D&D General Which D&D Words and Things are Post 1608?

[Cadence]

Going from another thread...

Heh heh, yeah... and a whole host of people still want 'Psionics' in the game, with 'Psions' as the main class for it. And that's even more sci-fi than Humanoid or Species.

So, which words and objects in D&D are of modern origin. Take modern to be after 1608. Why? Because 1608 is the OEDs first modern use of species which is relevant to recent D&D changes and the year given for the spyglass [edit: for the telescope that works like a spyglass anyway] which is in D&D equipment lists. Also exclude any that were created for non-science fiction fantasy literature. Because the fantasy ones feel like they should be in a fantasy game, but the discussion is inspired in part by the remark that species sounds to science or sci-fi.

To start with we have...

Humanoid - 1870
Psionic - 1952

 

[Yora]

All of Eberron is ca. 1920.

 

[the Jester]

I'm pretty sure that "libram" was invented by Gygax. Maybe "dweomer" too.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I'm pretty sure that "libram" was invented by Gygax. Maybe "dweomer" too.

"Libram" is just the accusative form of the Latin word libra. It is likely that it was meant to be a derivation of the Latin word liber, which means "book." (The accusative form of liber is librum, which might have been transmuted into "libram" because -um is not a common ending in English words.) Technically, liber also means "free, freedom," but the two etymologies are unrelated, like how "wind" (the thing that blows) and "wind" (the verb for coiling one object around another) are spelled the same but have completely different origins.

Dweomer, at least, is not at all a new invention, though he did revive a word that was nearly dead.

 

[Clint_L]

Hit Points/Experience Points
Armour Class
Saving Throw
Ability Check

It's a modern game - almost all of the language is modern. Drawing a line at "species" seems strange. So does all the kerfuffle about something that actually affects the game in no way. This is one of those debates that is going to seem really confusing in a few years - "Remember in 2022 when we all argued endlessly about calling the various species in the game species?"

 

[Cadence]

I'm pretty sure that "libram" was invented by Gygax. Maybe "dweomer" too.

I'm good with words invented just for fantasy literature.

 

[MNblockhead]

If we are going with 1608, then "spyglass". Earliest usage in writing, per the OED, is 1707.

 

[Davies]

Undead - 1897
Studded leather armor - c. 1977

 

[Cadence]

If we are going with 1608, then "spyglass". Earliest usage in writing, per the OED, is 1707.

The term spyglass. But isn't the 1608 telescope pretty much what is called a spyglass?

 

[MNblockhead]

Take modern to be after 1608. Why? Because 1608 is the OEDs first modern use of species which is relevant to recent D&D changes and the year given for the spyglass which is in

Not sure that I would go with "modern use" of species. It seems you are selecting the earliest use in the sense of zoology or biology. But in a fantasy game, even older uses of the term are arguably more appropriate. That could move the date back another half-century.


I. Senses relating to outward appearance or form.
†1.
a. Appearance; outward form. Obsolete.This sense is partly represented in the legal use of the word: see quots. 1651, 1765-8 at specification n. 1b.
1559 P. Morwyng tr. C. Gesner Treasure of Euonymus 400 An other very good wine with the same species, but in other weight.
1651 T. Hobbes Leviathan iv. xliv. 338 A Divinity under their species, or likenesse.

II. Senses relating to groups or classes.
7.

a. Logic. The second of the five Predicables (predicable n. 1a), connoting the common attributes or essential qualities of a class of persons or things as distinguished from the genus on the one hand and the individual on the other.
1551 T. Wilson Rule of Reason sig. Bvj Species is a common word that is spoken of many whiche differ only in number, as manne is spoken of Socrates,..and of euery proper name belonging to any man. As Socrates is a man.
1567 J. Jewel Def. Apol. Churche Eng. iii. v. 343 What adoo was made in daily disputations..aboute Genus and Species, and the reste of the Vniuersals.

8.

a. A class composed of individuals having some common qualities or characteristics, frequently as a subdivision of a larger class or genus.
1629 W. Prynne Church of Englands Old Antithesis 98 This kind of argument from euery indiuiduall to the speecies will not hold.
1653 tr. J. Stegmann Brevis Disq. in Phenix (1708) II. 324 Are you not yet sure whether..if you reject all the Species, the whole Genus be taken away?
1690 J. Locke Ess. Humane Understanding iii. vi. 211 The Individuals that are ranked into one Sort, called by one common Name, and so received as being of one Species.

9.

a. A distinct class, sort, or kind, of something specifically mentioned or indicated. Frequently const. of.The separate groups of quotations illustrate the chief varieties of context.
(a)
1561 T. Hoby tr. B. Castiglione Courtyer iii. sig. Cc.iii Both the one and the other is conteined vnder the Species of Homo.
1660 R. Coke Justice Vindicated ii. 26 If the Scriptures be true,..that since Adam..the species of Mankind was continued by generation.

c. Applied to individuals as unique or as typical of a class.
1644 J. Cleveland Char. London Diurnall 7 As the Angels, each of them makes a severall Species; so every one of his Souldiers is a distinct Church.
1656 A. Cowley Praise of Pindar in Pindaric Odes i Pindar is imitable by none; The Phœnix Pindar is a vast Species alone.