Discworld (world)
Encyclopedia
The Discworld is the fictional setting for all of Terry Pratchett
's Discworld
fantasy novels. It consists of a large disc (complete with edge-of-the-world drop-off and consequent waterfall) resting on the backs of four huge elephant
s which are in turn standing on the back of an enormous turtle
, named Great A'Tuin (similar to Chukwa
or Akupara from Hindu mythology
) as it slowly swims through space.
The Disc has been shown to be heavily influenced by magic and, while Pratchett has given it certain similarities to planet Earth
, he has also created his own system of physics for it.
Pratchett first explored the idea of a disc-shaped world in the novel Strata
(1981).
(of the fictional species
: Chelys galactica) who travels through the Discworld universe's space
, carrying four giant elephant
s (named Berilia, Tubul, Great T'Phon, and Jerakeen) who in turn carry the Discworld. The narration has described A'Tuin as "the only turtle ever to feature on the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram."
Great A'Tuin's gender
is unknown (though in The Colour of Magic
Pratchett describes the turtle as male), but the subject of much speculation by some of the Disc's finest scientific minds. The sex of the World Turtle is pivotal in proving or disproving a number of conflicting theories about the destination of Great A'Tuin's journey through the cosmos
. If, as the Discworld version of the popular "big bang theory" states, Great A'Tuin is moving to its mating grounds, then at the point of mating might the civilization
s of the Disc be crushed or simply slide off? Attempts by telepaths
to learn more about Great A'Tuin's intents have not met with much success, mainly because they did not realise that its brain functions are on such a slow timescale. All they've been able to discern is that the Great A'Tuin is looking forward to something.
The other theory, described as being popular among the Discworld's academics as the Discworld version of the steady state theory
, which in-universe is known as the "steady gait" theory, is that he/she came from nowhere and is going to keep swimming through space to nowhere for ever. Eric shows Great A'Tuin being made instantly from nothing, seemingly in support of the theory that it came from nowhere and would continue at a constant pace into nowhere; however, the events in The Light Fantastic
, in which the Great A'Tuin attended the hatching of eight baby turtles, each with four baby elephants and a tiny discworld of their own, would seem to support the Big Bang hypothesis.
The little turtles have since gone off on their own journeys. Whether this was the event the Great A'Tuin was looking forward to or merely one step towards its ultimate goal is not mentioned.
Great A'Tuin has been mentioned to frequently roll on its belly to avoid asteroid and comet collisions, or even to snatch these projectiles out of the sky which might otherwise destroy the Disc. These stunts do not affect the Disc's population, other than to induce severe seasickness on anyone who happens to be looking at the night sky at that time. A'Tuin has been known to do more complex rolls and corkscrews, but these are rarer. This is similar to real-world sea turtles' habit of rolling over with their shell down to protect themselves from sharks.
Due to the Great A'Tuin's travelling through the universe, the night sky of the Discworld, unlike that of our world, changes markedly over the course of decades, as the turtle departs older constellations and enters new ones. This means that astrologers must constantly update and alter their horoscopes to incorporate all-new zodiacs.
A tiny sun
and moon
orbit the Great A'Tuin, both about 1 mile in diameter when described at the start of the series, but the description of their diameter is increased to at least 80 miles later in the chronicles. The moon is slightly closer to the Disc than the sun, and is covered, on one half, with silvery glowing plants, which feed the lunar dragons. The other half is burnt black by the sun. The moon rotates, and completes a full revolution in about a month; the full moon occurs when the luminescent side is completely visible from the Disc, the new moon when the dark side is shown. The sun's orbit is so complex that one of the elephants has to cock its leg to allow the sun to continue on its orbit.
According to Pratchett, through the wizards of Unseen University
, Chelys galactica, and thusly Great A'tuin, are composed largely of the fictional element chelonium, the properties of which are apparently known to them (they do tests to look for it in Roundworld (the Discworld analogue of Earth) in The Science of Discworld
), but not to readers.
two-fifths that of the Earth
, which would make it roughly the size of the Pacific Ocean. In addition to its flatness, Pratchett gives it another principal geographic feature; Cori Celesti, a great, 10-mile-high spire of rock that lies at its exact centre and is the point of origin for its standing magical field. Cori Celesti is also the location of the Discworld version of real-world Greek Mythology
's Mt. Olympus, named Dunmanifestin, the home of many of the Disc's gods
. The area including Cori Celesti is known as The Hub, a land of high, icebound mountains that serves as an analogue to the real-world Himalayas
, polar regions (since, although the Disc has no poles as such, it is as far as possible from the Disc's edge and thus the sun), and Scandinavia – the Hublanders share many features with vikings. Polar bears are renamed "Hubland bears", while the Disc's equivalent of the aurora borealis (described as being produced by the Disc's magical field, rather than by magnetism) is known as the "Aurora Coriolis." Directions within the Discworld are not given as North, South, East and West, but rather as directions relating to the disc itself: Hubward (towards the centre), Rimward (away from the centre) and to a lesser extent, turnwise
and widdershins
(respectively, with and against the direction of the Disc's spin).
