Notron Cant - Taung language and Mandalorian dialects
A collection of source material for prehistoric Taung language (sometimes called Notron Cant) and Mandalorian dialects.
Shadows of the Empire Soundtrack Enhanced CD (1996)
Note: To my knowledge, this is the first mention of Dha Werda Verda and the war between Taung and Zhell over ancient Coruscant, that influenced further mandalorian lore. All presented information and screenshoots come from this video - for the need, I have linked the video starting with timestamp of 09:49 (The Music) but the whole video is worth to watch, especially as currently it is hard to get the original CD.
Much has been written on this famous text. We are indebted to the discoveries of space marchant and explorer Mungo Baobab (see The Adventures of Mungo Baobab, LucasFilm 1986) who found and preserved the Roonstones. Encoded into the crystal structure of the Roonstones was the earliest know text of Dha Werda Verda. It is considered original, and was translated in the Baobab Archives. The text was written five millennium before Coruscant's warlike primitive ancestors, a warrior race called the Taungs, invaded and conquered the indigenous peoples. Dha Werda Verda recounts in epic poem fashion the legendary story of a battle between the Taungs and the vanquished people, the Battallions of Zhell. The tide of the final battle was turned when a sudden volcanic eruption rained destructive ash onto the Zhell, smothering their city. The plume of ash rose kilometers into the sky, and cast a giant shadow over the land of the Taungs for two standard years. Thousands of years of continual construcyion have turned the original site of this epic battle into Imperial City. Henceforth, the Taungs became known as "Dha Werda Verda", i.e. The Warriors of the Shadow or in some translations, Dark Warrior. The Taungs themselves saw the shadow as a symbol of their destiny and adopted the Dark Shadow Warrior identity throughout their conquests.
"Booten wooten lanlock vootem / Al a sinkee dunken pooten / Achta werda verda roll / Poonka dunkee loten cho. Leeber soong whar tung tach picta / Manner manner migta richta / Schelecht varn toom-soing pa ho-grunten / Gersh ve dala funken mimpa / Droit! / To Gropen wettkampf Zunken! Betteltung seeck da mindy cooten / Parta blax dha scunken drassen. Manner manner, mitteltouse manner / Dha Dhazz jedoch / Land zu land offt letza / Unun nung. Manner manner / Durchsprung Nocha / Immer hauk gewordenspa / Zeeetoof en poof / Olaffka begonnenspah / Var var goopinski / von moglodite / Kortzva. Verto verto taplasko ta verto. Vom zoomenfest / Va va voomenfest / Kopocka locka hatta statan / Schel Tha noobin rest du common / Morbskurtz! Kaffee kaffee zum doom kaffee! / Ausbroll mobist manner mockah! / Ssstrung tartung tha stroong tartung! / Wo-cha nickschat hobbentrose. Jungclaus dha spricken / Impoot ga kunginchock! Kungach / Noplenkacht / Kungar Kungar / Ale Da Kungare!"
Additional research on information provided by the author of linked video and wookiepedia lead to The Destruction of Xizor's Palace sountrack:
(SIDENOTE: The Adventures of Mungo Baobab took a place during Empire Era.)
Knights of the Old Republic game, 2003
[Quest] Strange Stowaway You have encountered a young girl on board the Ebon Hawk... obviously a stowaway. The language she speaks, while sounding like Mandalorian, translates into pure gibberish. She may know the language, but she certainly doesn't know how to use it. And yet it seems to be the only language she knows. It might be possible to try talking to her... but dumping her on the planet is also a possibility.
Sidenote: details of the quest and Sasha's full dialogues with the player can be seen here
Star Wars DataBank: Baobab, Mungo, 2004(?)
Baobab escaped with a single Roonstone, which proved to be a great treasure. Inside its crystalline structure was encoded the earliest known text of Dha Werda Verda, an epic poem that predated the formation of the Republic and the colonization of Coruscant. For finding compelling evidence of an otherworldly ancient source of the Roonstones, Mungo Baobab's name was firmly secured in the history texts.
The Cestus Deception by Steven Barnes, 2004
"Do troopers ever have real names?" she asked. "Rarely." "Would you mind if I gave you one?" She was staring at him with such sincere intensity that he almost laughed. But couldn't. The whole thing was amusing, really. "What name did you have in mind?" "I was thinking Jangotat," she said quietly. "Mandalorian for Jango's brother.'" He laughed, but found his voice catching a bit in midchuckle. Jangotat. "Sure," he said. "If that makes it easier. Fine." Her answering smile burst with relief. "Thanks. Thanks, Jangotat. That's a good name, you know," she said, thumping him with her elbow. They both chuckled about that, until the mirth died away to a companionable silence. Jangotat, he thought. Jango's brother.
