Translation of the Cover page of 'The Treatise Metallurgic.'

[valkynphyre]

For those of you who have the Mistborn adventure game, around page 262, there is a full-page drawing of a steel inquisitor with symbols, obviously a written language, describing the drawing. Much like the drawings in the Way of Kings, the symbols do not directly correlate to our alphabet, but after some work I was able to translate them.

I present this unto thee, fellow sharders.

Hemalurgy, holiest of holy powers. By The LORD RULER, who shall live forever, God over men. Let not the knowledge of these sacred pages pass beyond the ministers, who dwell within his house, by his Holy Grace Unending.

Hemalurgy is greater by far than the lesser powers of allomancy or the barbarian powers of feruchemy, for it is the sum of both and more. Once granted unto the blessed of STEEL, they shall be forever changed.

Iron: Grant strength taken from humans.

Steel: Grant a physical power of Allomancy.

Tin: Enhance the human senses.

Pewter: Grant a physical power of Feruchemy.

Zinc: Enhance emotional fortitude.

Brass: Grant a mental power of Feruchemy

Copper: Enhance memory and intelligence.

Bronze: Grant a mental power of Allomancy.

Atium: Grant a power of temporal Allomancy.

Aluminum: Enhance a power of Allomancy.

Though you strike out their eyes,

they shall see the hearts of men.

For those who would truly serve His Grace, there shall ever be three of Steel to mark them.

Two shall bind their sight, and one shall bind their soul. Let the sacred spike of blessed metal pierce the heart of the sacrifice, to consume the soul and power. Thus prepared, the spike is thrust into the body and blood of the chosen by the Lord Ruler to receive his benediction.

Hope you guys enjoy!

Edit: Corrected a few minor mistranslations, as pointed out by Inkthinker. and finally figured out the typo that people were talking about. It is now "greater by far" as it should be.

Edited May 8, 2012 by valkynphyre

[Windrunner]

Wow! Great job! Was it written in the Steel Alphabet? If so it'd be nice if you could post the phonetic equivalents to English, since we don't know them yet. This is super cool!

[Voidus]

Yeah I'd love to see a phonetic translation, I have this thing about learning languages from fiction.

[valkynphyre]

Yes, definitely written in the steel alphabet. I can give you some of the equivalent symbols and the sounds they correlate to, but not all of them represent metals we know.

I'll take a gander.

A is represented by the symbol for Larasium

B is represented by the symbol for Iron

The 'K' sound is represented by the symbol for Bendalloy

the 'S' sound is represented by the symbol for Duralumin

CH is represented by the symbol at the chapter 20 header in TFE.

D is represented by the symbol for Copper

E and I are represented by the symbol for Tin. Tin also represents ie, ei, and any combination of those sounds

F/ph is represented by the symbol for Malatium

G is represented by the symbol for Cadmium

H is represented by the symbol at the chapter 21 header of TFE.

E and I are represented by the symbol for Tin. Tin also represents ie, ei, and any combination of those sounds

There were no J's on the page

The 'K' sound is represented by the symbol for Bendalloy

L and Ll are represented by the symbol for Zinc.

M is represented by the symbol for Gold

N is represented by the symbol for Electrum

O, Ou, U, and other similar vowel sounds are represented by the symbol for Pewter

P is represented by the symbol for Steel

Ph is represented by the symbol for Malatium

There were no Q's on the page

R is represented by the symbol for Brass

S is represented by the symbol for Duralumin

SH is represented by the symbol in the chapter 22 header of TFE.

T is represented by the symbol for Bronze

O, Ou, U, and other similar vowel sounds are represented by the symbol for Pewter

V is represented by the symbol for Atium

W is represented by the symbol for Chromium

There were no X's on the page

Y is represented by the symbol for Nicrosil

There were no Z's on the page

Edited to include symbols we've seen in chapter headers.

Edited May 1, 2012 by valkynphyre

[Windrunner]

Thanks so much! This is extremely neat.

[Elwynn]

Incredibly awesome. Nice job!

Tried applying it to AoL, Argle-bargle, glop-glyph. On to Mistborn trilogy!

[Eri]

Great job!

