Languages of Mystara

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A random discussion on Facebook led me to revisit the languages of Mystara and try to make some sense of its verbal kaleidoscope. I apologize in advance for running roughshod over material already generated (including possibly my own, given how long ago I might have written it). I did peruse and use as a guide much of what I found on Pandius. So, here’s my take today!

            Using the old-style D&D BECMI (basic/expert) game mechanics, PCs and NPCs can learn foreign languages. These come in addition to what is usually called a “common” language and alignment languages (if these are used at all). The latter doesn’t make much sense to me, especially when using an established game world. In the latter situation, a common language is the language spoken in the PC/NPC’s hometown. I’ll use Mystara since it’s one of the worlds I know best. In Karameikos, the realm PCs use most often as their starting point, Thyatian common is the lingua franca. The ethnic language of Karameikos is old Traladaran, which isn’t necessarily spoken by everyone living there, especially in major cities like Specularum (Mirros).

 

Fluency

            Rolling up a random foreign language does not specify how good one is at speaking or reading it. Use the following metric for the spoken form: roll 5d20—up to 20 Elementary (like a tourist), 21-70 Conversational (an immigrant or a visiting sailor), 81-100 Professional (a merchant or an ambassador), 101+ Native (only with an appropriate character background, a mother or father is a native for example). Multiply the Intelligence adjustment x10 as a modifier (see Rules Cyclopedia pp. 9).

            Skill Levels: Elementary enables “tourist-level” fluency (like asking where the bathroom is) with a strong foreign accent. Native command allows one to speak with ease and without a foreign accent, use local slang or patois with a certain flair, and imitate regional accents reasonably well (like a native of the US Midwest imitating someone from Kentucky, New York City, Australia, etc.).

            Reading/Writing: How easily a language can be read or written (if at all) depends on its writing system. If the alphabet is familiar, then words can easily be read. Understanding the written form still depends on the reader’s adjusted fluency score described above. If the alphabet is exotic, like oriental symbols or ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, reading is much harder for a foreigner. Someone with elementary fluency cannot read or write the language at all. If conversational, the odds of doing so correctly are equal to the adjusted fluency score that was originally rolled, probably with mistranslations, or grammatical and spelling mistakes. If professional or better, one can read and write without difficulty.

 

Dialects

            Real-World Analogies: These are local versions of a root language, usually spoken in a region or sometimes in just a single town and its neighborhood. Here’s a real-world example: the local patois spoken in my hometown is called Nissart, which sounds partly French. I’ve had some exposure to the dialect (in grammar school), but I don’t understand all of it despite being a native French speaker. Someone who isn’t a local might get a very rough grasp, but this isn’t guaranteed. On the other hand, I can make out 10% at best of French creole vs. well above 90% of Québécois. Another example: Cockney is an English dialect associated with the working class in London’s East End district. Appalachian English is a dialect associated with hillbillies and North America’s Smoky Mountains.

            The Fantasy Side: As regards Karameikos, one might detect varying dialects in Threshold and Rugalov compared with what folks in Specularum (Mirros) and Marilenev sound like. Threshold patois may reflect a Darokinian influence, while Rugalovian may actually be a Kerendan patois with old Traladaran influences.

            It might also be plausible that goblin, hobgoblin, ogrish, and others are all dialects related to mainstream orcish. My assumption is that many humanoid races originated from north-central Brun, and their languages derived from a common source more than 1,000 years ago, most likely Beastmen of Mystara’s prehistory. Orcs are the most extensive humanoid race in Brun. A great migration saw humanoids crossing the Izondian Strait into Davania. Others slowly spread to more distant horizons by way of great rafts over the seas or through tunnels and underground realms, spreading their idioms along.

            Deciphering Dialects: When using up a language skill slot, use the root language’s adjusted fluency score for its related dialect. Otherwise, halve the PC/NPC’s adjusted fluency score. Feel free to adjust these odds depending on how different a dialect really is from its root language. For example, the difference between Nissart and mainstream French is significant (words, pronunciation, grammar, and syntax may differ), while the shift from mainstream American to Appalachian English seems less so, although pronunciation and familiar expressions can be a challenge for British English speakers and visiting foreigners merely fluent in English. Further reduce the adjusted fluency score when listening to some old geezer with an attitude, who’s mouthing off in his beard a million miles an hour and makes zero effort to be understood. Expats among you know what I mean.

