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Similarities of language and pronouns across the Cosmere


The Watcher

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Now I know you are all probably gonna be bored but I have a thing for language so hear me out

Why is it that all the languages across the Cosmere are so similar!

i don’t mean the overall language, I mean things that are specific to a language, like usuage of pronouns and such. For example there is a slumlord on Nalthis named Ashu. Ashu is incredibly similar to the Aon Ashe! I know I know, Brandon was probably running out of names, but there are more too! Ati, the many millennia holder of Ruin, is an Aon! My theory on that is that he was Arelish but I have no way to confirm that. And IaIai has an Aonic name too! Aon IaI corresponds too closely to her name to be an accident. I believe Brandon is trying to show that these planets have been subtly influencing each other, at least they did at the past. Also because most of the names seem derived from Sel, I’m led to wonder if that is where the original humans resided.

Anyway that’s my theory or thought provoking thought, however you wanna view it. Please post comments if you find any other names that seem to be spread across the Cosmere! And if I’m wrong on anything please let me know!

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Aon Ati is a coincidence. It was creates for the story Hope of Elantris, which was written to include one of Brandon's wife's students, named Matisse. The only combination of letters in her name that would create an Aon is Ati... And so Aon Ati was born. 

Many things like this exist, like Shash. 

Quote

Questioner

So I have a question about the cosmere. I recently read The Stormlight Archive books and I love them, and then I reread Warbreaker and I noticed something. When Siri was teaching the God King how to read, she says one of the letters is called shash and this is the name of one of Kaladin's slave brands. I was wondering why.

Brandon Sanderson

It was just a coincidence, that one's been asked of me before, yeah it's just a coincidence.

source

 

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I would bet that the "in world" answer is that most humans and languages originated on Yolen, so there are bound to be some similarities in words and phrases.

And that the real-world answer is that Brandon likes the sound of certain letter combinations, and they tend to pop up more often.

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Brandon is also less thorough in creating his artificial languages than say, Tolkien is, and so his languages are bound to be less "water-tight" and realistic.  Maybe the similarities between proper names in different cosmere books are intentional, and maybe it's just a coincidence.  There are some aspects of his worldbuilding, such as the religions, in which Brandon goes above and beyond most fantasy authors and creates extremely complex and believable systems, but his languages are a little less fully realized - at least from what we've seen so far.  

Edited by Llarimar
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