a Conlang mail-list thread

Re: The last doublehour¹ of the island of Bothflanks

A. da Mek, Fri, 11 Sep 2020 11:09:00 +0200

      The last doublehour¹ <#1>of the Island of Bothflanks

Professor Hnerliq pointed to the red lever and announced to the 
onlooking colleagues and invited church, government, and press 
representatives: "As soon as I activate this machine, everything within 
one submollbaritone ell from the center of the chronokinetic field 
exciter system will be moved one sixtieth of a doublesecond¹ <#1>; into 
the past."

"Just one sixtieth of a doublesecond? We won't even notice that with a 
naked eye," one of the journalists wondered.

"Although the object will reappear in the place from which it 
disappeared, the Earth will rotate in the meantime, so the experimental 
object will disappear from this table, but it will reappear on that 
table about nineteen and a half² <#2>(submollbaritone) ells³ <#3>to the 
east," the professor explained.

"And what if there will be another object at the destination? As I can 
see, there is really something on that other table," was another question.

"That's exactly one of the goals of today's experiment. According to one 
hypothesis, the transfer is bidirectional and the two objects will be 
exchanged. But, according to my theory, the transfer is unidirectional 
and they will blend together. That's why one of the objects is copper 
brick and the other is a tin one.

"So you expect the result to be bronze?"

"That would be the case if the blending took place on a macroscopic 
level. But there is a possibility that the blending will be even more 
substantial and gold will be produced."

"Gold?"

"Yes, 29 + 50 = 79."

(Narrator's note: This is true, but 63 + 120 = 183, which is much less 
than 197. So even if the experiment result were truly gold, it would be 
mainly the unstable Au 183 gold, which would gradually disintegrate into 
Europium 151 and eight particles α.)

This drew the attention of the royal subcamerarius. He did not 
understand the meaning of those numbers, but the idea of ​​a source 
competing with Optaquan goldfields was tempting. "Then run it, 
Professor," he said eagerly.

The professor put his hand on the lever.

The door swung open. One of the assistant scientists rushed into the 
lab, waving his hand with several sheets of paper described by complex 
formulas.

"Hold on, Professor! I found you made one serious calculation error!"

Faces expressing scorn turned to him. Some insignificant student dares 
to correct Professor Hnerliq himself!

But it was too late anyway, the professor's hand had just completed its 
movement. The machine roared—and there was no visible change.

Meanwhile, the student walked over to the machine and stared at it with 
a somewhat frightened look.

After a moment of silence, the professor turned to the student: "You 
seem to be right after all. The machine doesn't work."

"But no, professor, it works," the student said slowly. "Except for that 
one mistake, everything else is perfectly fine. The significant is 
perfectly accurate, but the mistake is in the sexagesimal order."

"In the order of magnitude? Are you saying that the machine is sixty 
times less powerful? That the active area had the radius only one 
(barley) grain³ <#3>instead of one (submollbaritone) ell?"

"No, unfortunately the opposite is true, the machine is much more 
powerful than we expected."

"More powerful?" The professor thought about it. "A radius of one 
plethron³ <#3>? Have we moved the whole building one doublesocond back 
to the past, thus one half of a longitudinal minute to the east?" Then 
he turned his head toward the window. The outlook has not changed. 
"Nonsense!"

"Unfortunately, it's not just one order," the student said.

"Two orders? A radius of one (nautical) mile³ <#3>? The entire campus 
two minutes into the past, half a degree to the east?"

"Three."

"Three? Sixty miles? The whole island?"

"It's not an island anymore. We're two hours in the past now, 30 degrees 
to the east, somewhere in the middle of the continent."


------------------------------------------------------------------------


        Notes

*(1)*Alike the Mesopotamians, the Bothflench scientists divided the day 
cycle into 12 parts (Sumerian/da-na/, Akkadian/bêru/). So their units of 
time are twice as long as our units based on 24 hours per day.

*(2)*The center of Bothflanks lies at 49°30′ of north latitude, and this 
parallel is shorter than the equator at a ratio of cos (49.5°) = 0.65…, 
so that while one half of latitudinal second is 30 (submollbaritone) 
ells, one half the longitudinal second is only 19½ of a 
(submollbaritone) ell.

