I hate "fantasy words"

[pmmg]

I have been fortunate in that most of the names and places I created did not come up in google searches, but its been a long time since I searched for them.

I would suspect, that if they have appeared on the internet anywhere, they are not part of the internet lexicon now. Every digitized copy of an amazon upload is probably sucked right into their database of machine learning, and part of their internet brain.

I will agree with others. Long as I am not taking one that would make any balk (like Vader or Aragorn), just go with it. If its the right name for the right story, than so it is.

 

[JBCrowson]

I ētahi wā he ngahau kē atu te whakamahi i tētahi reo torutoru e mōhio ana ngā tāngata mō te whakaingoa i ngā mea. E noho ana ahau i tētahi wāhi e kiia nei ko Otaihanga. I whānau ahau i tētahi wāhi e kiia nei ko Porirua. Ka taea ēnei wāhi te hanga katoa, ā, ko te nuinga o ngā tāngata i runga i ēnei wānanga ehara i te mea he mātauranga nā te mea he torutoru noa iho ngā tāngata e mōhio ana ki te reo Māori, te noho rānei i te Moana nui ā Kiwa ki te Tonga.

(Sometimes it's much more fun to use a language few people know for naming things. I live in a place called Otaihanga. I was born in a place called Porirua. These places could be completely made up and most of the people on these forums would be none the wiser because very few people know the Maori language or live in the South Pacific.)

Not only a great language but some awesome folk lore. Aotearoa must be one of the most beautiful names for a country around.

 

[JBCrowson]

Even words from an online generator come up as something or a person's name! UGGGGHHHH!

One method I use to come up with names is to generate a simple description of the entity / object / place, so death might be 'midwife of sorrow'. I will then translate that into a language less frequently used in publishing - I use Irish for names in one city. Once I have the translation I will re-spell it phonetically and finally tweak it so it sounds the way I want it. That last bit I think is really important, especially for names that come up regularly in the story.

 

[Gurkhal]

I'm with the OP in that strange, weird or nonsense names and words usually detracts rather than immerse me in the story.

There can be a time and place for them but usually you can make "new" names and such with a language you know rather than rely on on the method decried by the OP in the first post. I think of for example GRRM's "bannerman" instead of vassal which admitedly is a made-up term to my knowledge but works, is easy enough to understand and can be exlained in a world where there's no Romance languages from which vassal can be brought into the language.

 

[A. E. Lowan]

I'm with the OP in that strange, weird or nonsense names and words usually detracts rather than immerse me in the story.

There can be a time and place for them but usually you can make "new" names and such with a language you know rather than rely on on the method decried by the OP in the first post. I think of for example GRRM's "bannerman" instead of vassal which admitedly is a made-up term to my knowledge but works, is easy enough to understand and can be exlained in a world where there's no Romance languages from which vassal can be brought into the language.

No, it's a word that's a synonym for "standard bearer." It's just not used as frequently.

 

[Gurkhal]

No, it's a word that's a synonym for "standard bearer." It's just not used as frequently.

Thank you for this. I didn't know that before but to learn new things is always appreciated.

 

[A. E. Lowan]

Thank you for this. I didn't know that before but to learn new things is always appreciated.

No worries. It's easy to run across words and things that seem to be fiction... and things that are in fiction that seem real. We've had our alpha reader since he was 16 and one of my writing students. He thought one used corvids to send messages. I had to explain that no, in our reality it was (is?) pigeons, and that the crow thing was Game of Thrones and maybe a few other story worlds.

And my wife thought ducks had teeth up until about 10 years ago. We were 40.

 

[JessMahler]

I admit, I'm a bit confused. If you don't like fantasy words, why are you trying to use them?

I second (or is it third?) the suggestion of compound words, a wonderful tradition in Germanic languages sadly lost in English. They can give a nice 'not from around here' sound without the need for fantasy words.
If you want to use fantasy words, I like Zomptists suggestion of a 'naming conlang'. Basicly, pick the sounds you want to hav, decide a few things like 'how many syllables can my words have' and 'is it okay to have multiple vowels in a row', and just start mixing and matching letters.

I wouldn't worry too much about words that have existing meanings. 'False friends' (words that sound the same but means omething different) are very common when you start learning languages. As long as the other meanings you find aren't bad/insulting/inappropriate, it's not a big deal. There are literally thousands of languages and millions of place-and-people names. As we write, we're un/fortunately going to recreate them from time to time.

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A few folks have suggested using existing languages. I would caution against that unless you actually know the language and/or culture. It's very easy to accidentally take something out of context or misuse a word.

 

[Deleted member 10411]

OK, I'm writing fantasy. I want to name some things with some "unique" words. I come up with a word. I google that word to make sure it doesn't mean penis or butt hole in some other language. Nearly every word I try that is remotely able to be pronounced by a human comes up in a google search! I just tried "Tohr-nil" and "Tohr-ni" and they both had things pop up. Heaven forbid I try to name a character and not have it show up on google. But I refuse to string a bunch of consonants together and have a bunch of words that no one can say. I know some people try to make their own languages and such, but as a reader, I don't want a bunch of weird words when I'm trying to read and enjoy a story. That's why I try to avoid made up words for my stories. Every now and then I want to come up with a unique word for something, but it seems friggin impossible!

How do you come up with your made up words for your world/stories? Do you google them to see if they are already words? If they do show up on google, how do you proceed?

I built my language based around concepts and objects first. So the deities that created my world needed to communicate, they started by naming themselves, then from the things they created individually I developed names for concepts that relate to each of them, for example one of them is called Hérdàn, he created the stars, so the word for star in my language comes from the translation of "lights of Hérdàn" which is "Vŕýnir tœl Hérdàn" Then because millenia have passed since the language was created i think about the way the words would have been adapted and shortened by the people of the world, so the condensed version of saying "Lights of Hérdàn" became Vŕithér which translates to "star."

 

[pmmg]

I built my language based around concepts and objects first. So the deities that created my world needed to communicate, they started by naming themselves, then from the things they created individually I developed names for concepts that relate to each of them, for example one of them is called Hérdàn, he created the stars, so the word for star in my language comes from the translation of "lights of Hérdàn" which is "Vŕýnir tœl Hérdàn" Then because millenia have passed since the language was created i think about the way the words would have been adapted and shortened by the people of the world, so the condensed version of saying "Lights of Hérdàn" became Vŕithér which translates to "star."

I do not fault your approach. I do like when think have that much consideration behind them....but, you give ma whole book with words like that, and....I may find it too much work. I hope you use those terms somewhat sparingly.

 

[Deleted member 10411]

I do not fault your approach. I do like when think have that much consideration behind them....but, you give ma whole book with words like that, and....I may find it too much work. I hope you use those terms somewhat sparingly.

I'm going to gradually explain how the language turned from Mílœyà which is the language that is spoken in the early days, into the common language that is used in later times, I've got 4 different languages that influence each other, that eventually turn into common tongue. I'm a massive fan of language and how it's used to portray whole concepts, so I have singular words that translate to an entire sentence. I'm not gonna put any of that in my YouTube videos though, I might explain it a little but I'm planning on saving that kinda stuff for other works I have planned. My actually book series is narrated by various scholars that lived in my world, the Scholars have different educations so they write about different things, and it's through these people that the history of my entire world is told. I've got plans, I wanna make middle earth look like a playground. World building is my true love, I'm working on the stories as I go