#cuneiform tag

[squiggleman]

the novels main character, Nate Spring (dont @ me) is a disabled, ex-marine solicitor going through a divorce and finding love in his new life.

It is a very serious novel. Very serious.

[a screenshot of Finn's document outlining the characters for his novel. It describes Nate Spring's occupation. It reads: Solicitor at law firm, called Fradge Mildew and Company. The boss and senior partner at the firm is Leopold (old poldy, for short) Bins. thanks.]

[valarhalla]

Lord of the Rings quotes in Akkadian, this time with the cuneiform actually included.

[the-goblin-queen]

[doodlingwren]

Can't believe that my fucking train is once again running 1 hour late because someone stole all the fucking copper from the railway line like omg stoooppp why are u so silly ahah stop making this prank it's too epic ahahah

[neonphoenix]

Anyone feel like helping a girl out and dropping your favorite translations of Gilgamesh? I don't know enough about it to identify good translators.

[dreamcrow]

(re: my latest gay activity)

THANKFULLY @arcaneorderships i managed to exert some measure of self-control this time 😂 i don't actually know any languages written in cuneiform, and i successfully refrained from trying to learn just for a soft silly doodle. but i do think a lot about how the order might have seen/received/participated in the discovery of various human technologies, including writing! so if u don't mind: gay little headcanon time Φ ᆺ Φ

for my order, it starts with bellroc. it's not the most elegant system, just little scratch marks or symbols at first to keep track of an ever-expanding collection of materials for their alchemical projects. think very very early cuneiform, probably not yet even crossing the border between "picture" and "symbol." but in those days they are still more or less interacting with (very limited) segments of human societies. while i do think they come up with their own writing system at some point (cries in worldbuilding...), i think they'd also naturally become familiar with these other systems just because they end up learning to read them, and so they end up cribbing a lot of ideas. the gold thing bellroc is holding in that picture is meant to be one of these things: a kind of two-pronged stylus, one point with a wedge tip (for making cuneiform marks), and the other a smooth/dot tip (like a pencil). they might write mostly (though not only) in their own language, but rather than reinvent the wheel, so to speak, they just adapt a system they already know works well.

my skrael. is a weird case. i basically just recycled this headcanon from an earlier and much more embarassing fandom oc, haha. i think the term i learned then was aliterate—not "illiterate," but just. not concerned with writing and written text to the (massive) degree most human societies are now. basically: he's not quite dyslexic (i don't think), but he largely doesn't read written text unless he has to. even then, it's mainly a nuisance: he either has to pay a lot of attention OR "just magic himself to be able to do it." (and as you may remember from bellroc, i'm very fond of "migraines following over-use of even the best assistive magic.") so while he can read, he just...generally Does Not. hence gently bullying bellroc to read for him, instead. >:)

i do love the thought of the order + writing though, so in return for giving me the excuse to write up this little post:

"wow crow that outfit looks awfully similar to the one you did for double date night ship week art" after staring at that picture for two straight days i 100% forgot the embroidery on his cloak and yes, several months later, it still HAUNTS me :')

one day however... One Day... i'll get to the fic i designed this outfit for and then the whole order will be fancystuck for ever and ever aMEN

[paranoidgemsbok]

I love how varied the jellybeans are

[copperbadge]

Here it is, in the...clay, one of Ea-Nasir's infamous complaint letters. It's small but you can definitely read the rage in the upward drift of the letters and the wall-to-wall text. No margins in cuneiform!

It's nigh impossible to get a good photo of it with the tag, because a) it's behind super reflective glass, b) it's next to the Royal Game of Ur which all the tours stop at so just getting to it is a feat, and c) there's a really grumpy security guard like. Right There. This is the best one I had and it was an accident, but that said I kind of like the composition.

Civilizations may rise and fall, but shitty copper fraud is eternal.

In case you missed it, the tag is from @liminal-craft's Etsy shop; they're on back order at the moment but I hear more are coming. Sure, if you believe a business partner of that scurrilous copper merchant...

[ID: Two images; top is an image of an oblong cuneiform tablet about the size of a smartphone, captioned "Complaint about delivery of the wrong grade of copper" and dated to roughly 1750 BC, the Old Babylonian Period, from Ur. Second image is the same cuneiform tablet, but hanging in front of it, off to one side, is a blurry keychain; it looks like an old hotel keytag, in a shiny copper finish, and reads "Ea-Nasir's QUALITY COPPER" with decorative fan designs and a line of cuneiform text.]

[sumerianlanguage]

I don’t know if this blog is still active, but I would like to know if there are known Sumerian words for insects, coakroaches, and spiders. Thanks

Hello! Here's some vocabulary that may be of interest to you.

