance, surface, level, length, repetition, quantity, intensity
I, J	arm, edge, handle, up, on, out, small, thin
K	palm, neck, hand, handle, tip, point, focus, cut, separation, dispersion, concentration
Kl, Gl	connection, junction, glue
L	goad, tail, linear, flexible, bend, soft, tender, closed, calm, up-arrow
Ll, Il	parallel, very flexible, very soft
M	water, wave, gesture, up-down
N	movement
Ks, X	handled protrusion, axle, cross, point
Ξ	cut, separate, not rolling
O	eye, circular, round, narrow, small
P	mouth
Q	Phi, Φ, traverse, hollow, depression
R	head, top, place, land, distance, energy
S	protrusion, connection, stitch, male
s	male
T	trim, fit, connect, align, cross, stand
Y, U, V, F	void, deep, empty, down, inside, in, transverse, not tangent
W, UU, YY, VV	void, wave, very deep, Ω
Th	turn, twist, rotate, circulate, roll
Ph	hole, periodic, go-return, phase, sides, in-out
Ch	point, mark, center, pointy, sharp
Ps	food, mouth protrusion, mouth-nose, face
Oo, OO	rounds, turns, spin, cover, bow
Ai	open arms, full, big, many females
Ay	fill-empty, bottom
Oi	many males
Io	on/off
Ei	fingers
El	opening/closing
Ey, Eu	well, water source, tube, reservoir, resource
St	aligned, stack, stick, stop, end, bottom
He	stick, support, limited opening
Hh	house
Hn	tube, joint
Ωr	lid, leader, supervision
Os	this, thing, he, who
Hl	level, level up
Hr	beyond level
My	inner, insert, nucleus, interior
Ny	insert, go in, penetrate
Nd	bulk, big, thick, robust
Dn	thin, weak, shaky
Dy	dive, go through, enter, hide
Di	come out, erect, exit, appear
Ni	move out
Ym	outer, cover, exterior, outwards, exit
Eyry, Eury	running-water
Amphi	both-sides, all-sides
Anti	opposite, counter
Iphi	cut

Letter    Semantics    Pronunciation

A=filling, precious material, content, quantity, half, load, cover, wide, pipe, limbs, female, (horns, ox); inherits H. (pron: open mouth for feeding)
Ai=duplication of A, a lot, very wide
B=double P, lips, two, double, breast, ground, hill, bumps, rock, boulder, soil, solid, balance.
Gamma=angle, slope, transport, transmission, load; inherits K, C, G, X.
C=angle, transmission, load; inherits Gamma, K, G, X.
D=passage (door)
E=opening, branching, edge, 
Ei=duplication of E, edges, fingers, five fingers

F=(hand, arm)

Z=zigzag, a passage in two directions, fast passage, horizontal, thunder, weapon, danger, rapid passage, extreme heat; inherits S, N

H=length, thickness, 2-dimensions, surface (wall, field), trunk, limit, level; inherits A

I, J=arm, edge, handle, up, on, out

K=palm of hand, stenosis, narrow hole, neck, hand, handle, tip, point, focus, dispersion, concentration; inherits Gamma, C, G, X

L=(goad, tail), linear, flexible, bend, soft, tender, closed, cover, calm

M=up-down, water, wave, gesture, slop

N=movement; inherits Z.

Ks=cut, handled protrusion, axle, cross; inherits X

O=circle, circular, round, narrow, small, cylindroid, (eye)

P=mouth

Q=hollow, depression, through, hole (needle's eye); inherits K

R=top, (head), exterior surface, place, land, distance, energy

S=(tooth), protrusion, stitching, double hook, big (sea) wave, zigzag form, male; inherits Z, 

s=male

T=trim, fit, cross, stand; inherits X

Y, U, V, F=void, deep, empty, down, inside, in, transverse, not tangent; V inherits B

W, UU, YY, VV=double hook, void, wave, very deep; inherits S, M

X=cross, crossing, mark, point, center, bifurcation, sharp

Th=double T, turn, twist, rotate.