As for ‘ie’ and similar – I think every sequence of same glyph (like ‘ll’ etc) just gets compressed into single glyph, as a general rule.

edit: Also, new symbols aren't really new. Look at Mistborn (1st book) chapter headings. All letters are present there, so you can refer to the non-known-metal glyphs as ‘glyph number X’, X being the chapter number.

Edited May 1, 2012 by Eri

[valkynphyre]

I'll look into that, and see if that is true. If it is, I will post them.

It looks like there's a few symbols that weren't even used on that page, there's one at the start of chapter 19 that is unfamiliar. also, there's a simple one on the prologue and epilogue that never appear on the Treatise Metallurgic.

I imagine the symbol on the prologue represents the number 1, and the one on chapter nineteen represents J, Z or Q.

If I was going to write an X, i would just use the symbol for K and then S.

The steel Alphabet is remarkable similar to what we see in The Way of Kings.

Edited May 1, 2012 by valkynphyre

[RenegadeShroom]

Wow, great job with the translation! If I may ask, how'd you figure it out? XD

Regarding the hemalurgic powers listed there. . . I find it interesting that for aluminium, it says "enhance a power of Allomancy", as opposed to "grant a power of enhancement Allomancy". Granted, being an in-world text means it's potentially incorrect, but does anyone have any thoughts on that?

[CrazyRioter]

this is really awesome.

[Dahak]

Wow, great job with the translation! If I may ask, how'd you figure it out? XD

Regarding the hemalurgic powers listed there. . . I find it interesting that for aluminium, it says "enhance a power of Allomancy", as opposed to "grant a power of enhancement Allomancy". Granted, being an in-world text means it's potentially incorrect, but does anyone have any thoughts on that?

That implies the possibility of a fifth type of Kandra blessing. The four we know of being the four metals that are described as enhance this that or the other.

[Joe ST]

this is awesome thanks so much. Am I ok to transcribe your findings/translation into the wiki?

EDIT: also

and

for references (the first one has letter assignments that have been confirmed to be incorrect/outdated by Peter).

[valkynphyre]

this is awesome thanks so much. Am I ok to transcribe your findings/translation into the wiki?

EDIT: also

and

for references (the first one has letter assignments that have been confirmed to be incorrect/outdated by Peter).

Well, as long as we can get what's posted there corrected, I have no problem with it going on the Wiki. That would be awesome.

AS for how I translated it, I looked for one, two, and three letter words. I knew a one letter word was either I or A. A three letter word was most likely AND or THE. Once I found a three letter word and a one letter word, I tried both, and when I got AND and A to be the right symbols, the rest just kinda fell into place like a puzzle.

Also, in regards to Kandra blessings, My assumption has always been that there are Eight possible. Four among the basic metals, Four among the temporal and enhancement metals. What exactly they would be is pointless speculation, for now.

Edited May 2, 2012 by valkynphyre

[Joe ST]

Awesome, thank's very much I'll try and retranslate the page using your charset when I get home

[ReaderAt2046]

this is awesome thanks so much. Am I ok to transcribe your findings/translation into the wiki?

EDIT: also

and

for references (the first one has letter assignments that have been confirmed to be incorrect/outdated by Peter).

Someone make a font out of this!

[valkynphyre]

Please!

[Kurkistan]

Excellent work!

*Must...fight...urge...to write a ludicrously long transcription program for whenever someone comes up with a font*

Edited May 2, 2012 by Kurkistan

[valkynphyre]

Should actually be really similar to Alethi. the same conversions appear to be taking place. Almost like they were both written by shards of the same God... oh, wait....

Edited May 2, 2012 by valkynphyre

[Kurkistan]

Should actually be really similar to Alethi. the same conversions appear to be taking place. Almost like they were both written by shards of the same God... oh, wait....

Huh... We might actually be in business. So we'll need a side-by-side comparison of both, someone to develop a font following similar rules for each symbol, a means to toggle between the two "modes"...

This might take awhile.

[PeterAhlstrom]

I made a font for the Alloy of Law versions...

[Kurkistan]

I made a font for the Alloy of Law versions...

Oh really?

