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.

Difference between revisions of "Elven language"

From Dwarf Fortress Wiki
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Line 117: Line 117:
 
** ''h'' only occurs in the digraph ''th''.
 
** ''h'' only occurs in the digraph ''th''.
 
** ''q'' only occurs in the digraph ''qu''.
 
** ''q'' only occurs in the digraph ''qu''.
−
* Common consonant cluster of ''sl''
+
* Only allowed consonant cluster ''sl''
 
* Elvish has no [[wikipedia:diphthongs|diphthongs]].
 
* Elvish has no [[wikipedia:diphthongs|diphthongs]].
 
* Possible [[wikipedia: syllable structure|syllable structure]] (C)V(C)
 
* Possible [[wikipedia: syllable structure|syllable structure]] (C)V(C)

Revision as of 00:00, 13 March 2016

Not to be confused with Quenya or Sindarin.

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

Alphabet

The letters of the Elvish 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 Elvish alphabet.

Letter frequency

N Letter Frequency
1 A 16.24%
2 B 1.23%
3 C 3.93%
4 Ç 0.13%
5 D 1.43%
6 E 13.16%
7 È 0.54%
8 É 0.49%
9 F 3.43%
10 G 0.09%
11 H 4.30%
12 I 12.89%
13 Ì 0.53%
14 Í 0.56%
15 K 0.16%
16 L 5.05%
17 M 4.68%
18 N 4.87%
19 O 4.16%
20 Ò 0.24%
21 Ó 0.35%
22 P 1.04%
23 Q 0.43%
24 R 5.36%
25 S 1.41%
26 T 5.64%
27 U 2.21%
28 Ù 0.12%
29 Ú 0.13%
30 V 1.50%
31 W 1.24%
32 Y 1.30%
33 Ÿ 0.98%
34 Z 0.18%

Graphemics

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

Diacritic meaning

The Elvish 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 long and short vowels, and no diacritic represents a "normal" length vowel.

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

Vocabulary

Main articles: Noun dictionary, Verb dictionary, Adjective dictionary, and Prefix dictionary

The average word in the Elvish 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").

V · T · E
Races
Divine · Dwarven · Elvish · Goblin · Human · Kobold
Modding
Text Sets
Retrieved from "https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php?title=Elven_language&oldid=224198"