Why does Scadrial have a word for Moonlight?

[Lesser spren]

It was establised in BOM that if a culture doesn't have a word for something, it does not translate. This is further seen in the term Ralkalast, refering to aluminum not translating to English in the language of the rose empire. Yet when Shai gives her name it translates even if Marasi has no understanding of the word. Is it possible that the word moon still exist in some vestigial form in scadrian like the word hound in axehound. If this is true then perhaps this will give us some clue as to why Kelsier invited a philologist on to his crew.

[teknopathetic]

I think she hears “????-light” in her language. It’s a compound word and I think a Scadrian would get the half they do understand. 

Edited December 28, 2022 by teknopathetic

[Elegy]

There are two gas giants in the Scadrian System that have moons: 

Spoiler

So they probably have a word for it, although its use would be mostly astrological and not as wide-spread.

Edited December 26, 2022 by Elegy

[AquaRegia]

I assumed Marasi heard a compound word which was half nonsense; something like "Fleeplight", where "light" is a word she recognizes, while "fleep" is not.

[CognitiveShadow]

It’s just like in stormlight:

Spoiler

Axehound is a word that most people don’t really understand. They don’t know what the hound part means. And the same thing happens when Hoid talks to Kaladin and mentions a dog and a dragon, he just has to explain what they mean to Kaladin. It would likely be the same for moonlight. If there is a term for a chunk of rock orbiting another chunk of rock that orbits a star, it would translate into that. If they have no concept of that type of thing, they’d hear some new word that would need to be explained

 

[Lesser spren]

I'm wondering if this is one of the reasons Kelsier has a Philologist on his crew, little idiosyncrasies in Connection and language could have huge implications  on the  history of the world, just look at the Hero Of Ages. Or the profanities of the religion of the god beyond.

[Flaming Coinshot]

Or maybe moonlight actually means something and has huge implications for the Cosmere? That'd be weird. 

[Frustration]

7 hours ago, Flaming Coinshot said:

Or maybe moonlight actually means something and has huge implications for the Cosmere? That'd be weird. 

I wonder what shard it is related to.

[Lesser spren]

 

1 hour ago, Frustration said:

I wonder what shard it is related to.

or perhaps Scadrial had a moon all along we just never see it due it revolving around at the same rate as it's rotation 

[Frustration]

56 minutes ago, Lesser spren said:

 

or perhaps Scadrial had a moon all along we just never see it due it revolving around at the same rate as it's rotation 

And the silverlight astronomers?

[+Oltux72]

On 25.12.2022 at 7:15 PM, Lesser spren said:

It was establised in BOM that if a culture doesn't have a word for something, it does not translate.

Northern Scadrian obviously has a word for light. The Scadrian system's gas giants having moons and Marasi having visited the university of Elendel, which uses a broad curriculum, is doubtlessly aware of them and will know a way of referring to them.

Even if you are using English, what justifies calling "moonlight" a word? Is "traffic sign" a word? Languages differ drastically in their ability to create new words from existing roots. We have no idea where on the scale Northern Scadrian lies.

On 25.12.2022 at 7:15 PM, Lesser spren said:

This is further seen in the term Ralkalast, refering to aluminum not translating to English in the language of the rose empire. Yet when Shai gives her name it translates even if Marasi has no understanding of the word. Is it possible that the word moon still exist in some vestigial form in scadrian like the word hound in axehound. If this is true then perhaps this will give us some clue as to why Kelsier invited a philologist on to his crew.

Scadrian has had multiple languages. We have no idea whether Ati and Leras used languages they knew when they created Scadrial. Hence it is unclear whether it can have vestiges from presumably Yolish.

On 26.12.2022 at 2:09 AM, CognitiveShadow said:

It’s just like in stormlight:

The ancestors of today's human Rosharans had hounds. The phenomenon that a word survives only in compounds is not rare, by the way. Do you think of "quoth the raven nevermore" when you read "bequeath" ? Or do you recognise the preposition in "midwife"?

[lacrossedeamon]

On 12/25/2022 at 7:50 PM, AquaRegia said:

I assumed Marasi heard a compound word which was half nonsense; something like "Fleeplight", where "light" is a word she recognizes, while "fleep" is not.

This is what I assumed. Marasi heard a partial calque with "moon" being said in Selish and "light" being said in Northern Scadrian.