Help me translate

[DreamIsCollapsing]

Hello all, 

 

Let's talk about name units. I dont know if you are aware (probably not if english) but GW stopped the translatation of units name. Apparently for copiright bull:cuss.

That's terrible, as a French baguette guyz I dont understand many of the new names. So i started a topic on a french forum to translate, or at least explain what the new name are. 

For exemple the new nurgle daemon. Plaguesbearers are now in French "Plaguesbearers". If you are an old friend with 40k like me, you remember the french name when GW was giving a :cuss about non english speaking country ("Portepeste" if you are curious). Anyway this one is easy. 

 

But then : Sloppity Bilepiper, Feculent Gnarlmaw.. (Feculent is what we call a "fake friend" in french, it's a world who looks like a french world who dont have anything to do with it. Feculent means Starchy in french, and i didnt know until recently why nurgle was making Potatoes in his garden..)

And they are so old english word, or word specific to english without french translation so I was hoping you could explain some of this word. 

 

Also maybe some fan lover know the etymology behind some word. I dont know where does Khorne come from for exemple (apparently not the nu-metal band). (Nurgle is from a mesopotamian god tho). 

 

FOUL BLIGHTSPAWN : I translate this as something like : The one who create (spawn) atrocious (foul, and not fool as I thought) disease (blight)

 

WARP : There is an english expression Warp and Woof, what does it means ? 

 

VENOMCRAWLER : Crawler ok, as it's a general name for insect crawling (in my skin ?) but why Venom ? This unit dont have Venom ability, am i missing something ? 

 

TALLYMEN : Didnt find a translation in french.

 

 

BIOLOGUS PUTRIFIER : Biologus en language warhammer c'est biologiste. Putrifier, attention faux ami ne vient pas de purifier (ce que j'ai longtemps cru), mais de Putrify, l'action d'amener au pourrissement. C'est donc un (Micro)biologiste de la Putréfaction. Miam.

 

FORGEFIEND : Forge (same word in french) and Fiend = Daemon. So Daemon of the forge ? 

 

 

SLOPPITY BILEPIPER : So Sloppity is a lazy man as i understood (a lazy plaguebearers in this context). Piper is the instrument, Bile is the liquid from the liver. So Bilepiper is a made up word for a Pipe from a liver am i right ?

 

SPOILPOX SCRIVENER : Scrivener is an old terme for writer was i told. Pox is the pox. Spoilpox ? I know they are different type of pox depending on the species it hits (canarypox, horsepox). Spoil (the name) is the loot you collect after a fight, so i dont understand this one. 

 

FECULENT GNARLMAW : So Feculent means "looks like feces", Gnarl is a portion on the tree and maw is a mouth. Is there a word play i dont see in this ? 

 

GREAT UNCLEAN ONE : Is this a reference to The Greats Ones from Lovecraft ?

 

Space marine interecessor : What does Intercessor means ? Looks like something the church. Same question for Inceptor. 

 

Reiver : Looks like an old english world to say "rob by force" is it right ? 

 

CUSTODIAN WARDEN : Custode means Guardian in latin, and warden means.. guardian in english ? So does it translate to "Guardian of guardian" ??

 

 

 

 

 

[Panzer]

 

stopped the translatation of units name

 

I'm actually glad to hear that. No offense but imo names shouldn't get translated ever. It's one of the reasons why I stopped buying the german Codexes etc.

[Gederas]

Intercessor is derived from the word intercede, meaning "intervene on behalf of another.".

 

Inceptor means "one that incepts at a university." or "one that begins or introduces.". Incept is a word that means "graduate from a university with an academic degree."

 

Also, yes, this means the Intercessors and Inceptors have the meanings of their names backwards. Because the Intercessors were intorduced as newly promoted Marines, while Inceptors intercede into combat via their jump packs.

 

Tallyman = Guy who counts tallies. Simple as that

 

RE Etymology: Khorne's name etymology is hilarious if only because of the word "Khorne" in Ancient Cypriot Greek literally means to "Crap Blood". Kh' - "To force outward", ORN - "Back passage", Ee - "Blood". Which uh.... Explains why he's so angry all the time

 

I could explain more, but I have to head to work now.

