Mahrazh: Difference between revisions

From The Languages of David J. Peterson
Jump to navigation Jump to search
m (Text replacement - "(\{\{head\|.+?)nominative singular, " to "\1")
 
(2 intermediate revisions by the same user not shown)
Line 1: Line 1:
{{lexeme|Dothraki}}
{{lexeme|Dothraki}}
{{phrasebook|doth|Basic}}


===Etymology===
===Etymology===
Line 9: Line 10:


====Noun====
====Noun====
{{head|doth|noun|nominative singular, animate||plural|mahrazhi}}
{{head|doth|noun|animate||plural|mahrazhi}}


# man
# man


=====Inflection=====
=====Inflection=====
{{Template:dothra-na|root=mahrazh}}
{{dothra-na|root=mahrazh}}


=====Translations=====
=====Translations=====

Latest revision as of 00:15, 26 September 2024

Dothraki

Etymology

From an invisible proto-language
The etymology of this word comes from an invisible proto-language. If you're confident you know the etymology, feel free to add it, but reader beware should the etymology be added by someone other than the creator of the language!

Pronunciation

IPA(key): /mahˈɾaʒ/

Rhymes: -aʒ

Noun

mahrazh (animate, plural mahrazhi)

  1. man
Inflection
Singular Plural
Nominative mahrazh mahrazhi
Accusative mahrazhes mahrazhis
Genitive mahrazhi
Allative mahrazhaan mahrazhea
Ablative mahrazhoon mahrazhoa
Translations

Creation and Usage Notes

In A Game of Thrones, there are a group of people referred to as the jaqqa rhan or "mercy men". After a battle, they go through and kill whoever is not yet dead but is critically wounded and suffering. Based on everything I knew about Dothraki at the time, if I were to accept "mercy men" as a direct translation, rhan would mean "mercy" or "merciful", or something like that, and jaqqa would mean "men". With a geminate uvular stop. You have to figure a word like "man" is going to enjoy some frequent use in dialogue, so there was no way I could possibly let jaqqa mean something as basic as "man", even if it made textual sense to let it be so. Consequently, I gave to jaqqa a meaning rather like "executioner": a bit literal, but I did what I felt I had to.

Having done so, I was now free to do whatever I wanted with the word for "man". Given that freedom, I felt I owed Dothraki something cool. I've long been a fan of post-vocalic [h], as you have it in Arabic, and my favorite sound is [ʒ], so I decided to throw them both in. To my mind, mahrazh is one of the coolest sounding words I've ever created. I still like it. I always hoped the fans of the books would be okay with it.

-David J. Peterson 01:23, 25 May 2020 (PDT)