Stormlight Archive Translation Guide

[PorridgeBrick]

Also, it seems like the shape of the glyphpairs can vary. Hasn't Kholin (kokh linl) been mentioned as being shaped both like a tower & crown, and like a sword & crown?

Accidental downvote. You all know the drill.

[Harakeke]

Interesting! Though wouldn't that interpretation translate to "LiN KoK NiL"?

I assumed that is the single glyph contraction "iN oL -K | -K oL iN", (alternately | Ko Li N-) and that the glyphpair KoKh LiNiL is what we see in the Tower & Crown chapter heading emblem.

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

Ungh, this is frustrating. I am starting to think we don't have enough information to take a meaningful stab at this...

But on a more cheerful note, half of Sebarial's glyphpair makes sense (refer to the Battle for Narak map; Sebarial's banner is to the left of the Command Tents text in the middle). The central mostly-vertical line most likely represents 'S' (rotated along the x-axis and smoothed), while the the one that looks like a wave and climbs at about 45° kind of looks like 'L' (again, rotated along the x-axis and smoothed). I suspect that out of the remaining two lines, one is just decoration (my guess: the top one) and one stands for 'B' (my guess: the bottom one).

So I guess this is progress. Maybe. But I was hoping for more...

EDIT: Harakeke, that's what I thought at first too - and in a way is what I've done. My khokh is really just a 'K' and my linil is just 'L'+'N' (though it's actually 'N'+'L'...), because I assume that symmetry is kind of magical and instead of taking the entire glyph "khokh," I can take just one of it's symmetric halves ("kho" or "okh") and apply the Thaylen-to-Alethi translation logic (remove vowels, squish 'k' and 'h' together, because they technically make a single sound). So we end up with the same result, I just go through the Alethi parent words of Kholin, while you take the target word (Kholin) and translate it immediately through Thaylen. Which might more sense, but will break once we start trying to translate words that are not proper nouns.

Edited March 12, 2014 by Argent

[Harakeke]

 

Ungh, this is frustrating. I am starting to think we don't have enough information to take a meaningful stab at this...

But on a more cheerful note, half of Sebarial's glyphpair makes sense (refer to the Battle for Narak map; Sebarial's banner is to the left of the Command Tents text in the middle). The central mostly-vertical line most likely represents 'S' (rotated along the x-axis and smoothed), while the the one that looks like a wave and climbs at about 45° kind of looks like 'L' (again, rotated along the x-axis and smoothed). I suspect that out of the remaining two lines, one is just decoration (my guess: the top one) and one stands for 'B' (my guess: the bottom one).

So I guess this is progress. Maybe. But I was hoping for more...

Haha! If you think those are bad, try wrapping your head around "Kharbranth" on p. 454 of WoK! ;-)

EDIT: Harakeke, that's what I thought at first too - and in a way is what I've done. My khokh is really just a 'K' and my linil is just 'L'+'N' (though it's actually 'N'+'L'...), because I assume that symmetry is kind of magical and instead of taking the entire glyph "khokh," I can take just one of it's symmetric halves ("kho" or "okh") and apply the Thaylen-to-Alethi translation logic (remove vowels, squish 'k' and 'h' together, because they technically make a single sound). So we end up with the same result, I just go through the Alethi parent words of Kholin, while you take the target word (Kholin) and translate it immediately through Thaylen. Which might more sense, but will break once we start trying to translate words that are not proper nouns.

Ah, I see. Though I've spotted enough reflection/rotation permutations to feel reasonably assured that the Alethi glyphs do explicitly encode vowels based on the positioning of the associated consonant (whether that is before or after...).

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

If anyone is curious about my notes - which are completely useless to anyone but me - here they are!

I think I might try to approach this from the alphabet's perspective again. How confident are you in your Thaylen-to-English key?

[Harakeke]

I'm close to 100% confident in my Thaylen > English key (barring any letters that didn't occur in the map). Pattern looked it over earlier too, and other than some silly some typos converting my handwritten key, it checks out.

Here's a selection of some of my more coherent glyph notes (ignore the Thaylen key on the legal pad. It's backwards. =P):

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

I wonder if I am not just flatout wrong in trying to translate the highprinces' names using their parent glyphs... Sebarial makes much more sense as [R][L] (rotated to indicate the presence of different vowels) than my attempts at sebes + laial.

I think I'll switch to this for now.

Edited March 15, 2014 by Argent

[Harakeke]

I wonder if I am not just flatout wrong in trying to translate the highprinces' names using their parent glyphs... Sebarial makes much more sense as [R][L] (rotated to indicate the presence of different vowels) than my attempts at sebes + laial.

I think I'll switch to this for now.

Never hurts to explore new ideas!

Though in this context, I think it makes more sense for Navani to have jotted down the names in their contracted form. She uses Kholin to refer to herself, Adolin, and Dalinar in various maps.

Here's an interesting puzzler: The Alethi Warcamps map has ten Highprince name glyphs along the left side, with the Compass Rose (Urithiru?) glyph in the middle. Note that the top set of glyphs are upside-down. Sadeas, Sebarial, Aladar, and Roion are easy to pick out. I'm not seeing Kholin though. The map itself does have the stylized Tower & Crown "Kokh Linl" drawn next to Dalinar's camp.