Edited February 18, 2020 by Gederas

[Marshal Rohr]

Sloppity Bilepiper is a name, no? You don’t translate names. Jean doesn’t become John. Mathieu doesn’t become Matthew. When I lived abroad they had us just pick local names to go by since English names don’t translate well to Arabic and some where too hard to pronounce.

[Gederas]

Okay, now that I'm back, let me get down to it.

 

MetalMammoth already summed up the Foul Blightspawn's etymology, but I'll add an additional tidbit regarding the name: The Foul Blightspawn smells so bad other Plague Marines think he smells bad. Plague. Marines. The living embodiment of decay and disease thinks the guy needs to take a shower because he smells that foul.

 

The Spoilpox Scrivener's name is is derived from three words: spoil, pox and scrivener. It's not using the word spoil in its definition like "spoils of war" but "spoiled" as in "rotten food". You're correct regarding the meaning of the word scrivener though. (he's a specific type of Herald of Nurgle that's writing all of the diseases that pop up down, as well as keeping track of what the Plaguebearers are doing)

 

As MetalMammoth said, the Feculent Gnarlmaw's name basically means "a tree that's twisted, with a mouth, that smells like feces".

 

... And yes, the "Guardian Guardian". GW does that kind of stuff. Take for example, Khârn the Betrayer: I'm told "Khârn" means betrayer in some kind of arabic language, so his name is Betrayer the Betrayer.

Actually, if literally translated, Custodian-Warden is more like Janitor-Guardian which is probably worse:)

A Custodian takes care of a building, and a Warden oversees it's security. Kinda makes sense, because the Custodians after all, are looking after the Imperial Palace. Keep in mind, we're talking about a universe where "Librarian" is also a pretty hardcore job that involves fighting demons on a regular basis....

It's not just GW that does that stuff with redundancies/repetitive names. People speaking English do this all the time. For example, you'll often hear someone say they need to go to the ATM Machine at the bank to get money. ATM being an acronym of.... Automated Teller Machine

 

Also regarding Librarians: Space Marine Librarians are ALSO actual Librarians if you read the lore. They keep their Chapter's lore and archives when not out in battle.

 

(though the real question with Khârn's name is why a dude from Siberia, that speaks with a Russian accent, has an Arabic name in the first place..... )

 

Sloppity Bilepiper is a name, no? You don’t translate names. Jean doesn’t become John. Mathieu doesn’t become Matthew. When I lived abroad they had us just pick local names to go by since English names don’t translate well to Arabic and some where too hard to pronounce.

Sloppity Bilepiper is a Job Title, not a name.

Edited February 19, 2020 by Gederas

[Rik Lightstar]

On the Intercessor vs Inceptor thing, I think you guys are off the mark.

 

The Inception of something is its very beginning, so the Inceptors are appropriately named, they are the ones that begin the assault with targeted firepower through a drop strike or rapid redeployment.

 

Interceding is interrupting on someone's behalf and typically swinging the fight/argument and that again exactly represents what the Intercessors should be doing. They should get involved later and tip the balance.

 

 

 

Reivers were specifically raiders who would strike across borders and then drop back to safety (over the English/Scots border mostly).

 

Custodian Warden is indeed a double naming, however it's two things the Organisation they are members of makes them Custodians, that's their affiliation so to speak, where as Warden is the individual role as are Vertus Praetor, Allarus Terminator and Shield-Captain. It makes sense that MOST Custodians are Wardens as that's the purpose of the Custodians but there's still a distinction between roles.

 

Rik

Edited February 19, 2020 by Rik Lightstar

[DreamIsCollapsing]

 

 

stopped the translatation of units name

 

I'm actually glad to hear that. No offense but imo names shouldn't get translated ever. It's one of the reasons why I stopped buying the german Codexes etc.

 

 

I kinda disagree, but that's not the point of this topic. I'm aiming at comprehend those words more thant translating them. 

 

 

Sloppity Bilepiper is a name, no? You don’t translate names. Jean doesn’t become John. Mathieu doesn’t become Matthew. When I lived abroad they had us just pick local names to go by since English names don’t translate well to Arabic and some where too hard to pronounce.