(SIDENOTE: Retconned for Concordian dialect)
Star Wars: Republic Commando game, 2005
Game soundtrack includes Mandalorian war chants (composed by Jesse Harlin):
Vode An (Brothers All),
Gra'tua Cuun (Our Vengeance),
Ka'rta Tor (One Heart of Justice),
Dha Werda Verda (Warriors of the Shadows)
Sidenote: Present here available on YT soundtrack includes also other music scores
The History of the Mandalorians, Star Wars Insider #80, 2005
The history of the Mandalorian shock troopers goes back a long way, some say to the dawn of recorded galactic history. Though in modern times the Mandalorians have become a grab-bag of alien races, including humanoids, Togorians, and Kerestians, the Mandalorians were once strictly a gray-skinned warrior race. Xenoantropologists believe that the original Mandalorian species was descended from the ancient Taung Shadow Warriors of Dha Werda Verda legend. Particularly compelling are similarities between the Mandalorian language and surviving Taung texts.
Guide to the Grand Army of the Republic, Star Wars Insider #84, 2005
Commander Bacara was originally trained by one of the few non-Mandalorian instructors, an ex-Journeyman Protector named Cort Davin from the Concord Dawn system. […] Bacara found it difficult to converse in Mandalorian with his brethren as he learned the peculiar dialect of Concord Dawn, which used words like “tat” instead of “vod” for “brother”.
The New Essential Chronology, 2005
Coruscant's humans may have come into dominance on their homeworld by defeating a near-human, gray-skinned species known as the Taungs in several series of legendary battles. The humans, who compromised the thirteen nations of the Battalions of Zhell, suffered an almost extinction-level defeat when a sudden volcanic eruption smothered their encampment. The towering plume of black ash loomed over the Taung army for two years, and the awed Taungs took the name Warriors of the Shadow - or, in the ancient tongue, Dha Werda Verda. The Battalions of Zhell recovered and claimed Coruscant for their own, while the Taungs may have become the Mandalorians, judging from what we have learned concerning similarities between the Mandalorian language and surviving Taung texts.
“Mandalorians: Identity and Language”, published by the Galactic Institute of Anthropology (in-universe quote prefacing Mandalorians: People and Culture, Star Wars Insider #86, 2006)
In five millennia, the Mandalorians fought with and against a thousand armies on a thousand worlds. They learned to speak as many languages and absorbed weapons technology and tactics from every war. And yet, despite the overwhelming influence of alien cultures, and the absence of a true home world and even species, their own language not only survived but changed little; their way of life and their philosophy remained untouched; and their ideals and sense of family, of identity of nation, were only strengthened. Armor is not what makes a Mandalorian. Armor is simply a manifestation of an impenetrable, unassailable heart.
Mandalorians: People and Culture, Star Wars Insider #86, 2006
Mando'a's origins are unclear. Despite the language's similarities with that of the Taung, from whom the original inhabitants of Mandalore were thought to be descended, it also contains elements not found in other galactic languages.
Karen Traviss' Official Site, 2006 (WEB ARCHIVE, 2011)
Alphabet
Grammar Guide to read here.
Dictionary, here to download
Republic Commando: Order 66, 2008
They were now on the final leg of the mission. It was going fine, all things considered, right up to the point when Jusik heard that voice again; that one tantalizing, half-familiar sound that made him listen. "Nurse," he said. "I need to check something." He held up a forefinger for silence. "Hear that voice?" It was the female one that sounded almost as if she was speaking Mandalorian. Something insisted begged, demanded that he at least go and look. Leaving the Jedi hadn't severed his connection to the force. "May I see that inmate? She may be on our list." When the nurse's back was turned Skirata shot Jusik a glance. What are you playing at? Jusik just raised his finger a fraction farther. Bear with me. "I'm afraid she's very uneasy around males," said the nurse. "And she has a history of violence against them." Jusik peered into the room. The woman was maybe forty, forty-five, a little older, and didn't look as if she could mete out even a harsh word. She huddled in the corner, rocking for comfort, and when her eyes met his, he knew she was very troubled indeed. "Can I talk to her?" Jusik asked. "Just be careful." The nurse slid the 'pad in front of him. "She's on a five-hundred dose of zaloxipine, just to manage her, but she's been detained indefinitely for three homicides. I can't take responsibility for her." Jusik squatted down and resorted to a little mind influence, the most benign, to make her realize he meant her no harm. It was worth trying even if he was stretching their luck. Something told him he had to, and maybe it was simply that he'd walked by one inmate too many. "Ner gai Bard'ika," he said. "Tion gar gai? Gar aliit?" He'd told her his name was Bardan, and asked her name and her clan name. She stared at him. It was as if she didn't believe what she was seeing, or hearing. "Arla," she said. She glanced at the nurse as if the woman was eavesdropping. "Neyar gain Arla Vhett." It wasn't Mando'a, but it was close enough for any Mandalorian to understand.
