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Languages

• Brust's Use of Hungarian
• Fenarian
• Dragaeran
  • Dragaeran Dialects
  • Dragaeran Languages
• Serioli
• Miscellaneous
  • "Bengloarafurd"
  • Olakiska
  • Silite

Brust's Use of Hungarian

When first reading Jhereg, I realized (after muttering it to myself about sixty times) that "Loiosh" is an English spelling of the Hungarian name "Lajos". Excited, I mentally thumbed through the book for other Hungarian names and words, but I could only find a few. (Not surprising; see note on my qualifications.)

Since I really was professionally curious (okay, it's an excuse ;-)\ ) and Brust's Web page does contain an invitation to email him, I asked him. Here are my question and his reply, which he has kindly given me permission to quote here:

Fenarian

Fenarian is Hungarian (BP ix-xi, "Note on Fenarian Pronunciation" by W.Z.Brust), written without diacritics except in Brokedown Palace. [2003-05-27:] It is spoken in "a series of small kingdoms near Lake Nivaper, just south of the Hookjaw Mountains" [Iss 105, Teldra to Vlad], where Morrolan grew up. Presumably Fenario is in this area.

I hear the suggestion of an accent in Noish-pa's syntax and style: this is a good way for an author to suggest a non-native's speech without resorting to distorted spelling to (badly) show an accent (which would also injure Noish-pa's dignity). He also uses the plural "elfs" [Tlt 42, Tek 126, Phx 176-7] in place of the normal English "elves".[*]

• "gázló" = 'ford' [TPG 249]
• "elvtarsok": Noish-pa cannot think of the Dragaeran word he wants to describe Kelly's people, in relation to the murdered Franz [Tek 52]:

  [Noish-pa:]	"Well, his people, his -- what is the word? Elvtarsok?"
  [Vlad:]	"Friends? Associates?"

  Noish-pa is never at a loss for words, in any sense. Is Brust doing something with the first syllable's resemblance to "elves"?

Dragaeran

Dragaeran Dialects

• Before the Interregnum, the region around Dragaera City was known for "purity of accent and pronunciation" [TPG 256]. (This is typical for a capital city, whose dialect often becomes defined as the standard.) Yet we also hear of "the northern twang of the city" [TPG 335]; and see the next paragraph.
• "'No,' he said in the clipped accent of the eastern regions of the Empire, making it sound like 'new.'" [Phx 20] -- Also, Khaavren speaks of the "clipped tones" of Mica's accent, saying, "you speak so differently from the northern twang of the city" [TPG 335]. Yet Khaavren and his friends met Mica less than a day's travel east of Dragaera City [TPG 179-209]. Maybe the peasants who live outside the capital and stay in one place all their lives (unless they are taken on by such a noble as Tazendra) retain an older pronunciation, little influenced by the court and the churning and mixing populace of the city, and not necessarily even the same kind of "clipped" sound as that of the east; or maybe Mica or his parents originally came from further east in the Empire. Perhaps survivors of the fringes of Adron's Disaster fled east in such numbers as to have influenced the speech of those regions by Vlad's time, but that seems much less likely.
• Baaro, the outlaw hired by Garland to kill our heroes in Bengloarafurd, speaks "in the harsh accents of the region" [TPG 255]. This is also in the eastern regions of "clipped" speech.
• Khaavren speaks with a "soft, gentle lilt which still betrays [his] country of origin" [FHYA 21], which is the Sorannah [TPG 3,24,52]. [See also TPG 335.]
• Paresh, a Teckla, "had the rustic accent of the duchies, to the immediate north of Adrilankha, but his phrasings were more those of a Chreotha or Vallista craftsman, or perhaps a Jhegaala merchant. Odd." [Tek 25] Of course, we soon learn the explanation, from Paresh's own lips.
• Savn recognizes Vlad's accent as from the South, but not specifically Adrilankha [Ath 6,7]. But in Northport, "you're from Adrilankha -- anyone can hear it from your voice" [Orc 101]. (That's Vlad, disguised as a Chreotha local, speaking to the Imperial investigators; but he obviously considers this credible and they don't call him on it.) It's reasonable that a city man would be more familiar with the accent of the capital than a farm boy would.
• Fird, the fruit-seller, speaks [Ath 167-170] with really strange syntax ("the odd grammatical formulations of Bigcliff" [Ath 168]). This is (probably) due to the influence of the tribe of Serioli that lived there until a few hundred years ago [Ath 62].
• Chaler, an Orca dressed as a seaman [FHYA 60], speaks "with the twang of the Southern Coast" [FHYA 62].

Dragaeran Languages

• Secret language of the Orca, which is no longer used [Phxxxx]

• In the "tongue of the Dragon", current in the Fourth Cycle but no longer in use by the time of The Phoenix Guards, "ara" meant 'ford'.[TPG 249-250] In Vlad's time it is apparently still used for ceremonial purposes [Drg 166]. "Fornia" means 'patience' in this language [Drg 48].

