amiu - "a murder of crows" and the parable of the snail

[pauraque_bk]

For seifergrrl:

Nórng "a murder (flock) of crows"

X-SAMPA / n`o_(low)r\N /

Amiu doesn't have as many special names for animal groups as English does. For this translation, I simply used the group plural of ngór "crow".

In the written form, the phonetic is ngéR "slime", a pictorial back-formation from ngáRe "snail". (Snail, literally "slime-bringer", was originally written with the simple pictogram, but later reforms added a redundant 'animate-bringer' marker. Usage of the pictogram then shifted over to the root word, "slime", making "snail" work like the other 'animate-bringer' words.)

The determinative is jung "dragon (or albatross)", indicating that this is a word for a large flying creature. Crows in Jingnong are bigger than our crows, but not as big as dragons -- they're simply classed "large" as opposed to small birds, bats, and large insects, which use "finch" as their determinative.

The double bar line indicates the group plural.

I'm taking requests for icons. nicolthewhore is next in the queue.

*

Since we've been discussing snails, this seems appropriate. I posted this (very) short Amiu story to the ZBB some time back, and now I've got it written out in native orthography as well. It may not seem like much, but I'm pretty damn proud of myself. Logographic writing systems are hard, dude.


ngáRe jyn

lúene wórmerjo. wáá wúan lénongmóm aalnóinííó ngáReLao. wéngow jaý éjje ijinglún míow. wéi maúng éjje wée Lúyn. wánoi Lao.

lúe ruimuj ngíém?


The story of the snail

I'm told there was once a person walking in the rain. He saw that his foot was about to tread on a snail. He twisted to the side, lost his balance, and fell into a mud puddle. He got to his feet and picked the snail up. It turned out to be a rock.

Was the person angry?


In native orthography:



Some of you will recognize elements from your icons in this text. I really have to thank everybody who's asked for one -- it's been tremendously helpful in figuring out the kinds of questions to ask about a language like this.


Textual notes:

The Luen, like many cultures, tell fables to illustrate moral principles. They generally end with a question, inviting the listener to supply the right answer. This story is meant to illustrate the opposite of our saying, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions". The Luen instead say, "The person in the puddle isn't angry". That is, he did the right thing based on the information he had, and shouldn't be upset, even though he landed in the mud. The idea is something like a combination of "Don't second-guess yourself" and "Don't cry over spilt milk".

This story also supplies the idioms "snail-seeming rock" and, by extension, "rock-seeming snail", meaning, respectively, "something that looks like a problem but isn't" and "a problem that doesn't look like one".

The Luen revile needless killing not out of concern for suffering, but due to their belief that causing death without consuming the carcass drains the killer's spirit. Despatching one inedible snail may not have much effect, but cumulative similar crimes would eventually leave a person angaúL ("dry") -- that is, soulless -- a very serious state of affairs.


An interlinear translation is here for those who want it. (I think I've changed a word or two since then, but nothing significant.)


Comments very welcome.

Comments

[chresimos.livejournal.com]

Eee, very pretty little story. I think you could go far with these Luen people; you seem to have developed them very carefully. :)

[pauraque]

Thanks. I do try to think carefully about it and make it as plausible as I can. I have to do things the way *they* think, not the way I think.