 

It's a made up name, and i want to know where does it come from. Let's take an exemple, and imagine Pokemon were, in fact, French and you, English speaking, are to play Pokemon with the non translated names. You will probably want to know what the heck is a DRACOFEU. Well it's made from DRACO : Dragon and FEU : Fire. Make sense, that's my point here, comprehend the name. (I should have put a different title on this topic tho). 

 

Intercessor is derived from the word intercede, meaning "intervene on behalf of another.".

 

Inceptor means "one that incepts at a university." or "one that begins or introduces.". Incept is a word that means "graduate from a university with an academic degree."

 

Also, yes, this means the Intercessors and Inceptors have the meanings of their names backwards. Because the Intercessors were intorduced as newly promoted Marines, while Inceptors intercede into combat via their jump packs.

 

Tallyman = Guy who counts tallies. Simple as that

 

RE Etymology: Khorne's name etymology is hilarious if only because of the word "Khorne" in Ancient Cypriot Greek literally means to "Crap Blood". Kh' - "To force outward", ORN - "Back passage", Ee - "Blood". Which uh.... Explains why he's so angry all the time

 

I could explain more, but I have to head to work now.

 

 

Wooaw, where does the Khorne is :cussting blood come from ? That's... pretty brutal (insert meme). 

 

It's not just GW that does that stuff with redundancies/repetitive names. People speaking English do this all the time. For example, you'll often hear someone say they need to go to the ATM Machine at the bank to get money. ATM being an acronym of.... Automated Teller Machine

 

 

Yes, we got the same thing in french. One of the most disturbing is the expression "Au jour d'aujourd'hui", wich means "Today". But HUI is an old french world for today, JOUR means today and AU JOUR means.. today. So thats translate in : In today day of today. 

And they you got some fool who go with "Au jour du jour d'aujourd'hui" : In the today's day of today today". 

 

But I just saw that Warden can also means "Director". So Custodian Warden could translate in Directof of the Guardian ? 

 

"Reiver" is like "Raider" - in this case it doesn't refer to them stealing your things, rather to them appearing swiftly and killing stuff. What did the French call the Viking raiders of old? That's probably a good start, unless it's something like "Those goat-lover sons of cheap women"

 

 

We dont have a word for that. Raider is translated into "Pilleurs" but it emphase on robbing and destroying thing, not so much on killing. 

 

So "blightspawn" could be something like "product of disease" or "child of infection".

 

 

That's my question : BlightSpawn means it's a personn created by disease or a person who creat disease ? (The second one fit more with the fluff). 

 

As for Khorne, Tzeetch, and everything that doesn't sound english, or in fact, human, I'm sure you weren't supposed to translate them. Only do their titles, like "The Blood-God" or "Changer of Ways"

 

 

Really dont want to translate Khorn or Tzzeencht, but i'm interested in finding where does those name come from (we already got Nurgle). 

 

@Rik : Thats some good stuff about Intercessor/tor. 

 

Tanks all for those. If you got info on the origines of warhammer name i'm interested. 

[Grand Master Laertes]

"

 

Really dont want to translate Khorn or Tzzeencht, but i'm interested in finding where does those name come from (we already got Nurgle).

 

 

From an interview to Brian Ansell (that was GW's General Manager when the Chaos Gods were invented):

 

Nurgle is an “actual” god (honest). Nergal is a Babylonian god who goes back to prehistoric times: he was still around to be worshipped by the Assyrians. I changed the spelling because I thought that “Nurgle” was more amusing. Also, it could be the sound of a death rattle, or air being expelled from a rotting, putrescent carcass. Nergal is god of death, disease and pestilence. Also god of war and ruler of the underworld (or sometimes his wife is). As he’s been around for a very long time his attributes have changed back and forth over the years. I’m sure he’s extremely pleased that we are still thinking of him. Perhaps with all this attention we might eventually conjure up a physical manifestation.

Khorne was derived from Conan’s “Crom”, who is an “actual” Celtic god who can also be spelt Krom or Khram. Good name for a war god.

Slaanesh was meant to be a sibilant, erotic, breathy, whispered/murmured sound. The models didn’t turn out quite as erotically charged as I’d hoped.

Tzeentch was meant to be the sound of a spell blasting out. Like in a Dr Strange comic. It also has a sort of Aztec feel: which goes with the feathers and the bright pastel colours.