The most general term for insects, bugs, and creepy-crawlies is umun 𒄯𒄯. There's also the potentially onomatopoeic term eh or uh 𒄴, "bug, moth, louse, flea, parasite", which is also the verb for "to have lice". Nim 𒉏 means "fly" and is the root of nimlal 𒉏𒋭 "bee". Kishi (written 𒁞 in cuneiform among other signs) means "ant(s)", and there are several words for "locust", including bir or buru 𒉆. Mar 𒈥 means "worm" or "parasite" more generally.

Unfortunately, insect vocab falls victim to the same issues of many other categories of words in Sumerian - that we know a lot of words for different bugs, but not which word means which bug. That means a lot of words have disputed meanings. Halloran (2006) has shurun 𒁨 for "cockroach" or "cricket", while the ePSD lists it as "cricket, grasshopper". Kuzazu 𒆪𒍝𒍪𒄷 is some sort of "wasp or flying insect", while ubshukur 𒌒𒉻 might mean "centipede" or a similar bug. And sharan 𒁙 is just "an insect" in the ePSD, but Halloran lists it as "tick, bedbug".

I've previously answered about "spider", which is ash, written 𒋠𒇴𒋦 in cuneiform. And do check out my prior posts on butterflies & moths and the hunt for the word for "bee", as well as my Sumerian animals tag in general. Enjoy!

[aristoteliancomplacency]

That galdor is amazing and reminds me of similar medical incantations from Akkadian/Babylonian/Assyrian medical texts, such as this one against the 'tooth worm' (toothache):

After Anum (the sky god) created the heavens, (and) the heavens created the earth, (and) the earth created rivers, (and) rivers created canals, (and) canals created mud, (and) mud created the worm, the worm went crying before Šamaš, its tears flowed before Ea: “ What have you given for me to eat? What have you given for me to suck? “I have given you the ripe fig and the apricot” “What good is that to me, the ripe fig and the apricot? Place me and let me dwell between tooth and gum, so I can suck the tooth’s blood and mince up the gum!” Drive in the peg and sieze the foot (while saying:) “Because you said this, worm, may Ea strike you with his mighty hand!” (italics = uncertainty in the translation, translation from here, where you can also hear someone reading it out in the original!).  (the tooth worm was prooobably a metaphorical thing, rather than like, a belief that there was actually a worm there).

Incomplete list of stuff that made me go apeshit reading Fellowship for the first time, medievalist edition (part II)

Part I here. Disclaimer: this is for fun!

Love that people keep stressing that they are going to the ELVES for COUNCIL. Old English names, especially among the rulers of Wessex, Northumbria, Mercia, etc, were often Elf Theme Names, one of the most famous and enduring of which is Alfred. Written the old way, Ælfræd or Ælfred (as in Alfred the Great), means Elf-Council, aka "counseled by elves". In their hearts... everyone wants to be Alfred... possibly this is only funny 2 me.

Tom Bombadil doing a training montage in the fucking magic system of Middle Earth?? He teaches Frodo to recite a poem that will summon him, Tom Bombadil, in times of need! Frodo gets kidnapped by undead wights in a barrow (like many a good young person in an Old Norse saga before him) and dutifully recites this magic poem. Frodo learned Recite Magic Poem! TOM BOMBADIL SMASHES THRU THE WALL OF THE BARROW LIKE THE KOOL-ADE MAN AND RECITES A BIGGER, STRONGER POEM??

At this point I gave up on trying to be normal about anything. As such, I'm pausing on Tom Bombadil again.

It helped (?? not psychologically) that Tom Bombadil recited something that felt a bit familiar, when he banished the wights. It's not anything like a direct translation, if indeed it bears any purposeful resemblance to the actual recorded medieval galdor called Against a Wen. Regardless, Against a Wen is an okay?? example of what a spoken word magic poem would look like, and why it's similar to what Tom Bombadil (and later Gandalf and others) do. Left screenshot is Bombadil against a barrow-wight. Right is Against a Wen, in English translation. (a wen was possibly a skin ailment, like a mole or a cancer). Banishing to/beyond the hills and shrivelling are the apparent themes. You don't have to follow me on this one, much less agree. Frankly this is the point I went off the deep end, probably.

Galdor can also protect! This just happens to be a banishment.

Gollum got exiled (the worst thing the early medieval and apparently proto-hobbit law could do to you) but not even for murder. No one found out about the murder. He just sucked.

ALSO Gollum lied and said that his matriarch (who exiled him) gave him the Ring. This implies it was plausible she'd give out rings, implying female ring-giver (standard role of a king). This is mentioned once and never again. ok!!

