Let’s make a language, part 27c: Religion (Ardari)

Although I’ve been intentionally vague on the whereabouts of Ardari, it’s definitely less attached to European culture than Isian. To that end, it has few true borrowings for religious terms, instead relying on reinterpreted roots from the native belief system. Angels and devils, for instance, are firar and ghemar. A priest is an ekòna—but modern reformation has led to the creation of a feminine variant for what was once a masculine-only term: ekòni.

The Ardari priesthood might not have been a bastion of equality, but the faith itself was. Most supernatural beings in the old polytheistic system came in male and female forms, so there are pairs like tsora and tsori, or fira and firi, and these stand alongside the neuter terms used as the default.

That’s not to say that Ardari doesn’t import religious terms from other languages. It does, but it uses native words for most of the basic concepts. The sole loan in the list below is tyorymat “religion”, a conceptual term that only came in once Ardari speakers of eras past needed to talk about religion as distinct from faith. Other borrowings are made instead to describe concepts specific to one religion, such as santös “saint” (from Latin sanctus), èklecha “church” (from Latin ecclesia), or mazhid “mosque” (from Arabic masjid).

Word List

  • angel: fir (or gendered fira/firi)
  • devil: ghem
  • fairy: lyun (or gendered lyuna/lyuni)
  • faith: mitraz
  • ghost: qoj
  • god: tsor (or gendered tsora/tsori)
  • heaven: èlyas
  • hell: uldall
  • holy: mirs
  • magic: bräz
  • priest: ekòna (also modern feminine form ekòni)
  • religion: tyorymat (distant borrowing from theo-)
  • ritual: plan
  • sacred: grès
  • soul: jull
  • to bless: konye-
  • to curse: dakya-
  • to pray: nyes-

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