Me Nem Nesa: A Phonological Analysis of Dothraki
Author: Sanjeev Vinodh
MS Date: 05-01-2019
FL Date: 08-01-2019
FL Number: FL-00005F-00
Citation: Vinodh, Sanjeev. 2019. «Me Nem Nesa: A
Phonological Analysis of Dothraki.» FL-
00005F-00, Fiat Lingua,
Copyright: © 2019 Sanjeev Vinodh. This work is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution-
NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Fiat Lingua is produced and maintained by the Language Creation Society (LCS). For more information
about the LCS, visit http://www.conlang.org/
Me Nem Nesa
A Phonological Analysis of Dothraki
Sanjeev Vinodh
Overview
Dothraki is a constructed language created by David J. Peterson with the Language Creation
Society for the HBO TV show ‘
’, based off of a collection of words found in
Game of Thrones
the ‘
’ book series by George R.R. Martin. According to Peterson, the
A Song of Ice and Fire
language behaves most like Arabic (due to its harsh velars and uvulars) and Spanish (due to its
-lat and -at lexical verb classes, dental consonants, and fusional conjugations) (Wright 2).
Inventory, Romanization, and Pronunciation
Dothraki’s phonetic inventory is near identical to that of English, with a few key differences. The
language does not contain the labial plosives [b] and [p] (except in names), has the notable
additions of [x] and [q], and only contains 4 vowel phonemes: [a], [e], [i], and [o]. The
romanized orthography of the phonetic inventory is identical to IPA for vowels, and identical to
English for consonants. The segments [x], [θ], [ʃ], [tʃ], and [ʒ] are represented by the digraphs
‘kh’, ‘th’, ‘sh’, ‘ch’, and ‘zh’ respectively. When these digraphs are geminated, they are
shortened, and represented orthographically as ‘kkh’, ‘tth’, ‘ssh’, ‘cch’, and ‘zzh’, while all other
consonantal geminates are represented as double consonants (like ‘nn’). Adjacent vowels are
pronounced separately (becoming nuclei of adjacent syllables), so geminates are represented
orthographically as double vowels (like ‘oo’) (Peterson 17-19).
Typological Tractability
Before beginning the phonological analysis of a language, there is a question that must be asked.
Is Dothraki a reliable language to analyze for phonological phenomenon? As a conlang, does it
have the consistency required to be analyzed as any other natural language? To answer this
question, we must look to a metric called typological tractability, which predicts how
typologically ‘normal’ a language is. Matt Destruel of Boston University approached the
assessment of this metric by examining Dothraki’s adherence to Joseph Greenberg’s ‘
Universals
’ (1963), a set of 45 linguistic universals compiled through extensive
of Human Language
analysis of 30 natural languages (see Works Cited). In a 2014 research paper titled published in
’, Matt Destruel demonstrated that Dothraki adheres to all 15 of Greenberg’s
Lingua Frankly
‘
Universals that are relevant to it (Destruel 12), thus proving it to be typologically tractable and
eligible for further study.
Phonology
The specific phonological phenomenon in Dothraki that will be analyzed in this paper are [ɾ] vs
[r], vowel laxing after [q], and stress assignment.
The ‘r’ alternation
One of the most prominent characteristics present in Dothraki is the pronunciation of the
orthographic ‘r’. Consider the following data (taken from “
”).
The Dothraki Language Dictionary
a) rikh
[rix] –
rotten
rhaesh
[rʰaeʃ] –
land
b) khogar
[xogar] –
clothes
rai
[rai] –
hooray
rhoa
[rʰoa] –
animal
yer
[jer] –
you
mhar
[mʰar] –
sore
hoshor
[hoʃor] –
golden
c)
jerriya
[dʒerija] –
discussion
d) chare
[tʃaɾe] –
ear
mori
[moɾi] –
they
e) mithri
[miθɾi] –
rest
tolorro
[toloro] –
bone
darif
[daɾif] –
saddle
chiori
[tʃioɾi] –
woman
krazaaj
[kɾazaadʒ] –
mountain
dothralat
[doθɾalat] –
to ride
davra
[davɾa] –
good
From (a), (b), and (c), it is clear that the orthographic ‘r’ is pronounced trilled when word-initial,
word-final, or geminated. On the other hand, (d) and (e) present examples where the ‘r’ is tapped
word-centrally, regardless of whether it is preceded by a vowel in (d) or a consonant in (e). Since
both segments [ɾ] and [r] are orthographically identical, and since they never occur in the same
environment, it is reasonable to propose that they are allophonic. The underlying form must be
the tapped /ɾ/, since this would allow predictable surface forms through the following rule:
/ɾ/ → [r] / {#__, __#}
/ɾ/ → [ɾ] / elsewhere
Finally, we can posit that similar to Spanish, the orthographic ‘rr’ is represented underlyingly as
/r/, thus resulting in the proper derivation for the geminate cases.