*(3)*Bothflench units of length:

grain (of barley) 	​latitudinal fourth 	8.575 mm
(mollsubbaritone) cubit, ell 	​latitudinal third 	514.5 mm
plethron, cord 	​latitudinal second 	30.87 m
(nautical) mile 	​latitudinal minute 	1852.2 m

	​latitudinal degree 	111.132 km

	​latitudinal sextant 	6667.92 km

	​meridional circumference 	40 007.52 km

Daniel Bensen, Fri, 11 Sep 2020 18:35:03 +0300

I know more about writing than I do about conlanging, so this is an
exciting opportunity for my ego! I'll try to control myself :)

da Mek, I applaud you for mixing conlanging and science fiction, and for
posting the result where other people can see it. It's something I struggle
with.

So here's a small critique:
This piece looks like part of a larger story. If it's supposed to stand on
its own as a short story, it needs some things, but if it's the first scene
of a novel, it works fine.
The discussion about merging atomic nuclei needs to be either more or less.
I guess the atomic nuclei didn't merge when they teleported, otherwise, all
the carbon atoms in people's bodies would now be aluminum and they'd die.
So what *did* happen? Did they switch with their target? Is there now a
circular chunk of the continent sitting in the ocean where Bothflanks used
to be(1)? The characters in the scene should ask and answer these
questions. Or, you can delete the possibility of atomic nuclei merging.
"Doublehour" and other non-conversions of units was a bit odd, but I got
used to it. I liked "subcamerarius." What I really missed was the
Bothflanks language!
Here is a challenge for you: translate the dialogue of this scene into the
Bothflanks language.
Anyway, the this scene was a good introduction to a story. It would be fun
to see how people respond to have an island suddenly appear next door (I
suppose in its own little circular sea of salt-water?). It would be fun to
see what happens once this technology becomes more widespread ;)

And hey, what if other people post their short bits of fiction on this
list-serve? Is that something we want to do?

(1) What about the Earth's orbit around the sun? If it went two hours back
in time, shouldn't the island be teleported to a point even further
eastward and upward?

A. da Mek, Fri, 11 Sep 2020 20:41:29 +0200 

> This piece looks like part of a larger story. If it's supposed to stand on
> its own as a short story, it needs some things, but if it's the first scene
> of a novel, it works fine.

This is mainly one of possible explanations why the longitude of 
Bothflanks is in some worlds 15° West and in other worlds 15° East.

Of course, I would like a story or even a novel from the world of 
Bothflanks; after all, no one was very interested in Tolkien's world 
until he placed an epic story into it. But so far I have 
"archaeologically excavated" only appendices about the system of measure 
and weight units, the calendar, myths and songs.

I can think of one possible sequel to this story. In brief, like this:
The professor thought again briefly, then blurted out, "So we're two 
hours in the past. Take a military plane, and hopefully you'll be able 
to cover those 1,170 miles in time."
"I've just tried that, and as you know, I unfortunately arrived a few 
seconds late."
(But 585 knots (more than 1000 km / h) seem unrealistic to me on their 
technical level.)

> The discussion about merging atomic nuclei needs to be either more or less.
This is something what is not a necessary component of the main theme, 
but I found very interesting that the sum of these atomic numbers gives 
per chance gold.
> I guess the atomic nuclei didn't merge when they teleported, otherwise, all
> the carbon atoms in people's bodies would now be aluminum and they'd die.
> So what *did* happen? Did they switch with their target? Is there now a
> circular chunk of the continent sitting in the ocean where Bothflanks used
> to be?
I myself would like to know what happened to that original piece of 
landscape. Maybe there was originally a big lake or an inland sea?
> I
> suppose in its own little circular sea of salt-water?

It is not so. The waters surrounding Bothflanks in our world are rivers. 
Look on the map (
https://po-de-s.cz/en/conworld/Bothflanks/index.html
). The western coast is Naab, the southern one is Danube, the eastern 
one is Moldau / Vltava, and the northern one is Eger / Ohře.

The Queen's river, Reginae flumine, AKA Rain river, is here Regen; and 
the Mizzle river, on its lower part called Beer river or Bear river, is 
Mies/ Mže - Berounka.
The city Palma Sinistra → PalSin is here Pilsen.

> (1) What about the Earth's orbit around the sun? If it went two hours back
> in time, shouldn't the island be teleported to a point even further
> eastward and upward?