Edit: The closest I can find (i.e. the only one that could plausibly start with a K) is the second from the top. This could be the more standard form of Kokh Linl. Parsing that glyph might yield useful information.

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

Okay, I grow more confident that any component of the Alethi glyphs that doesn't readily translate into a Thaylen letter is just for decoration. So the glyphpair can be written with a vertical line in the middle, with extra lines on each side of the line of symmetry (as long as they are symmetric), with horizontal lines on top and bottom, or any combination of those and more.

All those glyphs we see don't make sense to me otherwise. Rotating the individual components along the x- and y-axis, that's fair game. I don't know about rotating them by only 90° yet (so _ can turn into |), we'll have to see.

Harakeke, could you tell me where you got the Alethi glyphs (on the sheet with the standard, calligraphic, and radial style)? I see S and SH in the sas and shash glyphs, and K, L, N, and T probably come from kholin and tanat, but what about the rest?

Edited March 12, 2014 by Argent

[Argent]

Re: the battle map

I have them in the following order:

-----------------------------------

Aladar (not inverted!)

Kholin (inverted)

???

Sadeas (inverted)

Roion (inverted)

--- [ROSE COMPASS] ---

???

???

???

Sebarial (not inverted)

??? - originally I thought his might be Kholin, but #2 fits much much better

-----------------------------------

Parsing this Kholin, however, is damnation near impossible. I played with different zoom levels, and the bottom half of the glyph (which is where I suspect "L" is!) is a smudge. The one on the Narak map is pretty much the same in the top half, but the bottom is obviously a little less intricate - unfortunately isolating the differences is not going to happen with such a low-res Warcamps map...

Edited March 12, 2014 by Argent

[Harakeke]

Yeah - rotating 90° seems invalid.

Most of them I derived from Thaylen, and then cross-checked against the Highprince names: Sadeas, Roion, Sebarial, Kholin, Aladar; and Kaladin's tattoos: Sas, Nahn, Shash.

Which is why I'm more confident about *S than the other letters.

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Harakeke]

 

Re: the battle map

I have them in the following order:

-----------------------------------

Aladar (not inverted!)

Kholin (inverted)

???

Sadeas (inverted)

Roion (inverted)

--- [ROSE COMPASS] ---

???

???

???

Sebarial (not inverted)

??? - originally I thought his might be Kholin, but #2 fits much much better

-----------------------------------

Parsing this Kholin, however, is damnation near impossible. I played with different zoom levels, and the bottom half of the glyph (which is where I suspect "L" is!) is a smudge. The one on the Narak map is pretty much the same in the top half, but the bottom is obviously a little less intricate - unfortunately isolating the differences is not going to happen with such a low-res Warcamps map...

 

Aladar is the 3rd one down (inverted). Compare vs. p. 997 in WoR

1st is probably Vamah -- He's the only one that starts with a V

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

I'll have to play with those - and the other highprinces, if I can (#3, between Sadeas and Kholin, might end up being Thanadal - he is the only prince other than Aldar with an 'L' in his name, and I think I spot an (inverted?) 'L' in his glyphpair) tomorrow...

EDIT: I'll take a look about Aladar. If he ends up being #3, then maybe I can still find a candidate for Thanadal because of the 'L'. Good call on Vamah though.

Edited March 12, 2014 by Argent

[Harakeke]

I'll have to play with those - and the other highprinces, if I can (#3, between Sadeas and Kholin, might end up being Thanadal - he is the only prince other than Aldar with an 'L' in his name, and I think I spot an (inverted?) 'L' in his glyphpair) tomorrow...

EDIT: I'll take a look about Aladar. If he ends up being #3, then maybe I can still find a candidate for Thanadal because of the 'L'. Good call on Vamah though.

Navani's map in WoR makes it pretty clear:

Edited March 12, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

damnation, that R in Aladar had me stumped for an hour because it crosses the line of symmetry...

[Pattern]

Interesting! Though wouldn't that interpretation translate to "LiN KoK NiL"?

I assumed that is the single glyph contraction "iN oL -K | -K oL iN", (alternately | Ko Li N-) and that the glyphpair KoKh LiNiL is what we see in the Tower & Crown chapter heading emblem.

 

My opinion to Khokh Linil: Both glyphs could have been identified correctly by Argent.

Glyphs are symmetric. So what do you do, when you want to build one glyph from a glyphpair with to different glyphs? You move one glyph into the symmetry axis of the other. Preferably the first Glyph should be in the middle. If you read from left to right, you take the middle and go to right. If you prefer reading right to left (like arabic) you start again in the middle and go to left. Therefore you get the same word.

Now I see, that the same works for Aladar glyph. Though I would read it AlaTar based on Thaylen symbols. But since there are probably vowel variations of consonants...

 

So now back to Ch84 Code...I stray again.

 

Ok, Code has been broken while I was absent. So now I can concentrate more on glyph stuff.