Star Wars Complete Encyclopedia, 2008
Mando'a - A Mandalorian word for their native language, known in Basic as Mandalorian. Mando'a was strange to most humanoids, since it focused on the present tense and lacked any form of gender, although it was considered grammatically simple by many linguists. At its core, Mando’a was a spoken language, because many different groups spoke it with enough subtle variation that writing it down became problematic. It was seen as a robust, direct language used by robust, direct people, and it mirrored their culture. The Mandalorians had no word for "hero", but many different words for "stab". Being compared to a Hutt was the worst insult, and the word for "mother" and "father" was the same.
The Clone Wars in The Mandalore Plot episode, 2010
Satine Kryze: He was speaking in the dialect they use on Concordia, our moon.
Star Wars: The Essential Guide to Warfare Author’s Cut, Part 2 – Ancient Coruscant, 2013
In its entirety, Dha Werda Verda encompasses more than 700 verses divided into 11chapters and written in the language known as Notron Cant, whose subtleties continue to defy translation. But most people know only a fraction of the ninth — the 10 verses popularly known as “The Maker Comes to Unmake.” No matter what school, junior academy or crèche you belonged to, if you’re Coruscanti you either memorized the strange syllables of these 10 verses for recitation or had a schoolmate who did. But there’s something odd about our veneration of an ancient epic, notes University of Byblos historian Mesh Burzon. “We believe the Zhell were humans — perhaps the original human population that took to the stars when Imperial Center was known as Notron,” Burzon says. “The Taungs were not human. If the account of the destruction of Zhell is even vaguely accurate, it was a monumental disaster for humanity. So what you have is the descendents of those who survived a near-extinction reciting the poem their oppressors composed to celebrate the event.” As Burzon explains, the Zhell nations were battered by the loss of their capital, but not broken: They recovered and drove the Taungs off Notron entirely. The Taungs emigrated to the Outer Rim and eventually settled Mandalore, named for a legendary clan leader. From this new homeworld they became the scourge of the Republic, routinely raiding its outlying worlds and sometimes penetrating the very Core. The Mandalorian clans valued loyalty to their ferocious warrior code above all else, a quality that would eventually transform their society. A later leader, Mandalore the Ultimate, admitted humans and other species to the Mandalorian ranks. As it turned out, Mandalore the Ultimate was the final Taung to lead the clans. “The Taungs are now extinct, but their ways have been preserved by the Mandalorians — a human culture, ironically enough,” Burzon notes. Hu Jibwe, scholar of military history at the Salmagodro Grand Academy, notes that there is another song popularly known as “Dha Werda Verda” — the Mando’a war chant known as “Rage of the Shadow Warriors.” During the Clone Wars, some Mandalorian trainers taught this chant to their clones, and it became a hallmark of those units. It’s rarely performed today, so if you have a chance to see it, take advantage: The chant and ritual dance are mesmerizing, particularly if the dancers follow Mandalorian tradition and drum out the rhythm on the chest or back of those next to them: The ash of the Taung beats strong within the Mandalorians’ heart. We are the rage of the Warriors of the Shadow, The first noble sons of Mandalore. Let all those who stand before us light the night sky in flame. Our vengeance burns brighter still. The gauntlet of Mandalore strikes without mercy. We are the rage of the Warriors of the Shadow, The first noble sons of Mandalore. Let all those who stand before us light the night sky in flame. Our vengeance burns brighter still. But as Hu notes, “Rage” is far more recent than Dha Werda Verda. The best-preserved record of the Taung epic poem, written in Notron Cant and housed in the Baobab Archives on distant Manda, contains none of the verses of “Rage.” “It’s my belief that ‘Rage of the Shadow Warriors’ dates from the reign of Mandalore the Ultimate, when the Taungs knew they were being eclipsed,” Hu explains. “I’ve always thought it a poignant work — a plea that the Taungs not be forgotten by the newborn culture they knew would outlive them.” But what of the warriors on both sides whose valor is remembered in Dha Werda Verda? Of them we know almost nothing, academics say.
SIDENOTE: the full article can be read here.
BONUS:
Karen Traviss speaking mando'a
Bistro
Speeding ticket
Originally hosted on:http://www.karentraviss.com/page20/page26/index.html Archived site:...
Revenge of the Sith crawler
Originally hosted on:http://www.karentraviss.com/page20/page26/index.html Archived site:...
Interview with Karen Traviss about Mando'a and her new book "Triple Zero."
Interview with Karen Traviss about Mando'a and her new book Triple Zero.
SW Insider 86 Online Supplement: Inside Mando'a
Inside Mando'a Culture and Language by Bonnie Burton; Illustrations by Tom Hodges. An online supplement for Star Wars Insider #86. Original