This allows us to roughly estimate to which age this story belongs. The 
Earth is already round, so it is after the POC (Point of convergence) 
described by JRRT, how the world became round after the downfall of 
Númenor. But Bothflench myth say that although the world of the Third 
Age (here Mesolithic) was already round, it was not yet rotating, and so 
the Sun orbited around Earth in the distance where today is the 
geostationary orbit. This was changed in the next POC at -6250. Since 
the begin of the Middle Holocene, the Eath was rotating, but the world 
was still geocentric, so the Sun V3.0, much larger than the previous 
two, but much smaller than our Sun V4.0, orbited in the distance of 
today's L1. So this is the age of this story, before the last POC at -2250.

Another question is why the altitude of Bothflanks is now two hundred 
meters higher than it was when it was an island. The answer is that the 
Moon was already the same as our and so "geocentric world" more 
precisely meant "centered in the barycenter of the system Earth - Moon".

Jörg Rhiemeier, Fri, 11 Sep 2020 23:13:59 +0200

Hallo conlangers!

On 11/09/20 20:41, A. da Mek wrote:

> [lots of things about Bothflanks]

So Bothflanks is on the same timeline as Tolkien's legendarium? And do
the Corded Ware and Bell Beaker cultures, and thus also IE and Semitic,
originate on the island that in the time travel experiment gone awry
became what is now western Bohemia and eastern Bavaria? Or am I
misunderstanding everything?

--
... brought to you by the Weeping Elf
http://www.joerg-rhiemeier.de/Conlang/index.html

Daniel Bensen, Sat, 12 Sep 2020 11:34:54 +0300

>> Or am I
misunderstanding everything?<<
Yeah, I'm confused too. What's a "Point of Convergence"? What's the
relationship between our world and Tolkein's world and the world of
Bothflanks?

>>"I've just tried that, and as you know, I unfortunately arrived a few
seconds late."<<
Hahaha! I like that.

Although it raises an interesting possibility. If you make the time machine
send you back a day or a year(1), you'll teleport yourself back to more or
less the same place(2), and you'll be able to meet yourself.

Also, now there's a new country in Paleolithic eastern Europe with
airplanes and electricity (not to mention time travel)? Why doesn't this
technologically advanced society immediately conquer the whole continent?
Why didn't the Bothflanch conquer Europe when they were an island?

Finally, when do I get to see a sentence in Bothflanch? ;)

Dan

(1) What is a year in a geocentric system?
(2) Assuming no galactic core for our solar system to orbit around

A. da Mek, Mon, 14 Sep 2020 15:22:52 +0200

> What's a "Point of Convergence"?
"Science fiction writers usually have all changes flow from a particular 
historical point of divergence (often abbreviated 'POD' by fans of the 
genre)." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternate_history#Paratime_themes)

In my terminology, POC (point of convergence) is a similar event, but a 
confluence of two time branches instead of their bifurcation.
Before T.A. 3319 = CE -8788, there were separate time branches of a flat 
Earth and a round Earth; and then their timelines united.
> it raises an interesting possibility. If you make the time machine
> send you back a day or a year(1), you'll teleport yourself back to more or
> less the same place(2), and you'll be able to meet yourself.
If I remember correctly, this was mentioned in the "Back to the Future", 
and it was recommended to avoid this, because it would have severe 
consequences: either a global cataclysm, or a headache.
> Also, now there's a new country in Paleolithic
Mesolithic
>   eastern
central
> Europe with
> airplanes and electricity
As for electricity, it is not explicitly mentioned in the story. The 
machine could be mechanical, pneumatic or even magical.
> Why doesn't this
> technologically advanced society immediately conquer the whole continent?
Maybe the replacing of one part of landscape by another one was not as 
smooth as it appeared immediately after the transfer. The geological 
layers might became unstable and a severe earthquake might destroy the 
infrastructure of the civilization. Or the civilization might be 
destroyed by the barbarians of the surrounding counties, as was later 
Rome (and were here no NCNC rule, I would add "and as is Europe being 
destroyed nowadays").
> Why didn't the Bothflanch conquer Europe when they were an island?

Maybe they were isolationists. Or maybe they did not build ships (and 
the existence of airplanes was mentioned only in the possible sequel).

If the last sentence of the story were deleted, then we could even 
suppose that they were not aware of the existence of other dry lands.

