[LCS News] LCS hired to make Dothraki for HBO series Game of Thrones

[Language Creation Society]

Official HBO press release for today.

More info at http://conlang.org/dothraki.php.


EXPERT CREATES LANGUAGE FOR NEW HBO SERIES GAME OF THRONES

David J. Peterson, an expert language creator from the Language
Creation Society
(LCS), has been chosen to create the Dothraki language for HBOʼs
upcoming fantasy
series GAME OF THRONES, based on the book series “A Song of Ice and Fire,” by
George R.R. Martin.

When GAME OF THRONES executive producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss
needed a language for the Dothraki, Martinʼs race of nomadic warriors,
they turned to the
Language Creation Society.  The LCS solicited and vetted a number of
proposals for the
Dothraki language from its pool of experts, with Petersonʼs proposal
ultimately being
selected by the GAME OF THRONES production team.

Peterson drew inspiration from George R.R. Martinʼs description of the
language,
as well as from such languages as Russian, Turkish, Estonian,
Inuktitut and Swahili.
However, the Dothraki language is no mere hodgepodge, babble or
pidgin.  It has its own
unique sound, extensive vocabulary of more than 1,800 words and
complex grammatical
structure.

“In designing Dothraki, I wanted to remain as faithful as possible to
the extant
material in George R.R. Martinʼs series,” says Peterson.  “Though
there isnʼt a lot of data,
there is evidence of a dominant word order [subject-verb-object], of
adjectives appearing
after nouns, and of the lack of a copula [ʻto beʼ].  Iʼve remained
faithful to these elements,
creating a sound aesthetic that will be familiar to readers, while
giving the language depth
and authenticity.  My fondest desire is for fans of the series to look
at a word from the
Dothraki language and be unable to tell if it came from the books or
from me — and for
viewers not even to realize itʼs a constructed language.”

“Weʼre tremendously excited to be working with David and the LCS,” says
producer D.B. Weiss.  “The language heʼs devised is phenomenal.  It
captures the
essence of the Dothraki, and brings another level of richness to their
world.  We look
forward to his first collection of Dothraki love sonnets.”

Did you know?  (Hash yer ray nesi?)
* The name for the Dothraki people — and their language — derives from the
verb “dothralat” (“to ride”).
* The Dothraki have four different words for “carry,” three for
“push,” three for
“pull” and at least eight for “horse,” but no word that means “please” or
“follow.”
* The longest word in Dothraki is “athastokhdeveshizaroon,” which means
“from nonsense.”
* The words for “related,” “weighted net,” “eclipse,” “dispute,” “redhead,”
“oath,” “funeral pyre,” “evidence,” “omen,” “fang” and “harvest moon” all
have one element in common:  “qoy,” the Dothraki word for “blood.”
* Dothraki for “to dream” – “thirat atthiraride” – literally means “to live a
wooden life”; in Dothraki, “wooden” (“ido”) is synonymous with “fake.”
* The word for “pride” – “athjahakar” – is derived from “jahak,” the
traditional
long braid worn by Dothraki warriors (“lajaki”).

More information about the Dothraki language (and their love poems) will be
released over the course of the series.