One last fun fact about galdor: it is the word at the end of "nightingale" isn't that lovely? Luthien's name in-universe means nightingale. This is fine!

I spent a lot of time researching Aragorn's favorite rock. I love these books. If I recall correctly it's a real rock! but possibly. just a cool rock.

[frostfire-17]

Master post of Hittite facts

I protested that this was not a Hittite blog, and it still isn't - it's a blog about these dudes - but there's a lot of Hittite stuff in it now, so I figured I might as well catalogue it for ease of access. Posts are all still tagged "hittites yay!" as well! I'll edit it as I add more.

Post that started it all, with lots of interesting Hittite facts

More Hittite facts

Even more Hittite facts (some pictures in this one)

What is cuneiform? How does it work?

Further resources for Hittite history and language

ancient antiquarians

Bronze Age collapse

More on aggressive ecumenicalism + what it's like to get a PhD in Hittite

How did I get into studying Hittite?

[bottombaron]

for some reason every time I tried to add this to the tags of my last post about the Vampiric Transmogrification Ceremony, BUMblr had a fit and wouldn’t show my post in the official tags and I had to delete and re-post it, like, 5 times

most of this stuff I have been sitting on since the finale aired (like the alchemical symbols, thank you FMA), but here's some additional thoughts on my research journey for The Transmogrification Ceremony (part one):

startingggg with...

how Nandor knows how to read and write Ancient Persian Cuneiform…which would have been out of use roughly a THOUSAND YEARS before he was born 👀 👀

(not for the first time I have a very small suspicion of Nandor being older than he says he is…)

and he definitely knows what the basic alchemical symbols are b/c there’s no way he put the accurate corresponding cuneiform letters spelling english words for those elements on top of the symbols by accident!

the fact that the banners are all properly labeled, with the possible exception of one, is quite frankly both Doylistly and Watsonianly amazing

Nandor knowing at least the basics of alchemy isn’t actually that surprising. The Middle East, specifically Bagdad (which is located on the Tigris btw), was the foremost center of cultural and scientific knowledge (including big developments in alchemy) before the Mongols sacked Bagdad 4 years before Nandor would have been born.

Even after the sack, that knowledge and cultural need for learning didn’t just immediately dissipate and it would have still been an important city. Nandor, probably being born into a noble or middle class family, would have been educated in the sciences which would have included Alchemy. and if he wasn’t, as a ruler he would have had access to teachers and books to learn from. Nandor has always been curious, studious, and likes to read.

transmogrification is an actual alchemical term (webster's dictionary quote: transmute implies transforming into a higher element or thing. convert implies a change fitting something for a new or different use or function. transmogrify suggests a strange or preposterous metamorphosis) there's significance that can be read into this as the chosen title of Nandor’s made up ceremony if you’d like (other than it just sounds funny)

I was really impressed that the crew used actual Old Persian Cuneiform instead of the more popular Sumerian or Akkadian Cuneiform. technically Old Persian is just written with cuneiform-style symbols (much like modern Persian using Arabic-style symbols for their alphabet) and isn't cuneiform proper since it has it's own independently developed alphabet

a little disappointed that the cuneiform translated, not into Persian words, but to a rough spelling of English words for the elements already represented by the alchemical symbols (Earth, for example, would be būmiš = 𐏏, and instead here is just the symbols for 'I-A-R-T/th'. there is no 'E' in Old Persian cuneiform so 'I' substitutes)

tho I was delighted by the discovery that the cuneiform on the 'WATER' banner is close enough to اتر or ‘etir’, Persian for ‘ether’, that I don’t care if it’s a coincidence, i’m taking it

and you may be asking yourself if all the other banners just have rough phonic spellings of the elements the banner represents, why can’t ‘A-T-I-R’ (𐎠𐎫𐎡𐎽) just be a funky 'WATER' without the ‘W’? To that I say: yeah, maybe. There isn’t a corresponding cuneiform symbol for ‘W’ in Old Persian and the substitute of ‘I’ for ‘E’ is also used in ‘Earth’, so that isn’t a huge stretch. However, why not then use a ‘V’ 𐎺 or 𐎻, for 'W' instead of leaving the sound out completely?

Personally, I find the fact that the cuneiform translates more cleanly to an actual Persian word, and one that has huge significance to alchemy and the basic elements, too delicious to ignore. Unless wwdits crew clarifies that (which I would go feral for the opportunity to interview for all the little beautiful details and great work that they do), I’m going with the 'WATER' banner having ‘ETHER’ in cuneiform instead

(and yes i’m aware that ‘A-T/th-I-R’ could just be ‘E-T-H-E-R’ on it’s on and have nothing to do with the Persian word ‘e-t-e-r’ but why ruin the fun?)

