Elven Language/Runes

[TheDungen]

And china bent knee to the mongols and one of their decendants ruled china for hundreds of years. And byzantium was a greek civilasation rahter than roman one. It was only roman in its name. And while a comouter may know 4000 characters a keyboard cant.
Western languages have ambiguity in the words not in the letters.

As for fantasy setting i dot have a problem with warhammer having it this way i have a problem with every fantasy and sci-fi seting having it this way. Take stargate for an example, the as hard there write with runes sure, but for some reason a civilisation that advanced use ideograpic runes instead of the phonetic ones that primitive humans would in universe have derived from their system. Take Eoin Colfer's fairies in Artmeis Fowl. Another civilasation thats supposed to be more advanced than humanity and is ideograpic. The only example i can think of of the opposite is Atlantis in "Atlantis Found" by Clive Cussler.

[Quinzy]

As mentioned, the ability to live to thousands of years old, spend hundreds of years in a schooling system, and having a different brain chemistry all contribute to an explanation as to why non-humans might be inclined towards a ideographic writing system.

[stormblade]

Also, they're elves and would consequently never admit that they don't know best.

[TheDungen]

All of them? Out simple system of writing would then be an effect of our short lifespans and very specific to us? but when we look at humanity when we ahd shorter lifespans we see a trend towards the opposite, when we had shorter lifespans we had ideograpic writing. Not saying that one is cause of the other however, but empiricism doesn't seem to support you theory in that case. And if it was only do to biochemical factors then it would be more evenly distributed especially since phonetic is a more efficient system.

Like i said i know why they do it three reasons:

1. It makes it harder for non members of the species to master it. which makes their civilasation seem superior to us

2. Showing a more efficient system than ours is hard since of we knew of one we'd be using it. Its always hard to anticipate real progress. Just look at an old sci-fi how much of our current progress have they been able to anticipate (look at 2001: A space oddysey for an example)?

3. Because deciphering a phonetic text in a foreign language (a totally foreign language with no points of reference) is impossible. If each letter represents aword then you can find the symbols thta apear most often and say hey that has to be a are or is or was or soemthign like that. If its code (phonetic) but written in a language you know you cna find the most common symbol and guess that its the most common letter in that language. But if you know nothing about the language knowing how you write the most common sound in their language is kind of pointless. Especially since you only know how it looks like and not how it sounds.


So they have their reasons i just wish that the GW games dev team that have created a working language for both dwarfs and chaos could do the same for elves =(

[Urgat]

Looking at its sorry state I wouldn't call it 'existence'.

It's been through much worse than what it's going through these days.

Take stargate for an example, the as hard there write with runes sure, but for some reason a civilisation that advanced use ideograpic runes instead of the phonetic ones that primitive humans would in universe have derived from their system.

There is an excellent reason why the Asgards in Stargate use runes, and if you spend all but two seconds thinking about how the series background has been constructed, it should be quite obvious which it is.

[TheDungen]

Explain to me why the space version of a culture would use a ideographic rune system when the culture itself used a phonetic rune system.

[BobtheInquisitor]

I wish they would take it one step further and have each rune represent a complex metaphor that requires an extensive knowledge of the culture's mythohistoric architecture.

"Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra" or "Temba, his arms wide," for example.

But you know, Shaka, when the walls fell.

[Urgat]

Explain to me why the space version of a culture would use a ideographic rune system when the culture itself used a phonetic rune system.

Sure: the Asgard "raised" the humans that became our nordic civilizations (Norway, Sweden, Denmark), and who used a runic system back then (Futhark rune system, etc). So, these people got their runes from the Asgard. Or, from the mind of the creators, if they used runes, it's because their progenitors had to have given them to them, ergo, the Asgards had to have runes (and they're the same, see the shots inside their ships. I don't know where you get that ideographic/phonetic difference. Now I don't know if what's written on the Asgard control panels mean anything, it's not because they're the same runes that it's the same language, it's not because I know the Latin alphabet that I can read Italian). Makes sense now?

[Athelassan]

I'm frankly bewildered that anybody can seriously hold the belief that whether a culture uses a phonetic alphabet or ideographic characters is any better a reflection of its fundamental worth than, for instance, whether they serve the cheese course before or after the pudding.

[Tresidentevil]

So. Uhm. Does anybody have anymore links to some Elven runes and stuff?

[TheDungen]

Sure: the Asgard "raised" the humans that became our nordic civilizations (Norway, Sweden, Denmark), and who used a runic system back then (Futhark rune system, etc). So, these people got their runes from the Asgard. Or, from the mind of the creators, if they used runes, it's because their progenitors had to have given them to them, ergo, the Asgards had to have runes (and they're the same, see the shots inside their ships. I don't know where you get that ideographic/phonetic difference. Now I don't know if what's written on the Asgard control panels mean anything, it's not because they're the same runes that it's the same language, it's not because I know the Latin alphabet that I can read Italian). Makes sense now?

Ergo the langauges should be the same, but they're not. Norse runes are phonetic asgard runes as explained in series are ideograpic. where as gould teach an ideograic langauge to their slaves and from that system the ideographic hieroglyphs was derived. The ideographic diffrence i get in the episode about the hall of thor's might when Jacksson ascribes attributes to runes rather then sounds. Which is entirely wrong.

Runes have nothing to do with if a language is ideographic or phonetic to do. A rune is just another way to say a letter or symbol. The last set of norse runes for an example was a norse interpretation of written greek they had seen in cities like Constantinople.

