#but there was another that used 'š'

[talonabraxas]

Babylonian prayer to the Gods of the Night pullulū rubû wašrū sikkūrū šīrētum šaknā ḫabrātum nišū šaqummā petûtum uddulū bābū ilī mātim ištarāt mātim Šamaš Sîn Adad Ištar īterbū ana utul šamê ul idinnū dīnam ul iparrasū awātim pussumat mušītim ēkallum šaḫūrša kummu adrū ālik urḫim ilam išassi u ša dīnim ušteberre šittam dayyān kinātim abi ekiātim Šamaš īterub ana kummīšu rabûtum ilī mušītim nawrum Girra qurādum Erra qaštum nīrum šitaddarum mušḫuššum ereqqum inzum kusarikkum bašmum lizzizū-ma ina têrti eppušu ina puḫād akarrabu kittam šuknān šumūšu ikrib mušītim (TRANSLATION) The princes are closely guarded, The locking-bolts lowered, the locking rings placed, (Though previously) noisy, the people are silent, (Though previously) open, the doors are locked. The gods of the land (and) the goddesses of the land, Shamash, Sin, Adad and Ishtar Have entered into the lap of heaven. They do not render judgment, they do not decide a case. The night is veiled. The palace, its chapel, the cella are obscured. The traveler invokes god, but the one (who offers) a decision remains asleep. The judge of truth, father of the impoverished girl, Shamash has entered his cella. The great ones, the gods of the night, Bright Girra, Warrior Erra, The Bow, the Yoke, Orion, the Furious Serpent, The Wagon, the Goat, The Bison, the Horned Serpent, May they stand by so that, In the extispicy I am performing, In the lamb I am offering, You may place the truth Alan Lenzi. Reading Akkadian Prayers & Hymns: an Introduction. Society of Biblical Literature. pp. 71-82. Plate with Cuneiform Script: Pray to the Night Gods. Place of origin: Ancient East, Babylonia Date: Early 2nd millennium B.C. Medium: Clay

This is an extispicy prayer that used to be recited when performing divination at night. Its logic follows that, as the city’s activity declines for the night, the main gods retire as well, which makes sense as nighttime was probably very dangerous in ancient times. So instead one ought to seek the guidance of the ilī mušītim “gods of the night”. Here the term refers to the stars and constellations, plus fire god Girra (also called Gibil) and the fierce war-and-plague god Erra (syncretized with Nergal).

The constellation the Babylonians called the Bow, qaštum, is probably part of Canis Major, and the Yoke is Boötes. Orion was called Šitadarrum, Šitadallum or Šidallum, often spelled using the Sumerian logograms SIPA.ZI.AN.AN, meaning “the true shepherd of heaven”. The serpent is Mušḫuššum, one of the 11 chaos monsters reared by Tiamat, but tamed by Marduk and made into his pet in the Enuma Elish. It possibly referred to the Hydra constellation. The Wagon is famously Ursa Major and the Goat is Lyra. The Bison and Bašmum, “horned serpent”, however, are still unidentified.

The appellation “gods of the night” also appears in another prayer as part of the Maqlû (burning) rituals, a series of exorcisms and uncrossings performed in the small hours all the way until dawn.

This prayer unfortunately isn’t that useful for the modern pagan, as it’s a bit too specific, but one may find some use still in the lines rabûtum ilī mušītim / nawrum Girra / qurādum Erra / qaštum nīrum / šitaddarum mušḫuššum / ereqqum inzum / kusarikkum bašmum/ lizzizū (“The great ones” down to “may they stand by”) in nightly stellar invocations for whatever maybe-not-quite-licit matters you may want to perform.

(If you plan on singing or reciting this, please remember that “š” sounds like the English “sh” and “ḫ” is guttural)

May the gods be praised!

[yamayuandadu]

Christmas special: Santa and his helpers. Divine living fossils in Greek sources

For reasons unknown to me, while poorly researched hot takes like “Aphrodite is LITERALLY Inanna” (nevermind that that in areas which plausibly had contact with Greece the closest analog to Inanna would be Ashtart, notably dissimilar to Aphrodite) are repeated over and over again, the actual presence of specific eastern deities under their actual names in Greek sources seems to be a matter mostly of interest to experts in Bronze Age Anatolia. Even generally credible sites will overlook them. Obviously, part of the problem is that the survival of Bronze Age Anatolian deities - whether Hittite, Luwian, Palaic, Hattian or Hurrian - in the Iron Age was the exception, not the rule. The situation is still weird, though. The following article is meant to shed some light on the two main examples, Santa and Maliya - or, according to Greek sources, Sandas and Malis. Needless to say, Santa has nothing to do with Santa Claus; I’m publishing this as a Christmas special only because the accidental homophony is funny to me.

Santa

Santa’s name has a variety of spellings in cuneiform, with either a ta or a da, and transcriptions both with and without diacritics (specifically, with š - read like the English sh sound in “cash” and so on - in place of s) can be found in literature. Variable orthography was not uncommon for names written phonetically rather than logographically. I admit I went with “Santa” here entirely because it’s funny. There’s also a variety of derivative Greek forms, but we’ll get to that in time. Santa’ career began in the earliest textual sources from Anatolia, the texts from the Assyrian trading colony, so-called karum, Kanesh (modern Kultepe in Turkey). These have been dated to roughly 1800 BCE, and are largely just the ancient version of store receipts, legal agreements and guarantees. The early attestations of Santa are therefore basically limited to theophoric names, ie. names invoking the name of a deity, and do not offer much information about his character, beyond telling us that he was viewed as an appropriate figure  to name children after by some of the locals the Assyrian traders did business with. The only thing which might shed some more light on what sort of deity he was is his name. Its precise origin remains unknown, though there is a reasonably popular theory that it comes from one of the Anatolian languages, perhaps Luwian, and that it can be translated as “the furious one” or something to that effect. Luckily, later sources do offer a bit more insight. Texts written in either Hittite or Luwian pretty consistently portray Santa as a warlike deity armed with a bow. He also had some sort of connection to the plague, being invoked against it in rituals. Seemingly he was not a solo act in the Bronze Age sources, his entourage included Annarumenzi (“the forceful ones”) and Marwainzi (“the dark ones”), two groups apparently sharing his interests. Santa was also persistently associated with Iyarri, a plague and war deity similarly armed with a bow. In addition to shared interests in war, plagues and archery, the two also shared roughly the same circle of attendant deities. An interesting thing to note is that there is a single text which refers to Iyarri as female, but since it describes an omen seen in a dream and so far has no parallels, it remains a matter of heated debate if it means that this name referred to more than one deity, that Iyarri’s gender was variable for one reason or another, or simply that it’s a strange dream vision which does not necessarily reflect anything anyone ever actually believed about Iyarri. I personally find the first two options reasonable as temporary assumptions to stick to until more material surfaces, but your mileage might vary. Last but not least, a single text links Santa with Iyaya, a goddess of springs; it has been proposed she was his wife but due to scarcity of sources caution is advised. Sometimes spousal relations between deities are presumed based on too little evidence, which Steve A. Wiggins once satirized by noting applying the same logic to Christian saints would lead to theologically puzzling interpretations. After the collapse of the Hittite state, Santa disappeared from available records for a few centuries, just to resurface when the Neo-Assyrian Empire expanded into eastern Anatolia. Evidently he retained a degree of importance in the eyes of kings of so-called “Neo-Hittite” states, which confusingly were mostly Luwian-speaking (they also used a unique writing system in addition to cuneiform, Luwian hieroglyphs aka Anatolian hieroglyphs, but this is a long story in itself). As far as I can tell, this is also the first time when we get an indication he was the city god of Tarsus. The city does already appear in earlier sources, though to my knowledge no texts associate it with Santa. Still, the consensus view is that presumably the local political situation has been relatively stable between the end of the Bronze Age and the Neo-Assyrian expansion, which also meant local religion did not change much. It also seems plausible Santa was doing fine all along further west in Lydia, but we know very little about the western half of Anatolia in the Bronze Age so whether he was already present there earlier or if he was introduced at some point - perhaps by refugees from collapsed cities in Hittite territory - cannot be determined.

A coin from the reign of Caracalla showing Sandas and a horned lion (Wikimedia Commons) The Neo-Assyrian evidence of Santa continuing his career is not exactly plentiful, but it can be supplemented with quite literally dozens, if not more, references starting in the fifth century BCE or so. Coins from Tarsus from both Hellenistic and Roman periods depict him; theophoric names are incredibly plentiful; and due to Greek presence in the area, he starts to appear in Greek texts. A few different forms of the name are attested in this context: Sandas, Sandes, Sandon and so on. Note that Sandan is incorrect, and if you see it, you’ve stumbled upon someone trying to convince you The Golden Bough is still credible, since this misspelling is Frazer’s fault. Nominally, the interpretatio graeca of Santa was Heracles - how come, we do not really know; note Heracles was VERY commonly used as a translation of foreign deities, though. I think assuming it boils down to both being portrayed as formidable warriors, as a number of experts do, is sensible. You can find quite a lot of examples of this link in primary sources, it even pops up in Nonnus’ Dionysiaca. However, nothing is ever as simple as it sounds, and functionally “Sandas” remained essentially an entirely separate deity. A tradition which hardly aligns with presenting him as an alternate name of Heracles can be found in two sources: implicitly in the writings of Dio Chrysostom, and much more explicitly in those of  Stephanos of Byzantium, both of whom likely depended on accounts of local tradition from Tarsus. According to Dio, Tarsus was founded by a titan, while Stephanus outright calls Sandas one of them, and a brother of Cronus, Rhea, Iapetus, and a number of mysterious figures: Adanos, Olumbros and Ostasos. The presence of Iapetus is the real oddity to me, honestly - Kronos and Rhea are not unexpected, they are well attested, were worshiped for example in Olympia, and they do appear alongside “non-standard” titans at times, a good example being Ophion and Eurynome, but he’s not exactly an a-lister himself even among titans; I cannot really explain why he’s here. What about the other names? All of them seem to be deities originating in Cilica, specifically city gods. Adanos was the mythical eponymous founder of Adana; Olymbros might be related to a city from Hittite sources, Ellibra (there’s also a “Zeus Olybris”, possibly a related epithet), and Ostasos is otherwise unattested, but presumably also represented a city based on the context of this passage. The last two gods are so obscure that as of the 21st of December 2022 googling Olymbros brought up rather few results:

In a way, the Cilician gods enumerated by Stephanos certainly did fit the label of titans - they truly were theoi proteroi, obviously not in the way Hesiod used this term, but in much more literal way. They were, essentially, divine living fossils.

