Am I going insane or...?

[Shardbearer he/him]

Oh, a transliteralisation of some sound we don't really have?

[Morsk he/him]

I bet the h in "Valhav" is silent, and it's just there to avoid spelling it as "Valav" in English, which we'd be tempted to pronounce differently.

[Chromium Compounder]

Interesting that no one has mentioned Adonalsium's relation to Adoni, the Hebrew word for lord.  From the first time I heard the name Adonalsium I thought it was meant as a lord shard.  

 

In other words, Adonalsium is Lord of the Shards.

[Triumvirate he/him]

I don't think I ever admitted it, but I definitely recognized it, now that you mention it.  Nice.

[Thought]

What about Valhav? Wouldn't that make lh a single character as well? That seems a bit odd because it becomes val-hav with syllables added in.

 

Nah, it's just that "h" isn't a real letter, but a heavy breathing sound. Some languages leave it out entirely, and even English slaps it around a lot: for example, we say "an hour," "an herb," etc., instead of "a hour," "a herb," etc. If H were a real consonant, the latter would be correct, but it's not. So Valhav might better be represented in English as Val'av, but English speakers have no idea what to do with that: most of us would just pronounce it Valav, which it isn't.

 

"Sh and "th" are different, however. They're single letters that English, in its crazy-pants wisdom, represents as two letters each. "Th" is a great example, because so many languages use it. θ, ð, and þ can all of which get translated into English as "th." So when working backwards into Rosharian, it's likely that their native language treats them as single letters too. Alethela would probably be cleared written as Aleðela, but much like a heavy aspiration mark, English readers have no idea what to make of that.

Edited June 17, 2013 by Thought

[Khmauv he/him]

Always glad to provide interesting information, especially when it's about language. While I'm not a linguist, I've had historical training, and from that I "know" Latin (Classic and Medieval), Ancient Greek, modern German, Old English, and a smattering of Icelandic and Spanish. And by "know" I mean I can barely muddle through a translation provided I have a dictionary by my side and plenty of paper to take notes on, and recently had a refresher of some sort. I'm still working through Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis and it is very slow going.

Harrius Potter? What language are the spells in?

[Triumvirate he/him]

Latin, I believe.  Most all the spells are just Latin roots, prefixes and subjunctives (ha, making it up as I go along) smattered together.  "Wingardium Leviosa", etc.

[Khmauv he/him]

Latin, I believe.  Most all the spells are just Latin roots, prefixes and subjunctives (ha, making it up as I go along) smattered together.  "Wingardium Leviosa", etc.

...I know this is the case for and English version, but Thought is reading it in Latin. So if the book is in Latin are the spells in English?