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w2b
Acolyte
Italy
30 Posts |
 Posted - 01 Sep 2006 : 20:31:46
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i'm reading through many realms sourcebooks at the moment, and since i've always been a linguistics nerd, i'm wondering if there are info available on how some languages sound.
for instance, does anyone know of how chondathan could sound like? i think english, but then i wonder about loross... and what about dwarven or, even worse, celestial!...
there are many languages in the realms... the shou empire seems to use a form of quite orthodox chinese and kozakura gets japanese terms... in alzhedo it seems they say 'dirham' and 'pasha'...
what i'm wondering is, is there any source about various languages of abeir-toril? or at least good substitutes, in your mind- like, would you use sindarin for elven? there are some words (coronal, mythal, ar'tel'quessir, kiira ...) that seem to point to precise phonemes or even similar real life languages, but i'd like to know your opinions...
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Kalin Agrivar
Senior Scribe
Canada
956 Posts |
Posted - 01 Sep 2006 : 20:35:03
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| There is an excellent article in one of the Dragon (Magazine) annual editions (annual #4 ?) thta really delved into languages in the Realms..I still use it... |
Kalin Xorell El'Agrivar
- High Mage of the Arcane Assembly
- Lore Keeper of the Vault of Ancestors
- 3rd Son of the Lord of the Stand |
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Faraer
Great Reader
3308 Posts |
Posted - 01 Sep 2006 : 20:46:35
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Chondathan words look like (authentic) Inner Sea personal names, command words, etc. We assume, at least for convenience, that its pronunciation is similar to ours (whether that's Canadian or American or British English), with perhaps a bit more of a lilt.
The most developed constructed languages of the Realms are elven, drow and dwarven. Elven fragments are scattered all over the place, weren't made up with a unifying grammar in mind -- here is a good, but incomplete and spuriously capitalized, collection. (Sindarin is a quite different language.) Drow and dwarven glossaries are in FOR2 The Drow of the Underdark and FR11 Dwarves Deep, with additional vocabulary revealed here and there. |
Edited by - Faraer on 01 Sep 2006 21:05:52 |
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The Sage
Procrastinator Most High
Australia
31701 Posts |
Posted - 02 Sep 2006 : 01:46:16
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quote:
Originally posted by kalin agrivar
There is an excellent article in one of the Dragon (Magazine) annual editions (annual #4 ?) thta really delved into languages in the Realms..I still use it...
It, the article entitled "Speaking in Tongues", was only published in DRAGON Annual #4.
And this from Tom Costa -
"Thanks for mentioning my old (and very first) Dragon article.
In developing I took every official or semiofficial mention of a human tongue or dialect and tried to incorporate them and then I added based on what we knew of human (and where relevant other race) migration patterns, geographical barriers, and political boundaries and comparing to the number of languages in the Eurasian-N.African portions of the real world. That article was then taken by Sean K. Reynolds and simplified (honestly, a good idea from a playability perspective) and tweaked into the official list used in FRCS. All of that said, aside from a few inconsistencies that have cropped up since its original publication, my old article can be used with minimal changes in 3.5E.
I did not bind myself to 80 languages or recall even seeing that number at the time I wrote the article."
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Candlekeep Forums Moderator
Candlekeep - The Library of Forgotten Realms Lore
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Scribe for the Candlekeep Compendium -- Volume IX now available (Oct 2007)
"So Saith Ed" -- the collected Candlekeep replies of Ed Greenwood
Zhoth'ilam Folio -- The Electronic Misadventures of a Rambling Sage |
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w2b
Acolyte
Italy
30 Posts |
Posted - 02 Sep 2006 : 19:44:30
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dragon annual #4? i wonder if it's still available somewhere... maybe i might request it at wotc... i mean you get an idea of how rashemi or alzhedo might sound like just reading the kind of names they have, but a whole article givin' some details about the languages... 'speaking in tongues', cute title... kudos to tom costa.
faraer, you say chondathan should work like inner sea personal names... that would make it similar to english... list of chondathan names from frcs: darvin, dorn, evendur, gorstag, grim, helm... sounds rather anglosaxon to me- or did you mean something else?... i also went to the site you pointed out and yes, it's a nice glossary (kudos to the athors, i see you contributed!)- and it looks quite different from sindarin, you're right! i had read some of it in the sourcebooks, but that's a good list... as for the drow of underdark and dwarves deep i think i'm paying the price of being a newcomer- damn.
well i guess i'll go and see if there's any hope of getting that dragon issue from wotc now- and maybe the other two, but i don't think so, alas- in the meantime does anyone know if there are instances of sylvan, celestial, auran, draconic and other non-human languages anywhere? or even other ancient human tongues like loross...
thanks! |
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The Sage
Procrastinator Most High
Australia
31701 Posts |
Posted - 03 Sep 2006 : 01:28:48
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quote:
Originally posted by w2b
dragon annual #4? i wonder if it's still available somewhere... maybe i might request it at wotc...