Maliya

While Santa is the best attested example of a Bronze Age Anatolian deity living on in Greek sources, he is not the only one. Most often, his fate is compared to that of Maliya. She has much in common with Santa, in that both of them first appear in Kanesh in theophoric names, both appear in both Hittite and Luwian sources, and both survived until the Hellenistic period and acquired well attested associations with Greek deities, both via interpretatio and as independent figures. The meaning of Maliya’s name is unknown - or at least, there is no widely agreed upon explanation. A recent theory is that it might be derived from a term referring to “mental force” or something along these lines. She was in origin a river goddess, but she was also associated with gardens and, perhaps unexpectedly, with craftsmanship, especially with leather working. She had assistants named Maliyanni, “the small Maliyas” (yes, really) who have been compared in scholarship to Greek nymphs; something that will be relevant later. A curiosity worth mentioning here is that in addition to her Hittite-Luwian career, Maliya was seemingly also adopted by Hurrians in the kingdom of Kizzuwatna (normally it was the other way around - due to prestige of Hurrian culture, Luwians and Hittites adopted Hurrian deities). She was worshiped during a local Kizzuwatnean royal festival, ḫišuwa. In related texts, she appears in esteemed company, the creme de la creme of the western variant of the Hurrian pantheon. Among the deities invoked are Ishara, the tutelary goddess of Ebla already attested in the very oldest texts from Syria; Allani, the queen of the dead (portrayed as upbeat and friendly in her only literary appearance, and remarkably popular); Nupatik (one of the oldest and most broadly distributed Hurrian gods) in two hypostases; and oddities like Kurri, possibly a relic of the once politically powerful cult of Kura, the head of the Eblaite pantheon. So far no studies seem to investigate the reasons behind Maliya’s survival after the fall of the Hittite empire, so there is no explanation I can offer. At most occasional speculation about there in fact being two only linguistically related Maliyas can be found in scholarship. The evidence postdating the Bronze Age comes chiefly from Lycia and Lydia. Lydians seem to be responsible for the form of the name also found in Greek sources, Malis; Lydians stuck with the original Maliya. Her character changed to a degree compared to the Bronze Age, for example she might have developed a distinctly warlike side. In both Lycia and Lydia, Maliya developed a close association with Greek Athena. It was so close there is a Lycian depiction of the judgment of Paris where the other figures appear under transcribed Greek names, but Athena is replaced by Maliya! We also have the inscription in Lydian dedicated to her from the temple of Athena in Pergamon. What was this connection based on? Experts are not entirely sure. It wasn’t even necessarily entirely theological: Athena was prominent on Rhodes, and Rhodes was in turn influential politically in Anatolia. However, it cannot be ruled out that it was based on a shared association - either with warfare, craftsmanship, wisdom or just with specific cities. Despite the power of this specific case of interpretatio, similarly in Santa’s case, Maliya also had a separate role under her own name in Greek texts. Hipponax records a short prayer to her, which does not really say anything about her character. A single poem from Lesbos describes her as a weaver; there’s an admittedly recent and not yet widely accepted theory based on it, courtesy of Ian Rutherford, that if Arachne was not an invention of Ovid, she might have had her forerunner in a hitherto unknown adversary of Maliya, which could account for the story taking place in a Lydian city. However, my favorite reference to Maliya/Malis comes from Theocritus’ Idylls: in the well known episode about the abduction of Hylas carried out by nymphs, specifically naiads, one of them is inexplicably named Malis.

In other words, one of these nymphs in the famous Waterhouse painting might be her, if you want to believe. Worth noting is that this might indicate preservation of information about Maliya’s original character as a river goddess, something absent from Lycian and Lydian sources. However, note that the Maliades, naiads associated with the river Spercheois, are not related - this name is instead linked to the completely unrelated toponym Malis. Finally, there is an oddity which may or may not indicate a connection existed specifically between Maliya and Santa. Hellanikos states that a certain Malis, a slave of queen Omphale, had a son, Akeles, with Heracles. It has been argued that this might be a distant memory of a myth about Santa and Maliya, but as those two are not directly connected anywhere else, this is not exactly plausible.

In place of a bibliography

I recently finished obviously less humorous rewrite of the wikipedia Maliya article, created shiny new ones for Iyaya and Iyarri, and I am currently working on Santa but I failed to complete that one on time. All the sources used can be found there. I will add a small disclaimer, though: while Rutherford’s 2017 article is excellent as a source of information about Sandas, the few paragraphs devoted to Nergal are questionable, especially the baffling theory trying to connect Erragal with Heracles. Erragal was a separate deity from Nergal, and I do not think you can draw any real parallels between Heracles and a minor deity whose claims to fame include being married to the goddess of butchers (actually better attested than her husband) and a rather minor role in the flood myth as one of the deities tasked with wreaking havoc (next to such luminaries of the Mesopotamian pantheon Shullat and Hanish)... 

[chavashchelhi]

Чувашский алфавит (Chuvash alphabet)

Кириллица/Cyrillic

Включает 33 буквы русского алфавита и 4 дополнительные буквы кириллицы — Ӑ ӑ, Ӗ ӗ, Ҫ ҫ, Ӳ ӳ. При этом пять звонких согласных букв Б б, Г г, Д д, Ж ж, З з, гласные Ё ё, а также согласные Ф ф, Ц ц, Щ щ используются только при написании слов, заимствованных из русского языка, либо через русский язык.

В этом блоге я буду пытаться писать взаимствованные слова исключительно с чувашским алфавитом, включая буквы О о, Ф ф, Ц ц. In this blog I wiil try to write loanwords from Russian only with Chuvash letters, also including letters О о, Ф ф, Ц ц.

Пример / Example помидор -> помитор инженер -> иншенер орфографи -> орфокрафи

Includes 33 letters of Russian alphabet and 4 additional letters (there are links to what sound according to IPA each letter makes):

А а, Ӑ ӑ, Б б, В в, Г г, Д д, Е е, Ё ё, Ӗ ӗ, Ж ж, З з, И и, Й й, К к, Л л, М м, Н н, О о, П п, Р р, С с, Ҫ ҫ, Т т, У у, Ӳ ӳ, Ф ф, Х х, Ц ц, Ч ч, Ш ш, Щ щ, Ъ ъ, Ы ы, Ь ь, Э э, Ю ю, Я я.

The letters Е е, Ё ё, Ю ю, Я я are read by Russian rules: when they're placed in the beggining (ялта/jalta) or there's another vowel before these vowels (хӑяр/hӑjar) then it's read with /j/ in the beggining (as shown on the picture). Otherwise they are read without sound /j/.

The letters Б б, Г г, Д д, Ж ж, З з, Ё ё, Ф ф, Ц ц, Щ щ are used only for words Russian loanwords (highlighted on the drawing)

Латиница/Latin

Существуют разные интерпретации того, как должен выглядеть чувашский на латинице. Как мне кажется, в следующей картинке написаны самые распространенный вариант.

There are different opinions on how should Chuvash look latinized. I tried to write the more popular version.

source

Также "родные" глухие согласные (К к, П п, С с, Ҫ ҫ, Т т, Ч ч, Ш ш, Х х) озвончаются между двумя гласными или в случае, когда звонкая согласная (В в, Л л, М м, Н н, Р р, Й й) стоит перед глухой (или шумной) а после него идет гласная. В примерах сначала идут глухие согласные в словах, потом озвонченные. К -> Г (лекке; ака) П -> Б (аппа; апат) С -> З (ӑс; усӑ) Ҫ -> Словно мягкая ж??? ʒ (виҫҫӗ; уҫӑ) Т -> Д (паттӑр; атӑ) Ч -> Дж (чӑваш; ача) Ш -> Ж (ӑшши; ӑшӑ) Х -> как украинская г (хӑяр; ахах)

That being said, how do you actually read Chuvash? Unlike English, its pretty straightforward: as you can see above letters typically correspond to sounds, sometimes with exception of Е е, Ё ё, Ю ю, Я я.

But that's the least fun part about Chuvash language. The "native" consonants [К к (K k), П п (P p), С с (S s), Ҫ ҫ (Ş ş), Т т, Ч ч (Č č), Ш ш (Š š), Х х (H h)] between two vowels or between a vowel and a voiced consonant [В в (V v), Л л (L l), М м (M m), Н н (N n), Р р (R r), Й й (J j)] become voiced (examples in parentheses, first word is voiceless consonant, second is voiced): K -> G (лекке/lekke; ака/aka) P -> B (аппа/appa; апат/apat) S -> Z (ӑс/ӑs; усӑ/usӑ) ɕ -> something akin to ʒ but not exactly (виҫҫӗ/vişşӗ; уҫӑ/uşӑ) T -> D (паттӑр/pattӑr; атӑ/atӑ) ʨ -> ʥ (чӑваш/čӑvaš; ача/ača) ʂ -> ʐ (ӑшши/ӑšši; ӑшӑ/ӑšӑ) x -> ɣ (хӑяр/hӑjar; ахах/ahah)

источник

Также существуют правила ударения: Если нет гласных ӑ, ӗ в последнем слоге, то ударение падает на него. (ударение выделено жирным: лаша, ĕне, тамаша, кĕнеке, уйăхĕпе) Если в последнем слоге есть гласные ӑ, ӗ то ударение падает на слог перед ним (если на последний и предпоследний, то на слог перед ними). (каçăр, савăт, тĕпренчĕк, тикĕт) Если есть только гласные ӑ, ӗ то ударение падает на первый слог. (шăршă, пăсăк, чĕрĕп, тĕпкĕч, шăпăрçă, пăрăнăç, тĕршĕнчĕк)

источник

That being said, how do you actually read Chuvash? Unlike English, its pretty straightforward: as you can see above letters typically correspond to sounds, sometimes with exception of Е е, Ё ё, Ю ю, Я я.