The areas closer to the Rim are warmer and tropical, since the Disc's sun passes closer to them in its orbit. At the Rim, a great, encircling waterfall (the Rimfall) sends the Disc's oceans cascading into space. Pratchett is evasive about how the water eventually returns to refill the oceans, only saying, "Arrangements are made." The mist from the plunging waters creates the Rimbow, an eight-colour (the eighth is octarine) double rainbow consisting both of light and of magic.
Pratchett gives the Disc four main continents, along with a number of geographical and political regions and islands, some of which have not been described in detail in the novels, and the main information for which comes from The Discworld Mapp
and footnotes. The majority of the Disc's landmass is described as being composed of a single supercontinent
comprising a large main region and a smaller Counterweight Continent, a Discworld Analogue to the Far East connected by a narrow isthmus
. This supercontinent is composed of the unnamed Continent upon which most of the novels are set, the Discworld version of Europe, and Klatch, akin to Africa, India and the Near East. In Discworld's fictional geology, there is also the island continent of Fourecks, the smallest of the four, which resembles Australia
. It is also known as Terror Incognita (a play on Terra Incognita
). On these continents, Pratchett has created a large number of countries, kingdoms, cities and towns can be found; the most widely mentioned in the books being Ankh-Morpork
, Lancre, the Klatchian Empire and Überwald. In the Discworld Companion, Pratchett writes "there have been other continents, which have sunk, blown up, or simply disappeared. This sort of thing happens all the time, even on the best-regulated planets."
The Disc contains a number of fictional substances. One such is octiron, a dense black metal that is a large part of the Discworld's crust. Its melting point is above the range of metal forges. The gates of Unseen University are made out of it as is Old Tom, the university's bell. It is used to make magic needles and bells. It releases magical radiation, but if it becomes negatively polarised, it can be used to absorb such radiation. It generates significant amounts of heat under pressure, accounting for most of the volcanic geological processes on Discworld. When struck (such as with Old Tom), instead of producing a sound it briefly silences anything around it. Another is fingles, insinuated, in Eric
, to be an important part of human psychology. Their absence, according to the Creator, can cause psychological problems. "On the surface they were all right, but deep down they knew something was missing," as he put it, referring to the inhabitants of a world where he forgot to include any. Since Fingles do not exist on Earth, it is implied that Earth is the planet the Creator is referring to, and humanity is the species that is fundamentally incomplete because of its absence. Another is slood. First mentioned in The Last Continent
, Slood is a natural substance that could be discovered by intelligent beings, but that humans on Earth
have been too unintelligent to find; it is said to be much easier to discover than fire, and only slightly harder to discover than water. One of Rincewind's many accumulated positions is Reader in Slood Dynamics. The General Theory of Slood was discovered by Archchancellor Sloman, and a stained glass window representing this event is in the meeting room of the Unseen University
college council. The University's plumbing system contains pipes for maintaining slood differential.
. The Disc's "standing magical field" is essentially the local breakdown of reality which allows a flat planet on the back of a turtle to even exist. The force called "magic" is really just a function of the relative absence of reality in the local area, much in the same way that the absence of heat is described as "coldness." Magic warps reality in much the same way as the real universe's gravity warps it's space-time. The act of performing magic is, essentially, telling the universe what you want it to be like, in terms it can't ignore. This is very draining to magic-users, due to Discworld science's Law of Conservation of Reality (which states it takes the same effort to do something with magic as it would to do it mundanely). This is why most Discworld wizards store magic in a staff (with a knob on the end) which is a sort of capacitor
for magical energy.
