Here is the only tonal writing system I have made. It has ten tonal marks, but only eight tones, two of the marks not being true tones.

One of them means that you delete the tone that would normally be there, and another mark indicates that the previous consonant is ejective.

Here is a link that talks about ejective consonants: the descriptions may not help you much, but at the bottom their is a sample list so that you can listen to some of them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ejective_consonant

Here is the script.


By the way, I called ejective consonants glottalized consonants in the attachment. I am pretty sure they mean the same thing.

Aleph, the Hebrew letter I mentioned in the attachment, represents a glottal stop. Here is a link about the glottal stop. There is a button on the right with an arrow on it that will play someone saying the sound (very useful). It is the sound we always make before a vowel when there is no consonant before it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glottal_stop

Here is a link that talks about tones.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tone_%28linguistics%29

Hurrah for unfamiliarity!

You Lausers scare me sometimes That being said, I'm looking forward to diving into this language and the Wikipedia articles. Tonal languages have fascinated me ever since I've heard Thai being spoken

eru

Ejectives consonants and glottalized consonants are not the same thing. Since neither of them exist in English, and I'm not exactly an expert, I'm not certain how to explain the difference. Basically, ejectives are normally consonants, except that you add glottal motion (you move your Adam's Apple) consciously to accentuate the sound. Glottalization is more like adding a breath from the throat to your consonant.

Where did you hear it? I heard a glimpse of a language that was probably tonal once. I hope I can listen to some tonal, and click, languages. I will probably make a click writing system soon.

Here is a link about click consonants.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Click_consonant



That sounds right. I read an article about the Mayan writing system that called some consonants "glottalized," and described them as you described ejectives.

Hm...was that article on the internet?

BTW, I'm not an expert, but I am basing my statements on what I have studied about linguistics.

Here is the quote:
"The consonants followed by apostrophes are the "glottalized" versions of the plain consonants. A glottalized consonant is pronounced like a normal consonant, but immediately before the vowel is pronounced, the larynx is constricted (as if to pronounce a glottal stop) to produce a somewhat explosive sound."

Here is the link to the article. By the way, Ancient scripts.com has very much information.
http://www.ancientscripts.com/maya.html

After reviewing my book, I realized that ejectives are a form of glottalization. For an ejective, you move your larynx up, for an implosive, you move the larynx down. The glottalization your article describes sounds like an ejective to me.

@Tsahraf: I have been to Thailand once, for a month Fascinating language

But what you all are discussing now is beyond my reach so I will drop out of this thread

eru