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[Fenrir]

quote:Originally posted by HOTMACHINA:
<STRONG>"A dwarf is a short, stocky humanoid creature in Norse mythology as well as other Germanic mythologies, fairy tales, fantasy fiction and role-playing games.

The plural form dwarfs has been traced to the 17th century. The alternative plural dwarves has been recorded in the early 18th century, but was not generally accepted until used by philologist J. R. R. Tolkien in his fantasy novel The Hobbit. Neither spelling represents the regular phonetic development of the Old English plural dweorgas, namely dwarrows; rather, they descend from a new plural formed in Middle English from the singular stem. Similarly, the old inherited plural dwarrows acquired a singular dwarrow.[1] Although dwarrow has passed from the language, both dwarfs and dwarves are in current use. Many grammarians prefer dwarfs, many fantasists prefer dwarves. The form dwarfs is generally used for real people affected by dwarfism; the form dwarves is used for the mythical people described by Tolkien and others."null

So there you have it in a nutshell its dweorgas   </STRONG>

Bah! You got this rubbish from Wikipedia.

[Armok]

My vote is on dwarves.

Am I the only one that uses TOADYS and DFs version of dwarves to be the ultimate truth and measurement for the realism in all other settings including dwarves, the dwarves in DF are the DEFINITION of "dwarf", because Toady is t+o awesome to ever be wrong.

For any question about the real true nature of dwarves just ask Toady, HE is the ultimate authority on this subject.

[Fenrir]

quote:Originally posted by Armok:
<STRONG>My vote is on dwarves.</STRONG>

I don't think that the spelling of any word is up for vote.

[Blacken]

quote:I am a linguist.

A cunning one?

(Okay, okay, terrible joke. But your username makes it funny.   )

[Dreamer]

[veer from main subject]

Wikipedia is often ridiculed as a source because it can be edited by anyone and everyone.  If everyone can edit it, not everything is correct, right?

Well, yes, but the same applies to everything else to the internet.  The thing that sets wikipedia apart is that there are several groups of people who enforce the requirement of sources from other sites and very small groups of people who edit it for humor or self-interest.  These corrections are usually blatantly obvious and quickly corrected by the majority of people who want Wikipedia to be a good source of correct information, and it has been compared to the Encyclopedia Britainica in terms of accuracy.  (I think the EB has more volume per article, though, and more articles available.)

It's just that editing the wikipedia is such a petty thing most kids out there simply don't bother because there's no pride to be taken in it - Most people would content themselves by looking at shady websites or hacking into bigger, more challanging targets.  There are people out there who do vandalize the Wikipedia, but such things are usually found and corrected.

Sorry, it just irks me that people disregard an internet source off hand because it's written and edited by the public.  That said, the information on it should be trusted about as much as everything else on the internet, but I think I'll be visiting Wikipedia before I go off and do a google search for something.

[/veer from main subject]

[DJ]

Isn't the proper plural dorfs? I see it here all the time, so it must be right.

[Reign on your Parade]

You're correct that the encyclopedia brittanica has ON AVERAGE more volume per article, but it's problem is the long tail, meaning that a minority of the articles get a majority of the attention, which I BELEIVE is less so with wikipedia.

[penguinofhonor]

.

[Fenrir]

quote:Originally posted by penguinofhonor:
<STRONG>Yeah, I'm gonna have to say that Toady is my authority on all things dwarven. And it's dwarves. Or we could compromise to dwarfes. Just saying.</STRONG>

Let Toady call them what he will, he's earned that right and more. However, that does not change that the correct plural form of the word is "dwarfs".

[sorbius]

The real question is.....does it matter?  In DF they are dwarves.  perhaps in 'correct' english it is dwarfs, but who the hell cares.

[Red Jackard]

<MelonDude> stupid dorfs are called durfs

[WillNZ]

Somewhere, there is a dwarf screaming into the sky...

"WHAT AM I?!?"

[Lord_Phoenix]

quote:Originally posted by Fenrir:
<STRONG>I have a few unanswered questions about the true nature of dwarfs.

1. Are they short?
2. Are they the dark counterpart of elves (dark elves)?
3. Is the plural of the word "dwarfs" or "dwarves"?

2. Are they the dark counterpart of elves (dark elves)?
Dwarfs turn to stone when exposed to sunlight. It's a fact, I own a copy of the Poetic Edda. In another game, Hammer of the Gods, a 1994 turn-based-strategy game developed by New World Computing for MS-DOS, states that the dwarfs' home is Svart-alf-heim. "Svart" is the Old Norse word for "black", and "alf" is Old Norse for "elf". I also read that dwarfs and black elves may have been the same creature.
</STRONG>

Well, according to norse mythos, there are three types of Elves:  Ljosalfar, Dokkalfar, and Svartalfar, or Light Elves, Dark Elves, and Black Elves respectively. The Black Elves lived deep beneath the earth, and were miners and metal workers I think, and were somewhat malign.  Black elves were marked by a lack of women, or a shortage of women, or at least fertility, and were believed to steal human children and take them for their own.  I forget wether or not they were considered short in stature.  It's probably that the current fantasy depiction of dwarves is a mixture of multiple mythologies, perhaps a mixture of norse mythos, in which the svartalfar may be tall, with celtic brownies/fairies/elves/etc. who were pretty much all very, very short (on the order of inches tall), in much the same way Tolkein merged Celtic elves, who were woodland creatures and good archers, with the tall, fair haired Ljosalfar of Norse mythology, in which elves were not known for being archers, to create the elves in his stories.

The Dark Elves lived underground as well, but much closer to the surface, in hills and mounds.  I think they were thought to take things and hide them and the like if you disrepected them.

The Light Elves lived in the sky, and were the messengers of the gods, similar to angels in Christian/Judean/etc. mythos.

[ January 01, 2008: Message edited by: Lord_Phoenix ]

[Fenrir]

quote:Originally posted by Lord_Phoenix:
<STRONG>
...with celtic brownies/fairies/elves/etc. who were pretty much all very, very short (on the order of inches tall).</STRONG>

Originally, there was no such thing (at least in Celtic myth) as "little people". Fairies, elves, and the like were of human stature. I think they became little because of Christianity's attempts to destroy old myths and religions, I'm not sure.

[Red Jackard]

quote:Originally posted by Fenrir:
<STRONG>I think they became little because of Christianity's attempts to destroy old myths and religions</STRONG>

That's the way I read it.