You can try paizo.com... as I recall, they still offer some of the DRAGON Annuals for PDF and print (second-hand) sale.
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Candlekeep Forums Moderator
Candlekeep - The Library of Forgotten Realms Lore
http://www.candlekeep.com -- Candlekeep Forum Code of Conduct
Scribe for the Candlekeep Compendium -- Volume IX now available (Oct 2007)
"So Saith Ed" -- the collected Candlekeep replies of Ed Greenwood
Zhoth'ilam Folio -- The Electronic Misadventures of a Rambling Sage |
Edited by - The Sage on 03 Sep 2006 01:29:50 |
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Kajehase
Great Reader
Sweden
2104 Posts |
Posted - 03 Sep 2006 : 13:59:21
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| If you do a search for "Chondathan" in the pdfs of Ed's replies here at Candlekeep, he's also given the translation of several English words. |
There is a rumour going around that I have found god. I think is unlikely because I have enough difficulty finding my keys, and there is empirical evidence that they exist.
Terry Pratchett |
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w2b
Acolyte
Italy
30 Posts |
Posted - 03 Sep 2006 : 15:36:32
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i've been at paizo but dragon #4 is momentarily unavailable, dammit... they do have dwarves deep at least... i'll see to it...
if i do a search for chondathan... really? cool! thanks kajehase, that's great! i'm going! right now! |
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Faraer
Great Reader
3308 Posts |
Posted - 04 Sep 2006 : 01:30:21
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Nobleknight.com has Annual #4. Note that it's a (very interesting) taxonomy, not an in-depth examination of any particular language.
Some of the other languages you mention are 3E constructs with little presence in Realmslore. There's a Draconic lexicon in Dragon #284 (pirated here) which does apply to the Realms, as confirmed by the Draconic speech used in Ed Greenwood's story in Realms of the Dragons. There may be more bits in Draconomicon and other sources.
The Chondathan names in the little FRCS list are more than usually Germanic-sounding. Just look at a larger sample, such as the names in the appropriate Volo's Guides. |
Edited by - Faraer on 04 Sep 2006 01:35:48 |
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w2b
Acolyte
Italy
30 Posts |
Posted - 04 Sep 2006 : 21:00:03
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eh, a taxonomy would be something, faraer, i might go there...
in the meantime i'm examinating the name patterns of everything i see pertaining to a certain fr race or ethnic group, elves, kuo-toa, djinni, chondathans, illuskans... i think i'm on something...
so that draconic lexicon applies to the realms? it's been used by mr. greenwood nonetheless? that's great. that is something important. i bookmarked that. hey, even kobolds use that supposedly, and lizardfolk too... can be not that big but hey, everything counts. that elven glossary you contributed to, that's very good as well i think.
as for those chondathan names in the frcs yes, i suppose that could be a limited and thus not very accurate selection- the problem with volo is he doesn't often bother to tell you what ethnicity someone is... but i suppose the names i find in cormyr, sembia, chondath itself and most of the dales- and waterdeep probably- should tell me something... i must definitely gather all data available ^___^
thank you!
(p.s, thank you kajehase for the so saith ed of march 27, 2006, there's a pattern there! ^___^ kauba, oerl, uth, daysur, dul, taertaer... most interesting!) |
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TomCosta
Forgotten Realms Designer
USA
954 Posts |
Posted - 05 Sep 2006 : 19:48:56
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| I always figured pronunciation of most languages was pretty broad given the vast areas and cultures most of the more common languages are spoken. For example, Chondathan, the nearly defacto common (it's roots are the same roots as Common and its spoken by a huge swathe of the Western and Central Realms) probably sounds very different in Amn than in Chondath than in Cormyr than in the Dales. Compare it to the regional dialect differences in English between say New York, the American deep south, and inner city Los Angeles or the famous cockney accent of England versus the more stereotypical educated accent of England versus the Scottish accent or Irish accent. Sometimes one accent or dialect can be almost imcomprehensible to another fluent speaker. |
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w2b
Acolyte
Italy
30 Posts |
Posted - 06 Sep 2006 : 17:02:36
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wow, hello mr. costa! thanks for intervening!
i very much agree with you, considering the size of faerun they must speak lots of chondathan dialects. i see for instance tethyrians speak a dialect called calant, influenced by alzhedo, that seems to be widespread along the sword coast. i bet this was your doing!
thank you! |
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TomCosta
Forgotten Realms Designer
USA
954 Posts |
Posted - 08 Sep 2006 : 11:38:09
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| Actually, IIRC, it was Elaine Cunningham who first mentioned dialects either in one of her books or one of her old Dragon articles statting book characters. In any case, since there were a few official dialects, I felt one way to mix and match some of the official languages which had popped up was to turn some into dialects, but it also meant creating appropriate dialects for other languages. |
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languages in the realms
