My Favorite Words

My Favorite Words

Matt Fogel asked me to list some of my favorite words from my personal model languages. Here they are.

From Dublex, a language with 400 roots and over 5000 derived words:

vocsist /vohk-SEEST/ [voc+sist, "word system"]

language -- a systematic means of communicating by the use of sounds or conventional symbols

cisdesir /kees-deh-SEER/ [cis+desir, "story desire"]

story hunger -- an emotional need for fulfillment through narrative fiction in any form (book, television sitcom, movies, etc.)

From Fith, a language of aliens:

shi vum vai e ("you were an egg", lit. "you egg be") is the direst insult, equivalent to "f-- you" in English (and is a reference to the pestilent monotreme rodents native to the planet Fithia)

From New English, suggestions for new English words created by myself and others:

cantabilous [Ital. < LLat. cantabilis, worthy of being sung < Lat. cantare, freq. of canere, to sing.] 1. Worthy of being sung. _Surely His praises are cantabilous!_ 2. Smooth, lyrical, and flowing in style: CANTIBILE. -can-ta'bi-lous'ly. adv. -can-ta'bi-lous'ness. n.

From Sen:esepera, a phonetic simplification of Esperanto:

lingefa [< Esperanto lingvo] n. language

Sadly, one of my favorite languages was created on a Macintosh in the LEO database format in 1986 and had over 1,000 words, but it is lost to me now. It had the word torkirion. I don't remember what it meant; only that I liked it.