Let’s talk about words for family, since it’s on my mind.
Let’s start simple. The word for family is kabila.
Spouses
In Vandeth, you’d call your wife suma, and you’d call your husband mokot. To refer to your spouse more vaguely, you’d say ziva ir-jai [ir-lilis], which literally means “[my] soul’s joy”. The part in red is omitted when talking about someone else’s spouse, and usually left out when meaning your own, as it makes the phrase quite long.
Parents
The words for mother and father are mala and kola, respectively. However, most kids call their parents mam and dad. (The A is pronounced as “ah” in both.) They’re very simple sounds for kids to say, which is actually the real-world reason why they’re common words world-wide. To refer to both parents, you’d use varen.
Siblings
The words for brother and sister are gesh and zova. So, an only son might frequently lament about how his six zovan constantly get on his nerves. The word for sibling is teshiv, though it’s most often used in the plural, teshiven.
Children
So, what you call your kids depends on whether you’re the mother or father. If you’re the mother, you’ll call your daughter genli, and your son genmo. But if you’re the father, you call your son genli, and your daughter gensu.
It gets more complicated. If you’re talking to a mother, you call her daughter genthi and her son genmo. If you’re talking to a father, you call his son genthi and his daughter gensu.
The word for child is simply genvare.
Aunts, Uncles, and Cousins
Here’s where it gets fun. If you have an aunt, you’d call her your zovir. If you have an uncle, you’d call him your geshir. And if you have a pibling who is non-binary, you’d call them your teshivir. Or to refer to all your aunts and uncles, your teshiviren. See, these words come from a pretty basic structure: “[sibling word] ir-[parent word]”. So, to say “my aunt on my father’s side”, you’d say “zova ir-kola ir-lilis”, which literally means “my father’s sister”.
Cousins are similar, except instead they come from the structure “vir-[child word] ir-[sibling word] ir-[parent word]”. And the words for your kids are complicated. So, if you want to refer to your female cousin, the daughter of your aunt on your father’s side, you’d say vir-genthir., which in full would be vir-genthi ir-zova ir-kola. To refer to all your cousins, you say vir-teshivariren. The vir- here comes from the word ji-vir, meaning “far” or “distant”.
It’s convoluted, I know.
Nieces and Nephews
You should know the drill by now. Since your nieces and nephews are the kids of your siblings, that’s what you call them. “[child word] ir-[sibling word]”. So your nephew, by your sister, is your genmir. (The O is removed, as are all ending vowels, and replaced with the ir.)
And yeah! I’m a huge nerd for this, and made it a lot more complicated than it has to be. But that’s part of the fun.
Open Vulgarlang in two tabs.
(We do this because when you use presets of morphology that are on the site, they automatically enforce spelling changes which we cannot control, since they are behind a paywall).
In Tab 1, open Phonology and enable Word Structure.
Do the same thing in Tab 2, but with Advanced option on.
You need three presets from Tab 1: initials, finals, and vowels.
Let's go with Persian initials, Swedish finals and Latin vowels.
Next, paste as follows into Tab 2:
IMPORTANT: Just below V, the formula for S should be S = CV CVL VL
Tab 1 is no longer needed (it was our preset donor, xd).
Some languages and writing systems I’ve been making for my brother’s upcoming DnD campaign. He usually makes his own mythos and leaves the languages and scripts to me.
The dwarven language (Gewain) is read from left to right, and it was designed as very straight and geometric inspired by the Arabic script, made to be chiselled or carved into stone. With a central line that travels across the whole word, it allows for long, compound words to be made white still being easy to read. Has a main consonant form that is the start of the syllable, a space above for a vowel, and another below for an optional second consonant, that uses the “underform”.
it’s best visually seen as it’s meant to be, carved in stone:
“helfon”, the Gewain word for beauty. Here we see H, E, underform L + F, O, underform N.
The base elfish language, Alharic, was designed with voiceless consonants only and no “u” vowel, to sound more contained, and calm, giving it an almost “hushed” quality. This came in handy as later elves who came in contact with other races, developed different lifestyles and use voiced versions of some consonants, and harsher sounds using the “u”.
The script was made to form a full unit combining the consonant with the vowel.
The humans took systems from both these cultures and, in human fashion, adapted them into their script. They use both the underform concept from Dwarven and the “unit forming” concept from Elfish. Also comes in cursive!
It’s written top to bottom:
Last one for now, the language of the spider goddess, Rámsa.
