Earth words are possibly built around the syllable _ær_, from whence comes ærnalda and perhaps ærsrola and ærsrelia. Thus maybe _æren_ (cultivated land, inhabited world); _ærn_ (field); _eorl_ (we all know that one). Perhaps _ær_ also implies the direction "below", so "Middle World" also.
If we interpolate _ær_ as _æl_, we get a wildernessy context, perhaps. Thus the word "dæl" (as in "hill and dale") is found in the core of the name Odayla (Odæla: maybe even originally Orldæla). Can we maybe squeeze "tula" from tæla? And no doubt the phrase _odæl_ (odal) for collective property finds its way in here too.
If we put an _m_ in front of _ær_ we perhaps get a malign connotation of earth, as in _mæran gor_, goddess of untamed earth: consequently 'wilderness' might be a word like _mær_.
_ur_ obviously has cattle connotations, _rex_ is all about kingship, and
_theya_ something to do with childbearing and motherhood, and perhaps also
spirit or soul, rebirth and afterlife. Thus _urtheya_ (Eiritha) is
cow-mother, _ur-rex_ (Urox) is king-bull, and perhaps _they-kora_ (Ty Kora)
something to do with spirit-keeping. Any takers on _relia_ as the feminine
of _rex_ so that _ærsrelia_ (Asrelia) is an 'earth-queen'?
Dubious fun can be had with _heler_, a representative of harmony between earth and storm, a word no doubt cognate with a feminine _helera_ (dare I suggest this as a Theyalan word for Uleria?). No doubt words like 'rain' (I would propose simply _heler_), 'harp' (my notes had _elor_, but no idea why), 'harmony' are some sort of derivant from these.
If _ær_ is a feminine thing, then maybe _or_ or _orl_ is a masculine equivalent. Because it's the first part of Orlanth's name, perhaps also "centre" in the sense of "civilisation", "the World Order", "Great Compromise" etc. The word "torc" perhaps unites _or_ and _rex_ and hence symbols of kingship earn this name.
The root for 'storm' or 'thunder'or 'Middle Air' must inevitably be _umath_, which could do all sorts of things, such as becoming _anath_ (or 'anth' when appended to a word). Obviously then _orlanath rex_ ... you get the picture.
_hu_ I would go for as the word meaning "one" and "first", or maybe _um_,
which clearly has connotations of some kind with _umath_, maybe because of
some sort of association with concepts of 'primal change', or 'first mover'.
Humakt could thus come simply from _(h)umath_ or, I prefer, _hu-maket_,
where _maket_ is an archaic axe-like tool. This would thus compose the
eponym for Arkat's title as "one-sword" (by the way, in case this is
beginning to worry you, I had to check "eponym" on dictionary.com before I
could include it here).
zzzzz.... anybody still awake?
_fir_ or _vir_ gets my vote for 'man', and _fina_ for woman. Sheep could be
_ovia_ or whatever we need to get to _viriova_ (Voriof), 'sheep-man'. More
dubiously still I suggest that _theya_ offers a verb of nurturing/growing
_nathyar_ or something, and because 'v' is labial I can push my luck even
more and get something like _birnathyar_ (Barntar) for 'farmer'.
Since _gor_ clearly means 'frenzied' (bulls do that, after all), maybe 'angry', and possibly 'bad mannered' (because I'm uncertain regarding the credentials of the "gor" deities who I hadn't heard of before), we now fully understand _mæran gor_, and Vinga perhaps comes from _vina_, woman, + _gor_, angry... _vingora_
_ys_ gets my vote for 'song' and 'path' and the name Issaries has something
to do with this plus something stemming from _arroyn_, also the heritage of
Chalana Arroy. Lhankor My and Chalana are currently beyond my comprehension,
as also the syllable "hed" as in Hedkorlanth. There is also a worrying
correlation between "Daga" and "Drogarsi"...
_kor_ or _korl_ I would think is a directional thing, whichever
wind-direction Kolat is associated with, I guess. Whatever it is, it needs
to explain "carl", "HedKORLanth" and "KOLat"... and maybe "LhanKOR" and "Ty
KORA" too...
Believe it or not, I could go on... :0>
Cheers for now,
Jon.
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End of Glorantha Digest
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