Languages

I decided, 'way back when I initially wrote this chapter, that Azal was responsible for the creation of lots of languages. (There's a bit in the book of Enoch that tells of the various things the Grigori taught to man - languages were one of them, astronomy, cosmetics, all sorts of fun things.) So I'd always intended to have him slip into different ones at random, particularly in moments of high emotion - only I hadn't the time to look things up that year of NaNoWriMo, and though I'd made lists in the meantime, they hadn't been worked into the text yet. When I wrote the new Azal chapter for this NaNoWriMo... uh, I got caught up in what I was writing, and totally forgot about the language-thing. whoops.

So I've spent an hour this morning slipping in bits of things. I made a list of swear words in various languages yesterday, and I read over my lists of random phrases in other languages that I have in my binder of notes. I'd planned - and keep forgetting - to set up a post in which I a) give all the flowers mentioned and their meanings, which is often why they're present, and b) translate all the random bits of languages. I'm half-tempted not to do so - there are no such translations in the books I read from that time period, presumably because the audience at the time would have understood the bits in French (which I do not). But there are other languages I run into, and they're rarely translated - despite this, they lend a nice atmospheric effect, even when I can't figure out the meaning by context.

Still, I am the kind of person who flips to the back of the book to read eeeeevery footnote. So I will accommodate anyone else who is, too. ;) Also - if anyone notices any of these are waaay off the mark, please let me know. The internet is a sketchy resource at best when it comes to languages! (Japanese, I know enough of to figure if it's right or not. Latin and Italian, sometimes. Spanish, probably. Icelandic, the lines from Sigur Rós songs are right at least.)


bal masqué - French; masked ball
Bλακαϛ - Greek; stupid
Al ta'atzben otti - Hebrew; don't piss me off
Láttu mig í friði - Icelandic; leave me alone
Striapach - Gaelic; whore
endur fyrir löngu - Icelandic; a long time ago
urusai - Japanese (which not everyone has the font for, so I've Romanized); shut up
divooneh - Persian; mad, crazy, insane
Εὐαί - Greek; onomatopoeic - a cry of joy
fête - French; celebration, party
Broðum og drekkum saddir - Icelandic; we eat and drink ourselves full


I'm aware that I'm a little heavy on the Icelandic. This is because: I found good sources for whole phrases of it, it is crazy old, and it looks awesome. ;) It's also, if I recall correctly, very close to the oldest form of English, so given that English is largely what's spoken in the story, I suppose it's sort of fitting.