From Joshua to Fabian: Arovën into Demuan ... and a mistake!

Andawilv=E4n ty=EBmeholno.
Delvowilv=E4n fyillefy=F6rvo c=EFsa'nilin.
Holowilv=E4n baldoloro c=EBl=EFeh=EBlvar=EBnen.
Yn ty=EBm=E4n awro =EBa'vr=EBzel=F6n.

ja qumbu tel odelailai binde suodeyam
bi lok le tel jejelailai bender esper
   il verv ler sonog
bi odewu tel muelailai
   alala lama baa ler zososu snaal
bi suodeyam perninelailai bama wakda

The large bird shall sing his song
That river bird shall ruffle his feathers in the mist
That songbird shall speak of the magnificent stars of the night
That song shall be heard by every king.


The mistake was that I wrote it in the historic tense instead of the
prophetic, as I said. This is semantically like saying 'once upon a
time...'. Both could have been equally valid translations of the Aroven
I received, but I hate being caught out making mistakes in my own
language. Smart observers may notice a certain connection between
the -lailai suffix and Chinese.

wakda is really gender-neutral, but monarch is an unnatural translation
into English. The Demuan for mist is "the ground's clouds". jeje can
mean dance, but also shake about, or even (gosh) ruffle. Dontcha love
multifunction verbs? As for the last line, I take it Valdyan lacks a
passive? The Aroven version had 'chieftain' instead, but wakda covers
that semantic area.

When I received it, it wasn't clear whether the bird was the same one
throughout or not, so I took a guess, and it seems I was wrong. I merely
assumed some alliteration was going on due to the poetic medium.

Finally, the Valdyan translation seems to have misinterpreted the binde
identifier. Oh well. btw, anyone notice the connection between 'binde'
and 'bi'?

And finally, thanks for reminding me about 'numinous'. It's one of my
favourite words in Englosh, and I really should have derived my word
from that... perhaps 'nuumuu'. Now I need to find a new meaning for
'zososu'...

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I feel uncomfortable with this piece, as in context it could either
be considered a piece of ancient history, or a prophecy. Demuan doesn't
have
a time-neutral tense. I used the prophetic tense, thus implying that the
events have not happened yet, but they shall happen.

This may look like miltonian blank verse, but thats the way Demuans
like their poetry. The idented lines above are extensions of the same
gramamtical sentence, and as such, do not receive a new line.

---
ja qumbu tel odejedai binde suodeyam
the large bird sing self's song
---
bi lok le tel jejejedai bender esper
said river 's bird dance self's(p) feather
---
   il xe verv ler sonog
   between some ground 's(p) cloud
---
bi odewu tel muejedai
said singing bird speaks
---
   alala lama baa ler zososu snaal
   about concept-of night 's(p) awesome star
---
bi suodeyam perninejedai bama wakda
said song be-heard-by every monarch
---

Verbs have been glossed using English infinitives, although a strict
translation
of -jedai is "x *shall* happen sometime after we cease to exist". The
gloss is pretty
much word for word when the hyphens are counted. (p) marks a plural
owned object

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Pronunciation (rough guide):

Vowels are on the Spanish model. x is [S]. q is [tS]. j is [dZ]. Closing
stops
on syllables tend to be pronounced as their fricative counterparts.

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Dictionary (extract):

Indented items in this word list are inflected
forms of verbs or fixes of some kind.

alala  [prep] about ; concerning
baa  [n] night
bama  [id] every ; all ; both
bender  [id] self's [p]
bi  [id] aforementioned ; said
binde  [id] self's [s]
esper  [n] feather ; hair
il  [prep] amongst ; between
ja  [id] the [s]
  jedai  [fix] prophetic tense verb suffix
jeje  [v] dance ; shake ; move about in one place
lama  [id] the concept of ; the general group of
le  [*] 's [s]
ler  [*] 's [p]
ler  [pron] those
lok  [n] river
mue  [v] say ; speak ; tell
nine  [v] hear ; listen to
ode  [v] sing ; recite
  odewu  [adj] singing
  per  [fix] passive verb prefix
qumbu  [adj] large ; heavy ; big
snaal  [n] star
sonog  [n] cloud
  suodeyam [n] song
tel  [n] bird ; avian
verv  [n] earth ; ground
wakda  [n] monarch ; king ; queen
zososu  [adj] mighty ; majestic ; awesome ; glorious

adj - adjective
fix - prefix or suffix
id - identifier
n - noun
prep - preposition
v - verb