[TheDungen]

And on more info this


and then i don't think there's anything else. its a shame they haven't put half the effort into the elven language as they have in the dwarf or chaos ones =(

[Tresidentevil]

So do Dark Elves speak the same language and write the same as High Elves? They are technically the same race aren't they? I seem to remember reading Wood Elves have a slight deviation in language and writing, something like a different dialect.

[Ultimate Life Form]

So do Dark Elves speak the same language and write the same as High Elves? They are technically the same race aren't they? I seem to remember reading Wood Elves have a slight deviation in language and writing, something like a different dialect.

I wouldn't find it surprising, though several thousand years of separation (and propaganda) are bound to have an impact on language as well. Then again we should keep in mind that it was possible for Dark Elf sleeper agents to infiltrate the Phoenix King's court and apparently blend in perfectly with the other nobles, so they can't speak a very thick dialect. I would imagine the rune system mostly unchanged, but with several different readings/meanings attached.

As for Wood Elves, I don't know their runes, but their book mentions language quite a few times and also dives into etymological references sometimes as to how words have developed and changed. However since we don't know about the language as a whole, we have no way to fathom how fundamental those changes are. It could be a dialect or it could be an entirely different language.

[Tresidentevil]

I wouldn't find it surprising, though several thousand years of separation (and propaganda) are bound to have an impact on language as well. Then again we should keep in mind that it was possible for Dark Elf sleeper agents to infiltrate the Phoenix King's court and apparently blend in perfectly with the other nobles, so they can't speak a very thick dialect. I would imagine the rune system mostly unchanged, but with several different readings/meanings attached.

As for Wood Elves, I don't know their runes, but their book mentions language quite a few times and also dives into etymological references sometimes as to how words have developed and changed. However since we don't know about the language as a whole, we have no way to fathom how fundamental those changes are. It could be a dialect or it could be an entirely different language.

Thanks for the reply. I guess there has been a large passage of time with the Dark Elves effectively being a separate Kingdom and that gives the scope for regional differences and deviation. Then again is that passage of time really that much for Elves? I wouldn't put it past Dark Elf sleeper agents to train themselves to talk differently, actors can do it fairly easily in real life?

[Ultimate Life Form]

Then again is that passage of time really that much for Elves?

It is. Language change happens rather rapidly actually and it happens now. I have studied the topic for a few years now and you wouldn't believe what kind of crazy things happen all the time (like, for example, a latin word that means 'to protect' developing into a french word that means 'to kill'). If you pay heed you may find yourself saying things you would have deemed impossible a few years ago. Granted with Elven longevity this process is bound to happen at a slower pace, but we're still looking at a span of a few thousand years here, the time it took for English and German to develop into completely different languages.

I wouldn't put it past Dark Elf sleeper agents to train themselves to talk differently, actors can do it fairly easily in real life?

Well of course they were trained properly, but saying it's an easy task is a bit of an exaggeration. You have to keep in mind that actors train specifically for their role and focus on the things they have to say on stage, and they only have to keep it up for a few hours at best. The DE sleeper agents had to play their role all the time, for many, many years, and they had to be virtually perfect at fluently speaking about pretty much any aspect of life without further preparation. I would deem it impossible even for an Elf to pull that off. Even they will lose concentration at times, and a single Druchii word slipping past their lips or even a strange intonation would have given them away. But since these things aren't reported to have happened, I figure it can't have been too hard for them, meaning the languages can't be that much different.

[Tresidentevil]

This has been a good topic, thanks folks.

[TheDungen]

Language change happens based on generations, not on time. Each time a word is taught its meaning shifts slightly, 7000 years for the high elves are like 7 generations (High elves have aprox 2000 years lifespan a human generation is 40 years and our lifetime is 80, so the elven generation is about thousand years and 7000/1000=7) Which is like 300 years (280 but since the values are approximations there no reason to be exact) for humans. So they will have diverged about as much from each other as the brittish and americans have.



more specifically i think they have the same runes but in a diffrent font i you know what i mean. and the meanings of those runs will generally be the darker ones. Sariour will for an example probably not be used for describing the moon very often or used for magic, but more often for the meanings evil deeds and destruction wrought by nature.

[Ultimate Life Form]

Language change happens based on generations, not on time.

Actually the exact workings are still pretty much shrouded in mystery and open to interpretation, so simply stating this as a fact is leaving you way open to attcks.

Also we have quite a lot of real world examples that seem to disagree with you (prize question: did you know what a vuvuzela is two years ago?)

In short, don't tell me that you earnestly believe 2000 years of crazy Dark Elf propaganda didn't have a lasting effect on the language.

Also I'm pretty sure High Elves don't make babies only every 300 yerars. 'Generation' is a rather vague concept that works for us most of the time, but it can't reasonably be applied to species whose life cycle differs from ours in quite considerable ways.

And even if your theory is true that still represents quite a considerable change (or are you really implying Americans speak English? Who would of thought? Well, could care less.)

[nurgle5]

Greece vacated the world scene the day they submitted themselves to the Romans (and then the turks and pretty much anyone else who came along).

Many Roman emperors were heavily influenced by Greek culture (the growing of a beard was a notably Greek thing to do), as were many other aspects of Roman culture. Look at the Greek Pantheon and then the Roman Pantheon, notice any similarities? Just because the Greeks didn't have an empire anymore doesn't make them insignificant on the world stage or historically irrelevant.

(prize question: did you know what a vuvuzela is two years ago?)

I did, and I have to say I was outraged when all those international football games broke out during vuvuzela concerts