 

Related Languages

            Real-World Analogies: Distinct languages may be related without being considered dialects. Real-world examples are Romance languages, which include Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Romanian. Those are all derived from Late Latin. Mastering one gives a small chance of making out a few words spoken or written in the other four, maybe 10% if that. Someone who studied Latin can make out perhaps 20%. Northern Germanic languages (Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Icelandic, and Faroese) are related and fairly intelligible between them, as opposed to Southern Germanic languages (English, Dutch, German, etc.) which are more different from each other. On the west side of things are Celtic languages (essentially Irish, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, and Breton). Elsewhere in the Real World, the Semitic group includes Hebrew, Maltese, ancient Phoenician, Aramaic, and Arabic with its many dialects ranging from Morocco to Iraq, 3,000 miles away. Likewise, the Sino-Tibetan group comprises Tibetan, Burmese, and Chinese languages like Mandarin, Cantonese, and their dialects. The list goes on.

            The Fantasy Side: Thieves have a great advantage here with their Read Languages class ability, which covers any vernacular in the universe past or present. Right. That’s official game mechanics for ya! DMs with lots of time on their hands can piece together their game world’s language trees, using Real-World analogies as a rough guide. Root languages may not necessarily still be spoken, but can probably be studied. In order to understand possible connections between distinct languages in the first place and with subsequent dialects, language trees need to be established.

 

Language Trees

            To track down how languages propagated through Mystara and which ones are root languages vs. dialects, you can use this timeline and these thoughts about Mystaran languages. In a world the size of Mystara, this can be a major project (perhaps a topic for the folks at the Threshold Magazine to revisit—hint, hint).

            Using Real-World language groups as templates for Mystara is tricky business since pseudo-historical cultures litter this fantasy setting like confetti at a European carnival. The linguistic cacophony reflects the way the original Known World was put together back in the late 70s or early 80s: colorful but hardly realistic. I certainly have my share of guilt here with the Principalities of Glantri, not to mention my developments of the Savage Baronies and the Savage Coast in Dragon Magazine. Establishing Mystara’s language trees will demand a major suspension of disbelief and broad assumptions departing from Real-World models. It’s definitely fantasy.

 

Nithian: One of the oldest Mystaran languages, Nithian is an ancient Egyptian analog. It can be the basis for a pseudo-Semitic language group including Ylari/Alasiyan and Thothian. Hutaakans speak a Nithian dialect. I do not see a good connection between Nithian and antic Traladaran, which is pseudo-Greek. Traladarans once were under Nithian control, but I’d make their language entirely separate, spoken as a way to resist Nithian hegemony, and retained when they broke away. I’ll hold my nose and also extend Mystara’s proto-Nithian language group to include an analog “Indo-Turkic” offshoot to cover Sindhi, Jaibuli, and Hulean. Cough.

 

Neathar: This is Mystara’s Indo-European analog, the prehistorical source of many of the Known World languages. This includes at least two distinct branches: Antalian (a Germanic/Nordic analog) and Traladaran (a Greco-Latin analog). Pseudo-Gaelic and pseudo-Slavic offshoots are also rooted here.

            I had to conflate Greek and Latin likenesses to define old Traladaran because of the way Karameikan town names sound. Traladarans spread to Davania, establishing the great Milenian Empire there (ostensibly a pseudo-Greek culture). Adjacent to it dwelled archaic Thyatian jungle tribes, probably client states of the looming empire. They adopted a Milenian patois except for one retaining their ancestral Antalian dialect. They migrated north to the Known World and grew into the Thyatian Empire there (a Byzantine analog). As with Karameikos, Thyatian place names sound either Greek-like or Latin-like. Hattians of southern Thyatis, however, sound more German-like. Kerendans speak a dialect of Thyatian common. The latter has diverged significantly from Traladaran still spoken in Karameikos, given the 1,000+ years of evolution separating them, nearly precluding mutual intelligibility. Nonetheless, Thyatian common is now the Known World’s lingua franca.