But that's the least fun part about Chuvash language. The "native" consonants [К к (K k), П п (P p), С с (S s), Ҫ ҫ (Ş ş), Т т, Ч ч (Č č), Ш ш (Š š), Х х (H h)] between two vowels or when the voiced consonant is before voiceless [В в (V v), Л л (L l), М м (M m), Н н (N n), Р р (R r), Й й (J j)] and there's a vowel after it become voiced (examples in parentheses, first word has voiceless consonant, second has voiced): K -> G (лекке/lekke; ака/aka) P -> B (аппа/appa; апат/apat) S -> Z (ӑс/ӑs; усӑ/usӑ) ɕ -> something akin to ʒ but not exactly (виҫҫӗ/vişşӗ; уҫӑ/uşӑ) T -> D (паттӑр/pattӑr; атӑ/atӑ) ʨ -> ʥ (чӑваш/čӑvaš; ача/ača) ʂ -> ʐ (ӑшши/ӑšši; ӑшӑ/ӑšӑ) x -> ɣ (хӑяр/hӑjar; ахах/ahah)

source

There are also rules on how you should stress syllables: If there is no vowels Ӑ ӑ, Ӗ ӗ in the last syllable then stress is on the last syllable. (stress is bold: лаша/laša, ĕне/ĕne, тамаша/tamaša, кĕнеке/kĕneke, уйăхĕпе/ujăhĕpe) If the last syllable contains Ӑ ӑ, Ӗ ӗ then stress goes before it (imagine as if stress is scared of those vowels and runs away from it). (каçăр/kaşăr, савăт/savăt, тĕпренчĕк/tĕprenčĕk, тикĕт/tikĕt) If there is only vowels Ӑ ӑ, Ӗ ӗ then the stress is on the first syllable. (шăршă/šăršă, пăсăк/păsăk, чĕрĕп/čĕrĕp, тĕпкĕч/tĕpkĕč, шăпăрçă/šăpărşă, пăрăнăç/părănăş, тĕршĕнчĕк/tĕršĕnčĕk)

source

[therivergirl]

Watching MasterChef

My mum: I think this candidate used to have a problem with her Rs, Listen to how she says it!

Me: *listens* Oh, yeah. And her Ss too. I say as someone who has issues with my Ss.

Mum: Yeah, It does sound a bit like yous Ss!

(For context I went to speech therapy intermittently for four years as a kid because I had an issue with the letters S, Z, Š, Č and Ž. Š=sh, Č=ch, Ž is like J in french, like in Jaune or bonjour)

*realizes that speech issues are yet another neurodivergent trait*

Well, fuck.

(Disclaimer: Neither I nor my mum are speech therapists. My mum is an accountant, and I'm a family medicine intern, we mostly went by experience based on my own speech issues I had as a kid.)

[signipotens]

Simple reason why it’s so complicated is that Standard Arabic has some 25 consonants but the Standard Latin alphabet only has some 20 consonants (and they aren’t even the same 20 consonants! Arabic has the gall to not have /p/ or /g/ while also having 6 post-velar sounds that Latin doesn’t) so you have to make do with digraphs or diacritics.

Ideally a romanisation system roughly signifies the proper pronunciation of the word it’s transcribing—if I want to transcribe the word باب “gate”, something like <bab> would be far more useful than something like <gig>, even if “whenever you see <g> you should pronounce it like <ب>” is something you can technically do (like how Pinyin treats <q>).

And this works for most sounds in the language. ب is a b, ك is a k, ت is a t, ل is a l, س is a s, د is a d, ف is a f. But then what about ق, Arabic’s other k-sound that isn’t quite a k-sound? We don’t want people messing up their dogs and their hearts. Well, even though we’ve already used <k> for the obvious choice ك, Latin luckily happens to have two other k-sound letters <c> and <q>, and because <c> can be very confusing (because a lot of people will see <ci> and think it should be /si/), <q> seems the next obvious choice. So كلب <kalb> and قلب <qalb>.

Sometimes the digraphs to use will be obvious too. ش is a sh, (if you speak Persian or Urdu) چ is a ch, ث is a th. But what about ذ? English uses <th> for both of its th-sounds, but we don’t want readers to confuse their ث and their ذ, so why not say that if ت is t and ث is th, then د is d and ذ is dh?

The issue is that sometimes digraphs kind of suck. First of all, how are you supposed to distinguish a sh-sound from a s-sound followed by a h-sound, like in مصحف? You could represent ش with a single letter like š (which some but not all systems do). Likewise with ṯ for ث and ḏ for ذ.

And how are you even supposed to represent emphatics at all in Latin? Arabic has four of them ص ض ط ظ, but Latin doesn’t have anything close. If you asked any European they would just say that they are basically the same sounds as <s d t dh>, so why not treat them that way, but distinguish them with a little dot or line under them? Then you get both a roughly correct pronunciation from a layman and a one-to-one correspondence for the letters (ظ is typically ẓ because a) where would you put the dot on <dh> or <ḏ> and b) several dialects of Arabic don’t distinguish dh and z anyways).

So that just leaves us with those post-velar sounds ا ح خ ع غ that Latin just can’t really work with. We’re lucky to have <k> for ك and <j> for ج, and <h> is good for ه so that’s cool. And then we’ve already decided on <q> for ق so that’s also cool.

If we like digraphs, we can use <kh> and <gh> for خ and its voiced equivalent غ, since they’re in the same place of articulation as k and g but fricatives (plus we use <kh> for that sound in languages like Russian, as <ch> (German) or <x> or <j> (Spanish) would be confusing for چ and كس and ج). If we don’t like digraphs, we can use those lines again like we used for ث and ذ, so ḵ for خ and ḡ for غ (line goes over because of the tail).

Then we have ح which is super annoying because it’s not ك or خ or ه, it’s another h-sound entirely. And <hh> looks really stupid (some systems do use it tho). This is finally where some linguistic technical stuff pops up, because it turns out that “emphatic” is kind of a bogus term, and different people disagree on what exactly makes something emphatic. If you think ح is basically the emphatic version of ه, you might be inclined to write it like ط, with a little dot <ḥ> (you might also think that ق is the emphatic version of ك and so write it <ḳ>. Or you might just think <q> looks silly and like dots instead). Or maybe you think that ح is just kind of like ه but more, so you write it with a line like <ẖ> or (more common, also used for the sound in Maltese) <ħ>.

And then we have ع. Here we give up. Backwards question mark ʕ looks like ع so we are just doing that. If you don’t have a ʕ on your keyboard. um. Modifier letter half ring left ʿ also looks like ع. Or just use opening single quotation mark ‘ because it’s curved in the right direction (or even spiritus asper ʽ if you’re cool). This is nice because some people also already use <’> for ا when it’s being used as a consonant; we can make the orientation a distinguishing feature (or use modifier letter half ring right ʾ or non-reversed question mark ʔ if you are using those systems instead).

And that’s that.

Unambiguous choices (it would be pretty weird if you did not do this):

b ب t ت d د r ر z ز s س f ف k ك l ل m م n ن h ه w و y ي

Kinda stretching but it’s cool:

j/ġ ج q/ḳ ق

Could be either digraphs or letters with diacritics:

th/ṯ ث dh/ḏ ذ sh/š ش kh/ḵ خ gh/ḡ غ

Emphatics with dots:

ṣ ص ḍ ض ṭ ط ẓ ظ

H, now with more H:

ħ/ḥ ح

Um. Yeah sure:

ʕ/‘ ع ʔ/’ ا

And that’s that!

can anybody explain how Arabic transliterations work. why the q, why the t and s and h with the dots underneath, what’s the difference between kh and gh

[blackwaxidol]

"Šimmumah (ur-Nokru)" is pronounced "Shimmumah" but u didn't hear that from me.

[xenonmoon]

I am teaching myself how to write with hieroglyphs in my spare time but it's not me if it doesn't end up being silly stuff or memes from time to time.

(full breakdown of the hieroglyphs under the crack)

Ok, so this is not a direct translation or anything serious or accurate, just some pot-pourri I put together focusing more on which hieroglyph means what than grammar / actual words in ancient egyptian.

So it's still "random bullshit go" with the same construction and some transliterated words. I got a bit creative with them.

Right to left (asymmetric hieroglyphs point to where you should start reading)

[letters] are biliteral signs I used, (letter) the uniliteral signs repeated afterwards to mark which way the previous sign should be read. I used Gardiner's list as reference.

"Random" r ꜣ [nḏ] (ḏ) m [stẖ, det. "turmoil"] I used the set-animal as determinative (signs used for semantic disambiguation) since, well, it was often associated to chaos and turmoil. What is more chaotic than randomness, I thought [ideo. Bull] š i t [ḥs, det. "excrment"] Could've used "bull" and "excrment" as ideograms and call it a day but it wasn't that much of aesthetically pleasing, so I kept the ideogram for "bull" and spelt out "sh*t" using the appropriate determinative. pr [iw, det. "movement"] This should be the actual way of saying "go out" in ancient egyptian (I don't know which one, though) I've found with an online dictionary, but I'll leave looking further into that for another time.

That's basically it. And since you're here it mean you've read the whole lot of it, I appreciated it. Cheers.

[imuybemovoko]

so I made a language

well technically i've made kind of a bunch of languages

and probably already have a very old post about one of them

but here's another one. I call it Pinõcyz. I started working on it in February of 2020.

PHONOLOGY

I don't want to get too deep into the evolution I did on this, but to illustrate a little of that, I'll explain what's going on with the vowels and /z/. Basically, in most consonants where the modern language lacks a labialized pairing, i.e. /m l q/ and others, the labialized consonant simply unrounded. Historical /ðʷ/, though, merged with /z/ instead, yielding contrasting /z zʷ/ preceding /ɛ ɵ u ɔ/ and contrasting /ɛ ɵ u ɔ/ and /e ɨ ɯ o/ following plain /z/.

I realize also that I've sort of doubled the explanation of this in the notes maybe?! and left a note about the romanization in this screenshot that I deleted the romanization from because I want to display it separately. I'm not going to replace this screenshot a fifth damn time. :D

ORTHOGRAPHY

The Pinõcyz language is written primarily with the Tewrinnal /teɣrinːal/ script. It's an abugida.

...For a language with eleven vowels and fairly complex syllables.

You know, very much not the normal simple, open syllables that such a system usually operate best with.

So just what the hell is going on here?

Well, every character has an inherent vowel /ə/. To represent other vowels, diacritics are used, and to represent, for example, a single-consonant coda, another diacritic is used to mark that there isn't a vowel. For example:

/mə me m/

There are six regular vowel diacritics:

/nɨ ni no na ne nɯ/

But, we also have to handle four more vowels somehow, and the labialized consonants where they're distinct.

That's all handled with one diacritic, marking both for labialization on the consonant and, where relevant, these different vowels.

/nʷɵ nʷi nʷo nʷɔ nʷɛ nʷu/

So that helps with those things. But what happens with a consonant cluster, or a geminate? Those are weird, right?

Well, the script uses a longer diacritic for that. Let's use the name of the script as an example:

/teɣrinːal/ (It's written from right to left.)