• Old North-western tongue, still preserved by the Dragon and Lyorn [TPG 125]. The involvement of the House of the Dragon seems to suggest that this could be the same as the "tongue of the Dragon". The Dragons would preserve it for reading their old records, and the Lyorns preserve records of everything. The Northwestern name "Marishori" means 'keeper of trust' [TPG 126]; see discussion of Dragaeran surnames.

  However, the Northwestern language is explicitly distinguished from the tongue of the Dragon, which it seems to have superseded. [TPG 250] In fact, since "Bengloarafurd" is a compressed form of the Northwestern name "Bengloara Ford", it seems that the modern Dragaeran language (i.e., the one in use at the times of The Phoenix Guards and the Vlad series: a difference of a thousand years or so, less than one Dragaeran lifetime) is descended from the old Northwestern language, much as modern English is descended from the Middle English of Chaucer's contemporaries and the Old English of the author of Béowulf.

• [1999-03-23] Old Northwestern could be the same as Kanefthali, which is presumably the source of names like "Hwdf'rjaanci", but which is never mentioned as a language. What is Kanefthali, then? Well...

  1. The Kanefthali River Valley can be seen from the north of Northport,
  2. and presumably the river originates in the Kanefthali Mountains, which "start only a few hundred miles away". [Orc 92-93]
  3. Since Northport is actually to the west of Adrilankha ("ought to have been called Westport" [Phx 17]),
  4. the coast between them runs roughly east-west;
  5. and assuming that the sea is to the south of the Empire here, rather than the north -- which is supported by [1999-09-12]:
     • Brigitta's statement that the River meets the sea "a long, long way" to the south [BP 264]
     • and Vlad's comment to us that "Khaavren's Sea" is 300 miles south of Baritt's Tomb [Drg 248])
     • and, most obvious (but taking longest for me to find), "The city of Adrilankha lies along the southern coast of the Dragaeran Empire." [Yen 39] [1999-12-23]
  6. the Kanefthali River, running to the sea, must be running southward.
  7. So the Kanefthali Mountains start a few hundred miles north of Northport
  8. and therefore a good distance northwest of Adrilankha.
  9. If we assume (or even if we don't) that they extend even further north (rather than running just east-west)
  10. they therefore are also northwest of the former capital city, Dragaera (City) (now Adron's Sea of Chaos),
  11. which was probably the reference point from which the region known as the Northwest got its name.
  12. Now, Kanefthali names, like "Hwdf'rjaanci", give most Dragaerans a great deal of trouble [Orc 286, and throughout],
  13. and they're associated with the Northwest [Orc 286].
  14. So it seems reasonable to conclude that "the old Northwestern language" comes from the Kanefthali region, and can therefore equally well be called Kanefthali, at least by the likes of us, until proven otherwise.

  I earlier argued in this space that "Old Northwestern" was probably not the same as Kanefthali, since most Dragaerans have great trouble with Kanefthali names. I should have known better. After all, most Americans have trouble even approximating the reconstructions of Old English pronunciation: it's a different language, and the changes have by definition moved our current speech away from it.

• Behind the throne in the Palace on Greenaere Island is a decoration (quite possibly the seal of the kingdom) that Vlad describes as "a large carved orca [...] with a motto in a language I couldn't read". [Phx 33] Maybe the writing system was different from that used in the Empire, or maybe it was a different language, or both. Vlad says nothing about the language being different on Greenaere Island, or even the accent, and he has no trouble understanding overheard conversations (such as that between his pursuers and Aibynn), so if the inscription was in a different language it may have been an older one.

  Sethra says that "the first invasion" of the neighboring Elde Island by Dragaerans shouldn't really be counted as a war. [Phx 95] What does that imply? Not a Dragaeran occupation of uninhabited territory, or it wouldn't be considered a war by any criterion, and she wouldn't bring it up at all. Perhaps early Empire Dragaerans took over the island from non-Empire Dragaerans, then intermarried with them and lost their House identities. The same could have happened on Greenaere Island, with the language of the earlier inhabitants surviving for ceremonial uses.

• See also the section on Dragaeran names.

Serioli

Pel uses several phrases of the Serioli language, which is in vogue at court at the time of The Phoenix Guards. Only the first is explicitly described as Serioli, but these are the only foreign, italicized expressions in the book.

• "k'sozhaleniju" [TPG 40]: 'unfortunately'
• "konechno" [TPG 112]: 'of course'
• "k'luno" [TPG 163]

• "ben" = 'ford'. [TPG 249]
• "kvirinun" = 'time of melting snows', and "shuloon!re" = 'to arrive prematurely'. [TPG 126]
• In creating the Lavodes, Sethra took the name "from a Serioli word that meant 'versatile,' or, pronounced slightly differently, 'of mountains'". [FHYA 518]
• "kyrancteur", the Serioli name for trellanstone. [Iss 206] [2003-05-27]

See discussion under Serioli names. "Kvirinun" could conceivably be a Russian word but I don't think it is, while "shuloon!re" and "Jggo!f'tha" could not be (for the same kinds of reason that you, if you are a native or fluent speaker of English, know that they couldn't possibly be English words that you happen not to have heard/read). [2003-05-27]

The language is used in sorcery, at least before the Interregnum: in preparing a flash-stone, Tazendra chants "a few words in the language of the Serioli, of which she had at least memorized what she needed to know" [TPG 175]. It may be "the language of sorcery" in which Vlad wrote the rune for the verbs "to receive" [Tal 39] and, presumably, "to summon" [Tal 58], in the Paths of the Dead.