[Kurkistan]

Update:

Looking at the comparison, it looks like valkynphyre was right and we have almost a 1-1 correspondence between the alphabets. New Brandon signing question (or Peter, if he's feeling generous): "Were the Scadralian and Alethi alphabets designed by the same (in world) person?"

"Scadralian" adds 'w' and commas/periods, so hurrah there. Currently representing 'w' with just a 'u' in the Roman-Alethi converter, so easy as cake to switch those out.

As noted, the page lacks 'x', 'z', 'q', and 'j'. It also appears that Scadralian lacks a unique character for 'th', going with just a 't'+'h'. Generally an easy conversion if I have reason to do it, though the lack of a 'j' bothers me.

On a side note, how did you manage to get a high enough resolution to see all of the symbols clearly, valkynphyre? I zoomed in on my PDF and could barely make out the symbols even when I knew which ones to look for where.

Edited May 3, 2012 by Kurkistan

[valkynphyre]

On a side note, how did you manage to get a high enough resolution to see all of the symbols clearly, valkynphyre? I zoomed in on my PDF and could barely make out the symbols even when I knew which ones to look for where.

Well, it wasn't really high resolution at all. It was terribly pixellated and grainy. I just worked with what I had. Luckily, most symbols were distinct from the others around them, though several gave me PROBLEMS. especially in the first couple of lines, there's a brass symbol followed by lerasium, and they mash together... I thought it was two new symbols for a while. The symbols for steel were completely indistinct, where they represent the word Steel. I just looked at all the symbols, how the crescent was shaped, and where the dot was until I got it right.

Chromium was also terribly difficult to distinguish.

Mostly i zoomed in to about 200%, then zoomed in or zoomed out until i got a decent enough picture to recognize. About halfway through, though, I didn't have to zoom it all and reading it became much easier with familiarity. The last couple of lines were almost like reading in english... okay, more like reading in french, which I don't know very well.

speaking of just having the PDF, does anyone have a physical copy of it yet? They never mentioned how long I would have to wait to receive it. 6-8 weeks?

[Kurkistan]

Well, it wasn't really high resolution at all. It was terribly pixellated and grainy. I just worked with what I had. Luckily, most symbols were distinct from the others around them, though several gave me PROBLEMS. especially in the first couple of lines, there's a brass symbol followed by lerasium, and they mash together... I thought it was two new symbols for a while. The symbols for steel were completely indistinct, where they represent the word Steel. I just looked at all the symbols, how the crescent was shaped, and where the dot was until I got it right.

Chromium was also terribly difficult to distinguish.

Mostly i zoomed in to about 200%, then zoomed in or zoomed out until i got a decent enough picture to recognize. About halfway through, though, I didn't have to zoom it all and reading it became much easier with familiarity. The last couple of lines were almost like reading in english... okay, more like reading in french, which I don't know very well.

speaking of just having the PDF, does anyone have a physical copy of it yet? They never mentioned how long I would have to wait to receive it. 6-8 weeks?

Well I'll be chromium-leeched. That's downright heroic. How long did the whole process take/why did you decide to embark upon it?

P.S. Also, I didn't order the physical book (yes, I am cheap), so I don't know.

Edited May 4, 2012 by Kurkistan

[valkynphyre]

Well, it all started about 2 years ago, when someone cracked the Alethi language. I didn't think it could be done. I was wrong. So, this time, I decided to do it myself. If I hadn't known how to translate Alethi already, it would have taken a lot longer. I was looking for the CHs, the Shs, and the Ths, and once I started identifying vowels, i remembered they were grouped in Alethi and that saved me time, too.

I think it took about 2 and a half hours, total. My little brother helped a bit, too.

I wrote down every new character, made a few guesses as to which letters they represented, but mostly it turned into one of those transcription puzzles that always lead to corny jokes.

I hate corny transcription puzzle jokes.

But, I digress. I noticed no one had translated this yet, and I just had to do it for myself. It was quite enjoyable.

Edit: on a different note entirely, I NEED a profile pic of my name in a stylized steel alphabet font. Guess I'll have to do that.

Hey, Indispensable Peter Ahlstrom, any chance that AoL font could somehow make its way in my direction? Pretty pony please?

Edited May 4, 2012 by valkynphyre