 

[Gederas]

RE Etymology: Khorne's name etymology is hilarious if only because of the word "Khorne" in Ancient Cypriot Greek literally means to "Crap Blood". Kh' - "To force outward", ORN - "Back passage", Ee - "Blood". Which uh.... Explains why he's so angry all the time

Wooaw, where does the Khorne is :cussting blood come from ? That's... pretty brutal (insert meme).

As I said, it's from Ancient Cypriot Greek, made by breaking up Khorne's name into the constituent parts in Ancient Cypriot Greek.

 

It's not just GW that does that stuff with redundancies/repetitive names. People speaking English do this all the time. For example, you'll often hear someone say they need to go to the ATM Machine at the bank to get money. ATM being an acronym of.... Automated Teller Machine

Yes, we got the same thing in french. One of the most disturbing is the expression "Au jour d'aujourd'hui", wich means "Today". But HUI is an old french world for today, JOUR means today and AU JOUR means.. today. So thats translate in : In today day of today. 

And they you got some fool who go with "Au jour du jour d'aujourd'hui" : In the today's day of today today".

Good to know every language does that. But I think (American, because of course we're the ones who made this abomination) English takes the cake with "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo". Which is a grammatically correct sentence. Yes, really :lol:

[Dagoth Ur]

 

 

 

 

 

RE Etymology: Khorne's name etymology is hilarious if only because of the word "Khorne" in Ancient Cypriot Greek literally means to "Crap Blood". Kh' - "To force outward", ORN - "Back passage", Ee - "Blood". Which uh.... Explains why he's so angry all the time

Wooaw, where does the Khorne is :cussting blood come from ? That's... pretty brutal (insert meme).

As I said, it's from Ancient Cypriot Greek, made by breaking up Khorne's name into the constituent parts in Ancient Cypriot Greek.

 

It's not just GW that does that stuff with redundancies/repetitive names. People speaking English do this all the time. For example, you'll often hear someone say they need to go to the ATM Machine at the bank to get money. ATM being an acronym of.... Automated Teller Machine

Yes, we got the same thing in french. One of the most disturbing is the expression "Au jour d'aujourd'hui", wich means "Today". But HUI is an old french world for today, JOUR means today and AU JOUR means.. today. So thats translate in : In today day of today.

And they you got some fool who go with "Au jour du jour d'aujourd'hui" : In the today's day of today today".

Good to know every language does that. But I think (American, because of course we're the ones who made this abomination) English takes the cake with "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo". Which is a grammatically correct sentence. Yes, really :lol:

Let me hit you with one in serbocroatian that is both grammatically and semantically correct: Gore gore gore gore. All are pronounced the same but translate to "Above there the hills burn even worse."

[Ayatollah_of_Rock_n_Rolla]

 

RE Etymology: Khorne's name etymology is hilarious if only because of the word "Khorne" in Ancient Cypriot Greek literally means to "Crap Blood". Kh' - "To force outward", ORN - "Back passage", Ee - "Blood". Which uh.... Explains why he's so angry all the time

 

I could explain more, but I have to head to work now.

 

I can't take it on your word only here. Please give us references to inscriptions containing these words, tell what are their Attic or Mycenian equivalents, explain possible phonetic changes. Because in this form none of the words is Greek nor it is transcription from the syllabic script.

 

[alfred_the_great]

Tallyman is also a phrase for death. In this symbolism, he is counting the souls coming across to him.

 

No sources beyond local stories!!

[Lord Nord in Gravis Armour]

On the Intercessor vs Inceptor thing, I think you guys are off the mark.

 

The Inception of something is its very beginning, so the Inceptors are appropriately named, they are the ones that begin the assault with targeted firepower through a drop strike or rapid redeployment.

 

Interceding is interrupting on someone's behalf and typically swinging the fight/argument and that again exactly represents what the Intercessors should be doing. They should get involved later and tip the balance.

 

That's how I always read it, too. I mean, the Inceptors are literally there at the INCEPTION of the ground war, dropping in fast and taking out AAA targets while the Intercessors are still checking their seatbelts.

[Ascanius]

I'll give you some Google Translate-driven examples of how I'd interpret these names. Where there are compound names I'll hyphenate them because I have no idea how French handles that normally. Any alternatives you can mix and match parts of.

 

Foul Blightspawn - Something like Fétide Nielle-Progeniture or Pollué Corruption-Ponte.