I'm using a very loose interpretation for Ether = The Soul which also describes it as the 'Fifth Element' (insert Multi-Pass joke here), or quintessence, and kind of develops into a 'heavenly spirit' kind of essence later. Strictly speaking Ether describes a 'void or nothing, is the material that fills the region of the universe beyond the terrestrial space' but describing it as The Force isn't as significant in the wwdits universe than representing Guillermo's soul

in mythology Aether is the 'pure, fresh air that the god's breathed', different from the air mortals breathed. In Greek mythology he is the son of Darkness and Night and is the primordial personification of the bright upper sky. In Orphic cosmogony he was the son of Time and the brother of Chaos, and he was basically pregnant with the Great Cosmic Egg, of which Phanes the 'First Born God of light and goodness' came from

so there's...that

the use of the cuneiform symbol for ‘new word’ ( 𐏐 ) in front of ‘A-T-I-R’ is interesting and i’m not sure of the significance of it. In cuneiform there is no space between words, so each new word is signified by this symbol, but obviously there is no use of the symbol when each banner only has one word each. and there isn’t any other cuneiform symbol that looks like it either (which makes sense since it’s used for clarification not create typos). it’s an interesting little bit that i’m fascinated with

i did check to see if the (𐏐 ) symbol has a phonic sound to it that might have represented the ‘w’ in Water, but found nothing.

my reading is that it’s being used in the spirit of the meaning and is signifying that the following cuneiform is not related to alchemical symbol of water, like the other ones are. which would track if the cuneiform is translated as ‘ether’ instead

Old Persian cuneiform is read left to right like english, unlike modern Persian, that is read right to left. so that originally confused me, especially since I started with 'AIR' which is backwards to begin with lol

the banner for 'AIR' being backwards is literally only noticeable by the cuneiform symbol for A being inverted 𐎠 (it's the last symbol on the right and has the triangle head starting from the right instead of the left). The same symbol is seen in the 'EARTH' banner turned right. There is no symbol in Old Persian cuneiform that would look like that and sure enough, when flipped, the translation only makes sense as 'AIR'.

that was either a mistake by Nandor, the crew. or on purpose by Nandor, the crew. or some combination thereof. (alchemy having significance with things being backwards does not make that choice easy tbh, but what that significance would be if on purpose ??? idk)

if you’re wondering, I did check to see if anyone else had their bondage-rope-capes-things tied into a bow around their necks like Guillermo. from what I can tell only Nadja and Derek do? Nadja has a big lovely bow which would have been tied by her husband and I’m assuming the awkward limp bow Derek wears is tied by himself. everyone else does not have the Shibari rope completely tied around them. i’m assuming there is wire around the collar holding the shape of them. again, looking into that little detail, if we are taking the Suspiria bondage costume more literally, tracks as Nadja has her loving husband Laszlo to tie her in a beautiful piece, and Derek with his s&m collar, is the picture of a sad sub tying himself up because he has no one else to do it for him

Most importantly however, is that Nandor does not have a tied knot, which confirms to me that he dressed himself without any help from Guillermo and that makes me sad. but then also adds significance to Guillermo being tied in so lovingly:

Nandor makes every last detail here about Guillermo and not himself. it’s almost too much, with how selfish Nandor is in the previous seasons. season 4 especially, what with that ‘you have to make everything in my life about you’ line from Guillermo. but here Guillermo is the special one and Nandor makes sure that every single bit of theater is for, and about, him.

the symbols that I think Nandor is referring to when he says he doesn't know what they mean, are the top symbols, which I will be getting to in my part 2 👍

[sarandipitywrites]

Character voice tag

@loopyhoopywrites and @emabatis tagged me for this one - thank you! Check out Loopy's lines here and EM Abatis's lines here

Rules: Rewrite a the line of dialogue from the person who tagged you into the voice of your OC’s! (You can include a short beat of action to help establish character if you want.) Pass on the tag with a new line of dialogue.

Loopy passed on the line, "May I ask you a question?" and Abatis's was, "Yes, please!" i'll be looking at how the folks from The Art of Empty Space might say it. i'll tag @that-cyber-writer, @squarebracket-trick, @innocentlymacabre, and @serotoninshift to share (if you feel like it!) your characters' take on a classic: "I thought you were dead." if you want to hop in, take this as your open tag!

now, on to the character voices (written in second-person present tense, because i'm feeling contrary today):

Phi

"There's something you're not telling me." Phi doesn't look up from their work; they just keep clacking their abacus, scratching cuneiform numbers into clay. "Did you think I wouldn't notice?"

