Canonfire! Forums-viewtopic-Distilling Greyhawk To Its Essence

Thu Apr 24, 2008 10:41 am Baklunish Names and Detailed City Descriptions

I need to pick the brains of my fellow hawkers.

I have been writng a series of article regarding the island chains of the Dramidj; they are largely done. However I need help with the linguistic flavour; from what sources I have found.
Zeif: uses ibn and ibnt
Ekbir: uses bin
Komal: uses (?)
First am I correct and does anyone know what if anything Komal would use. I view Komal more persian than arabic; so I was wondering is their an iranian linguistic name usage such as ibn and bin.

I have written edition neutral overviews of the various island cities; unfortunately I have no cartography skills but I do have more detailed notes on some of the cities. If there is interest and someone would volunteer to create the maps; I could with some some work create a more detaile description for each city.

If so; we could consider the overviews as teasers Wink

Look forward to the feedback

Thu Apr 24, 2008 12:54 pm

Here is a good site for inspiration. You can, if nothing else, generate names from it and reverse engineer their structure to adhere to your desires.

http://www.behindthename.com/random/

Thu Apr 24, 2008 5:37 pm

It's too bad ephealy's not around to finish the Baklunish stuff he was working on. I might recommend looking some of it up (on this website), though.

Thu Apr 24, 2008 7:12 pm

The Baklunish are not Arabic(a misconception on the part of later writers)- they are "Eastern". Best to expand upon them in that fashion. Take everything from the Middle East to the western border of China and wrap it all up together into a barely recongnizable, homogenous whole.
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Thu Apr 24, 2008 8:45 pm

Thanks for the feedback; chaoticprime I already found the site and used it for many of the names.

I realise it is a middle-eastern mix but I was just hoping a greysage would know if their is some accepted pattern. LG Gazeteers of Ekbir and Zeif; I noticed the ibn and bin pattern. Anyone have any ideas: Just names for Komal or some kind of linguistic affectation like their eastern neighbours.

Anyone interested in producing the city maps; the written overviews are done, it would add another level of detail.

Fri Apr 25, 2008 4:12 am

Is there any source material for existing maps for the area? I'm no Anna or Yabusama, but I can work Photoshop and Campaign Cartographer pretty well. If I have access to the books (between my own collection and Ancedmath's) I can likely knock out a map quickly (a few days to a week) and well. Where writing takes me longer, doing graphics is more relaxing and tends to get done faster.

PM me if you'd like me to help ya.

Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:15 am

Have you tried EBON yet? I use it for my Greyhawk names when I run a campaign. It's a good utility.

Fri Apr 25, 2008 7:08 pm

MikelAmroni: I have PMed you back and gratefully accept your kind offer Wink

Do you have the Dungeon Flanaess Map; since the Darlene Map doesn't show the island chains. I could then send the descriptions and hex coorindinates.

Yep have used EBON too; names aren't really the problem. I really just need to know if their is some middle eastern linguistic affectation since I don't speak the language or if the names themselves are sufficent - authenitic feel type of question.

Thanks for the feedback everyone Happy

Fri Apr 25, 2008 8:58 pm

I wouldn't use ibn, bin or anything like that . Take an example from the Baklunish gods themselves. Xan Yae is decidely Eastern in flavor(beyond here name, her whole schtick is very Eastern/Chinese), while Geshtai and Zuoken are not as exactingly archetypal or even identifiable and give a better glimpse as to the ambiguity built into the Baklunish. It is noticeable that many Baklunsih place names use Arabic/Eastern sounds in the words, but the spelling patterns are not the same at all. I think using these blended sounds is perfectly fine, but using Al', ibn, bin and similar ligual bits is not so good. This whole philosophy was tossed out the window by later writers unfortunately.

That is just my view of things though. As usual, people should write things in a way that is meaningful to them, and if somebody else doesn't like it, then they are free to use/not use/change it themselves.
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