The syntax of Serioli is quite different from that of Dragaeran [TPG 62].

We also see a couple of highly improbable Serioli personal names, and what Vlad presents as translations of the Serioli names for the Great Weapons we have encountered so far [Phx 223,Drg 111]:

• Magical-Wand-for-Creating-Death-in-the-Form-of-a-Black-Sword (Blackwand)
• Dagger-Shaped-Bearer-of-Fire-That-Burns-Like-Ice (Iceflame)
• Artifact-in-Sword-Form-That-Searches-for-the-True-Path (Pathfinder)
• Remover of aspects of deity (Godslayer) [2003-05-27]

See also the section on the Serioli themselves.

Miscellaneous

Bengloarafurd Ford

This place name [TPG 249-250] is composed of the word for 'ford', in

1. Serioli (ben),
2. Fenarian (somewhat slurred from gázló),
3. the ancient tongue of the house of the Dragon (ara),
4. Dragaeran (also somewhat slurred, as represented by the spelling furd: cf. the modern pronunciation of "Oxford"), and
5. modern Dragaeran, fully pronounced as a separate word (represented by English ford)

But then I found the following items: [2004-11-21]:

1. From "Fun-with-words":
   Torpenhow Hill -- This place in Cumbria in the UK may be a quadruple etymological redundancy. Tor and how can be traced to Old English forms of hill, and penn may be linked to the Celtic word for hill. If this is true, the name means 'hill hill hill hill'. However, linguists and etymologists generally argue that at least one of the elements of this name has a different root.
   

2. From "Word Ways":
   In his second book, Beyond Language (1967), Dmitri Borgmann posed a problem and offered a solution that have both gone unremarked until now, over 35 years later. For those who don't have the book, here is part of Problem 35. Etymological Eccentricities: Find a word or name that exhibits a pure, quadruple redundancy, consisting of four elements identical in meaning. The resolution provided by Borgmann runs as follows: In The Story of English, Mario Pei mentions a ridge near Plymouth, England, called TORPENHOW HILL. This name consists of the ...
   [They won't show you the rest of the article without a credit card number. The Pei book is probably where I got the story from. -- MAM]
   (source)

Olakiska

[2003-05-17] The local language in the Eastern village of Blackchapel, near Morrolan's childhood home, is Olakiska [POTD 34]. "Fennick" (compare German "Pfennig"), the name of a local coin [POTD 31], may be a word in Olakiska, but Morrolan carries a different currency and is unfamiliar with the word even though he grew up less than twenty miles away and speaks the same language.

Silite

[2003-05-17] Morrolan's name means "Dark Star" in the language of the Silites [POTD 83], who lived in the area of Blackchapel many years before his birth [POTD 82]. He's far from the only Dragaeran with an Eastern name. Miska the eternal coachman, who gives him the name [POTD 35], calls them the Silatan; that may be the Fenarian name for them, since in Miska's own language Morrolan's name would be Sötétcsilleg, which sure looks Hungarian (i.e., Fenarian) to me, and Teldra tells Vlad it's Fenarian [Iss 105]. (In Paarfi's dialogue, Miska calls it "the language of the Silatan" and Teldra calls it "the language of the Silites" [POTD 82]. In our less leisurely age, I call it "Silite". I have no guess as to what language of our world it is or represents, if any.)

Notes

[my qualifications] While I am a linguist (a scientist of language) by training, avocation, and profession, and I know something about Hungarian, I don't know the language. For example, when I started writing the Names page I didn't actually know that "Kati" is a Hungarian woman's name, but I did know that "Kati" or "Kathi" would be pronounced "Cawti", as well as English spelling can approximate it. ([2005-01-14] Since then I have had the opportunity to ask a native speaker, who confirmed the name "Kati" and its pronunciation.)

[magyar] "Magyár" is Hungarian for "Hungarian".

[elfs] [2005-05-25] At this point I formerly had the parenthetical note "but I think Vlad once uses the equally abnormal plural 'knifes'". When I quoted this section on the Dragaera list, Steve (2005-05-25) simultaneously confirmed my memory and ruled the point irrelevant:

Yeah, but that was, to use the technical expression, a boo-boo.

[diacritics] Hungarian is written with three diacritical marks on vowels:

• an acute accent, as in magyár, primarily indicating a long vowel;
• a dieresis ("umlaut"), as in Bölk, used to show a front rounded vowel;
• a double acute accent (not available in this character set, ISO Latin-1), indicating a long front rounded vowel.

[Russian] Brust's transliteration, while faithful to Russian, is somewhat misleading to a Russianless English-speaker who would like to pronounce these words correctly. A closer approximation is:

• k'sozhaleniju: ksaw-zha-LAY-nee-yoo ("zh" like the "s" in "pleasure")
• konechno: con-YESH-nuh

[ford] As a noun, 'place to cross a river'.