‘i Ge ‘erRoPeGu KtleTaChaTe
“Have you heard of the Dragon People?”
click to visit larger image The History, page 1 From Grass Dog Studio |
You may notice in The Epic of Sally Robertson that Fenmere, the Worm, refers to himself as “Poet of the Dragon People”. This is the first page in his origin myth. If you look at this page and take note of the little black figure closest to the big dragon’s tongue, that’s Fenmere.
The script around the outside of the page is in Fenmere’s original tongue, which most people call FaNaMaRa (though that is not technically correct – FaNaMaRa means “poetry”, and I’m still waffling on the real name of the language).
I’m planning on making an 18 page book of illustrations that tell this origin story. There are several other myths as well that will be told other ways. But, in the book, I’m not planning on using any English. It’ll just be the illustrations and the script. But! I’ll include the translations here in the blog posts!
Translations for page 1
Big letters:
‘e’o KtleTaChaTe oBiPaYeZ’a
“[the Great One] Birthed 900,000 Children”
Smaller letters to the left:
NoLuBuNoJeDa FeFaFe BeBa
“We don’t tell stories of the Father” or “We don’t know the Father”
Smaller letters to the right:
JeDoKeRu BeNeJaDe Be ‘oo
“Maybe the Father has negotiated with the Story Teller” or “The Father may have spoken with Bone Jackdaw”
I’ve been working on this language for the past couple of weeks, and it’s becoming fairly complete, in terms of its grammar. Eventually, I’ll have a website with a searchable dictionary for it. And a font for the script.
The script is supposed to be based on someone using a talon to write it in the sand. Of course, it can be imitated with a brush easily (that’s how I did it here). I do plan on making a clay talon and going down the beach and experimenting with it to be sure it works the way I expect.
Anyway, this is all cannon. If you’re reading the comic, reading this will help you understand it!
In the Beginning originally appeared on Drawing Contraption on 2014/03/21.