Need help with race names

[FrankL]

Hi,

 

I've recently published a story in Cross and Cosmos, and then I noticed a problem with it. In "The Strong Survive," the names of the breeds of Sachalin aren't very good. The Sachalin wouldn't think of themselves as "lion-headed," "tiger-headed," or "cheetah-headed." Outsiders might think of them along those lines, but they themselves wouldn't.

 

I've been playing with the names but want some feedback and other thoughts before I decide.

 

The Sachalin are a felinoid race. They were formed by dark magic blending human and one of three giant cat species. They have humanoid body shapes (no tails, though) with fur and claws. Those coming from lion blends have golden fur (the men grow manes during adolescence, the women have hair from birth). Those from tiger blends have tiger stripes and no hair for men but women do. The "cheetah" breed has spots and the same hair issues as tigers.

 

My first thought was to start from the Latin name of each. Lions are Panthera leo, tigers are P. tigris, and cheetahs are Acinonyx jubatus. Leonine and tigrine point the way without the problems of lion-head and tiger-head, but jubatine is going to cause confusion. Maybe that's okay, or would be okay if the other two were likewise different.

 

Another possible problem with working off the Latin names is that the mage who first made them was an elf who lived during the Elven Empire (which has a very Latin feel to it). After the Sachalin slaves revolted and left the Empire to govern themselves, they shook off everything elvish. I don't think they would keep the names for themselves that their oppressors gave them.

 

It's been suggested that the names be completely foreign for each. I prefer to avoid forcing my readers to do mental mapping, but sometimes it's necessary (my stories even have the same months of the year and seasons as our world to keep mapping down). But I can see how in this case, completely foreign might be best. Maybe playing with the German (or other European, non-Latin descendant) names for the three.

 

Any thoughts, please?

[Kraven Kor]

Re: Need help with race names

 

My recommendation would be to "give them their own language" (not really, give me a moment lol) - make up some words that, to them, mean "lion-clan" or whatever.

 

As they are based on felines, their own language would probably consist of a lot of cat-like noises; growling, purring, lots of "ow" type syllables / phonetics, lots of g and r....

 

So... 'Gaarrorow' (gae-ar-roe-row) for lion ("Garo" for lion, "row" for clan?), 'Rahgororow' (rah-goor-rah-ow) for tiger, etc.

 

However, your species is not a natural species and thus may not even have the cultural background to have their own language. Depends how far back the original event of their creation is and their history since then.

[Shadowsoul]

Re: Need help with race names

 

Other people could refer to them using these 'Latin' words but they could have their own names for themselves in a different language.

 

Even if they didn't create their own language their dialect of Latin could have developed along different lines to that of the Elvish 'classic' Latin. New languages will eventually evolve from the same roots as particular pronunciations and spellings come into fashion in different regions and words are borrowed or adapted from other language groups. That's why modern Americans speak and write a language very like but not quite the same as modern English. (English being defined as the language spoken in England. Since English was born in England its inhabitants have an absolute veto about what constitutes proper English and the right to correct other English speakers in the most patronising manner possible even when visiting other countries).

 

So if you want your Sachalin to have their own language that doesn't mean they can't use Latin words or root words. Maybe as Kraven Kor suggests you could use a more feline way of speaking to make the words distinctive. E.g. try saying Leo in a feline accent.

 

And since this is fantasy and you aren't actually using 'Latin' but 'Elvish' you can always cheat and come up with more easily recognisable terms such as Chetrine for Cheetah-heads. If any Latin buffs in your group point this out then you can smile sweetly and explain that this is not actually Latin so what you say goes.

[AlHazred]

Re: Need help with race names

 

Shadowsoul's last notion is the tried-and-true method used in many fantasy novels -- to have race-names that sound similar to proper English, but are also "in their native tongue." So, for example, the Panthryn, Leonyn, and Tigryn could be the race names (for some reason, Ys are very popular with the run-of-the-mill fantasy authors (or as I like to call them, "Sturgeon's Legions").

 

Another way is to make "poetically-translated" race-names. For instance, there's no reason frog-fish people would have a name pronounceable by humans; so, in my fantasy campaign, outsiders called them the Deep-Folk (and since my players are all humans, they did too) while they call themselves something that translates to "People of the Deep Wisdom." Keep in mind that homo sapiens has as a root the word homo, which came from the Old Latin hemo, meaning "the earthly one," so even the word for humans has a "poetically-translated" meaning.

 

Yet another way is to riff off of things your players know well, even if there's no real reason for it to be so in your fantasy world. For instance, say one of your PCs plays a lion-headed Sachalin, and has a cat named Whiskers; perhaps the lion-headed Sachalin call themselves the Wis-Kar, or have the "poetically-translated" name of "Long-Whiskers."

[Ockham's Spoon]

Re: Need help with race names

 

The problem with naming them with their own language is that it will be difficult to pronounce or represent with a Latin alphabet. Consider the city of Beijing, which used to be known as Peking, but neither of those names are phonetically quite right because our alphabet isn't equipped to handle the true pronunciation. So in the end the name is going to be corrupted one way or another, either because "English" speakers have their own terms for the cat people or because they just can't pronounce it right. Far from being a problem, this should give you justification for calling them almost anything that makes sense to you.

 

If you like the Latin sounding names, consider that the cat people might have kept them, the same way Americans took Uncle Sam and turned him from a joke into a national icon. Sometimes people take pride in how far they have come or want a reminder of the way things were before so they don't let it happen again. If that is the case, the cat people may have adopted their "original" names as both a mnemonic and as a way to thumb their noses at their oppressors.

[FrankL]

Re: Need help with race names

 

Sorry. I have been away for a while and meant to respond earlier.

 

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas. I had things figured out until I returned today.

 

The Sachalin rebelled from their elvish masters around 1200 years ago. They do have their own language, but since their throat, mouth, and tongue are human shaped, they can pronounce any of the human sounds. They had been created as slaves about 400 years before that.

 

If you like the Latin sounding names, consider that the cat people might have kept them, the same way Americans took Uncle Sam and turned him from a joke into a national icon. Sometimes people take pride in how far they have come or want a reminder of the way things were before so they don't let it happen again. If that is the case, the cat people may have adopted their "original" names as both a mnemonic and as a way to thumb their noses at their oppressors.

 

I can see Amerosh I standing on the top of a city wall, holding up the elven general he defeated during their rebellion, and throwing him back down into the city, roaring out, "We are LEONINE!" The jubatine and tigrine leaders standing next to him would roar similarly.

 

I still have the racial slur "furry." Had a bandit refer to a Leonine by that once. The bandit survived the ordeal but has new scars that exist in sets of 4 parallel to one another.