> Finally, when do I get to see a sentence in Bothflanch? ;)

Here is a language with a provisional designation Fullgradish (although 
it has also the zero grade, it is only a positional variant of the full 
"e" grade and has no grammatical meaning):

"Njovis, julnas net, njecumer despecet, njem, jes duzet egur njuzem; 
njem, jes debŗt emzah njebŗm, njem, jes ecu debŗt njedzemem. Njovis 
duket: "Mecŗdes dégnet ken dúdemej tedzemem, jes degnetj tecumer.". 
Tecuser duketen? "Secŗdeser meper degneterj sem: tanŗs, jes njŗs, sulnéz 
njovip súd dekŗnetj egŗm ńjestŗm, éd tovip njulnes net.". Tenéd geçļvet, 
tovis debuzet njazreméd.

> What is a year in a geocentric system?

Although this is no problem in the penultimate world which is geocentric but rotating, so the year is the period of Sun, it is a problem in the antepenultimate world and in any nonrotating world where the Sun is not slowly walking on the inner surface of the Sphere of stars but freely orbits the Earth. Maybe that could be fixed by a invisible companion of the Sun, but I need to investigate this matter more thoroughly.

> Assuming no galactic core for our solar system to orbit around

In the worlds where the Galaxy is not a river of milk(*) flowing on the 
Heavenly sphere, we could calculate the distance in which the core 
orbits the earth.

(*)

The river of milk is mentioned in the Measuring songs

Introduction

The/Nautical mile collection/consisted of 20 song, and the/Military 
league collection/consisted of 50 songs. Of them only one whole song and 
several fragments are known today.

Each verse is 8 syllables long, but it is sung twice with different 
rhythm, so that each couplet becomes a quadruplet of 12 bars.Assuming 
the mollbaritone (As) passus 5 feet (1½ m) long, this corresponds to one 
Middle (des) chain (18 m) of 100 Middle (a) links or 60 feet.


      Word-by-word translation

(This text breaks the rules of English syntax,
but it shows to the reader the word order of the original.)


Once one heaven was, / on which many of gods lived.
And through that heaven flowed (a) river / which was full of milk.
On (the) bank of that milk river / lived (a) tortoise long ages.
Even when she was longeval, / onto everybody death once waits.
And so came (a) while thus, / when she expired on last.


Even when she had life long, / remained after her (a) carapace mere.
(The) carapace (was) found (by) messenger of gods;
 / from lover (side he) it covered (with) skin.
Where used-to-be front legs, / (he) attached two long horns.
(The) horns (he) connected by a piece of wood,
 / to which (he) stretched bandelets of intestine.
And so thus (the) dead beast / gave to originate to (the) first lyre.


Before (the) tortoise dead dropped, / on her back (she the) earth carried.
Angel with (the) name "Fame of (the) lady" / raised earth by left palm.
Near (the) center of (the) heaven a-staying, / (he) raised up hands hisself.
Earth (he) held with hand holy, / on (the) heaven (he) stood with left heel.
On that bank full of milk / slipped to him his heel.


(The) celestial, who earth carried, / onto knee right dropped.
On knee right a-kneeling, / on (the) earth, through which milk flows,
over hisself head (he) held earth, / with of right hand fingers all.
But earth's grerat weight / tilted him still lower.
(The) knee also slipped, / then itself unbounded hell.


Woe, woe, is it in arse, / earth itself down rushes.
Onto heaven (it) crashed, / (the) structure of (the) world (it) overturned.
Heaven, which below was, / into ceiling itself now changed..
Earth, which earlier ceiling was, / into floor itself now turned.
Six minutes is (a) short while, / we walked only (a) quarter of (a) mile.

(Fragments of the the second quarter follow.)


Earth was nearly flat, / of hills was only few.
On hills heaven lies, / to go through under it is possible only with 
difficulty.

(...)


Raised is heaven again, / to the little bear on tail.


      Prosaic version


        Prequel to the quarter mile story


Once upon a time, there were three noble birds,
one taking off,
another landing,
and the third one, different.


The first two birds were eagles,
and the third bird was a white swan.
But others say that all three birds were cranes.


And that swan laid an egg,
and the yolk of that egg became earth,
and the egg whites became air,
and the shell of the egg became heaven.


        Prosaic version of the quarter mile story


(Once upon a time, there was a heaven,)
and through that heaven flowed a river,
and on the shore of that river lived a tortoise,
and on the back of that tortoise was an earth.


Although tortoises are long-lived creatures,
it came to pass after many days,
that even that great tortoise died,
and the earth started to slip from its back.


And there was an archangel who saw it,
and he took the earth,
and he stood on his left heel near the center of the heaven,
and he held the earth above his head by his left hand.


But the earth was heavy,
and his left heel slipped,
and he knelt on his right knee,
still holding the earth above his head by his left hand.


