Re: Language

From: Andrew Solovay <asolovay_at_...>
Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 16:14:34 -0800


Light Castle wrote:
>
> Heortling and Esrolian are related.
> The game actually gives the heortling homeland "speak Sartarite" as a language. Do I
> assume those are interchangeable, or is Heortlander speech and Sartarite speech just
> really similar?

Heortlings resettled Dragon Pass ~275-300 years before the Hero Wars, yes? In a largely-illiterate society, without telecommunications, that's a long time--quite enough for some linguistic drift. Certainly enough for "Speak Sartarite" to be considered a distinct skill from "Speak Heortling". Maybe they aren't two different languages--I expect a native Sartarite could converse with a Heortlander without much trouble--but enough to make it hard to understand someone speaking quickly in the other tongue. (As a f'r'instance, I know lots of Americans who had great difficulty understanding the Yorkshiremen in "All Creatures Great and Small".)

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