I need a name for a race
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I need a name for a race
I hope that this is the right place...
I need a good fantasy name for my race of half human half skeleton creatures. I'm completely lost as to what to name them. Oh, and by the way, they're pretty much invincible.
Re: I need a name for a race
Are they undead? If so, you could take a name from mythology and spice it up a bit. There's some cool undead like Revenants (which are basically European zombies ) or Draugr (Norse grave protectors) or you could call them the Deathless, after the lich Koschei the deathless.
Re: I need a name for a race
No, not undead exactly, although I'll take that into consideration, but they're just..... unbeatable, if that makes any sense. (I really don't know how to explain it further.)
Thanks, though! :)
Re: I need a name for a race
Well, what do they look like? Colloquially, they could be known for their appearance. Are they known for a specific attribute or ability? Why do people fear them? For example, something monstrous that sneaks quietly and is good at camoflaging themselves could come to be known as creepers. So just kinda think on those sort of lines instead of trying to fancy up something mythological.
You also don't have to stick to just one name either. I have a race of magic creatures that hunger after souls. They are referred to in several ways, because each term represents a different aspect of what they are known for, and the names also depend on the culture of the character who is referring to them. So keeping that fluidity in names might help you.
Try sketching out a list of words you associate with them, too, then make up something based off of that.
Re: I need a name for a race
Thanks.
Due to some help elsewhere, I've accumulated the following list:
They are known to outsiders as 'Boneheads'
They are known amongst themselves as 'Knochenfiends' (Which means bone fiends. Knochen is bone in German.)
They are trying to build their Ossaman Empire, (Which means bone empire. I'm not sure what language ossa is from.)
Thanks for all your help!
Also, <3 ectosapiens. Maybe I could use that also.
Re: I need a name for a race
Ossa comes from Portuguese (and probably other similar languages like Spanish, French and Italian).
Re: I need a name for a race
Correction: Excuse my mistake I'm not fluent in Portuguese, I believe it's 'osso'. But still, similar nonetheless.
Re: I need a name for a race
Yeah. osso is Portuguese. :)
Thanks
Re: I need a name for a race
Do they really want to call themselves fiends? Do they pride themselves on scaring people or consider themselves evil, or are they the good guys in their eyes? Or does fiend not have a negative connotation to them?
Re: I need a name for a race
Yeah. They enjoy scaring the heck out of people, but they might turn out (as a plot twist) to be the good guy soldiers trying to build an empire that would benefit the world, while Aren, (My MC,) is trying to stop them.
Or, of course, maybe not.
I'm planning a sequel, one entitled "Revenge of the Boneheads," so maybe they won't be the baddies.
:/
Re: I need a name for a race
Gotcha. In that case, Knochenfiend sounds good. Is the K pronounced or not? You'll probably want to work the pronunciation in somewhere so half your readers aren't saying it wrong.
Re: I need a name for a race
I'm pretty sure that the K isn't pronounced.
So what about the pronunciation? Do you think that after the first time I use it I should show in parenthesis the correct pronunciation?
(NOCK in fiends [I think that's how you'd write it....])
:)
Re: I need a name for a race
The easiest way to clarify the pronunciation in the story is to have someone say it wrong and someone else correct them, like JKR did with Hermione's name. This is easier if you have someone who's never seen the word before and they read it wrong, but if you have a character with some kind of speech tic and someone else corrects them without knowing or because they get sick of hearing it wrong it can work too.
Re: I need a name for a race
Yeah. Shoulda thought of that. Thanks!
Pronucniation in italilics is way too history textbookish anyway.
Re: I need a name for a race
Skeletal = Ecto
Human = Sapien
Combined = ectosapians
One could quibble over the terms - race, nationality, ethnicity, or culture. I don't know the rules for fantasy.
Your creatures could be ectosapians from the Toric warrior culture bred on the isle of Oric. Thy share the island with Borics and Dorics.