Apologies if this is not the correct community for this question, happy to post elsewhere if that is the case.
In English, it feels common place for fantasy novels to use Latin inspired words for their spells or magic languages - unfortunately Harry Potter is the only one I can think of off the top of my head, but I’m sure there are more! Sci-fi can also fall into this ‘trope’ using Latin themed titles or names - such as “Augustus”, “Primus”, military titles, names etc.
Is this common for other languages in Europe to pull from Latin for their fantasy/sci-fi books? Do novels in the eastern hemisphere pull from dead/uncommonly spoken/ritualistic languages for this purpose? Does one languages pull straight from other living languages?
Is Sanskrit used in South-Eastern Asia? Are there extinct Chinese dialects that live on in the fantasy/sci-fi genres? Do novels written in an Arabic language use a dead sister language from the Arabic continuum? Do books in South American pull from the wealth of languages spoken before European colonization? Do languages with multiple alphabets (looking at you Japanese, but would love to learn about other languages with multiple alphabets) use only a specific alphabet for magic spells? Is Swahili used for magic words in Somalian media?
I’m not looking for answers on these questions explicitly (not that they wouldn’t be appreciated), just giving examples of the theme.
A notable (English) exception I recently read - A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine - which uses names from the native language(s?) of the Americas, primarily Aztec if I’m remembering correctly.
In situations like this, it’s best to remember why dead languages are dead: Nobody speaks these languages anymore because everyone kept accidentally casting spells!
Anime and japanese (and chinese?) culture often uses German or French imagery or words in ways that either lack some context and sometimes it’s complete gibberish. The “Frieren” anime uses German words for names that would not be names in German. (Frieren is a verb means, “being cold”, but actually not the kind of emotionally cold that the character Frieren is either, it just means being physically cold).
The use of latin is actually deeper rooted in mysticism and religion. Nobody really used it as a spoken language after the fall of the roman empire, but the chatholic church still used it it’s ritualistic language until the bible was translated to German by Martin Luther. That’s not the only case of that happening either, if you look into the sumerian and related languages, they shared an alphabet, but the actual grammar and pronunciation and use shifted and it evolved in a way that the older language grew to be exclusive for religious rituals, while the more common language was a different one.
Another example that might have slipped your attention is mathematic’s use of Greek symbols. We don’t speak Greek. We don’t have those symbols readily available on keyboards or anything.
Programming languages of course. They’re basically exclusively in English. Some of the concepts in programming are actually cumbersome to translate and make the most sense if you have an understanding of English.
Apparently the Hindi translations of tge Harry Potter books translate the Latin into Sanskrit, but that’s more of a cultural thing, since Sanskrit has a similar cachet among South Asian Hindus and Buddhists as Latin has among European Christians.
Using Latin for Latin based languages has the benefit that the words feel appropriate for their effects somehow, since most people don’t know Latin but would be familiar with words that have similar roots.
Translating them into alternative historical languages gives the same effect for other cultures.
That’s what had me asking this question, wasn’t able to articulate the as clearly in my big speel as you did in 2 paragraphs though haha
That is exactly the type of example I was looking for! I wonder if that’s common amongst books that are written in languages those regions?
Professional magician here - when I do my show for kids I always get them to shout out “Boom!” and explain that it’s like a special effect in the movies.
Whenever I say I’m going to teach my favourite magic word, some kid always chimes in with “Abracadabra”. I think it’s from Vaudeville - some magician made it up and everyone copied them ever since.
You should know the origin, and surprise - it’s Latin!
Per wikipedia: "The actual origin is unknown, but one of the first appearances of the word was in a second-century work by Roman physician Serenus Sammonicus… who in chapter 52 prescribed that malaria sufferers wear an amulet containing Abracadabra written in the form of a triangle.[12][13]
The power of the amulet, he claimed, makes lethal diseases go away."
That old huh? Amazing!
One Japanese anime (Ascendance of a Bookworm) uses German for the names of the gods.
Japan using German for naming things is actually super common.
A big example right now is the anime Frieren which names almost everything in German. Including the title (which means to be cold).
Probably a hold over from the cross over episode they did in the 40s
The manga Negima! used German and Latin and a number of other languages if I recall.
I remember an anime (that i never watched nor got interessed so i forgot the name) where they use Italian to cast spells I want to watch it 😂
Interesting! Names of old Germanic gods (Odin, Tyr, Hella, etc.) or typical German names (Klaus, Sabine, Angela, etc.)?
