Dunmer Dictionary and Blasphemy

Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 9:36 am

I was participating in some roleplaying in my guild's forum in anticipation of creating a character in TESO. I wanted to develop a story as to why an Altmer would abandon his people for the Ebonheart Pact. I did a little research on the Altmer creation myth and decided that my character's father named him "Anuiel" after the being formed from Anu.

The character, after falling in love with a Dunmer assassin and betraying his father and family, is renamed by an agent of Sithis. The name is "MurhDra," which is a combination of "death" and "life" in the Dunmer language. I found these words on casualscrolls.wikia.com.

My vision is that the character will be a siphoning Nightblade. I found the idea of siphoning to fit well with the idea of the counterbalance between Anuiel and Sithis, which are opposing forces.

One of my guildmates, who is admittedly more versed in the lore than I am, suggested that it might be considered blasphemous within the Summerset Isles to name your child directly after a god like Anuiel.

He also was uncertain of how reliable casualscrolls.wikia.com is as a linguistic source.

So, my questions are: 1. Is the idea of naming an Altmeri child Anuiel out of the bounds of acceptable behavior in the Summerset Isles? and 2. Is the source that I used to find more on the Dunmeri language a reliable one?

Thanks.

P.S. I've been a fan of the series since Morrowind, but this is my first time participating in this forum.

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Jennifer Rose
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 9:50 am

Can an Altmer be in the Pact? I thought the races were restricted to a particular faction.
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LuBiE LoU
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 7:21 am

They were (Which svcked), but as far as I know, you can play different races in other factions ,Imperials included, if you get a certain pre-order of the game.

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[Bounty][Ben]
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 7:17 pm

I'm not going to judge the quality of casualscrolls since this is the first time I've heard of the site. However, it is on the wikia network, and given my distrust of the network, I'd advise that you take what you read from that site with about a pound of salt.

UESP has a http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Ehlnofex_Languages#cite_note-THOCX-17 dedicated to Ehlnofex-based languages. The Dunmeri content is probably not as in-depth as you were hoping, but it's a start. And If I remember right, a lot of the Dunmer language is dervied from the Aldmer language.

While I don't know of any taboos in Altmer naming conventions off the top of my head, I can see your guildy's concern in naming your character after the God-King of the Altmer people. The Altmer tend to view life, mortality, and subgradience as a bad thing, so I imagine it wouldn't be too normal to name your child after someone who taught that the Mer should escape the Mundus rather than perpetuate it.

Higher level characters can make their way into other lands.

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Nicholas C
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 12:12 pm

Not if you pre-order. :)

And I'm the guildy he's talking about btw.

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Rhi Edwards
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 8:50 am

I can't speak for Dunmeris, but there is a WIP Aldmeris on TIL with a mostly fleshed-out grammar and a lexicon of a hundred or a couple hundred words (not including numbers and structural words like articles).
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Natalie J Webster
 
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Post » Thu Mar 13, 2014 5:35 am

Does no one else see the irony of playing an assassin named "Murhdra"?

Speaking of which, neither of those words are attested in any source I'm familiar with. I had never heard of that site before, but it would appear everything on it is made up for an rp. From their main page.

"This site serves as a companion to the Casual Elder Scrolls PbP roleplaying game, and as an expansion to the existing Elder Scrolls lore. The articles here are strictly fanon, based on our own ideas and theories. Whether you're a player or just a fan with cool ideas, you're welcome to edit and add pages and help Casual Scrolls grow."

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JD bernal
 
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