#boralverse

vasir /vaˈzɪr/ [vɐˈzɪː]

vizier, minister, a high executive officer in certain (esp Arab and/or Muslim) monarchies;

envoy, attaché, diplommat, a senior official representing a state in negotiation or at a foreign court;

puppetmaster, éminence grise, grey eminence, one who wields the real authority while another nominally rules;

(chess) queen, the most powerful piece on the board which moves both orthogonally or diagonally

Etymology: borrowed from Arabic وَزِير • wazīr "vizier, minister", literally "carrier". The word entered Borlish in the late medieval period, originally restricted to accounts of foreign courts and to the game of chess; use for diplomats in general and by extension puppetmasters in other contexts is seen from the seventeenth century.

ligaçon /ˌli.gaˈtsɔn/ [ˌli.gɐˈtsɔn]

link, connection, bond, tie, a thing that joins two or more entities;

relationship, relations, the ongoing state of connection between persons or groups (esp in political use);

liaison, affair, dalliance, an illicit or informal romantic attachment;

(medicine) ligature, ligation, the tying-off of a vessel or duct, or the cord used to do so

Etymology: Middle Borlish, an action noun from ligar "to bind, bandage, link" < Latin ligō "I tie, bind", reinforced by direct borrowing of Latin ligātiō "a binding". The genteel use for an illicit attachment is a nineteenth-century euphemism; the surgical sense follows Latin medical usage.

cateu /kaˈtau/ [kɐˈtau]

wicked, evil, vile, despicable, ill-intentioned or morally reprehensible;

mean, nasty, spiteful, malicious, disposed to cause (especially petty) harm or taking pleasure in others' misfortune;

naughty, contrary, badly behaved, wayward, (of a child) given to mischief-making or disobedience;

foul, grim, miserable, (of weather) unpleasant due to e.g. cold or wet or wind;

bad, wretched, unfortunate, (of luck or circumstances) not at all conducive to success or flourishing

Etymology: directly from Old Borlish cativ "wretched, pitiable", from Latin captīvus "captive, imprisoned". The semantic shift to immorality (with parallels in e.g. Norman caitiff "cowardly" or Portingale catio "child" < "puny, scrawny") occurred through the transition to Middle Borlish, motivated by the theological notion of wrongdoers being "captives of sin, or of the devil". The applications to weather and to children are both attested from the early modern period.

continued translation from the beginning of [real-life] book The Henchmen of Zenda by KJ Charles, a 2018 pastiche of the 1894 romp The Prisoner of Zenda.

L'oc nolois surcair glonscellous sad just ða y scon femn aus dottr menað a nascenç. This would not have been a great problem if the new wife had had daughters.

Doum sceint cossy, la nastisceu un heir, un ivan ayent sy pariscenç heritað eð eld un picq dou annað postir soll'heriter reyal. Fate being what it is, she produced a son, a child who inherited her looks and was just two years younger than the royal heir.

Y scuir receveurn cos raut reconnoscenç com Rudolf Rous e Michael Saf, magn harmonent con y terrentað dy Fradr Grimm oç intermanent Ruritania. The boys quickly became known as Red Rudolf and Black Michael, very much in keeping with the Brothers Grimm landscape that is Ruritania.

Jo vil vos digr l'oc: alcun hom entr nos no sta aure. I will tell you this: none of us there was snow white.

Y scuir sceurn s'ojar lou meðes pre ðe sceurn parolar. The boys learned to hate one another before they learned to speak.

Michael sta frastr eð audaç e carið par lorry paðr tandic Rudolf sta bleic e spagent, alor Rudolf oja Michael. Michael was sturdy and daring and beloved by their father where Rudolf was pallid and fearful, so Rudolf hated Michael.

Ma Rudolf sta un prinç tandic Michael no sta nien, alor Michael oja Rudolf, con un passion oç se souðurent afont luy cos briglandessem lonc ig y launt de Rudolf deneu saviblessem. But Rudolf was a prince where Michael was nothing, so Michael hated Rudolf, with a passion that smouldered in him the more strongly as Rudolf’s failings became more apparent.

programme notes from the complimentary booklet accompanying the 2026 Century Tour of the Lady Maud Orchestra. This section was penned by Dr Wernycke Belldrop; she is a professor of music at the University of Makerfell [Makerfield, Lancashire] who specialises in the Long Peace period.

Born in Anvers [Antwerp], Ton Cráyenshot (b. 1784 or 5, d. 1841) inherited his interest in Deviance Theology from his father Mickel, who was simultaneously a practising physician, publicly tovaric [gay] and an early adopter of this "anti-Paradise" philosophy in French Guillenne even as the reactionary wave of the Modest Arrangement overtook the region. Outside of circles familiar with Pacific-era composers, his son Ton is remembered best for his short stories (which single-handedly introduced the winter-frost figure of Har Suthock to our folklore) and for a particular melody from his first opera Ad Pentaculum, completed and first performed when he was twenty-nine.

Ad Pentaculum was first performed in the Anvers Showburg on Midwinter's Eve in 1814, and it was advertised as hél vÿvoud "wholly five-fold". It lived up to its claims, comprising five acts each with five scenes, five principal voices (Jochem, Øde, Harbard, Mater Gértie and the Outcast), the five-tone scale representing the Yacht [the Wild Hunt], and finally the music's beat being five-foot [e.g. 5/4 time] throughout.

Jochem, a young Willem clavierman grieving the loss of his sister Øde, hears the Yacht passing one stormy winter night. He looks out, though his mother had warned him in childhood never to do so, and is swept up for the night. The Yacht's leader Harbard, a charming grey-bearded master of disguises, offers a reunion with Øde in exchange for Jochem pledging himself to the ride. Harbard pursues Jochem back in ordinary life, while the nun Mater Gértie continues her admonitions and advice. Finally the ghost of Øde herself encourages Jochem to accept. Jochem leaves for good with the Yacht, twisting Mater Gértie's lessons in a spirit she had not intended.

semblant /sɛmˈblant/ [sɪmˈblan(t)]

ilk, kind, sort, type, a category to which something belongs;

appearance, look, aspect, the visible form something or someone presents to others;

mien, countenance, expression, the look on a person's face or (by extension) their presumed emotional state

Etymology: from Old French semblant "appearance; resemblance; the look on one's face", originally the present participle of sembler "to seem, resemble", itself from synonymous similāre in Vulgar Latin, a refashioning of Classical similis "like, similar". In the modern language the term usually has dismissive or otherwise deprecating connotations.

sposar /spoˈzar/ [spʊˈzɐː]

espouse, embrace, take up, to declare oneself committed to (a stance, doctrine or cause);

(legal) marry, wed, to take as a spouse;

vouch for, back, to confirm the good character of

Etymology: Old Borlish, from Latin spōnsō "I promise", the frequentative of spondeō "I pledge solemnly, give my word". The specifically matrimonial reading, not seen until the fifteenth century, may be a later back-formation from related spous "husband, wife".

sentenç /sɛnˈtɛnts/ [sɪnˈtɛns]

worldview, ethos, outlook, the framework of values and assumptions through which a person interprets the world;

(formal) opinion, view, stated position on a particular matter;

maxim, aphorism, dictum, a pithy saying with moral or didactic force;

(legal, archaic) sentence, judgement, the formal pronouncement of a court

Etymology: borrowed from Latin sententia "opinion, judgment; thought", itself a derivative of sentiō "I feel, perceive, think". The term was first attested in the Middle Boral period in juridical contexts. The "maxim" sense flowered in the moralising literature of the early modern period, when collections of aphorisms circulated widely as pedagogical tools.