So, couple of things going on here. First, that second chunk is /ɣri/. The glyph for /ɣ/ doesn't need the null vowel diacritic (shown here on final /l/) because it's marked with this tie bar that shows it's part of a cluster in the same syllable as /ri/. And second, that third chunk is /nːa/. Marking geminates via this tie bar is one of several uses of this other glyph, the null-consonant.

We also have to handle initial vowels.

And diphthongs.

So what's going on here?

/ə ɨ i o a e ɯ/

Here's the null-consonant glyph, and every vowel on it. These don't take the rounding diacritic; for geminates, said diacritic will appear on the consonant glyph proper.

/qaj teu/

Diphthongs are written as though the first component forms a simple syllable with the consonant, but then with the null consonant immediately following.

Alright.

So here's all the base glyphs real fast:

/∅ m n ŋ p b t d k g q/

/t͡s d͡z t͡ʃ d͡ʒ r l j f v s z/

/ʃ ʒ x ɣ h �� ɬ/

And one last quick note, /zʷ/ is represented by the glyph for /ð/ with rounding diacritic. Here's an example, in the form of a common given name:

/zʷɛzi/

Last but not least, the script has a couple of punctuation marks:

In order, something between the role of a comma and a semicolon; a marker for the end of a sentence; and an exclamation and imperative marker. These are small and appear next to the bottom of the last glyph, much like a period or comma might.

I don't have a font of this yet, and even if I did I'd have some trouble getting that to function well on Tumblr. So I'm going to briefly explain the romanization that I tend to use.

For the non-labialized consonants I have:

/m n ŋ p b t d k g q t͡s d͡z t͡ʃ d͡ʒ f v ð s z ɬ ʃ ʒ x ɣ h r l j/

⟨m n ň p b t d k g q c ż č ǧ f v ð s z ł š ž x w h r l j⟩

For the vowels I have:

/i ɨ ɯ e ə o a/

⟨i y u e õ o a⟩

The other four vowels and the labialized consonants are handled with diacritics on the characters for the vowels. So,

/ɛ ɵ u ɔ/

⟨ê ŷ û â⟩

and to mark that the preceding consonant is labialized, i and o also take circumflex, î and ô. The result is that ⟨w⟩ represents both /w/ and /ɣ/, and ⟨j⟩ represents both /j/ and /ɥ/, and obviously, for example k, g, r represent both plain /k g r/ and labial /kʷ gʷ rʷ/, and so on.

And because this doesn't handle labialized z, I have /zʷ/ ⟨ź⟩, and for example ⟨zê⟩ /zɛ/.

This probably isn't anything close to an ideal system, but it's what I settled on in 2020 and I don't think I want to change it. It's weird, but it's phonetic, in a sort of weird roundabout way.

So let's get into the grammar.

We'll start relatively simple: word order is verb-subject-object, with descriptors that follow what they're marking except for some in the animate class that are derived from verbs (more on all that later), and placement of other things like indirect objects and relative clauses varies in a couple of ways.

Also, subject pronouns often, but are not required to, drop entirely.

NOUNS

Whether a noun is considered animate or inanimate has some impact on case markings and other things like that. In general, people, certain concepts, feelings, anything divine, weather phenomena, time, animals, some tools, injuries or illnesses, fire and water, and plants food items considered spiritually important such as tea and many herbs are animate; other nouns are inanimate. Certain shelled sea creatures are also inanimate.

Case markings carry a plural marker and information related to definiteness within them. Animate nouns are considered definite by default and so have an indefinite article that incorporates into the cases; inanimate nouns are considered indefinite by default and so incorporate a definite article into their case markings.

Pinõcyz has split-ergative alignment based on animacy. Animate nouns take the (unmarked) nominative case as subject and the accusative case as object; inanimate nouns take the ergative case as subject and the (unmarked) absolutive as object. All the case markers except the ergative appear as suffixes; the ergative, though, is a particle that precedes the noun. There's a lot of wonky historical reasons for that, a bit beyond the scope of this.

Here's a table of the regular forms:

Where I have something in parenthesis, what sounds occur at the end of a noun determine whether it's present. For the vowels (i.e. most of them), it drops if the noun has a final vowel, and for the definite singular inanimate dative, that l is present if it's a final vowel and gone if there's a final consonant. There are other effects that the final consonant can have but they're often less predictable than this.

I'll explain the ablaut more when I get to verbs since it's more relevant there, but the definite singular inanimate dative does trigger ablaut, and the inanimate singular definite genitive triggers ablaut in nouns with a final vowel, where the y is dropped.

POSSESSIVE CONSTRUCTIONS

The possessor is marked with the genitive case and precedes what it marks. Examples: Tuštez bylen "Tušte's cousin", ðandaz manõn "rapids", lit. "river's teeth"

ADJECTIVES

Here I'm using "adjectives" as a sort of catch-all term, there's not a separate class of adverbs. There are, however, separate sets of animate and inanimate descriptors. These come in the form of a few adjectives that can simply be used for either sort of noun, i.e. izy "also", or in the form of separate, often derived forms for animate nouns, i.e. ðakan rõr "the stone nearby", but šõrõr celiż "the nearby ash tree". Many animate adjectives are derived more recently from verbs, and those ones precede what they describe, unlike the others. The new verb-derived animate adjectives are still often transparently related to one of several verbs. For example, šõrõr here has incorporated šõ "to have" as a prefix; wâðrata "dry" takes wâð "to be" as a prefix, and so on.

Except for a few exceptions, animate adjectives may not be used for inanimate nouns and vice versa, i.e. šõrõr ðakan here would be ungrammatical.

ABLAUT

I'm going to take a second before I get into the rest of this to discuss ablaut in more detail.

Sometimes, but not always, an i or e vowel remains in a suffix that triggers ablaut. This was universal before some of the vowels were eroded, but is now a bit trickier to predict if the vowel has been lost. Historically (read: before vowel length was lost, a bunch of final vowels got eroded, and a bunch of other things happened), a long i or e in the final syllable triggered fronting and raising of the vowel in the preceding syllable. How that expresses in the modern language is roughly reflected by this table:

Most of the time, labialization was retained through this raising, so sê "to float" > sîż "they (inanimate, plural) float".

Some verb endings including tense markers and subject agreement trigger ablaut.

VERBS

Oh boy these get messy. Alright, I'll start with the tenses. I'll give an example sentence or two with each, and I'll explain the personal agreement after that.

Simple Present: unmarked. Deals in ongoing actions, states, things like that. Example: Symvinan "I'm thinking".

Habitual: -čin if the noun has a final consonant; -ǧin for a final vowel; in final plosives, the č metathesizes into the word like CVčCin. Triggers ablaut. Deals in actions that the subject carries out often or habitually. Examples: Łezeǧinõn manõnxaz "I often swim in the river"; Wêličkinõm dõz ðažgaňna "She often moves my pans".

Imperative: -žǧin for final vowel, -ščin basically otherwise; rarely -šõčin with final clusters. Triggers ablaut. Commands, things like that. Example: Biliqščin żŷknõ! "Prepare the boat!" (Fun note: żŷk "boat" is an animate noun; that's the accusative case.)

Future: -ðem, VðCem metathesis with final plosives. Deals in things that will take place in the future. Triggers ablaut. Examples: Bigimðemõǧ yquddiz bêdêkkuinan "They will gather the king's council"; Taxe beðqemõl "Therefore you will flee".

Conditional: -sõn if final consonant, -zõn if final vowel, VsCõn metathesis for final plosive. Deals in possibilities, uncertainties, etc. Example: Boňgestõnõn żen Lagruisyn "I might mail those to Lagrui".

Subjunctive: -õð for some final consonants, -ôð for others; -ð for final vowel; metathesizes with final stop VðõC unless it's in a cluster. Expected, preferred, "ought to be". Example: Kalyðõl "You ought to sleep".

Past-habitual: -šał with final consonants, -žał with final vowels; metathesizes VšCał with final plosives. Things the subject used to often or habitually do. Example: Kyużêžałõn ðembawynxaiz "I used to explore among these ruins often."

Optative: -kî for final consonant, -gî for final vowel. Triggers ablaut. Deals in things desired or hoped for by the speaker. Example: Erõmjeqqîl nida "I hope you return early". (In this example the consonant was absorbed into the final q on the verb root.)

Pluperfect: -łyš, metathesizes VłCyš for final plosives. Final consonant in the suffix retains labialization when vowels follow. Deals with actions completed by a specified or implied time period. Example: Dîrzynłyšôč "They (animate, plural) had taken ill". (Final consonants in the root form will have lost labialization, but they retain it when, like here, a vowel is introduced via a suffix.)

Experiential: -šai for final consonant, -žai for final vowel, VšCai for final plosive. Marks an experience that has happened at least once without respect for time, and is repeatable. Example: Sylezunčaiž wâðger waišqalnan "We have survived some large floods". (This example shows fortition of the fricative immediately after a nasal, a common sound change.

Now let's look at the regular forms of the person endings.

Most often, these will retain the vowel before the suffix consonant, but that is not always the case, sometimes you lose it and keep the one after, and it's not predictable in a way I can describe neatly here. For final vowels in the root or the TAM affix, typically no vowel is retained after.

Here's where things get WILD.

PASSIVE VOICE

The passive voice renders the agent of an action as an oblique and promotes the patient, so that it's focused a bit more. The passive is derived from an auxiliary verb that takes the tenses and the verb agreement, giving a qir- prefix. Then the verb is incorporated after that, and then -(u)z prefix, where the u drops if the z is allowed to form a final cluster with the final consonant or the verb has a final vowel. Then the agent of the action takes the ablative case. Example:

Qiršõmrenõnżõ Madriz lezgammuðgõż "Madriz was stabbed by an impostor". (This sentence is sus. Also note the fortition, z > d͡z after that nasal.)

ANTIPASSIVE

In ergative constructions, it's often more appropriate to de-emphasize the agent. In these cases, an antipassive construction forms, basically the passive construction but with the oblique-marked object in the allative case. This shows up mainly in relative clauses, but can form in fully independent sentences for emphasis reasons. Example:

Qiršymqamżõ pera Varasyn "An apple hit Vara"

An active-voice rendering of this same sentence would be Qamšym gõr pera Varanõ; the ergative particle here lends a degree of emphasis that is not always useful. Some speakers even consider it ungrammatical to form a sentence with the accusative on the object and the ergative on the subject, though that's far from universal and is mostly a hard-and-fast rule only in relatively conservative dialects. (For the most part, variation among dialects is beyond the scope of this post.)