According to TVTropes (Gratuitous German, AoaB examples page) it looks like they lean less on German names and more on nouns like Angriff (attack) and Leidenschaft (passion). Japan particularly seems to like choosing German as the gratuitous foreign language.
Japan and Germany were allies in World War II.
That’s why when anime takes place in a foreign land, it’s either outright declared to be Germany, or it’s heavily implied to be Germany. Shingeki no Kyojin (Attack on Titan) appeared to be Germany until the country was named… in season 3 which was 5-6 years after the show started. At the end of season 3, I should add. Fullmetal Alchemist was set in a country that was based on Germany. Their head of state was called the Fuhrer and the whole thing was set to resemble Nazi Germany. SPYxFAMILY takes place in Cold War-era Germany, except East Germany becomes Eastonia and West Germany becomes Westalis. The capital? Berlint. They’re not even hiding it. Then you have The Saga of Tanya the Evil where a cruel Japanese salaryman dies (is murdered) and he is reincarnated as the little girl version of Hitler, plus magic. The country is called the Fatherland and it’s very obvious what they are going for. Oh and of course she’s leading the charge to take over the world. To be fair she is called Tanya the Evil, so they aren’t glorifying her actions… but the Japanese creative empire we all love is a bit weirdly comfortable with Nazis and Nazi-era Germany… less weird when you realise that historically, they were allies in that war.
Funny that they’re both our allies now… but while anything Nazi related is strictly forbidden in Germany, it’s practically celebrated in Japan, to this day. Fullmetal Alchemist came out in 2003 (the anime, anyway). SnK, 2013 or so. Tanya the Evil was around that time. SPYxFAMILY is new and new episodes are coming out weekly. Though to be fair their show is post-WWII and Eastonia (East Germany) is portrayed as the enemy, and Westalis (West Germany) is seeking peace, though they’re using the exploits of their top spy (the main character’s adoptive father) to do it.
While you are right in general, Fullmetal Alchemist isn’t an example of glorifying Nazi Germany. The country is a military dictatorship, they committed a genocide while conquering a neighbouring region and are not portrayed as the good guys. The war and genocide was shown to have long lasting bad effects both on the victims and the perpetrating soldiers. And the leadership is literally working for the big bad.
Just wanted to clarify, as this is one of the few examples where they play the Nazi card straight instead of going: “nice uniform and marching music”.
it’s interesting seeing people examine a work, confidently working out the most surface stuff while completely missing the forest behind it
Godwin’s law
I don’t know what names are typical, but they certainly aren’t using actual norse gods. All the characters, gods included, have german-sounding names, but they’re mostly long enough that I doubt people use them routinely in real life
So in folk tales from Eastern Europe or Germany I know, most “magic words” are either rhyming nonsense or just specific sentences in the same local language. Think “abracadabra”, ours in Hungary is “csiribú-csiribá”, you’d pronounce it like “chiribooh-chiribaah”.
“Sim sala bim” is one you see a bit in the Nordics, popularized by a Danish magician with the stage name Dante. Gibberish definitely does help remove the magic words from what the audience knows a bit.
I didn’t even think about the being a common nonsense or flavour of jibberish in other languages, thanks for sharing!
In the magic 2.0 series of books, even though it’s not really a rule imposed by the universe or anything.
The characters like to use Esperanto for their spell/program names.But Lojban was right there!
Speak friend, and enter
I prefer those that are completely made up.
Iain M Banks uses very nice names, imho. Humanoids and drones all have a complete form that is very long.
E.g. Xide Hyrlis’ full name is Stafl-Lepoortsa Xide Ozoal Hyrlis dam Pappens
Not to speak of intelligent spacecraft who name themselves, e.g. Ethics Gradient or Serious Callers Only.
I could go on for hours.
Of course he must have taken inspiration from somewhere - no idea how or where.
[off topic?]
Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny.
The backstory is that Earth sent out colonizing ships to distant planets. The passengers were kept in suspended animation, while the crews were allowed to clone new bodies and transfer their minds.
This particular planet was colonized mostly by Hindus. After developing super powers to help conquer the hostile native fauna, the crew has declared themselves Gods. They use the Hindu pantheon.
https://bookshop.org/p/books/lord-of-light-roger-zelazny/c41678bf1dbdd1a7
Harry Potter isn’t really exemplary of English in this regard either. You are generalising from lack of knowledge. This isn’t a thing in English either outside of Harry Potter.
