Re: OT: Quick Intro

Joe wrote:
>Andreas Johansson wrote:
> > Race languages? Does that means you're planning to have one Elvish
> > language, one Trollish one, one
> > Little-bluey-grey-cynoids-with-an-obsession-for-malt-whiskey one (or
> > whatever races you're including)?
> >
> > Nothing "wrong" about that, of course, but, despite being common in RPG
> > worlds etc, a such situation is slightly odd; why are there multiple
>human
> > languages, but only one cynoid one? Explanations can, of course, be
>found -
> > the cynoids may be confined to a smaller geographical area than the
>humans,
> > say - but forgoing to make _the_ cynoid language in favour of making _a_
> > cynoid language frees one from having to provided them.
>
>Yes, Tolkien did well at that, by having both Quenya and Sindarin.
He actually had a few more Elvish languages, like Telerin and Silvan Elvish.
But I suspect that the Lord of the Rings, with it's plentiful references to
Elvish speech and Dwarvish inscriptions, has, thru' not too attentive
readers, helped establish the pattern in many Fantasy worlds of each
non-human race having just one language. I've, in RPGs, seen rather amusing
examples of this, where Dwarfs speak Dwarf, Minotaurs speak Minotaur and
Halflings speak Halfling, while the humans, in addition to being the only
race that doesn't get a capital letter, for some reason don't speak Human.
And they _never_ bother to explain this irregular state of affairs.

                                                     Andreas

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