            It can be imagined that most other languages of the Known World derive from Antalian or Traladaran. One notable exception: Darokinian is a construct cobbled together from Traladaran, Antalian, elvish, dwarvish, Ylari, and ancient Nithian, which morphed into a distinct and coherent trade language. It would therefore be logical to assume the language of the Five Shires is a Darokinian dialect heavily influenced by Thyatian common. Both would be prevalent there. Didn’t I say “confetti?”

            Glantri is a patchwork of cultures with their own ethnic dialects. One is altogether alien: New Averoigne. Erewan and Belcadiz are elvish dialects, the latter with a strong Traladaran influence. Caurenzan derives from old Traladaran. Klantyrish and Boldavian are distant proto-Antalian relatives, while Bergdhoven combines Antalian and Alphatian. Aalbanese is more clearly Antalian, while Blackhill adopted Alphatian common. Krondaharan is an odd mix of Nithian and Ethengarian. If there were a Glantrian lingua franca, it would be an inner parlance used solely by the wizardly elite, aside from Thyatian common and Alphatian common. Streamers and confetti!

            To complete the Known World linguistic overview, Ethengarian (a Mongolian analog) isn’t related to any language group. It could link its source to the empire of the Great Khan on the continent of Skothar. If that’s true, then there’s probably a story posted somewhere justifying how the Ethengarians came to live in the Known World. Real-World Mongolian may have a distant link with Turkic, but none at all with Chinese. Mystara doesn’t have the equivalent of a big pseudo-Chinese empire anyway or an analog for a Sino-Tibetan language group. This makes Ochalean another unresolved hiccup, possibly a language of off-world origins, like Myoshiman. Heldannish and Norwoldan are essentially Antalian, although Hattian superseded the original Heldann dialect. Yay, party hats!

 

Oltec/Azcan: This language group spread from the continent of Skothar’s central plains. Suspending disbelief, one may imagine proto-Oltec/Azcan to evolve into three distinct branches: 1. Jennite, which would be a Mongolian analog (the Great Khan Empire in Skothar), 2. Oceanian would roughly emulate Real-World Austronesian (Pacific Islanders) including Ierendi’s Makai as well as Nuar, the Pearl Islander colony of Alphatia (and anything like Real-World Malay, Indonesian, or Filipino Tagalog), and 3. Neo-Oltec/Azcan, an Amerindian analog, such as the Atruaghin Clans’ dialects.

 

Tanagoro: The language group emerged from Tang, Skothar’s southern peninsula. It can be found in the Serpent Peninsula, the realm of Yavdlom and Ulimwengu. Yav is heavily influenced by Sheyallia elvish, however. Tanagoro dialects can be heard as far away as Cestia, Eastern Davania, and Vulcania. Curiously, they did not appear to have spread to western Davania.

 

Elvish and Dwarvish: Each own ancient roots unrelated to the previous four language groups. It stands to reason that, over time, neighboring cultures influenced the elvish and dwarvish dialects. A good example of this is Belcadizan elvish and its Traladaran or Thyatian influence. Elvish has also become the root for certain humanoid cultures, such as actaeons, centaurs, forest-dwelling fairy folk, dryads, skyborne faeries, etc. Gruugakh gnolls also speak a distant elvish dialect. Due to their locations, Minroth and Vyalia dialects are elvish with Thyatian influence. Meanwhile, gnomish is a subset of dwarvish with elvish influence. Here are some references to elves’ and dwarves’ backgrounds in Mystara.

 

Orcish: As I developed earlier in this article, proto-orcish emerges as a language group for many humanoids. At present the root language for all related dialects is centered in north-central Brun. They grow farther apart depending on the races but also the geographic distance between “ground zero” and their tribes’ locations. From the point of view of an orc, the closest dialects are, respectively: 1. Goblin, 2. Hobgoblin, 3. Mainstream Gnollish, 4. Kara-Kara, 5.Bugbear, 6. Ogrish, 7. Giantkind (especially hill giant), and 8. Trollish. Other types of giants generally speak Antalian, although some have adopted the local population’s language.

