accent always falls on the first syllable, regardless of the length of the word. Thus Garth, being from the Northern Waste, pronounces the name of his home city OR-duh-nin, while the people of Skelleth or Dыsarra would pronounce it Or-DOO-nin.
The Plain of Derbarok, lying as it does between Eramma and Orыn, has no set rule; its inhabitants vary their pronunciation at whim, and there is no consensus as to whether the correct pronunciation is DER-ba-rock or Der-BAR-ock.
Phonetics: The Eramman language has seven basic vowels, which are represented in transcription by A, E, I, Y, O, U, and Ь; most have two pronunciations, depending on whether they occur in an accented syllable or an unaccented one.
A is always pronounced like the a in era.
E in an unaccented syllable is pronounced like the e in get.
E in an accented syllable is pronounced like the й in passй.
I in an unaccented syllable is pronounced like the i in bit.
I in an accented syllable is pronounced like the ee in bee.
Y is a sound which does not occur in English; regardless of accent it is pronounced like the Russian bI; best approximated as something between the accented and unaccented I.
O is always pronounced like the o in got; there is no long O in Eramman.
U in an unaccented syllable is pronounced like the oo in book.
U in an accented syllable is pronounced like the oo in boot.
Ь in an unaccented syllable is pronounced as in German; in an accented syllable it falls somewhere between the German ь and o.
The use of a circumflex indicates that a vowel in an unaccented syllable is pronounced as if accented (e.g., Orыn and Dыsarra, pronounced OR-oon and Doo-SAR-ra). One-syllable words are always considered accented, but a circumflex may sometimes appear as a reminder.
Diphthongs are common in Eramman, especially AI, pronounced like the English word 'I,' and EU, which does not occur in most forms of English, but closely resembles the Cockney pronunciation of the long O- sound.
Consonants are pronounced much as in English, except R, which is trilled or 'flipped' slightly (not rolled). The following combinations should be noted: TH is always as in thin, never as in there.
DH represents the voiced th as in there.
BH represents a sound somewhere between b and v, as in the Castilian Spanish pronunciation of either.
PH represents a sound somewhere between p and f; in the combination P'H the apostrophe has no sound or value whatsoever except to indicate that the P and H are both pronounced individually and not as a single phoneme. P'hul is one syllable.
CH is pronounced as in church.
J is pronounced as in jar.
G is always as in get, never as in gem.
KH represents a voiceless gutteral, like the German ch in ach.
GH represents a voiced gutteral; it sounds rather like gargling.
SH is pronounced as in sheep.
ZH is pronounced like z in azure.
A final note on the names of the gods: Eramman is a declined language with seven cases; all nouns will ordinarily have an ending indicating their case and what part of a sentence they are. Names, however, do not have endings, ever. The names of the gods are, for the most part, simply words indicating their provenance with endings removed. Thus aghadye, the nominative form of the word for 'loathing,' becomes Aghad, and bheluye, meaning 'destruction,' becomes Bheleu (yes, it should be bheleuye or Bhelu; a few centuries earlier it was bheleuye, but pronunciations change).
Native speakers would not find this confusing, nor tend to identify a god too strongly with the single trait his name represents, because they are accustomed to names with root meanings that may not have much to do with the things named. For examples of similar attitudes among speakers of English, consider the names Grace and Victor; no one assumes that every woman named Grace is in fact graceful, or that every man named Victor is a successful fighter. How many people, upon hearing the name New York, even remember that there is an old York?
Furthermore, many of the root-words have changed meaning or dropped out of common usage; regvosye, meaning an unwillingness to understand, is extremely archaic, and no longer used as the ordinary word for blindness. That is just one example of many.
NOTES ON ERAMMAN MYTH AND THEOLOGY
In the beginning, according to the myths of Eramma and Nekutta, there was nothing at all except Dagha, and a nothingness far more complete than is ordinarily considered. There was no time, no space, no matter, no energy, no life, no death, nothing at all. Dagha, existing without these things, is therefore totally incomprehensible; it is customary to refer to Dagha as 'he,' but actually there is no way of saying whether he is male, female, neither, or both.
In some way, this incomprehensible being created time and space; however, being outside time himself, he could not directly interfere or manipulate anything within the space he had created. For that reason, there is no cult of Dagha, no worship, and no prayer to him.
Not satisfied with an empty cosmos, Dagha also created beings that could manipulate it, beings that were within time and limited by it, but were still immortal and unconfined by space. These beings were the gods.
Since they were created from nothing, they were of necessity created in pairs, each the negation of its twin. In each pair there was a god dedicated to the elaboration and ornamentation of the cosmos, and another dedicated to returning to primordial nothingness. Dagha created seven pairs in all; the seven dedicated to creation are known as the Lords of Eir (from an archaic word meaning both 'tree' and 'vitality'), and their seven foes are known as the Lords of Dыs (from dusye, meaning 'death' and also 'darkness').
The first pair created are usually referred to by their attributes rather than their names, Life and Death; they do have names, however. The role of Ayvi, the god of life, is frequently misunderstood; he is not in any way a preserver of life, but merely its bestower. He brings the first spark to each seed or embryo, but nothing more; and the Final God does nothing but remove that spark.
The next creation was of four gods rather than two: Aal, god of growth and fertility, countered by P'hul, goddess of decay; and Bel Vala, god of strength and preservation, countered by Bheleu, god of destruction. Aal is generally given precedence over Bel Vala, but P'hul is considered inferior to Bheleu; the reasons for this apparent contradiction are unclear.
The next creation was again of four gods, but this time there was no confusion in rank; Aghad, god of hatred, fear, and loathing, and his sister Pria, goddess of love, peace, and friendship, are universally acknowledged as mightier than Sai, goddess of sorrow and despair, and Gau, goddess of pleasure and delight.
These ten are the High Gods; their four younger siblings are considered lesser, but therefore more accessible, deities. The sixth pair is Leuk, lord of light and bringer of inspiration, and Andhur Regvos, the god of darkness and blindness.
The seventh and final pair of Eir and Dыs are Tema, goddess of night, and Amera, goddess of the day. With the creation of these two Dagha either exhausted his power or lost interest.
These fourteen gods amongst them created the world, to provide themselves with an arena in which to manifest themselves; and in the early days of their creation, in emulation of their master, they created lesser gods.
All the various cults of Nekutta and Eramma agree thus far, with the exception of a few outcast religions and followers of obscure deities; however, there is virtually no agreement as to the existence, number, and nature