Vowel laxing
Dothraki orthographically consists of 4 vowels (a, e, i, o), but has 7 vowel sounds in its phonetic
inventory: [a], [e], [i], [o], [ɑ], [ɛ], and [ɔ]. The occurrence of these segments is perfectly
predictable as seen below, and seems to exhibit a vowel laxing process triggered by the uvular
plosive [q]. Consider the following data (taken from “
”). The
The Dothraki Language Dictionary
first column is a list of words containing each orthographic vowel before [q] in word-initial and
word-central positions, while the second column is the same for [q]’s velar counterpart, [k]. The
vowel sounds in the second column are a representation of what each vowel sounds like
following any segment other than [q], so an exhaustive list has not been included.
qafat
[qɑfat] –
to ask
kafat
[kafat] –
to smash
loqam
[loqɑm] –
arrow
shokat
[ʃokat] –
to jump over
qevir
[qɛvir] –
forest
haqe
[haqɛ] –
tired
qiyalat
[qejalat] –
to bleed
kemik
[kemik] –
ally
hake
[hake] –
name
kisha
[kiʃa] –
we
naqis
[naqes] –
small
dothraki
[doθɾaki] –
men who ride
qora
[qɔɾa] –
hand, arm
koalak
[koalak] –
healer
eqorasalat
[eqɔɾasalat] –
to let go of
sekosshi
[sekoʃʃi] –
surely, certainly
From the data above, it is clear that although orthographically identical, the vowels [a], [e], [i],
and [o] are pronounced differently when they follow [q], with no exceptions. This is phonetically
natural, since each vowel displays place of articulation assimilation to the backness of [q] by
becoming lax (or more back in the case of [i]→[e]. The alternation can be captured by the
following rules:
and since [i] has no lax counterpart in Dothraki’s phonetic inventory,
/V/ → [-ATR] / q__
/i/ → [e] / q__
Stress
The final phenomenon is stress assignment in Dothraki. Below are two sentences released from
an actual Game of Thrones script, which were marked with stress in order to help actors with
their dialogues (taken from “
”):
Season One Dothraki Dialogue
‘Anha tih mahra’zhes fin ‘kasha cha’kat kar’lin.
[‘an.ha tih mah.ra.’ʒes fin ‘ka.ʃa tʃa.’kat kar.’lin]
“I saw a man who lasted 20 miles.”
(“You Win or You Die, S1E7)
E’yel ‘varthasoe she ileka’an ‘rikhoya arreka’an ‘vekha ‘vosi yero’on ‘vosma to’lorro!
[e.’yel ‘var.θa.so.e ʃe i.le.ka.’an ‘ri.xo.ya a.re.ka.’an ‘ve.xa ‘vo.si ye.ɾo.’on ‘vos.ma to.’lor.ro]
“The rain will fall on your rotting skin until nothing is left but bones.”
(‘The Pointy End’, S1E8)
From these transcripts, words seem to fall into two predictable categories: word-final stress when
the word ends in a consonant, and word-initial stress when it ends in a vowel. However, the word
[to.’lor.ro] presents a counterexample, where the stress is penultimate rather than word-initial as
predicted. It would be simple to label this as an exception, but this pattern is also found in other
vowel-final words:
zha’vorsa
[ʒa.’vor.sa] – “
dragon”
vo’secchi
[vo.’setʃ.tʃi] – “
of course not”
(Peterson 21)
Instead of labelling every outlier an exception, a more comprehensive analysis can come from
positing that Dothraki is a quantity sensitive language, and thus relies on syllable weight for
stress assignment. In Dothraki, VC and CVC (closed) syllables can be considered heavy, while
CV (open) syllables are considered light (CVV syllables cannot exist, since Dothraki converts
vowel geminates into nuclei of adjacent syllables). Given these definitions, the stress assignment
process can be delineated through a leftward scanning system outlined in the following steps:
1.
If last syllable heavy, assign stress to it.
2. Else, see penultimate syllable. If heavy, assign stress to it.
3. Else, assign word-initial stress.
Works Cited
Battis, Jes, and Susan Johnston.
Mastering the Game of Thrones: Essays on George R.R.
. McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2015.
Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire
Destruel, Matt.
Shekh Ma Shieraki Anni: Typology of a fictional language created for artistic
. Lingua Frankly 2(1), 2014. doi:10.6017/lf.v2i1.5406.
purposes
Greenberg, Joseph H.
, 73-113. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press,
Universals of Human Language
1963.
Littauer, Richard.
. Dothraki.org, 23 Jan. 2016,
The Dothraki Language Dictionary (Ver 3.11)
docs.dothraki.org/Dothraki.pdf.
Peterson, David J.
Living Language Dothraki: a Conversational Language Course based on the
. New York, NY: Living Language, 2014.
Hit Original HBO Series Game of Thrones
. Dothraki Wiki,
Season One Dothraki Dialogue
wiki.dothraki.org/Season_One_Dothraki_Dialogue.
Wright, Ellen B. “Creating Dothraki: An Interview with David J. Peterson and Sai Emrys.”
, 27 Jan. 2015,
Tor.com
www.tor.com/2010/04/22/creating-dothraki-an-interview-with-david-j-peterson-and-sai-e
.
mrys/