 

Reptilian: Two separate groups may coexist, depending on game world preference. Proto-draconic is the ancestral language of early dragons. Dragons speak closely related dialects based on their colors, with good mutual intelligibility. Proto-tortlish is either a subset of draconic or a distinct language group.

            It might be judicious to establish proto-tortlish as the reptilian group’s root language. Other reptilian languages like those of troglodytes, lizard men, chameleon men, cay-men, gatormen may therefore be distantly related to neo-tortlish (see Related Languages, earlier), each spawning its own dialects. Kobold speak, however, may be a draconic patois heavily influenced by orcish.

 

Marine Languages: One group involves human-like merrows. These are folk who took to the seas eons earlier and established marine cultures. Their languages are likely distantly related to the closest surface cultures and adapted to an aquatic setting. Another group concerns the sea elves whose languages reflect migration patterns of surface elves. Tritons are native to the Elemental Plane of Water, so their language is essentially alien (see next entry). The Kna communicate in Ichthyan, an indigenous language related to fish. Devilfish, also known as Ixitxachitl, once spoke a language related to the Kna, but it grew deeply corrupted to become analogous to Darkspeak, the lingua malefica per excellentiam uttered by certain races of darkness such as the Velya among others.

 

Alien Origins: Alphatian is the elephant in the room. Its once-vast empire encompassed the Alphatian mainland, parts of the Isle of Dawn, Ochalea, Bellissaria, and various neighboring islands. Jennite likely influenced Bellissarian dialects, while Antalian-colored dialects were more prevalent on Alphatia’s west coast and Qeodhar.

            Another alien language, dubbed Laterran, emerged in Glantri’s New Averoigne. Curiously, Laterran shows similarities with old Traladaran, perhaps subjects of parallel evolutions. Laterran also emerged in faraway Renardie’s lupin population. This humanoid culture possesses an ancestral idiom featuring growls, barks, whimpers, howls ranging from faint groans to full-throated calls, sniffs, snorts, lip smacking, facial expressions, and body language such as ear movement, tail wagging, head cocking, teeth baring, raised hackles, etc. Unfortunately, it possesses no written form (so far). In nearby Bellayne, a rakasta kingdom, one speaks a mix of Antalian and Laterran. Bellaynish also includes an ancestral language, somewhat similar to pre-Renardois.

            Emerond is another off-world language centered in northeastern Davania. It does not relate to any other in Mystara, nor did it spawn dialects. Emerondians have not migrated from where they originally made landfall so far as I know.

 

Foreign Language Types

            Foreign languages on which a human fighter might spend skill slots should differ greatly from choices available to garden-variety elves, dwarves, druids, and magic-users, let alone denizens of faraway Bellayne or Renardie. This required identifying different types of languages that can be referred to by a single letter code (A to N), depending on their nature and how remote they may be from the PC/NPC’s hometown. The following list reflects a Karameikan point of view.

 

