v50 Steam/Premium information for editors
  • v50 information can now be added to pages in the main namespace. v0.47 information can still be found in the DF2014 namespace. See here for more details on the new versioning policy.
  • Use this page to report any issues related to the migration.
This notice may be cached—the current version can be found here.

Elven language

From Dwarf Fortress Wiki
(Redirected from Elvish language)
Jump to navigation Jump to search
v50.14 · v0.47.05
This article is about the current version of DF.
Note that some content may still need to be updated.
Not to be confused with Quenya or Sindarin.

The Elven language is one of the five languages the player will come across. This language is used in-game for the names of the universe, continents, rivers, elven governments and settlements, elves, artifacts and engravings. However, as of yet, it lacks everything necessary for proper conversation, like grammar or personal pronouns.

Alphabet[edit]

The letters of the Elven alphabet are:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34
Majuscule forms (also called uppercase or capital letters)
A B C Ç D E È É F G H I Ì Í K L M N O Ò Ó P Q R S T U Ù Ú V W Y Ÿ Z
Minuscule forms (also called lowercase or small letters)
a b c ç d e è é f g h i ì í k l m n o ò ó p q r s t u ù ú v w y ÿ z

Of these 34 letters, 13 are vowels (A, E, È, É, I, Ì, Í, O, Ò, Ó, U, Ù, Ú); the 21 others are consonants.

The letters J and X of the ISO basic Latin alphabet do not occur in the Elven alphabet.

Letter frequency[edit]

N Letter Frequency
1 A 1762 17.05%
2 B 133 1.29%
3 C 426 4.12%
4 Ç 14 0.14%
5 D 155 1.5%
6 E 1428 13.82%
7 È 59 0.57%
8 É 53 0.51%
9 F 372 3.6%
10 G 10 0.1%
11 I 1398 13.53%
12 Ì 58 0.56%
13 Í 61 0.59%
14 K 17 0.16%
15 L 548 5.3%
16 M 508 4.91%
17 N 528 5.11%
18 O 451 4.36%
19 Ò 26 0.25%
20 Ó 38 0.37%
21 P 113 1.09%
22 QU 47 0.45%
23 R 582 5.63%
24 S 153 1.48%
25 T 146 1.41%
26 TH 466 4.51%
27 U 193 1.87%
28 Ù 13 0.13%
29 Ú 14 0.14%
30 V 163 1.58%
31 W 135 1.31%
32 Y 141 1.36%
33 Ÿ 106 1.03%
34 Z 19 0.18%

Graphemics[edit]

The study of the graphemes, or writing units, of a script, and of their relation to the phonemes of the spoken language.

  • Digraphs th and qu.
    • h only occurs in the digraph th.
    • q only occurs in the digraph qu.
  • Only allowed consonant cluster sl.
  • Elven has no diphthongs.
  • Possible syllable structure (C)(C)V


Diacritic meaning[edit]

The Elven language has two diacritics (◌̀ and ◌́) used on four vowels (e, i, o, and u). Its possible that this is just a simpler version of the Dwarven language's system, with just high and low pitch. It's also possible that the two diacritics represent short and overlong vowels, and no diacritic represents a long vowel.

It's interesting that A stands out as the one vowel with no diacritics, while in Dwarven it's the one with the most.

Vocabulary[edit]

Main article: Language#Vocabulary

The average word in the Elven language is 4.993 letters long. The longest known words are thitathi ("admire"), thafatha ("battle"), riquethi ("chop"), lethathi ("glum"), thavetha ("mauve"), thethéfa ("meal" (paste)), cèthutha ("mine"), tithithi ("pepper"), quathari ("play" (perform)), thawathi ("post"), naquithe ("rabble"), thatheci ("rustic"), nethitha ("squid"), fithithe ("stretch"), thanetha ("ungodly"), and tholatho ("waste").

The average word has 2.556 syllables. Words either have two or three syllables.

V · T · E
Races
Divine · Dwarven · Elvish · Goblin · Human · Kobold
Modding
Text Sets
Retrieved from "https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=Elven_language&oldid=302502"