MEDIOPASSIVE

The mediopassive construction handles both reflexives and certain intransitive sentences where the subject is not necessarily interpreted as the agent, such as "I fell". It derives from an old auxiliary verb ša- which takes any tenses and the subject agreement, but in this case the main verb, marked with the experiential, is not fused to the end of that. Examples:

Šan kadynčai "I fall" (fortition after the nasal again); Šamom dewšai "He has washed himself".

CAUSATIVES AND INDIRECT OBJECTS

A causative will usually take the form of the cause oblique-marked, taking the ablative case; an indirect object is typically marked with the dative case unless circumstances suggest something else. Typically, an animate oblique will precede the verb and an inanimate will follow the entire clause, but this is somewhat flexible for the purposes of emphasis. Examples: Taraðõd sybêkužõn Jŷddenõ "I met Jŷdde because of Tara" (causative); Kitronyz šŷllalõ leðõn żŷknõ "I'm building a boat for Kitron's clan" (indirect object).

NEGATION

Negating nouns and adjectives is done with a suffix -riq; this does not trigger ablaut. Example: cymanõnriq "nonexistence, void". In nouns this is primarily a derivational method.

In verbs, there is a negative auxiliary, jan in root form. It takes personal agreement, preceding the main verb, and the main verb takes tenses. Here's the forms of the negative auxiliary:

In passives, antipassives, and mediopassives, the negative auxiliary takes root form and precedes the verb construction as a particle.

Examples:

Jan šan kadynčai "I did not fall"; Ne vreita grõn teta "The candle isn't burning".

QUESTIONS

The interrogative terms are:

qa "who"; hud "what"; jõl "where"; tõr "when"; wal "why"; ðam "how"; gy "which one", also a general interrogative; jezyn "to where"; jeðõd "from where". They usually precede the verb, with the exception of gy when it precedes a noun, i.e. Jenin gy tynnanõ? "Which sumac tree am I looking for?"

RELATIVE CLAUSES

The interrogative terms also function as relative pronouns.

If the noun of the relative clause is animate:

Subjects, direct objects, and indirect objects can be relativized without any extra trouble, simply constructing the clause out of an interrogative and then the verb and relevant noun. Examples:

Subject- Kasran kêdynõ qa bašqõm "I see the dog who ran"

Object- Gy bûriðemõl ňaňlõ qa ��õkasran? "Will you wait for the man who I forgot?"

Indirect object- Wâðõm pinõ qa daxõn luz qarut "That is the person who I gave your money to"

For obliques, genitives, and objects of comparatives, it's necessary to use a passive. Examples:

Oblique- Jenižǧin sadynõ jeðõd qirmomrenõnżõ Nabi lezgammuðgõż! "Find the knife with which Nabi was stabbed by an impostor!"

Genitive- Gy činõl riżalnõ qaz qirõmjeniz rênnan Dargoðõd? "Do you know the shrub whose leaves are sought by Dargo?"

Object of comparative- Dalqamõn ainan jeðõd šoðõð qirčinõnfilz "I playfully hit the nonbinary person who I am sung better than by"

Yeah, Pinõcyz has a word for the act of hitting someone gently in a humorous or flirty way, it's dalqam.

If the noun of the relative clause is inanimate:

Only absolutives may be relativized. Example:

Absolutive- Qiršõngaduz wegrizxaiz jõl kerkożżynčõm verraw "I was given birth to in the city which the king declared war against".

For all other sorts of relative clauses, antipassives must be used. Examples:

Ergative- Vreitašõn ludan hud qiršõmfaisqõ Balzasyn "I burned the arrow that killed Balza" (that -z suffix here is metathesized into the verb and devoiced, and we have a following epenthetic vowel)

Indirect object- Kasran eigu jezyn qirčinõmdaxuz xâż lenasyn "I see the clearing to which the tide gives water"

Oblique- Laxõždõn ðaka jeðõd qiršõmmaxnaz ewa "I broke the stone with which the shellfish hunted"

Genitive- Šommom qâra huż qiršymžac mez rênnażi "The basil that lost its leaves has died."

Object of comparative- Jenimon reňkum hud qirčinõnjanjaz han dõsyn "I have found the needle that is longer than me" (lit. "grows more than me")

A FEW TRANSLATIONS

I feel like translating some stuff, just to show a bit of the feel of it with either some familiar texts or maybe some stuff I decide to write for this. Again, no font, so I'll have to rely on my weird handwriting for this.

The One Ring inscription:

Verreðym gi grõn uda że cy, jeniðym gi że;

[verːeðɨm gi grən ɯda d͡ze t͡sɨ | jeniðɨm gi d͡ze]

rule-SUBJ-3S.Inan one ERG.DEF ring 3P.Inan all | find-SUBJ-3S.Inan one.DEF 3P.Inan

"One ring shall rule them all, the one shall find them;

Bêlašõðym gi grõn uda że cy, ta heqalxaz gŷšqamõðym że

[bɛlaʃəðɨm gi grən ɯda d͡ze t͡sɨ | ta heqalxaz gʷɵʃqaməðɨm d͡ze]

gather-SUBJ-3S.Inan one ERG.DEF ring 3P.INAN all and evil-LOC imprison-SUBJ-3S.Inan 3P.Inan

"One ring shall gather them all, and shall imprison them in evil"

Mordor jejaxtaz jõl xalzunõǧ tawna

[mordor jejaxtaz jəl xalzɯnəd͡ʒ taɣna]

Mordor territory-LOC where reside.3P.Anim shadow-P.DEF

"In Mordor land where the shadows live."

A few quotes from Goncharov and its promotional materials:

Jaqym grõn rêǧi Napolisyn

[jaqɨm grən rʷɛd͡ʒi napolisɨn]

come-3S.Inan ERG.DEF winter Naples-ALL

"Winter comes to Naples"

Ai fiłatõš syganõn; so, fiłacõnõn uri lun ðam qirčinymfiłac yaň sadusyn

[aj fiɬatəʃ sɨganən | so fiɬat͡sənən ɯri lɯn ðam qirt͡ʃinɨmfiɬat͡s jaŋ sadɯsɨn]

O lover apologize-1S | look love-COND-1S only 2S.ACC REL.how ANTP-HAB-3S.INAN-love\ANTP boot knife-ALL

“I’m sorry my dear, I can only love you the way a boot loves a knife.”

Kamassõnõl mainõ Napoliðõd žaz dajersyn qarrêðdõ Mâskõvaxaz ňaňňyz qa zazõðõǧ hud fiłatõǧ lun vaðdõd

[kamasːənəl majnə napoliðəd ʒaz dajersɨn qarːʷɛðdə mɔskəvaxaz ŋaŋːɨz qa zazəðəd͡ʒ hɯd fiɬatəd͡ʒ lɯn vaðdəd]

trace-COND-2S path-ACC.DEF Naples-ABL 1P.GEN home-ALL childhood Moscow-LOC man-GEN.P REL.who say-SUBJ-3P.Anim REL.what love-3P.Anim 2S.ACC blood-ABL

“you could trace a path from Naples to our childhood house in Moscow with the blood of all the men who’ll tell you they love you”

I'll probably do art and shit with this conlang at some point, and not just LOTR and Goncharov brainrot.

Enjoy!

[inonibird]

Sahuldeem/Kaleesh Q&A #8

Here we go again... (questions bold; answers italic) — Have you added or changed anything plotwise in Sahuldeem since completing the script? Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night and thought “It’s not too late to throw that in” Oh, hell yeah. All the time. (and I’ve also cut things, as well) The original script covers a LOT but doesn’t go nearly as in-depth as the prose, unsurprisingly, and I have found myself expanding on a lot of scenes because I can get into Qymaen’s head (and others) and explore emotions in greater detail. Probably the biggest example of an incredibly important late addition to the story was Ronderu’s backstory. Wild, I know. I always had a vague idea of what it would involve, and had written a description off to the side for my own knowledge, but in the original script Qymaen never actually found out about her past. I decided the reader would be too interested to NOT find out, and the only way we would learn of it was if Ronderu herself told Qymaen, so I massively expanded that wet lung scene with her opening up to him and am SO glad I did it.

What do you think Grievous is saying when Obi-Wan pries his chestplate open? He has already said it once in the story. He’ll say it at least one more time before we get to the end. Context clues will be there until then, but that final time will be when I translate it. ;)

Did the rank of Baatar ever get mentioned in Sahuldeem? Apparently it's higher than Tarkhan but lower than Khan Oh, yeah, I did include it, but I swapped the hierarchy of Baatar and Tarkhan. It made more sense in my brain for Tarkhan to be closer to Khan.

So as far as clan symbols go, what’s the difference between these sigils?

Ugh, these symbols. Very confusing. So my understanding has been that the mask and cape are meant to be variations of the same sigil (that of the Jai Clan), even though the art of the Martyr shows yet ANOTHER sigil that I also feel could represent the Jai Clan. Maybe one or more of them are just incredibly stylized? Maybe one is the “standard” sigil and another is the “Chieftain/Khan/Khagan” edition? Take your pick. The arrows, IMO, are more generic Kaleesh markings that can be used by any clan. They likely have a lot of similar motifs and designs across the globe.

My brain just randomly conjured a parallel universe where Grievous was an Ewok instead of a Kaleesh and now I'm imagining Sahuldeem with the exact level of depth and angst but the characters are literal teddy bears Why would you do this to me??? … *files away for later if I ever want to torture anyone with some ridiculous imagery*

So what does a tuugmusme look like exactly? We’ve never really seen a visual depiction of someone wearing it Closer to a facemask/scarf that covers the lower face than to, for instance, a full niqab. Usually patterned, if not decorated. May include clan sigils, but not as prominently as what is painted on kakmusmal.

I have a question or two about the tumu. How big are they? I’ve been thinking of them as about the size of parrots, but considering their radically different body plan they may be way bigger or smaller. Also do they have any uses beyond looking pretty? I have this idea for a trained seabird that the Kaleesh use to find shoals of fish, but I kind of got the vibe that Babbar’s usefulness begins and ends at unsettling people through the power of mimicry. Parrot is a good comparison, actually, and I like to imagine tumu come in as many varied sizes as parrots do. Some could be as large as a macaw, and…well, not sure if any are as tiny as a budgie, but maybe a cockatiel! And they can absolutely be trained to be more useful than Babbar (messenger tumu are a thing), but your assessment of that particular tumu is pretty accurate. x’D

How did you come up with sahuldeem, the word itself? How many words did you try before you found one that sounded right? So a thing I’ve often been doing when I snag Sumerian for Kaleesh is ignoring the “š” (which is a voiceless post alveolar fricative) and just treating it like “s” (a voiceless alveolar fricative that I assume is sibilant)…and this is usually because I like the sound/flow of a word better without the “sh” sound, though not always. In searching for a term closest to “grief”, I found “šà-hul…dím”, which translates to “to grieve” but more literally translates to ‘to make the heart evil’ (I know, right?!?!). Rather than transliterate this to Shahuldim, I went with Sahuldeem (I liked the sound of “sa”, and I wanted to parallel the “ee” in Sheelal). …Tadaaaa!