Foreign Language Types
Human or Demi-Human	A.   Commonly spoken within 100 miles from hometown or in an adjacent realm. Example: if PC/NPC is Karameikan, this includes local old Traladaran dialects, Five Shires patois, Darokinian, Alfheim elvish, Makai, and Minrothad elvish if different from Alfheim. B.   Commonly spoken beyond adjacent realms or more than 100 miles away. Example: for Karameikan nationals, this includes Rockhome dwarvish, any one of Glantri’s multiple languages, Ethengarian, Ylari, Soderfjordan Antalian, Thothian, Alphatian common, Ochalean, Pearl Islander, Sind, Tanagoro, Hulean, Ispan, Verdan, etc.
Humanoid	C.   Spoken within 100 miles from hometown, such as kobold, goblin, orcish, ogrish, gnollish, bugbear, giantkind, etc. This category also includes Hutaakans, faerie folk, hags, etc. D.  Spoken more than 100 miles away (else, as above).
Off-World Languages	E.   Spoken by humans, demi-humans, or humanoids connected by trade or warfare with the PC/NPC’s realm. Example: Myoshiman. F.   Any off-world language other than Type E.
Normal Animals except for lowlife and non-intelligent wildlife	G.  Language understood by animals living within 100 miles from hometown. Seafaring folk may pick up marine-related languages (dolphin, shark, whale, sea turtle, seal, marine avian, etc.). Landlubbers favor languages of land wildlife (wolves, bears, eagles, etc.) H.  Language understood by animals living more than 100 miles away (else, as above).
Monsters With 2+ Int.	I.    Spoken within 100 miles from hometown (incl. giant animals and some constructs like gargoyles). J.    Spoken by monsters living more than 100 miles away.
Outer Planar	K.   Spoken by human-like people or humanoids. L.   Spoken by any other creature with Intelligence 2+ such as aerial servants, archons, basilisk, cockatrice, djinn, demons, divine servants, elementals, etc.
Lost Languages	M.  Languages no longer spoken that may be found in ancient scriptures or engraved in ruins, such as ancient Nithian and many languages now only spoken in the Hollow World. This includes monstrous but not outer-planar or quasi-magical languages.
Forbidden Languages	N.  These are quasi-magical languages such as Darkspeak understood by all undead (intelligent or not) and certain races dwelling underground or in a marine abyss. Cursed languages that turn readers insane, or those who merely hear it spoken, fit in this category as well. The language of devilfish could belong here.

 

Language Choices

            When a neophyte character is first created, skill slots can be assigned to languages. The table below shows what types of languages are available to different character classes or races. Some allocations are made to accommodate the AD&D game and B/X-BECMI mechanics. When rolling for a foreign language type, pick one row that best describes a PC or an NPC: either its character class, its race, or its profession. Then roll percentiles. The Races category concerns anything other than human. For example, pick the Fighter row for a human paladin; on the other hand, an AD&D elven fighter can pick either the Fighter or the Elven row (the B/X-BECMI official elf class must pick the Elf row).

            Due to space limitation, the whole percentile ranges aren’t listed in the following table—just the highest values. For example: on a d% roll, the barbarian class can pick up an A-type foreign language with a 01-50 score, a C-type with 51-80, a G-type with 81-95, or an I-type with 96-00. Roll separately for each skill slot spent on foreign languages (check their fluency scores separately as well).

Random Language Types

Categories	H/DH		Humanoid		Off-World		Animal		Monster		Planar		LL	FL
Classes	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N
Barbarian	50		80				95		00
Bard	30	60	80		90						95	98	00
Cleric	30	55			75						85	90	95	00
Druid	25	35					75	00
Fighter	30	55	70	80	90				95		00
Magic-User	30	55			60	65			70	80	85	90	95	00
Monk/Mystic	40	60			80		85		90		95		00
Paladin	40	65			80						90	95		00
Ranger	30	50	60	70			80	90	95	00
Thief	35	55	65	70	75				80				00
Races	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N
Dragonborn	30	50			55	60			80	90	95	00
Drow	25	45	60	65							70	75	80	00
Dwarf	30	55	65	75					85				00
Elf	30	55	65		75		85		90		95		00
Gnome	30	55	65		75		95				00
Half-Elf	50	75	85		90				95		00
Halfling	45	70	80		90		00
Half-Orc	20	30	70	80					90	00
Lupin	50	75			85		90		95		00
Rakasta	30	50	70		85				95		00
Tiefling	30	55			70						80	90		00
Tortle	45	70							80				00
NPCs	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N
Ambassador	40	65			85	95					00
Beastmaster	20	30	40				55	65	85	95	00
Merchant	35	65			85	00
Missionary	35	60	75		85	90					95			00
Navigator	45	75			85	90	95		00
Pirate	30	50	65	75	85				95	00
Sage	20	30	36	42	48	54	60	66	72	78	84	90	96	00

That’s it for now. Happy blabbering!

By the way, I also hate Google Blogger for all its formatting cr*p and incoherent behavior.