 

Warp - The English has a dual or even triple meaning. "Warp" as a verb means to twist, deform, bend out of shape, as others have noted, but "warp and woof" or, more commonly, "warp and weft" refers to weaving cloth. The warp strands are held stationary on the frame and the weft/woof strands are passed through the warp strands in an over-and-under pattern. The double meaning is because "the warp" in Warhammer is the realm of Chaos from which magic comes and through which spaceships travel, so it's part of the fabric of reality. It's especially clever because the warp in Warhammer is both the source of magic which changes or mutates things and a timeless dimension which is analogous with being the stationary, unchanging part of that fabric.

 

In French I assume the pun doesn't translate in the same way, but something like Déformation or even Fausseté to capture the third Warhammer-applicable meaning of "warp", which is to twist or distort the truth, falsify reality.

 

Venomcrawler - You don't seem to need help with this but yeah, it's just a creepy-sounding name. Venin-Rampeur or whatever, if you wanted a more different form.

 

Tallyman - Guess I'd go with Pointage-ouvrier or Compte-homme. "Tallyman" just means "a person who counts things" in the sense of a job title like "baker" or "carpenter", albeit one that's archaic. You could also check and see how "tallyman" is translated in any French version of 'The Banana Boat Song' that may exist.

 

Biologus Putrifier - You know about "biologist" but as you can see it's a kind of fake Latin version of the word with "-us" on the end instead of "-ist". You could leave it the same or go for Biologuse if that doesn't look too weird. A "putrifier" is just "one who putrefies" so you could go with Putréfieur or Décomposeur.

 

Forgefiend - You have this under control, but maybe Forge-Infernal to preserve the distinction between "daemon/demon" and "fiend"?

 

Sloppity Bilepiper - As others have said, "sloppity" isn't a real English word, it's kind of childish wordplay. In English children's rhymes you might hear phrases like "the rabbit went hoppity-hop", for instance.

 

In conjunction with "bilepiper" I personally take the basic word "sloppy" to relate more to something that's mushy or liquid than the other meanings of "untidy" or "vague". In English you can say that water can slop out of a bucket, for instance. So for "sloppity" some variation on Détrempé would make sense. Again, no idea how you do that in French! Détrempité appears to not be a word itself, for instance.

 

For Bilepiper, "bile" is the same so Bile-Cornemuseur, maybe?

 

Spoilpox Scrivener - Gâcher-Vérole Scribe or Enlaidir-Vérole Scribe. "Scrivener" is another antique or archaic word - how is the title of Herman Melville's "Bartleby the Scrivener" translated into French?

 

Feculent Gnarlmaw - Fécond Hargne-Gueule seems like a pretty straightforward translation. A looser alternative would be Dégueulasse Nœud-Gouffre.

 

Great Unclean One - I'd be tempted to translate "great" as Gros for the English pun on "gross". Something like Gros Sale Une or Grand Être Impur.

 

Intercessor - This is not a common English word. A 'normal' construction (which would still not be used very often in English) would be "interceder", someone who intercedes with an authority on another's behalf, like if a respected colleague had a word with your boss to get you out of trouble. But there is a straight French translation for the religious term "intercessor", which is unsurprisingly Intercesseur.

 

Inceptor - Again, not a normal English word. "Inceptor" in Latin is Débutant in French, but hey. In general, "incept" means to start or initiate, so you could do something with Entamer (Entameur?) or even go with a somewhat punny take and use Lanceur (because they launch combat by launching from space), unless that's already used for smoke launchers.

 

(The definition of someone who graduates from university with a degree given earlier in the thread is so uncommon that I've never heard of it before, but I am Australian and we don't necessarily hear all of these archaic phrases. It was more than enough that my university distinguished between "graduands", people who had completed their courses and qualified to graduate, and "graduates", people who had actually gone through the graduation ceremony.)

 

Reiver - So "reive" means raid and "reave" means "plunder or rob". They're closely related - you'd reive another town to reave them of food and money - but since the root idea is "raider", maybe something like Braqueur would work?

 

Custodian Warden - You're right that they basically mean the same thing. Again, "custodian" derives from Latin (Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? and all that), so you could leave it alone, or do something like Gardien Veilleur?