Hi If this has been mentioned before I apologise but somthing just struck me
about fictional alien names:
GZGverse has the Kra'vak 2300AD system had the Kafer (who called themselves
IIRC Kavak?) Traveller, the K'kree, AKA Centaurs C J Cheryh's Compact Space
(Pride of Chanur etc) the Kif David Weber's Apocalypse Troll, the Kangas
(because they looked
like....!)
Larry Niven's Known Space, the Kzin Marvel Comics in the 70s had the Kree The
movie Forbidden Planet has the lost race of the Krell Peter F Hamilton's
Nights Dawn Trilogy has the enigmatic Kiint and of course there is Star Trek's
Klingons
You can see the pattern. I just wondered why it was so popular? Would anyone
else like to contribute with names.
> At 02:52 PM 2/3/2000 -0000, you wrote:
Wing Commander has the Kilrathi...
I'd assumed the prevalence of 'K' in alien names was because the authors
wanted strong, aggressive sounding names with hard Kuh sounds. The name
Kra'Vak goes nicely with an aggressive nature. The ship classes of the Kra'Vak
also appear to have patterns of hard kuhs, glottal stops, and short vowels.
It's a fairly common technique to pick names which the author thinks sound
appropriate for the race and which pick up on the author's intent for their
nature or psychology. I wouldn't be surprised if you could find a link between
'Klingon' and a 60's communist individual or place, and if you picked the
right brains, between 'Ferengi' and a miser, moneylender, or financial
institution.
> On 3-Feb-00 at 13:25, Anthony Leibrick (a.leibrick@virgin.net) wrote:
You wouldn't want your evil alien race names to K'lash.
***
You wouldn't want your evil alien race names to K'lash.
***
Yeah, but it would be kind of fun if they WERE the K'lash. ;->=
Let's see... A race of stone beings on the planet K'asbahh...
Or, maybe, with a great leader named K'laroo...
*choke* *gasp*
The_Beast
> picked the right brains, between 'Ferengi' and a miser,
"Farangi" is actually an Arabic word used during the Crusades, meaning
"Franks", ie anyone from western Europe.
This is often the case with hard consonant sounds (K, B, D, P, T). You also
see a trend to softer, kinder, or more intelligent races using soft sounds
like L or M (ex. Lothloria <sp>, Landru). Sometimes S is used, if it is a
short s sound. A long S sound us usually for some evil race (sounds like
hissing). The V sound is often used for valiant or vigilant races (ex.
Vorlons). Names that start with long vowel sounds are usually bad, but short
vowel sounds are usually good. And X and Z are almost always the villians.
Just some cultural insight.
---
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net <mailto:bkb@beol.net>
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/
---
[quoted original message omitted]
> picked the right brains, between 'Ferengi' and a miser,
It's a bit more complicated than that, though Laserlight's right.
In Thai, the word for "Foreigner" is Falang, or Farang. Comes from
Falang-say
which is "Francais". There are many similar examples, some coming from the
Arabic, others directly.
<humour>
Whthere you take your etymology from 11th century Arabic (Spanish Conquest),
12th century Outremer, 19th century Thai, or any point in between, Ferengi =
The Frogs. No matter where you go outside Europe, the Spanish or Portugese may
have got there first and grabbed all the gold and silver, the Dutch might
taken everything else not nailed down, the Brits may have then removed the
> On Thu, 3 Feb 2000, Roger Books wrote:
> On 3-Feb-00 at 13:25, Anthony Leibrick (a.leibrick@virgin.net) wrote:
<thump><thump><thump> Don't we call the Narn Bat Squad out on punning on this
list?
Please?
> Alan wrote:
> Whthere you take your etymology from 11th century Arabic (Spanish
For some peoples it is the other way around. The word "Welsh" stems
from an old Germanic root meaning "foreigner, stranger" - the Swedish
word "välsk" (rarely used nowadays, but it only went out of fashion during
this century) still means something like "foreign, strange, odd,
coming from faraway places" rather than "coming from Wales" :-/
Later,
> At 02:19 PM 2/3/00 -0600, you wrote:
So if you dropped an asteroid on K'asbahh would you be... Ohh, I can't finish
it. Would someone send the Bat Squad 'round my way to put me out of my misery?
Please?
> Or, maybe, with a great leader named K'laroo...
> At 02:50 AM 2/5/00 -0700, Don Greenfield wrote:
Ask and ye shall receive <eg>.
[tromp][tromp][tromp]
[off key background singing]
[tromp][tromp][tromp]
"kill the wabbit, Kill The Wabbit, KILL THE WAAAAABBIT!!!"
[tromp][tromp][tromp][TROMP!][TROMP!][TROMP!]
Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack!
Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack!
Whack! Whack!
[TROMP!][TROMP!][TROMP!][tromp][tromp][tromp][tromp...]
> -MWS- wrote:
> [tromp][tromp][tromp][TROMP!][TROMP!][TROMP!]
> On Sat, 5 Feb 2000, Alan E and Carmel J Brain wrote:
> -MWS- wrote:
let's stop - this is getting Evertsen silly (although it's good to see
we have enough Witte de With which to argue).
tom
ps to Narns: i'm in university college, room 4:6. pop round any time.