Up The Way Lexicon Time&Distance Westerlund Maps Dominism Life Details Races Virtues The World Locale Links Beastiary

Erlundish Lexicon

Below are some of the words which can be found throughout the Brighland pages.  

AEtheling: Adult male members of the royal line.

Aulderlundic: Angular runic alphabet of the pre-Dominist Erlundish. Still used in some secular settings.

Aulderlundism/Aulderlundish: The native religion of the Erlundish.

Brikan-ri: The formal language of the Dominist church.

Brikan-oh: A common diplomatic and trade tongue of the continent.

Brintic: A formal script developed by the Brikani Empire, commonly used by the Dominist church.

Ceorl: A freeman; one who may buy and sell land, carry weapons, speak at moots, etc.

Demosic: A flowing script, derived from Brintic, which is used for the majority of correspondence and many official documents.

Dominism: The dominant religion in most of Brighland.

Dracancraeft: A pre-Imperial script, so called because it is said to have been used by dragons.

Dryhten: a general term for a leader or lord.  One man’s thegn can be another man’s dryhten, and sometimes one thegn can have two dryhten that he is beholden to.

Ealdorman: Political and military representative of the king in a shire.

Ettin: A large carnivorous humanoid; a troll.

Gedryht: A group of thegns serving a dryhten; a warband.
Haffree: An unfree social status, between a ceorl and thrall.  Usually tied chiefly to working a noble's land.  
Heorthwiga: "Hearth Warrior"; a well-paid, well-trained and very loyal professional warrior in the service of the king or other powerful noble.  A variant term is "husceorl."

Hide: An administrative term; roughly, the amount of land needed to support on family (avg. 120 acres)

Horde: Collective term for the humanoid monsters which live emanate from the Great Valley.  Nietenfynds are the most common Hordish creature.

Hundred: An administrative designation; roughly 100 hides.

Moot: Meeting; gathering of the folk in an area to discuss or debate.

Nietenfynd: Vicious, savage humanoid monsters.  Known by some as orcs or orcneas. Sometimes used to denote any evil beastie.

Ordman: A ceorl or thegn designated for regular military service.

Shire: Administrative unit roughly equivalent to a modern county.

Shire Reeve: Financial representative of the king in a shire.  In speech, it is often shortened to "sheriff."

Thegn:(Read: Thane) A noble who is sworn into the service of a lord.  This is a broad class of nobility.  Most thegns are skilled in the use of arms.

Thrall: A slave or bondsman.  

Werod: A warband; differs from a Gedryht in that the term implies a group of freebooting adventurers rather than a lord and his thegns. Sometimes used to mean  a cohesive unit in an army (usually half a dozen to a dozen men) that trains and fights together.

Wiscraeft: Low magic, or magic using minor charm and herb lore.

Wyrdcraeft: High magic, the magic of spells, arcane lore and talismans.

Wysard: Practitioner of high magic.

Designer's Notes: There are a number of unfamiliar terms either taken directly or derived from Old English.  In developing this setting, I thought they would add to the feel of the setting, making it more flavorful than the more common, if more familiar, knights and counts and barons.  There is a line between making it rich and making it too strange to easily understand, and I fear I have crossed the line once or twice.  Ah, well, it's a work in progress.