But his right knee also slipped,
and the earth fell from his left hand,
and it crashed onto the heaven,
and the order of the world was turned upside down.


        Continuation of the quarter mile story


And Our Lady took the heaven,
and she raised it by the tip of the middle finger of her right hand.


But the heaven started to slip from her middle finger,
and she raised it by the the tip of the index finger of her right hand.


But the heaven started to slip from her index finger,
and she raised it by the the tip of the thumb of her right hand.


But the heaven started to slip from her thumb,
and a little dog jumped onto her palm,
and he is raising the heaven by the tip of his tail.


But the heaven will slip from its tail,
and it will crash into the earth,
and the order of the world will be again turned upside down.


And near the center of the heaven will be a throne,
and on that throne will sit a king,
and that king will be holding the earth.

A. da Mek, Mon, 14 Sep 2020 22:56:28 +0200

> So Bothflanks is on the same timeline as Tolkien's legendarium?

The history of Bothflanks is not written from the "God's perspective",  
as a undeniable truth revealed by the (sub)creator.  Its sources are 
Bothflench annals, chronicles and other works of Botflench historians 
and philosophers; so there is no less of mistakes, speculations, 
ideology and crackpottery than in similar documents in our world.

The Tolkien's legendarium thus can be considered as the "Fabulous tales 
of Elves" (whose arrival is contemporary with the arrival of Magdalenian 
culture) and the events before the LGM as the "Fabulous tales of Ainur", 
whose arrival is approximately contemporary with the arrival of 
Cro-Magnons, European early modern humans, Aurignacian & Gravettian).

If this is not enough to explain some contradictions, then we can 
consider that it is not a single world but rather a bundle of similar 
worlds, possibly connected in some or other way, be it some POD, POC, 
(star)gate or rabbit hole. Tolkien placed his stories deep enough to the 
prehistory to not coincide with history s.s. (and with the Biblical 
timeline),  and the flat world stories before a supernatural change of 
the world, but the "straight road" is still opened for elves and 
exceptionally even for some non-elves. Similarly, the BF myths can be 
arranged into a serial sequence, starting with the one where BF is a 
continent dozen times larger than now; following by the shrinking of the 
whole planet 1:12 as a punishment for Lilliput (as the main villain 
shrunk 1:144) assailing Brobdingnag (as the victim the only land 
remaining in its original size) while BF, Atlantis and Hyperborea 
refused to help the victim; an so on. But this does not exclude "Gates" 
and "Straight Roads" into worlds which are in some of the previous 
stages, or which underwent another sequence of events and are more close 
to Tolkien's world or any other fiction or a folk mythology.

Events from the real (pre)history of our world can serve as an 
inspiration for the fictive history of more or less fantastic worlds; 
some of the fictive events can take place only in the more different 
worlds, but some less unrealistic can be copied also into the worlds 
with the same geography as ours.

I like stories which are as much as possible ambiguous in which world 
they take place. For example the description of the route to Bothflanks:

We sailed along the westernmost coast of our continent, then back 
eastward, and at last again northward up to the mouth of a great river 
at the 45th degree. There we left the ship suitable for sailing along 
the coast, and on the board of another ship we left the coast and 
voyaged ten degrees westward, then three degrees northward to the Rye 
island, then five degrees again westward up to the southeast corner of 
the Land of Dragon's Right Flank, and then along its south coast half 
degree westward up to the Fortress of Biggers, and at last one and half 
degree to the Rain City, which lieth on the 49th parallel.

This may be interpreted as a voyage around the Iberian Peninsula, and 
then from the mouth of Garonne on a greater ship to some (mythical) 
Atlantic Islands. But it also can be interpreted as a voyage around 
Anatolia, and then from the mouth of Danube on a smaller ship upstream, 
with a stopover on one or more real river islands.

(BTW, an interesting piece of land on the bank of theDanube is

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberland

; maybe it could be also marked on the map of the world of BF.)


>   And do
> the Corded Ware and Bell Beaker cultures, and thus also IE and Semitic,
> originate on the island

They came there in the Late Cyan Age. (But according a myth, they lived 
there also in the Cycle of Bliss (CB 0 = CE  -30000), and before the 
penultimate Raising of Heaven (cca at the beginning of the Aperture Days 
(ApD, -28652) they entered the Heaven and returned to the Earth one 
cycle of precession later, before the ultimate Raising of Heavens.)
 

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