Gerania

Gerania stalks closer, faer jaw set. Fae stops a breath away from you. "I'm going to ask you something, and you are going to answer me. Your answer will be quick, and accurate." Blue fire whips around you in a cold tempest. "Is that understood?"

Baz

"...Alright." Baz's smile breaks through, a crack in springtime ice. "I think I'd like that."

Lienzo

"You're going to make me beg? And here I thought you were above that." Though his words are harsh, he barely holds back a smile. A crooked eyetooth peeks out from behind parted lips. "Fine: yes... please."

[risingmoonyue]

I imagine the languages getting increasingly more eldrich, strange and all-round obscure. Some of them cause hallucinations of the final galaxy wide war of long dead civilizations and also shift alphabets exactly every 2.467 seconds. Both Marvel and Batman are vibrating in excitement (Billy because holy moly I didn’t realize I knew these languages they’re so cool Mr. Batman lookie—! Bruce because they’re so fun to solve it’s like a brain teaser :))) he knew his languages hyper-fixation would come in handy take THAT Jason!!), and meanwhile the league decided to set apart a room specifically for these reports because they’re starting to warp reality around them. Batman asked Marvel to read one aloud and it set a computer on fire. Constantine took one look at them and immediately turned around swearing up a storm and chugging a bottle of tequila. He refuses to stand within 60 feet of them on report days.

When Billy’s mad at Batman he fills out justice league reports in dead languages

[dreamcrow]

not ONLY am i neurotypical about textiles i am being EMINENTLY NORMAL about writing systems

[nitewrighter]

I've had @retrocatastrophy's roommates AU for Elric and Conan on the brain so I wanted to write them a little somethin' somethin'.

----

It's midnight and Conan is standing at the fridge with the door open eating cottage cheese directly out of the carton. Elric is watching him pointedly from the beat-up couch in the living room, white hair tied up in a bun secured by a wooden hair fork, journal in his lap filled with morbid chicken-scratch that is somehow both fluidly spidery and almost as angular as cuneiform.

"Did you forget to eat again?" Conan's voice from the kitchen is both warped and muffled.

"Don't talk with your mouth full," Elric resumes writing.

"Elric."

"I had a late lunch."

"Get some cereal or something."

"Mm-hm."

Conan steps out of the kitchen, now holding a beer, and leans against the living room wall. "Did you wait up for me?"

Elric snorts a little. Conan glances over at the TV, where a campy-looking film is playing at a low volume. Background noise. "I'd be up this late anyway," he replies.

The couch cushions squeak and rock beneath them both as Conan practically backwards-bodyslams into a slumped lounging position, cracking open a light beer and nursing the foam off the top of the can. "Taarna wants to hang out next week."

"Mm?"

"As in, you'd be hanging out too."

Elric weighs this for a bit longer than a normal person would. "...I can do next week," he says, slowly tripping from word to word.

"You could have tagged along tonight."

"I don't 'tag along.' If you want me to come, invite me, and give me some time beforehand to prep."

Conan just gives a short exhale out of his nostrils at this before sipping his beer.

"What?" says Elric.

"What do you mean 'What?'" says Conan.

"I can tell when you're thinking of something and you've decided not to say it," says Elric, "What is it?"

"Just... you'd get better at the 'spontaneous hangout' thing if you actually... hung out."

Elric is giving him one of those narrow looks again.

"...are you gonna get the cereal--?" Conan starts and Elric makes a frustrated noise and pushes his journal off onto the end table.

"I'll get the damn cereal--" he mutters, sulking to the kitchen.

"What's the movie?" Conan calls after him, grabbing the remote and turning up the volume.

"Horror Express," Elric's answer is punctuated by the closing fridge.

"Nice," says Conan as Elric re-takes his seat next to him, more carefully to accommodate a cereal bowl.

They watch for a few minutes before Elric says, "Taarna actually mentioned me? Like, by name?"

"Well, yeah, you're both spooky and distant and when you actually start to come out of your shell and have fun, then you both get fucking deranged."

Elric's shrewd narrow look has softened to mild exhaustion at this point. Getting something in his stomach does take the some of the edge off, even if the guy is like, 60% edge.

"Which... I mean in a good way?" Conan adds on a little too late, "Like, you get along, is what I'm saying."

Elric almost smiles at this.

"So what's the monster tonight?" Conan glances back at the screen.

"Frozen caveman vampire," Elric says between crunches of cereal.

"Nice."