On the Discworld, where magic has more in common with particle physics
than Houdini, high-level background magic (most likely a reference to real-world background radiation
) occurs when a very powerful spell hits, creating a myriad of sub-astral particles that severely distort local reality. Building a house in (or even walking into) a region where this has happened is extremely dangerous as it is mentioned that an individual may not remain the same species, shape or level of sanity, as they were when they entered. Medium levels cause odd effects, such as coins landing on their edges and turning into caterpillars. Areas with larger than normal quantities of background magic tend to display unusual qualities, even for the Disc. Very high quantities of magic can knock a hole in Discworld reality, leading to an invasion by Lovecraftian monstrosities from the Dungeon Dimensions, or, almost as bad, the world of the Elves
. In the Discworld universe, magic is broken into elementary particulate fragments in much the same way that energy and other forces are in real-world quantum physics. The basic unit of Discworld magic is the thaum (from the Greek
thauma, marvel), equal to the amount of mystical energy required to conjure up one small white pigeon, or three normal-sized billiard ball
s. Several SI
-modifiers have been applied to it (e.g. millithaum, kilothaum) in the books. Magic can be measured with a thaumometer, which is described as a black cube with a dial on one side. A standard thaumometer is good for up to a million thaums, beyond that level, Discworld reality starts to break down. The thaum also appears to be a particle; the Discworld physics equivalent of the atom
. "Splitting the thaum" revealed that it was in fact composed of numerous sub-particles, called resons ("thingies") which in turn are created from a combination of up to five "flavours": up, down, sideways, sex appeal, and peppermint (see the real-world quarks).
In the opening books, the number eight is generally significant and has magical properties on the Disc, (e.g. the number of the colour of Magic, octarine) and should never be spoken by wizards especially in certain places. Doing so may allow the ancient dungeon dimension creature "Bel-Shamharoth the sender of eight" to break through (this is taken to a somewhat-extreme end in one book, as even the narrator takes great pains to avoid saying the word). On the other hand, eight turns up in many places one would expect the number seven in the real world (e.g. the Discworld week contains eight days, not seven). After The Colour of Magic
, both the colour and the number eight no longer appeared as dangerous.
The Disc's magical field is centred on the Cori Celesti. Everyday natural forces, such as light and magnetism
, are muffled by the power of the Disc's magical field, and rather than a magnetised needle, navigators on the Disc use a compass with a needle of the magical metal octiron, which will always point towards Cori Celesti. Light is so oddly affected by magic that, as it passes into the Disc's atmosphere, it actually slows down from millions to hundreds of miles an hour. One odd effect of this is that the Disc has time zones, when, as a flat world, it shouldn't. Another effect is that, as reported in Thud!
, the red-
and blue-shifting of light becomes noticeable when travelling at speeds of merely a hundred and twenty miles per hour.
and drop bear
s are real on the Disc; in reality lemmings don't actually rush en masse off cliffs; on the Disc, they do, because that is what people believe (actually, since mass suicide would seriously foul up natural selection
, they tend to abseil (or rappel)
down them instead). These concepts of Discworld physics are also exploited in both wizard and witch magic. For example, when a character wishes to turn a cat into a human, the easiest way is to convince the cat, on a deep level, that he is a human. In fact, the main reason the Auditors of Reality
dislike sentient beings in the Discworld universe is because the Auditors are the personifications of the real-world laws of physics, but the Discworld physics' power of belief and the humans' ignorance constantly remake the world, making their work fruitless.
More significantly, it is also belief that gives Discworld's gods their powers. Discworld gods start off as tiny spirits, and gain power as they gain believers; this is explored most thoroughly in Small Gods
. A similar effect has led to the personalisation and "reification" in the Discworld universe of mythological beings symbolising abstract concepts, such as Death
, the Hogfather and other anthropomorphic personifications. In Hogfather
, the assassin Mr. Teatime tries to kill the patron of Hogswatch by using an old magic that involves controlling a person with a part of their body (in this case, the teeth collected by the Tooth Fairies), in order to stop children from believing in him, and almost succeeds.
; its basic composition is determined by what it is ultimately meant to be. This primary element, out of which all others spring, is known as narrativium, the elemental substance of Story. Nothing on the Disc can exist without a Story first existing to mold its destiny and determine its form. This is, perhaps, a take on the fact that nothing can ever happen on the Disc unless it is written in a story
by Terry Pratchett. On the Disc, if a story or legend is told often enough and believed by enough people, it becomes true. This is known in in-universe physics as the law of narrative causality.
For example, characters in Guards! Guards!
describe the marauding (noble) dragon as an "impossible" creature, yet it is able to fly and breathe fire because that is what dragons are expected to do. Similarly, a witch gone bad may meet a bad end after building a house of gingerbread
. If a miller has a third son, he will invariably leave him only his cat
. A hero will always win when outnumbered, since million-to-one chances are dramatic enough to "crop up nine times out of ten", but always lose when faced with "a little bald wrinkly smiling man" who is almost always highly trained in martial arts.
