From: Peter Metcalfe (P.Metcalfe@student.canterbury.ac.nz)
Date: Tue 25 Mar 1997 - 02:57:43 EET
Alex Ferguson:
==============
Me>> I view all the Pelorian farmers as having the same
>> basic language whereas Dara Happan and New Pelorian are merely
>> the dialects spoken by the wealthy and educated.
>The G:G language rules partially support this, but also indicate that
>DH and NP are more dissimilar, both to each other and to the Pelorian
>Farmer Languages, than any of the PFLs are to each other.
Checking, I see that you are right. I mixed up the little fractions
>The PFLs, I suggest, each have a Pelandan basis, but are heavily overlaid
they used in communicating with each other.
>with varying amounts of Theyalan, Dara Happan, Pentan, and Carmanian
>influences, loan-words, etc.
I wouldn't say Pelandan but Pelorian. The Balazarings and the
Jarstics have just as much a Pelorian basis as the PFLs but
the mutual comprehensibility is decreased (1/10th). IMO the
PFL are the vulgar versions of the Dara Happan Speech heavily
enriched by whatever local speech used to exist and various
influences. But Dara Happan became a fixed courtly speech
whereas the PFLs kept on changing.
This would entail the existance of a 'Low' Dara Happan Speech
(now extinct) which changed with the times and was what the Dara
Happans spoke when not at Court (ie like medieval Italian to
Church Latin, or Koine to Attic Greek). This does raise the
riddle of how to treat the Pelorian Farmers that were under the
rule of the Carmanians. Should they speak a Pelandan Farmers
Tongue (for which they should get 1/3 with other Pelandan Farmers,
1/10 with other Pelorian languages save New Pelorian of which
they get 1/5)?
>Pelandan and Dara Happan were at some point
>quite distinct, though already by the time of GRAY are becoming somewhat
>smooshed together. (Originally I'd thought names like "Antirius" were
>Pelandanisms, but it would appear not. Darsen or thereabouts, anyone?)
Dara Happan when borrowing other words tends to murder them quite
FWIW, Antirius IMO originally comes from Pelanda and is related
brutally. Hence I doubt that Dara Happan and 'Modern' Pelandan
ever became more mutally comprehensible than say 1/5. As for the
origins of the Pelandanisms, Naveria and Darjiin are also places
that should be looked at.
to Turos (cf the description of him in the GRAY where he is the
patron of the assemblies). The Ant in the front of his name merely
means something like 'Rightful' Turos. All I have to figure out
know is how (and where) the ending changes from -ros to become -ri
before being picked up by the Dara Happans to become -rius.
>Instead, I think [New Pelorian is] a deliberate and self-conscious
>attempt to recreate the "original" Pelandan language, [...] This
>process is alluded to in the Entekosiad, as JeSevenisation, though
>New Pelorian isn't identitified as the end result, that I recall.
This makes me wonder. Would New Pelorian then be a Restoration Era
language? Prior to this, the official philosophy was heavily bent
on uprooting Carmanian influences with extreme prejudice and pro
Dara Happan (cf TakenEgi being the Lord of the Four Quarters).
- --Peter Metcalfe
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