 

BTW, while looking for hints for the code in WoK, I stumbled over the fact, that Shallan can speak, read and write Thaylen, but cannot read Selay. So perhaps there will be another language...

 

Also in Shallan's application interview with Jasnah it got obvious that there are major, minor and topical glyphs - which can be written calligraphically - but you've already got that. 

Edited March 12, 2014 by Pattern

[Argent]

@Pattern & @Harakeke, want to coordinate deciphering efforts or something? I really want to figure (enough of) this out before the Chicago signing next week...

Edited March 15, 2014 by Argent

[illsmithyourbonds]

My (uneducated) opinion on glyphs in general is that they must all be symmetrical. I say this mostly for composing glyphs, and I think this because there is a quote (from Shallan I think) that I don't have on me about how Nohadon's name was changed to Nohadon to make it more symmetrical and how in Vorinism symmetrical-ness is considered holy and awesome and since glyphs I think are supposed to be pretty and awesome I think they are symmetrical.

 

My other opinion is that if there is a word with just an 'h' sound then look out for a diacritic, because Shallan says that Nohadon's name is symmetrical, because the 'h' is represented by a d with a diacritic or something like that.

 

I am truly in awe of your decrypting and translating capabilities by the way.

[Khyrindor]

Is the most accurate translation key of everything at the top of the post? I want to help out with this too.

[Harakeke]

@Pattern & @Harakeke, want to coordinate deciphering efforts or something? I really want to figure (enough of) this out before the Chicago signing next week...

I'd love to, but I've got some significant real life deadlines looming, so I've had to put deciphering Alethi glyphs on the back burner.

Since it turned out the Ch. 84 doesn't actually have anything to do with the glyphs, I don't feel in such a rush now. I've also started *actually reading* WoR. (Just got to the end of Part III)

Some general musings:

I feel like having a basic grasp of the writing systems gives me a richer appreciation of the world. When Navani drew the big Justice glyph at the end of WoK, I could visualize the process. Spanreed communication takes on a more elegant feel. Even the names of passing background characters clearly indicate their ethnicity, and thus general appearance. The attention to detail and internal consistency in these books is fascinating.

Like Hoid, I too am very curious about the etymology of Axehound.

It's odd, isn't it? Strange choice of words. Archaic. It's why I took the case. "Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound." Why say "hound"?

The Khokh and Linil glyphs in the chapter headings must have a bunch of screw you lines, since the words themselves comprise only two or three sub-glyphs. Likewise for Navani's big burny "thath".

I love that the glyphs have been sitting under our noses for *years*, and we're only now getting around to deciphering them! The Frostlands map seemed a little too straightforward when I was first working on it, but here it's gone and kicked off this whole new puzzle! I guess there really is always another secret!

One thing that would certainly be helpful for a joint effort would be to compile a collection of all the glyphs we've seen, cropped, oriented, and in the highest resolution available.

@Khyrindor - for the moment, as best as I can tell. I'll try to keep the first post updated.

Edited March 17, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

Yea, I started a reread of Words of Radiance a few days after my initial breeze through it, and I find myself appreciating the linguistic worldbuilding much more. Every time I see a Thaylen name I go "of course it would look weird to outsiders, it's written like this in their native language!" I also understand why men generally don't bother learning the Alethi glyphs - because of those "screw you lines", which is now now official canon term.

I wouldn't feel bad about not figuring them out before Words of Radiance - we had nothing that suggested a logical approach. It was the Frostlands map that was the key - from Thaylen letters, to Alethi words, and then to the glyphs. Without the Thaylen alphabet we couldn't have figured out anything.

P.S. "Navani's big burny "thath"" must always be mentioned with context from now on.

[Harakeke]

Here's a comparison of the "ten fundamental glyphs" from Shallan's sketch of Elhokar's sword (left) and the Surgebinding Chart (right). Click to enlarge.

 

 

Note how the surgebinding versions have way more screw you lines.

I'm less confident now that these glyphs correspond to the names of the Heralds.

Edited March 19, 2014 by Harakeke

[Argent]

I always figured those were the names of the Orders.

[illsmithyourbonds]

I can see the last one being Ishi, which is that symmetrical nickname for Ishar, Herald of Luck.

If I could use image editing software with any degree of decency, I would highlight the parts of it that look like the Sh, but I can't. Instead I'm gonna say that there is a Sh with a line in the middle, that looks like either an oSh or a Sho (depending on how you read the chart) or a Sh* with * being a vowel that I think is i (and this is if you think there are 11 forms of a consonant - one with each vowel before, one with each vowel after, and one with neither).

I think this means that they are names of the Heralds, but I may just be a terrible glyph reader.

[Swimmingly]

Screw You lines do make things more complicated... I wonder if they're only in artistic representations or if the simplified (non bird-flipping) versions use only the Thaylen forms. Maybe we can get a look at some of Amaram's notes in SA3? Another note, wouldn't an informal glyph-based writing system be even easier if you got rid of the symmetry? Blasphemous as a lady shaking safehands with a Voidbringer, but more efficient. Edited March 19, 2014 by Swimmingly