You ever think about what Grievous would have looked like if he’d lived to the age he did without becoming a cyborg? Well, considering at what age in Sahuldeem he does become a cyborg, I don’t have to think too hard about it. ;P

—

And then just an extra note:

Two years ago I wrote a silly rap(?) about General Grievous. One year ago I started posting Sahuldeem. Thank you to all the folks who have been following along and reading what is the very definition of a passion project. If you’re enjoying the journey, please do shoot me a message/drop a comment on AO3 (or a kudos if you don’t want to stress over words). Not sure what 2022 will bring on...well, so many fronts, but I hope to at least keep pressing on and posting this story without too many delays on the horizon~

[mishkakagehishka]

Hiya Korka!! Yet another random question. Are there any fun words in your first language you'd want someone who doesn't know the language to know?

I'm always fascinated every time I see you talk in Croatian on here so I thought I'd ask ^-^

Omg hiiiii wait let me teach you some of my favest words, then. Most of my fave words are such due to how they sound rather than their meanings, but! I'll also add a translation <3

Žarko - derived from žar (embers), and meaning "hotly" or, more commonly, "passionately", "eagerly"

Bdjeti - to not sleep for an entire night, or, if you add "over [object]", to watch over and worry about someone or something

Krletka - bird cage. -tka ending words are fun to say, but this one also has a krl- beginning, so it's even more fun <3

Bodež - dagger, I have a fascination with the letters ž and š, they just sound gorgeous to me, especially when either at the beginning or the ending of a word.

Also, since you're a fellow enstars fan, here's a fun one: Izumi - means "inventions". Though its etymology is also neat, iz (from) + umjeti (to know, to be skilled, in turn derived from "um", "mind") :>

As for what I think someone should know, I don't think there's any one word or phrase that falls under that... well, it's always useful to know how to say "I love you", right? It's "volim te". We used to use "ljubiti" for "to love", but now it's very rarely used as anything other than "to kiss", though I use "ljubi [my name]" (literally "[my name] kisses/loves [you]" lol) as "thank you" with close friends. I'm not sure on voljeti's etymology, but, supposedly, it's related to "will", "desire" or "want", which is a bit cute tbh

[egyptologylessons]

The Broken Obelisk of Hatshepsut (𓇋𓏠𓈖𓎸𓏏𓄂𓏏𓀼𓏪) “imn-ẖnmt ḥA.t-šps.wt” ‘United with Amun, Foremost of Nobel Ladies’ at the Karnak Temple - Sacred Lake Precinct Karnak Temple Sacred-Lake 𓈙𓏤𓂦𓂋𓏜 “š-ḏsr” is the largest of its kind and was dug by Tuthmosis III (𓅝𓄟𓊃𓄤𓆣𓏫) “djhwty-ms-hprw” ‘Thutmose (Born of Thoth), Beautiful of Forms’ (1473-1458 BC). It measures 393 feet (120m) by 252 feet (77m) and is lined with stone wall and has stairways descending into the water 𓈗 “mw” The lake was used by the priests 𓍛𓊹 “ẖm-nṯr” for ritual washing and ritual navigation. It was also home to the sacred geese 𓊃𓂋𓅬𓏪 “srw.w” of Amun 𓇋𓏠𓈖𓁩 “ı͗mn” (the goose being another symbol of Amun) and was a symbol of the primeval waters 𓅮𓄿𓏲𓏏𓏖𓈗 “pAwty” from which life 𓋹𓈖𓐍 “ˁnḫ” arose in the ancient Egyptian’s 𓂋𓐝𓎀𓀂𓀭𓏪 “rmṯ” idea of creation. Source: https://discoveringegypt.com/karnak-temple/karnak-temple-sacred-lake/ 𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬𓋹𓎬 Follow: @egyptologylessons 𓋹𓊽𓋴 𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁𓊁 #Egypt #egyptian #ancient #ancientegypt #hieroglyphics #ägypten #thisisegypt #egyptologist #myegypt #egyptianhistory #egyptology #explore #hieroglyphs #madeinegypt #egypte #egyptians #egyptshots #loveegypt #discoveregypt #egitto #埃及 #مصر #egipto #explorepage #lake #karnak #beforeandafter https://www.instagram.com/p/CSFAg5jryVp/?utm_medium=tumblr

[gwendolynlerman]

Languages of the world

Kven (kvääni)

Basic facts

Number of native speakers: 5,000-8,000

Recognized minority language: Norway

Script: Latin, 30 letters

Grammatical cases: 13

Linguistic typology: agglutinative, SVO

Language family: Uralic, Finnic, Finnish

Number of dialects: 2

History

1860s - ban on the use of Kven

1970s - reversal of the ban; Kven begins to be taught in school again

1987 - first anthology

Writing system and pronunciation

These are the letters that make up the script: a b c d ð e f g h i j l l m n o p q r s š t u v w x y z ä ö.

Vowel length is indicated by doubling the letter, similarly to how gemination is expressed.

Grammar

Nouns have two numbers (singular and plural) and thirteen cases (nominative, genitive, partitive, inessive, illative, elative, adessive, abessive, allative, essive, translative, and comitative).

Personal pronouns have two variants in the third person, one of which is used to quote what another person has said.

Verbs are marked for tense, mood, person, and number. The third-person plural verb ending is formed using the passive form.

Dialects

There are two dialects: Eastern and Western.

[kispu]

Babylonian prayer to the Gods of the Night

pullulū rubû wašrū sikkūrū šīrētum šaknā ḫabrātum nišū šaqummā petûtum uddulū bābū ilī mātim ištarāt mātim Šamaš Sîn Adad Ištar īterbū ana utul šamê ul idinnū dīnam ul iparrasū awātim pussumat mušītim ēkallum šaḫūrša kummu adrū ālik urḫim ilam išassi u ša dīnim ušteberre šittam dayyān kinātim abi ekiātim Šamaš īterub ana kummīšu rabûtum ilī mušītim nawrum Girra qurādum Erra qaštum nīrum šitaddarum mušḫuššum ereqqum inzum kusarikkum bašmum lizzizū-ma ina têrti eppušu ina puḫād akarrabu kittam šuknān šumūšu ikrib mušītim

(TRANSLATION)

The princes are closely guarded, The locking-bolts lowered, the locking rings placed, (Though previously) noisy, the people are silent, (Though previously) open, the doors are locked. The gods of the land (and) the goddesses of the land, Shamash, Sin, Adad and Ishtar Have entered into the lap of heaven. They do not render judgment, they do not decide a case. The night is veiled. The palace, its chapel, the cella are obscured. The traveler invokes god, but the one (who offers) a decision remains asleep. The judge of truth, father of the impoverished girl, Shamash has entered his cella. The great ones, the gods of the night, Bright Girra, Warrior Erra, The Bow, the Yoke, Orion, the Furious Serpent, The Wagon, the Goat, The Bison, the Horned Serpent, May they stand by so that, In the extispicy I am performing, In the lamb I am offering, You may place the truth

Source: Alan Lenzi. Reading Akkadian Prayers & Hymns: an Introduction. Society of Biblical Literature. pp. 71-82.

This is an extispicy prayer that used to be recited when performing divination at night. Its logic follows that, as the city’s activity declines for the night, the main gods retire as well, which makes sense as nighttime was probably very dangerous in ancient times. So instead one ought to seek the guidance of the ilī mušītim “gods of the night”. Here the term refers to the stars and constellations, plus fire god Girra (also called Gibil) and the fierce war-and-plague god Erra (syncretized with Nergal).

The constellation the Babylonians called the Bow, qaštum, is probably part of Canis Major, and the Yoke is Boötes. Orion was called Šitadarrum, Šitadallum or Šidallum, often spelled using the Sumerian logograms SIPA.ZI.AN.AN, meaning “the true shepherd of heaven”. The serpent is Mušḫuššum, one of the 11 chaos monsters reared by Tiamat, but tamed by Marduk and made into his pet in the Enuma Elish. It possibly referred to the Hydra constellation. The Wagon is famously Ursa Major and the Goat is Lyra. The Bison and Bašmum, “horned serpent”, however, are still unidentified.

The appellation “gods of the night” also appears in another prayer as part of the Maqlû (burning) rituals, a series of exorcisms and uncrossings performed in the small hours all the way until dawn.

This prayer unfortunately isn’t that useful for the modern pagan, as it’s a bit too specific, but one may find some use still in the lines rabûtum ilī mušītim / nawrum Girra / qurādum Erra / qaštum nīrum / šitaddarum mušḫuššum / ereqqum inzum / kusarikkum bašmum/ lizzizū (“The great ones” down to “may they stand by”) in nightly stellar invocations for whatever maybe-not-quite-licit matters you may want to perform.

(If you plan on singing or reciting this, please remember that “š” sounds like the English “sh” and “ḫ” is guttural)

May the gods be praised!

[karmaholmes221]

Vicomte de Phantom

Part 9- The Manager's Office

The love story of Raoul and Christine is timeless, how they overcame everything to be with one another, but there is much more to their story than that... there was another woman, Raoul's first wife. The first Vicomtesse de Changy. And she was just as much a part of the story as any other character.

I clutched several letters to my chest, my skirts shifting around me as I walked quickly into the manager’s office, which contained a desk and several chairs, both covered in papers. Firmin sat staring scornfully at a newspaper article. “‘Mystery after gala night,’ it says, ‘Mystery of soprano's flight!’ Mystified baffled Surete say, we are mystified we suspect foul play!" “ Firmin read out loud, lowering the paper. “Bad news on soprano scene first Carlotta, now Christine! Still, at least the seats get sold gossip's worth its weight in gold." He seemed to catch sight of me in the doorway, as he stood up and gestured me further into the room. "What a way to run a business! Spare me these unending trials! Half your cast disappears, but the crowd still cheers! Opera! To hell with Gluck and Handel, it's a scandal that'll pack 'em in the aisles!”

