The Pictorial D'ni Dictionary

larryf58 · **Posted:** Thu Jul 14, 2016 12:58 pm

Zunu is the D'ni word for ending. The root word is zu, meaning end.

...And this is an ending, but not necessarily the end.

Zunu is the last word that I can easily find an illustration for. You can help out if you want. I'm always open to suggestions about how to illustrate more difficult words.

So, while this is the last of the first series of word illustrations, as they say in D'ni... khapo rezunu rildolgelenij gath (perhaps the ending has not yet been written). You can take a look at the D'ni Dictionary, and if you can imagine an illustration for a word I haven't done yet, I'm waiting to hear from you.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Fri Jul 15, 2016 12:12 pm

The cardinal directions in D'ni are rema (north), vamo (east), tēma (south), and sāra (west).

This is a big change from my normal layout for words. I had to leave the "porthole" off because it covered too much of the design. This is also the first time I've put multiple words on the same illustration.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Sat Jul 16, 2016 2:21 pm

Here, we begin the second series of words. These words are a little harder to find illustrations for, but I gave it my best shot.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Sun Jul 17, 2016 1:02 pm

Continuing:

larryf58 · **Posted:** Mon Jul 18, 2016 12:29 pm

Continuing to experiment with a new layout based on feedback from the commentary topic. It was suggested that I add a ring around the image, and I had the choice of either moving the word and translation texts higher up, which would have covered more of the illustration, or doing this.

Arotan is a word that calls for a little thought. While "outsider" is a translation that captures its meaning, we are told that the literal translation is "other". Yet that makes no sense, because the -tan suffix is a modifier that "changes a verb into a noun that performs the verb". The root word, aro, would have to be a verb to have that suffix, and "other" is an adjective.

Much the same applies to "outsider". "Outside" is a noun, not a verb, so the root word aro can't be that either.

The waters are even more muddied by the habit of many players who like to translate it as "book-worlder", which makes even less sense because in D'ni, bookworld woud be kordova, and the -tan suffix wouldn't fit that either because it's another noun.

In summary, I doubt that we really know what aro means yet, only that it's a verb of some sort.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Tue Jul 19, 2016 12:14 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 20, 2016 12:33 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Fri Jul 22, 2016 12:09 pm

This is another difficult word to illustrate. This is the second version of this illustration. I didn't like the first at all.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Sat Jul 23, 2016 12:46 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Sun Jul 24, 2016 1:24 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Mon Jul 25, 2016 11:22 pm

Chiso is the root word, and it's a verb meaning "to archive". The -tav suffix changes the verb into a noun, "an archive".

larryf58 · **Posted:** Tue Jul 26, 2016 12:12 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Wed Jul 27, 2016 12:53 pm

larryf58 · **Posted:** Thu Jul 28, 2016 12:25 pm

D'ni is a spelling variation of this word. It can also be translated as "new start" or "new beginning", but the literal translation is "new again". Since "renew" means "to make new again", that's the definition I chose for this illustration... mainly because it's just one word and the others are not.

larryf58 · **Posted:** Fri Jul 29, 2016 12:32 pm

Dū is the root word in the name of a granary Age, Er'duna. While the name of the guild which owned that Age and many others is normally translated as the Guild of Caterers, that's not a literal translation. The guild's name in D'ni is Telokh Dū'sholtantē, which translates as "guild of food preparers". In other words, it could just as easily be translated as the Guild of Cooks.

But it goes much deeper than that. The Guild was one of the eighteen major guilds that ruled D'ni after the abdication of King Kerath, and it was a major guild because it was far more important that just the name suggests.

When you live underground all your life, there aren't very many things you can do to grow or gather food. There were fish in the D'ni lake system, and mushrooms and other fungi might have been available, but that's a pretty limited diet and with a population of hundreds of thousands, you'd fish the lakes out pretty quickly if they were all you had. That's where the guild of caterers came in. They were not necessarily responsible for cooking, although they did that. What they really did was to produce food for D'ni. They owned many Ages where they had extensive farms, ranches, fisheries, and other means of production, and they processed the raw foodstuffs into the products that were part of the D'ni diet.

If you were a D'ni housewife, you probably cooked for your family. But you started by going to a guild market and buying guild bread, meats, and vegetables. Literally everything you put on the table save water was thanks to the guild of caterers and the massive organization they had in place to bring that food to you. Without them, life in the D'ni caverns would not have been possible. Is it any wonder that they were considered one of the most important of the important guilds?

The Pictorial D'ni Dictionary

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