KL, GL=connection, junction, joint, glue

LL=parallel, very flexible, very soft

Ph means hole, periodic, go-return, phase, sides, in-out.

CH means pointy, sharp.

PS means mouth protrusion, face.

OO (Ω) means rounds, turns, spin, cover, and is replaced, in Greek, by Omega.

AI means open arms, full, big, many females.

AY means fill-empty.

 OI means many males, on/off.

IO means on/off.

EI means fingers.

EL means opening/closing.

EY, EU means well, water source, tube, reservoir, resource.

ST means aligned, stack, stick, stop.

Literal and sub-literal semantics

I am proposing an alternative, graphocentric hypothesis for the origin of words. Words do not exist until they are written. The word-creator ('poet') draws on a piece of clay or paper whatever she has in mind, putting elementary concepts together like an architect who explains a house plan to the builders. The term 'ichnography' (trace-writing) evokes this analogy. The reader is trained to produce a phoneme for each grapheme and to phonetically put syllables together. The theory is consistent with the ancient meaning of 'poetry,' i.e., making [words] from scratch, a definition largely overlooked today.

Alphabets are software devised for creating languages. They replace older arbitrary 2-dimensional drawing systems (e.g., logograms) with a small set of standard lines that everybody can learn. Myths are short definitions of neologisms, or, I should say, neo-graphics. Mythemes explain new terms, a standard set of metaphoric relations between concepts. For example, the 'geographical' mapping of an object relates its primary use (a cooking pot 'lives' in the kitchen), kingship suggests importance (the cooking pot is the 'queen' of the kitchen), marriage means combination with other objects (the cooking pot 'marries' its lid), descendants are products (steam cooking is the child of the cooking pot and the lid), death is a replacement (the microwave oven slew the cooking pot), and so on. Mythological genealogies are ancient systems of a hierarchical classification of objects and corresponding names. The set of traits that a poet chooses to include in an object's name is arbitrary and subject to poetic freedom. An alphabet (or other types of a writing system) is the cornerstone at the origin of each linguistic taxon. Changes within an alphabet are at the origin of new languages within a linguistic family.

The letters are iconic units of meaning. Primarily, letters lent their graphic form, e.g., O is a circle, a closed line; the letter I is an open, straight line, an edge, an arm; M is a wave (up-down); etc. They also represent physical forms or properties, topology, movement, or a numeric value. Additionally, as ideograms, letters convey a handful of basic notions associated with their shape. O represents round forms, e.g., an eye. Words sharing letters have somewhat overlapping micro-semantic fields.

A computing language is an appropriate analogy. It consists of a limited number of elementary commands with predefined meanings (analogous to the letters). The programmers (poet) may combine these commands into concise functions (roots). They may then combine elementary commands with functions into an algorithm (word), and algorithms into fully functional programs (texts).

Like codons, small strings of letters (digraphs, trigraphs, syllables) attain specific purposes and form morphemes that can be recycled into new words. The letters are conveniently recombined to describe objects. Their order is crucial because their meaning is modulated by preceding and following characters. For support, the aspirated and the duplicated consonants denote quantity, intensity, or recurrence; e.g., Th = TTT…; MM in English hammer shows a repetitive up-and-down movement; two eyes (OO) denotes a look. Inverted strings correlate with antonymy; e.g., if MY (MU; as in myth, mummy) means inwards, to insert, include, cover, hide, protect, YM (UM; as in thymus) means outwards, to outgrow, extract, excrete, expose, unfold, discharge, reject, remove, uncover. Th>Y>M is an antonym of M>Y>Th.

I use independent words featuring a string to identify the underlying sememes and refine the interpretation of individual letters (training set). I then use different sets of words (validation sets) with the same or the inverted string to validate the predicted sememes. For each mythological term, I retain the hypotheses compatible with the related mythemes. I repeat the process until the network of thus interpreted myths makes complete, coherent sense.