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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Desdichado" data-source="post: 4415364" data-attributes="member: 2205">If it isn't obvious, I borrowed some real life linguistics for my fantasy world.  Most of the northern rim of the Mezzovian Sea speaks a language that's similar to Spanish or Italian... but not exactly.  I think there's always a fine line between fantasy names and real-life names; too fantastic and nobody can keep them straight, and they don't "feel" like anything except weird; too common and they don't work either, because it doesn't even feel like a fantasy anymore.  For this north Mezzovian language, I wanted something familiar, but not too familiar.  I speak Spanish (formerly fluently; I'm a bit rusty now) but if I used actual Spanish names and placenames, I had the funny feeling that my setting would just have felt like southern California, and I wanted something a bit more exotic than that.Most of the names and place names are derived from the Catalan and Occitan (Provençal) languages, but I've also got a few Asturian words here and there, as well as taking some Spanish words and just jazzing them up manually.  These feel sufficiently Spanish or Italian to work quite well and not feel too alien, yet they don't feel exactly like Spanish or Italian, and since Occitan and Catalan are relatively obscure languages, there's not too much preconcieved notions attached to seeing a name or word from those languages.The Komewan and Kvuustu languages are derived from word generator programs I have with custom parameters on them.  The Kvuustu language in particular gives a very definite feel; it specializes in hard consonants, difficult consonent clusters and long vowels represented by doubled vowels.  Komewan I keep around because it gives a result that feels like it's somewhere between Nahuatl, the Aztec language, and Japanese.  Again; the vaguely familiar yet odd feel is exactly what I'm going for; I want these words and names to resonate with something, just not too strongly.I've also used a few names from "Yog-Sothothery"; Carcosa should be immediately apparent (although it also fits with the vaguely Hispanic feel) as should Leng, and possibly Mnar, Pnakos and a few other names I cribbed.  To further strengthen the impression that I'm merely an idea thief, my first incarnation of this setting was purposefully set up to resemble the 3rd century Tarim Basin on the Silk Road, with Razina being geographically about the same place Kucha or Karashahr.  Rather than a peninsula, the Strachina was a vast desert basin, much like the Takla Makan, and rather than sailing ships, Razina hosted caravans between two rival empires that, geographically at least, if in no other sense, represented Qin China and the Kuchean or possibly Sassanid Persian Empire.  The current geography is not disimilar to the Mediterranean Sea, except completely closed off, and the name Mezzovian is a sort of homage to that idea.  Razina, in that scheme, is geographically about the same place as the Western shoreline of Greece, and the Komewan Empire is about where Egypt would be.  Mnar and Pnakos, from whence the Mnar Theocracy came many generations ago, are about where the Pillars of Hercules are, and Carcosa is a large group of island about where Carthage would be.I'll try and scan the quickly sketched map I have and post it soon.</blockquote>

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