tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 05/10/2026καὶ μὴν καὶ τοῦ μέλανας εἶναι καὶ λευκοὺς ἀνθρώπους καὶ ξανθοὺς καὶ κατὰ τὰς ἄλλας ἰδέας διαφέροντας αὐτὸς αἴτιος γίνεται παρὰ τὸ πῶς ἀποπέμπειν τὰς ἀκτῖνας ἐπὶ τὰ κλίματα τῆς γῆς. —Cleomedes 100
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 05/10/2026Ancient Greek account of human skin color variation sounds very modern: “And indeed [the Sun] is also the cause of men being black, white, and yellow, and of their differing in other respects of appearance, owing to the manner in which it sends its rays upon the climes of the earth.” 100
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 03/10/2026sorrel sounds like it should be a fish, herring sounds like it should be a bird, and impala sounds like it should be a big cat 151
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 26/09/2026Proto-Germanic really lucked out orthography-wise. Very pleasing in the Latin alphabet. 140
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 26/09/2026The way British people say tæco and pæsta is extremely lindy. English has been borrowing Latin a as æ for like 1500 years. 010
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 26/09/2026Reading about the Gospel of Jesus’ Wife fiasco and how forgers will write on genuinely ancient bits of papyrus. Eventually someone’s gonna realize you can just grow papyrus with ancient radiocarbon ages, and I think papyrologists should be ready for that. 140
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 25/09/2026I like when language families have an Akkadian. Gothic, Avestan, Old Prussian, Gaulish, etc. 181
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 02/09/2026think i’m gonna spend this month reading about celtic language revitalization 070
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 27/08/2026Plato would find movie theaters incredibly funny. 060
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 10/08/2026The IPA could really use a better symbol than ⟨r̝⟩. Just give us r with palatal hook already. 160
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 10/08/2026I like how French independently derived the Greek spelling of /y/ vs. /u/ 030
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 09/08/2026I’ve long thought this to be one of the most beautiful passages found in a dissertation’s acknowledgements. From Mark James Henry’s 2013 PhD thesis, The Syntax of Reduced Nominals in Akkadian. 030
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 06/08/2026I wonder about the history of this letter. I know it’s mostly a Soviet thing, but I’ve seen Roman cursive documents which wrote q this way, so I’ve always assumed it ultimately went back to that. 010
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 30/07/2026at the proto-angloid convention and they just voted to take the r out of spreak and put it in goom 073
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 20/07/2026every once in a while i’ll see a north caucasian word on wiktionary and go “damn that really does look chinese” 020
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 12/07/2026hélt að við myndum loksins hefna haralds harðráða 😢 010
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 08/07/2026Punic word of the day: salus ‘three’ Famously referenced by St. Augustine. 000
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 08/07/2026So now we’re talking about triphthongs. And macom was one of those Pre-PS Cwa > Cā situations 110
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 08/07/2026Punic word of the day: κουλ (koul) ‘voice, speech’ Cognate with קול and قول. 1153
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 06/07/2026obviously a lot of the sign values are correct but linear b is such a terrible writing system i find it hard to believe we’re reading it right 020
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 06/07/2026Punic word of the day: sufet ‘judge, consul’ If you know a Punic word it’s probably this one. 030
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 05/07/2026Punic word of the day: ουλωμ (ulom) ‘eternity, age’ Cognate with עולם and عالم. 070
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 05/07/2026when a hromoid says something so chnaphobic you gotta hit them with the phanebal 020
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 04/07/202625 more years until we outlast the Ptolemaic dynasty 🥂 031
Reposted by tonogenesisBenjamin Suchard @bnuyaminim.bsky.social · 04/07/2026Is tophetgooning even worth it if roids will come and spike your carthisol 381
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 04/07/2026Punic word of the day: sanuth ‘years’ Happy 250th America! 🇺🇸 092
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 04/07/2026people really overuse ɸ and β in linguistic reconstruction 040
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 03/07/2026Punic word of the day: macom ‘place’ Cognate with מקום and مقام. This word has o in place of the usual u corresponding to Hebrew ō and Arabic ā. Something something triphthongs. 181
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 03/07/2026>8th month is named after a guy called Octavian 1111
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 02/07/2026people who say there’s no such thing as the hardest language to learn never met someone who speaks chinatec 110
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 02/07/2026Punic word of the day: helicot/elichot ‘hospitality’ Cognate with הֲלִיכָה 0153
tonogenesis @tonogenesis.bsky.social · 01/07/2026Punic word of the day: hulec ‘guest’ Morphological equivalent of הוֹלֵךְ, semantic equivalent of הֵלֶךְ 1112
