WotBS Names, names, names

[Oldtimer]

While running a fourth group into War of the Burning Sky, I started to do an extra round of thinking regarding some names in the campaign. Most of the important names have already been reworked into something that works in swedish, but I realise there are still some proud nails there. One of those is "Seaquen". I get that the town lies by the sea, but "quen"?

For those of you that also runs the campaign in a non-english language, have you changed Seaquen into something else?

Also, I've started to look at the Taranesti place names in Book 7. "Ycengled Phuurst"? "Phorros Irrendra"? Was this some sort of tactics involved in the naming? "They can't order an invasion if they can't pronounce the place".

Ryan? Any input on Seaquen and Taranesti names?

 

[Lylandra]

I cannot say too much about Seaquen, but from my own language, I got that "Phuurst" means "forest" ("Forst" in German) and Ycengled (which I pronounce Icen-gled) is some sort of Icy glade. Works in German as well because Ice = Eis which is pronounced the very same way.

Phorros I guess could mean the same as Phuurst, but in the drow dialect.

So... I really didn't change much because the area where I live has some really funny names that sound very much like Tolkien-inspired hamlets anyway (Like Elbtal = valley of the elves). And we even have Dassen!

The names I did change were "Woodsman" into "Förster" (a woodsman/ranger job), Cornerwood into "Waldeck" (which means... wood's corner) and Innenotdar to Innotendar because in the hessian dialect one could translate the former to "Being there in times of trouble". It... just sounds awful to a hessian. Oh and all of the names that are just decriptions anyway, like monastery of the two winds or Alydi gap.

 

[Oldtimer]

Danke for the feedback, Lylandra.

Did you have any input to this, [MENTION=63]RangerWickett[/MENTION]?

 

[Mrpereira]

I didn't change any of the names in the setting - although at times it is hard, especially for my players, to say the names correctly - even after I spelled it for them. That siad, we just go with the flow, as we all know what we mean.

 

[Lylandra]

Strolling through some indian name lists (for my Zeitgeist character), I just realized that Ashok Danava doesn't really fit into the standard Ex-Morrus naming scheme of quasi-Latin names. Rather, his name is a combination of an indian first name (Ashok) combined with the name for a group of demons (Danava). His son's name Kathor is also of indian origin. Is this just a coincidence? Or is this a nod to something else?

I don't really remember whether one of the countries that were annexed by Coaltongue had a pseudo-indian background...