There was a stomping behind me and I moved away as Andre burst in, in a temper. “Damnable! Will they all walk out? This is damnable!”

Firmin moved to stand beside his colleague. “Andre, please don't shout. It's publicity! And the take is vast! Free publicity!”

Andre’s voice came out as a strangled cry. “But we have no cast.”

“But Andre, have you seen the queue?” Firmin asked calmly before spying the letters in my hand. He gave an annoyed wave of his hand and I took that as my cue to begin to read.

I quickly opened the first of the letters and began to read. "Dear Andre what a charming gala! Christine enjoyed a great success! We were hardly bereft when Carlotta left, otherwise the chorus was entrancing, but the dancing was a lamentable mess!" I glanced up at their distraught faces and opened the next letter. "Dear Firmin, just a brief reminder: my salary has not been paid. Send it care of the ghost, by return of post. P.T.O.: No-one likes a debtor, so it's better if my orders are obeyed!" I read aloud.

The managers shared a look. “Who would have the gall to send this? Someone with a puerile brain”

Firmin took both of the letters from me and examined them. “These are both signed "O.G.". “

“Who the hell is he?” Andre snapped.

A look of realization overcame both of them. “Opera ghost!”

“It's really not amusing!” Firmin said, unamused.

“He's abusing our position!” Andre snapped

“In addition he wants money!”

Their voices merged together as they continued to speak. “He's a funny sort of spectre to expect a large retainer! Nothing plainer, he is clearly quite insane!”

I jerked around as my husband stalked into the building, turning to face the managers, one of Erik’s notes in his hand. “Where is she?”

“You mean your wife?” Andre asked.

“I mean Miss Daae, where is she?” Raoul snapped.

Firmin gave him an exasperated look. “Well, how should we know?”

”I want an answer. I take it that you sent me this note?” Raoul accused, holding up the envelope.

“What's all this nonsense?” Firmin questioned.

“Of course not!” Andre ordered and Firmin quickly jumped in as well.

“Don't look at us!”

“She's not with you, then?” Raoul asked almost surprised.

“Of course not!” Firmin said, repeating what his partner had just said.

“We're in the dark. “ Andre assured.

“Monsieur, don't argue, isn't this the letter you wrote?” Raoul snapped holding up Erik’s letter.

“And what is it, that we're meant to have wrote?” Firmin questioned hotly before realizing his mistake. “Written!”

Raoul held out the letter and I lunged forward, snatching it from him, rolling my eyes at the surprised look on his face as I ripped open the letter and began to read aloud. "Do not fear for Miss Daae. The Angel of Music has her under his wing. Make no attempt to see her again."

“If you didn't write it, who did?” Raoul asked the mystified managers as I tried desperately to find my voice to ask about what Erik meant by see her again.

The doors were thrown open and Carlotta burst in. She carried a letter as well and look no more cheered about it than the others were. “Where is he?” She snapped as the managers rushed to meet her.

“Ah, welcome back!” Andre began before Carlotta cut him off.

“Your precious patron, where is he?”

“What is it now?” Raoul inquired, unimpressed.

Carlotta’s eyes fixed on Raoul and a murderous look crossed her face. “I have your letter; a letter which I rather resent!”

Firmin turned to Raoul and asked quietly “And did you send it?"

Raoul glared. “Of course not!”

“As if he would!” Andre sassed.

Carlotta narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “You didn't send it?"

“Of course not!” Raoul repeated.

“What's going on?” Firmin questioned, tired of being ignored.

“You dare to tell me, that this is not the letter you sent?!” Carlotta sneered waving the letter around and I stepped forward to take it from her.

“And what is it that I'm meant to have sent?” Raoul snapped looking to me as I quickly pulled the letter from the envelope and read it.

"Your days at the Opera Populaire are numbered. Christine Daae will be singing on your behalf tonight. Be prepared for a great misfortune, should you attempt to take her place." I looked up from the card to glance at the managers, who were obviously beginning to tire of the intrigue.

They moved forward and each of them took one of Carlotta’s arms their voices joining to become one. “Far too many notes for my taste and most of them about Christine! All we've heard since we came is Miss Daae's name.“

Out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of Madame Giry and Meg and moved to stand beside them, already well aware of their message. They were here to give the news of Christine’s reappearance. Giry silently handed me yet another letter. “Miss Daae has returned.” the managers turned sharply to face her.

“I trust her midnight oil is well and truly burned.” Firmin stated drily.

“Where precisely is she now?” Andre questioned.

“I thought it best that she went home.” Giry said simply and Meg stepped forward.

“She needed rest.”

Raoul moved forward. “May I see her?”

“No, monsieur, she will see no-one.” Giry said, glancing between me and Raoul.

“Will she sing? Will she sing?” Carlotta snapped, angrily.

“Here, I have a note.” I said and Carlotta lunged toward me.

“Let me see it!” She shrieked and Raoul threw an arm out, keeping her from crashing into me.

“Please!” Firmin snapped, gesturing for me to read.

I glanced around and cleared my throat. "Gentlemen, I have now sent you several notes of the most amiable nature, detailing how my theatre is to be run. You have not followed my instructions, I shall give you one last chance. Christine Daae has returned to you and I am anxious her career should progress in the new production of "Il Muto". You will therefore cast Carlotta as the Pageboy and put Miss Daae in the role of Countess. The role which Miss Daae plays calls for charm and appeal. The role of the Pageboy is silent which makes my casting, in a word, ideal. I shall watch the performance from my normal seat in Box Five, which will be kept empty for me. Should these commands be ignored, a disaster beyond your imagination will occur. I remain, Gentlemen, Your obedient servant, O.G."

“Christine!” Carlotta screeched, outraged.

“Whatever next?” Andre snapped

“It's all a ploy to help Christine!” Carlotta continued.

“This is insane.” Firmin exclaimed.

Carlotta quickly shouted out. “I know who sent this;” she jabbed an accusing finger at my husband. “The Vicomte; her lover!” I turned to face Raoul, wondering deep down if this was true.

Raoul wrapped an arm around my waist. “Indeed?” Raoul said, irony dripping in his voice before turning his attention to the others. “Can you believe this?”

“Signora!” Andre protested.

“O traditori!” Carlotta continued, in a fit of rage as the managers continued to try and sooth her.

“This is a joke!”

“This changes nothing!”

“O mentitori!” Carlotta screeched at them and they tried again to calm her.

“Signora!” Firmin tried.

“You are our star!” Andre followed.

“And always will be!”

“Signora.”

“The man is mad”

“We don't take orders!”

“Miss Daae will be playing the Pageboy, the silent role.” Firmin announced to everyone.

Andre, catching on joined in. “Carlotta will be playing the lead!”

Carlotta ignored them and continued with waxing melodrama that only she could accomplish. “It's useless trying to appease me! You're only saying this to please me! Signori, Š vero? Non, non, non voglio udire! Lasciatemi morire! O padre mio! Dio!”

“Who scorn his word, beware to those the angel sees, the angel knows.” I warned as Carlotta turned on the manager's again.

“You have reviled me!” she turned from them and began to make her way through the opera, the managers on her heels and the Girys, Raoul and I following after. “You have rebuked me!”

“Signora, pardon us.” The managers spoke.

“You have replaced me!” Carlotta snapped.

“Please, Signora, we beseech you.” The managers were beginning to sound desperate.

“This hour shall see your darkest fears.” I warned.

“I must see her.” Raoul and Meg said together

“Abbandonata! Deseredata! O, sventurata!” Carlotta continued.

Giry moved forward and took my am. “The angel knows, the angel hears.”

“Where did she go?” Raoul asked quietly, speaking to no one in particular.

“Abbandonata! Disgraziata!” Carlotta continued.

“Signora, sing for us! Don't be a martyr.” the managers begged.

“What new surprises lie in store?” Giry’s, Meg’s and mine voices became one as we all looked to Carlotta.

The managers approached her lovingly. “Your public needs you!” Andre said dramatically.

“We need you, too!” Firmin added.

“Would you not rather have your precious little ingenue?” Carlotta said, unassuaged, her lips curling into an unappealing sneer at the last word.

“Signora, no! The world wants you!” the two managers quickly disagreed before the two adopted their most persuasive attitudes and I rolled my eyes, disgusted by the scene in front of me. “Prima donna first lady of the stage! Your devotees are on their knees to implore you!”

“Can you bow out when they're shouting your name?” Andre questioned.

“Think of how they all adore you!” Firmin said sweetly before there voices merged again..

“Prima donna, enchant us once again!

“Think of your muse.”

“And of the queues round the theatre!”

“Can you deny us the triumph in store? Sing, prima donna, once more!”

Carlotta smiled and nodded, registering her acceptance as the managers continued to cajole her while the three of us watched.

“Christine spoke of an angel.” Raoul murmured.

“Prima donna your song shall live again!” Carlotta said to herself in triumph.

“Think of your public!” The managers said to Carlotta

“You took a snub but there's a public who needs you!” Carlotta continued.

“She has heard the voice of the angel of music.” Giry murmured to me and I knew immediately that she was talking about Christine.

“Those who hear your voice liken you to an angel!” The managers complimented.

“Think of their cry of undying support!” Carlotta sang.

”Is this her angel of music?” Raoul said and I gazed around the room, looking for some sign that Erik was listening.

Andre leaned over and whispered to Firmin. “We get our opera."

“She gets her limelight” Firmin replied in the same tone.

“Follow where the limelight leads you! You'll sing again, and to unending ovation!” Carlotta sang, caught up in the moment.

“Is this ghost an angel or a madman?” Giry asked, almost silently.

“Leading ladies are a trial!” The managers whispered.

“This miscasting will invite damnation.” I whispered to Madame Giry and she nodded.

“Tears. oaths. Lunatic demands are regular occurrences!” The two managers said with annoyance before the persuasive looks returned.

“Bliss or damnation? Which has claimed her?” Meg asked.

“Think how you'll shine in that final encore! Sing, prima donna, once more!” Carlotta said, a far away look in her eyes.

”Oh fools, to have flouted his warnings!” I snapped loudly.

“Surely he'll strike back.” Meg whispered to me.

“Surely there'll be further scenes, worse than this!” The managers said simply.

”I must see these demands are rejected!” Raoul said, a set look in his eye

“Who'd believe a diva happy to relieve a chorus girl, who's gone and slept with the patron? Raoul and the soubrette, entwined in love's duet! Although he may demur, he must have been with her!” I tried desperately to ignore the managers as they continued to talk about my husband and Christine. “You'd never get away with all this in a play, but if it's loudly sung and in a foreign tongue it's just the sort of story audiences adore, in fact a perfect opera!” Firmin and Andre said.