Made to be easily written (or weaved by her elven followers) in one continuous long string, it links together the whole word seamlessly. (examples are a little iffy because it’s harder than it looks to fluently write it without stopping!)
The list is mostly derived from the Forgotten Realms Wiki, though I have closely read through several of the LoD books, this is an undertaking I have only started several months ago and I haven’t had time to comb through all available source material. If, while reading this list, you find any missing items and are able to provide a citation I’ll gladly accept additional words but for the time being the list is considered to be complete.
A few words are marked with an asterisk to indicate that, while they are considered to be “Drow” words by several sources, these words are either translations or words direct from Common which reasonably should have a Drowic equivalent. These words I intend to look closely at when I provide an expansion on this list in the near future.
All canonical Drow words and phrases listed below the cut.
Abban – ally, not-enemy
Abbil – comrade, "trusted" friend
Akh – band, group
Alur – better, superior
Alurl – best, foremost
Alust – forward-facing, in front of, in the forefront
Aluve – i/we leave you
Asanque – likewise, of course, as you wish
Avinsin – doomed
Bae'qeshel – a rare type of drow bardic magic
Bauth – around, about
Bautha – dodge, to dodge
Belaern – wealth, coinage, treasure, profit
Belbau – to give
Belbol – gift
Bol – unknown, unidentified, mysterious or important
Brorn – surprise
Brorna – surprises
C'rintri – noble drow
Cahallin – produce or harvest, including raid-spoils, but not hunted game or cooking
Colbauth – path, known way
Colnbluth – outsider, non-drow
Crinti – high ones
Dal – from (sometimes shortened to da')
Darthiir – surface elf/elves
Del – of (sometimes shortened to d' or de')
Dobluth – outcast
Doeb – out
Dos – you
Dosst – yours
Dosstan – yourself
Draa – two
Draada – second
Dragazhar – underdark bat
*Drider – half–spider/half-drow abomination
Dro – life, alive
Duk–tak – unholy executioner
*Duergar – deep dwarf/dwarves
Duvall – secret adviser
Elamshin – destiny, the will of Lolth
Elend – usual or traditional
Elendar – continue, continued, continuing or enduring
Elgg – death, destroy, kill or slay
Elgg–hor – the destroyer
Elgghinn – death
Faer – magic
Faerbol – magical item
*Faerie – translation of a term used to refer to a surface elf
Faerl – magical
Faern – magic worker or wizard
Gee'antu – Underdark tarantula
Gol – goblin
Golhyrr – ruse, trap or trick
Golhyrrl' fhaazht – The Dream Trap, strange nightmare dreams given out by the giant fungus Araumycos involving the comfort of the mass and the hopeless chaos of individuality
Harl – down, under or below
Harl'il'cik – kneel
Haszak – illithid
Honglath – bravery, calm, clear thinking or good behavior
Iblith – offal, excrement, often used when referring to humans as well as other non-drow races. Can be used as an insult
Ilhar – mother, also to mother as in to give birth but not to raise young
Ilharess – matron mother
Ilharn – patron
Ilindith – aim, goal or hoped for event
Illiyitrii – a formal dance sometimes involving costumes
Ilythiiri – drow
Inth – plan, scheme or stratagem
Inthigg – agreement or treaty
Izil – as
Jabbuk – master, a man who holds an office of power
Jal – all
Jivvin – to play; to play a game, or have other amusement or fun
Jivvin quui'elghinn – torture until death, apparently a cynical distortion of the term for fun
Khal'abbil – my trusted comrade
Khaless - meaning trust or a drow game called Khaless. Because trust is so lacking in drow society, it is often used in an ironic sense to mean misplaced trust
Khazid'hea – to cut
Kolsen'shea orbb – to pull the legs off a spider, an arcane phrase and idiom
Tonight and possibly tomorrow I will be working on composing the list of canonical words and phrases. Following that I will likely be posting a minor expansion on that list including mostly derivative words and some analysis of root words.
This weekend I'll have a real treat in store. I'll start working on a basic approach to drow hand code, beginning with signs for basic D&D races and classes.
At this point in time I'd like to invite my followers to send asks or submissions for specific D&D specific words you would like to see (perhaps an obscure playable race, a spell, or monster). I will also be able to provide names for individual characters in drow hand code.
If you would like to have your character given a name in hand code please use either the ask box, submission box, or private messaging to send me your character's name and a brief description of their physical and personality attributes (feel free to also link a picture of your character as it may get included in the video).
Submissions will be open through Saturday morning, but once I make the video I won't be taking new name submissions until the next time I revisit drow hand code.
