Alicornutopia

I always assume that even if Draconic doesn't recognize shrens as dragons, English does. It recognizes things as diverse as Toothless, Kaylo, and Ansharil as dragons; why shouldn't Mial count in English?

Edit: part of this post moved to sandbox discussion thread.

I mean, it's kind of crucial in-universe that Draconic insists (and therefore most dragonishes insist, and therefore other languages have tended to follow along) that dragons and shrens do not belong to any kind of obvious common category even though they kind of blatantly do. So for us to sit around saying dragons when we mean specifically Elcenian dragonishes would cause unnecessary confusion, I think. Even though, in any language that has been going around calling a bunch of different diverse kinds of dragonlike creature "dragon" and then arrives at Elcenia, it would certainly make vastly more sense than otherwise to include shrens in the word.

But clearly not everyone has this mental block. I mean, Mial speaks Draconic like every other dragonish, the pattern is there, but he's so intensely Miles that he has very little trouble seeing through its bulllshit. He will, however, have some trouble spreading his terminology.

I had not caught up with Mial introducing the term. I just did now. Then, at the bottom of one page he said he'd yell at somebody whose fault it was. I said “that sounds fair”, then while turning the page realized such a person existed and said “go yell at Alicorn”. Suddenly page 17 finished loading and I saw the Alicornutopia account saying “It's not my fault”. It took me a bit to get my brain on track to realizing that was Aurim responding to Mial, not Alicorn responfing to me.

But yes, you point about it mattering enough in-universe makes sense. I'd have picked a different English suffix for the noun, though. Mail originally said “dragonish” as an adjective and it morphed into nounhood without the suffix changing to “oid”.

I like the sound of dragonish better than dragonoid. It has more of the feel of having been invented by a two(-equivalent)-year-old Miles.

DanielH wrote:I had not caught up with Mial introducing the term. I just did now. Then, at the bottom of one page he said he'd yell at somebody whose fault it was. I said “that sounds fair”, then while turning the page realized such a person existed and said “go yell at Alicorn”. Suddenly page 17 finished loading and I saw the Alicornutopia account saying “It's not my fault”. It took me a bit to get my brain on track to realizing that was Aurim responding to Mial, not Alicorn responfing to me.

But yes, you point about it mattering enough in-universe makes sense. I'd have picked a different English suffix for the noun, though. Mail originally said “dragonish” as an adjective and it morphed into nounhood without the suffix changing to “oid”.

I think if he's about six years old it would make sense for him to say dragonish instead of dragonoid. Six years olds will come across the -ish suffix before the -oid one, I think.

There's probably a reason for it sounding like it was invented by a two-year-mature Miles. And its a word that needs to exist; it seems to be the only instance of Draconic failing to provide a word when it's wanted, and it's a shame that most other Elcenian languages copy that.

Now I'm wondering if the dragon-hating countries use the same word for both. It seems likely that the general populace wouldn't know about shrens, or would say “that doesn't stop you from being an evil dragon” if they did. That could make it harder for the word to spread, though, if the previous primary users of similar words hate dragonishes.

Related question for Alicorn about Elcenia/Barashi canon (possibly already answered but difficult to look up): Does Draconic have a word for “dragon” that counts Barashin dragons even though it doesn’t properly have a word for “Elcenian dragons & shrens”?

MTC wrote:Related question for Alicorn about Elcenia/Barashi canon (possibly already answered but difficult to look up): Does Draconic have a word for “dragon” that counts Barashin dragons even though it doesn’t properly have a word for “Elcenian dragons & shrens”?

Pretty sure it does, yes. I remember there being an Elcenian dragon who wound up getting stranded in Barashi and finding some Barashian dragons, and explaining herself to them as being also a dragon but a different sort, or something - I don't remember the exact details but the translation magic made it sound to the Barashian dragons like she was also a dragon, which was plot-important, unless my memory is really on the fritz today.

Adelene wrote:

MTC wrote:Related question for Alicorn about Elcenia/Barashi canon (possibly already answered but difficult to look up): Does Draconic have a word for “dragon” that counts Barashin dragons even though it doesn’t properly have a word for “Elcenian dragons & shrens”?

Pretty sure it does, yes. I remember there being an Elcenian dragon who wound up getting stranded in Barashi and finding some Barashian dragons, and explaining herself to them as being also a dragon but a different sort, or something - I don't remember the exact details but the translation magic made it sound to the Barashian dragons like she was also a dragon, which was plot-important, unless my memory is really on the fritz today.

It was that Cooper one that was a terrible girlfriend and you sound right. Barashian dragons are speciests.

I thought about that part of the story, yes, but it doesn’t necessarily mean Draconic has such a word, just that the language the Barashin dragons spoke had such a word, or at least it did as far as dragon translation magic is concerned… which might amount to the same thing, but might not. Having re‐read that part now, it is interesting that she thinks of the Barashin dragon she’s just met as a “dragon” even before they start talking, that may point to Draconic having such a word, but I still think it’s worth asking.