“His game is over!’ Raoul said confidently and I gripped his arm, trying to gain his attention.

“This is a game you cannot hope to win!” I warned, my voice growing desperate.

“And in Box Five a new game will begin.” Raoul said and my grip on his arm tightened.

“For, if his curse is on this opera…” I trailed off and Meg spoke.

“But if his curse is on this opera”

“Prima donna the world is at your feet! A nation waits, and how it hates to be cheated!” Andre and Firmin continued, in their element.

“The stress that falls upon a famous prima donna! Terrible diseases, coughs and colds and sneezes! Still, the dryest throat will reach the highest note, in search of perfect opera!��� Carlotta’s voice carried, filling the room.

I glanced around me, worried about what would happen if Erik were listening. “then I fear the outcome.”

“Christine plays the Pageboy, Carlotta plays the Countess.” Raoul mumbled.

I continued as if he wasn’t there. “should you dare to” Meg’s voice overlaid mine as she joined in. “when you once again,”

Our voices all merged together. “Light up the stage with that age old rapport! Sing, prima donna, once more!”

Out of nowhere the Phantom’s voice boomed out. “So, it is to be war between us! If these demands are not met, a disaster beyond your imagination will occur!”

I felt fear grip my heart and I looked to my husband, praying that he wouldn’t be collateral damage in this war.

[aion-rsa]

Van Helsing Returns For A Final Season And Adds Time Travel To Its Narrative Palette

https://ift.tt/3af4PjN

This Van Helsing article contains major spoilers for the season 5 premiere.

From the dynamically retooled opening title sequence to the Jack-centric Transylvania storyline, it takes only moments to recognize that Van Helsing’s fifth and final season promises to take fans on a wild ride as it brings to a close its delightfully circuitous tale of horror’s most iconic vampire hunting family. Season premiere “Past Tense” doesn’t represent the first time the Van Helsing family story finds itself in the past, but there seems to be a more concerted effort this time to employ traditional time travel elements as the unanswered questions mount.

It’s been sixteen months since the season four finale, but the head of the Van Helsing clan remains noticeably absent from the story even though her imprint is unmistakable. Fans of the series understand Kelly Overton’s (Vanessa Van Helsing) pregnancy last season limited her participation, and though she doesn’t appear in the season premiere, Nicole Muñoz (Jack) and Tricia Helfer (Olivia/The Dark One) deliver strong performances that skillfully carry the episode. Still, where’s Vanessa?

Before we address Vanessa’s whereabouts, however, it’s the stunning narrative redirect showrunner/writer Jonathan Lloyd Walker and director Jonathan Scarfe (Axel) throw at viewers that suggests a new approach to bringing the vampire apocalypse to an end. What appears to be a truth on Van Helsing doesn’t always play out the way we think it will, but when Jack leaves the Dark Realm and finds herself in renaissance Transylvania, there seems to be only one logical explanation – time travel. You have to love that Jack immediately recognizes the drastically changed landscape and sets out to take care of business. 

Read more

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Van Helsing Season 5 Overcomes Production Challenges

By Dave Vitagliano

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Van Helsing Season 4 Episode 13 Review: The Beholder

By Dave Vitagliano

Vanessa apparently still resides in the Dark Realm, but it seems clear that she’s the catalyst for Jack’s temporal journey to Dracula’s city of origin.  Of course, Jack’s experience here could turn out to be similar to Vanessa’s meeting with her grandmother Lily in season three,  but for now, we have to consider conventional time travel as the most likely scenario. Needless to say, time travel in the hands of a less skilled writer can lead to a multitude of narrative pitfalls, but with Walker (Continuum) at the helm, the story is in more than competent hands. Still, we have to wonder how Vanessa’s role will play out since it seems reasonable to assume that if she can send Jack to the past, she can leave the Dark Realm at any point herself. So why does she stay?

Once we learn that Count Dalibor’s wife Olivia (Tricia Helfer) may, in fact, be the genesis of the Dark One, it’s only a matter of time before she and Jack come face to face. It doesn’t take long for viewers and Jack to face the quintessential time travel dilemma: if you could go back in time and kill baby Hitler, would you? Traveling to the past to prevent an apocalyptic future has become a science fiction staple, and Jack now faces the ultimate moral decision. “Now I know why my mother sent me here.” Understanding Vanessa’s motivation is one thing, whether she can carry out this gruesome task is quite another. 

While it might be simpler to have Jack kill Olivia and prevent the 21st century evil that plagues the American northwest, other options do exist. “What if you could stop what turns her dark?” Florian (Matúš Kvietik) asks a reticent Jack. Unfortunately, the Transylvanian problem is far more complex than simply eliminating new mother Olivia. Actions have consequences, and if time travel tales tell us anything, it’s that unintended consequences generally rear their ugly heads sooner rather than later. Whether it’s the Grandfather Paradox or the Butterfly Effect, things rarely turn out the way the protagonist thinks they will.

Not surprisingly, Helfer (Battlestar Galactica; Lucifer) seamlessly transitions from the dark, ultra evil creature at the heart of the vampire threat to a loving wife and new mother who unknowingly sells her soul to Michaela and the roots of the Sisterhood. Nonetheless, the plot thickens because killing Olivia and preventing her from becoming the Dark One only takes care of one problem. What about the Sisterhood? Jack and Ivory already killed Michaela in the present, but now Jack can prevent her from creating and expanding the Sisterhood and becoming the Dark One’s bride. Does Jack have it in her to commit what will seem like multiple atrocities to the innocent bystanders who possess no knowledge of the future from which she comes?

Olivia’s role in the coming apocalypse isn’t as cut and dried as it might seem, and when Florian shows Jack the portrait of the count and countess, it’s her last name that stimulates Jack and the fateful decision she ultimately makes. Dracula. Did Vanessa actually send Jack to this point in time with the intention that her daughter could operate in the role previously ascribed to her – mankind’s savior?

Nobody said saving the human race was going to be easy, and we most certainly didn’t expect the Van Helsing storyline to end up in the middle of a Renaissance street fair, but it’s a perfect vehicle for Olivia to meet another major player on the dark side.  “I see two futures diverging,” the fortune teller (Jesse Stanley) tells Olivia, and the woman who will eventually become the Oracle, informs her that two women wish to shape her fate. “Something dark awaits you.” And Jack’s kill list grows taller by the minute.

“I told you; vampires, and I’m the cure,” Jack explains to Florian, but the subtext here implies something quite different than her ability to return victims to the human state. Micheala (Heather Doerksen) wishes to resurrect someone and begins brewing a potion that seems to affect both Jack and Olivia and sets into motion an act which can’t be taken back. We’ve witnessed this watershed moment many times before, and too often the hero hesitates and allows evil to escape. Not this time, however. Jack plunges her dagger into Olivia’s throat. “I’m sorry; I had to.” This is not the first person Jack has killed, but it will be fascinating to watch the effect this murder has on her personality. Still, if she’s to prevent the dark future, there are at least two more deaths to consider. 

“Do not get enchanted by whispers of magic and monsters,” Dalibor (Kim Coates) tells Florian, laying the groundwork for Jack’s revelation that vampires are real and must be stopped. However, Jack’s in a difficult situation since the “I’m from the future,” explanation rarely yields positive results. It’s early, so we don’t know if Vanessa has an exit strategy planned for Jack, but for now, she’s on her own. Is Florian enamored enough of this stranger to overlook the murder of his beloved countess, or can Jack offer some kind of proof that everything she says is true? And how will Dalibor handle his wife’s brutal killing? No one ever said the Dark One has to be female.

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Over the course of five seasons, series creators and showrunners Simon Barry, Neil LaBute, and now Jonathan Lloyd Walker have managed to lure some of genre television’s finest actors for guest spots and recurring roles, and “Past Tense” continues this trend. Filming inside a real Slovakian castle takes the Van Helsing world building to another level which works brilliantly with Jack’s journey to the past, and though it’s likely only a brief paradigm shift, the intriguing introduction of time travel into the overall arc helps assuage the momentary loss we feel in the absence of the core characters. Vanessa will be back. The future’s not as clear for Violet, Doc, Axel, Ivory, and Julius who are still out there somewhere.

The post Van Helsing Returns For A Final Season And Adds Time Travel To Its Narrative Palette appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[kiragecko]

It looks like I'm going to have to take a break from studying Proto-Athabaskan/Na-Dene. It is actively engendering ill-will and anger towards Americans.¹

I recognise that none of y'all are personally at fault. But if any American Tumblr users want another way to respect other cultures:

Could you PLEASE start using internationally agreed upon standards?!?

Celsius

Metric

Whatever other people use in cookbooks

I don't know, maybe the International Phonetic Alphabet? If you're a linguist? Maybe? Since the 100 year old, German language, grammar of a dead South American language, that I translated using google, was EASIER TO UNDERSTAND than any of your articles written in the last decade?

Please

Bonus quiz:

Which symbols can be used for THE SAME SOUND in Americanist Phonetic Notation?

1. Same as 'k̭'

'c'

'kʸ'

'k‧'

'tʸ'

'k̑'

All of the above

2. Same as 'š'

'c'

'sh'

' ʃ '

All of the above

3. Same as 'ts'

'c'

'ȼ'

Yup, this can also be a 'c'. Two different types of 'c's, even!

4. Same as 's'

'c'

'ṣ'

'ç'

'š'

'σ'

All of the above

Weirdly, all of those symbolize other sounds. This is one sound everyone agrees on.

5. Same as 'ẟ'

'z̭'

'ð'

'ȼ'

'dh'

all of the above

6. Same as 'žʳ'

'zhr'

'ẓ'

'ʐ'

'ǯ̣'

all of the above

7. Same as 'ñ'

'ŋ̑'

'ỹ'

'ɲ'

'ꬻʸ'

'nʸ'

All of the above

8. Same as 'č'

'tc'

'tš'

' tʃ '

All of the above

9. Same as 'j'

'dž'

'ǯ'

'ǰ'

'dʒ'

'dj'

All of the above

10. Can anyone tell me what 'ẟh' stands for?

'ð', as would make sense

'θ', which makes no sense at all, but the text is suggesting

a dental 'ɹ̥', since it's being compared to other approximants

'c', like every other sound

something completely different

Seriously, if anyone knows, I am completely lost

¹I'm getting mad at the entire population of the US. Which isn't fair to y'all. Which is why I'm taking a break.

Answers: The final option is correct for every question except 10. Which may have no answer.