Discworld witches often employ narrative in their magic, but consider it ethically tricky since it interferes with free will
. Discworld wizards avoid doing so because narrative that severely strains credibility requires outright sources of magic to feed on, sometimes indiscriminately. Knowledge of stories, their use and how to change them forms the basis of many forms of magical power in Discworld physics. Pratchett characters who use and/or change stories include Lilith, Black Aliss, and Granny Weatherwax. The habit of many Discworlders to take metaphor
literally has combined with the power of belief to produce some very odd areas on the Discworld. The Place Where The Sun Does Not Shine, for instance, is a deep crevasse in Lancre, incidentally located between A Rock And A Hard Place.
of magic on the Discworld, also often called the eighth colour. This fictional colour is strongly indicative of magic and can only be seen by wizards (who sometimes describe it as resembling a fluorescent greenish-yellow purple) and cats. As in conventional human colour vision, colour opponency
prevents the perception of reddish-greenish or yellowish-bluish colours; it would therefore be impossible to perceive a colour as "greenish-yellow purple". If greenish-yellow
and purple
lights were shone together, a shade of grey
would result; with pigments, the result would be brown. The normal human visual system works by the presence of cone
s and rod
s in the eye; the ability of Discworld wizards to see octarine is explained by the additional presence of octagon cells.
Dwarfs
: Short, stocky, bearded metal-workers, generally seen wearing chain mail and brandishing axes. They are similar to the Dwarves
of J. R. R. Tolkien
's Middle-earth
, to which they largely started out as a homage. (Other definitions)
Trolls :Trolls on the Discworld are, essentially, living, mobile rocks. Trolls have grown to overcome those vicious stereotypes of yore and have lived very prosperous lives in heavily populated cities with (relatively) little killing. (Other definitions
)
Golems
: A form of a clay robot
, awakened by a spell or priestly words to do people's bidding. (Jewish folkloric definition
)
Gnomes : Ranging in size from six inches to two feet, they are, Pratchett says, more or less interchangeable with the Nac Mac Feegles. (English folkloric definition
)
Undead
: (Other definitions
) Species in the Discworld novels categorised as undead include: Zombies (Other definitions
), Banshees (Celtic folkloric definition
), Ghouls (Other definitions
), Ghosts (Other definitions
), Mummies (Other definitions), Bogeymen (Other definitions), Werewolves (Other definitions
), and Vampires (Other definitions
)
Elves
:Are based more on the nastier kind of fairy
-folk in Europe
an (and other) folklore
s than elves as portrayed in most modern (post-Tolkien
) fantasy fiction. (Other definitions
)
Gods
: On the Discworld, are divided into major gods that are parodies of the Pantheon
s of Greece and Rome and "Small gods" that are relatively powerless but by acquiring more believers may graduate to the Discworld Pantheon
Centaurs: Believed by Discworld characters to be the result of magical mutation. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Fauns: Believed by Discworld characters to be the result of magical mutation. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Furies: Furies are birdlike creatures from Ephebe who can be trained to target a single individual, forcing people away from him/her. In that sense they act like guard dogs, whether their "master" likes it or not. They appear to be barely sentient. Featured in Unseen Academicals
. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Goblins: "Nasty cowardly little bastards who collect their own earwax", as described in-universe by the victims of the war that engulfed the Unholy Empire. Of course, victims on both sides of the war both say this, and somehow, depending on who is telling the tale, all the goblins apparently fought for the other side. (Other definitions
)
Gorgons: It is mentioned that a Gorgon had joined the Ankh-Morpork City Watch
and accidentally turned 3 people to stone. Referenced in Unseen Academicals
. (Greek mythological definition
)
Kvetch: Creatures covered from head to foot in hair who fled their native Mouldavia for Ankh-Morpork after a war broke out. Sam Vimes snidely remarks that Vetinari will demand some are allowed on the Watch before too long.
Lizard Men: Near-extinct, exceptionally unintelligent creatures who make ideal henchmen for Dark Lords. Evil Harry Dread had two lizard men in his horde, both named "Slime". Featured in The Last Hero
. (Other definitions)
Orcs: A near extinct race who were bred/made from men (as goblins, according to Discworld character Lord Vetinari, were not vicious enough) to be weapons in a great war. So far only one living orc (by name "Mr Nutt") is known to exist although it is suspected that others exist in the wilds of far Überwald. Mr Nutt initially had to hide his species, even from himself, due to the brutal reputation and legends about orcs. Orcs themselves are shown to be not necessarily 'bad' creatures; given the opportunity they can easily educate themselves, gain wisdom and a great sense of honesty and morality. However many were forced into battle by men and knew only lives of cruelty thus giving rise to their fearsome reputation. They possess exceptional levels of strength, as well as a special organ hidden deep inside their body that is designed to heal the orc, even capable of bringing them back from some types of death. Featured in Unseen Academicals
. (Other definitions
)
, and has been expanded upon in later novels and The Discworld Almanak
(2004). It has numerous oddities, the chief of which is its length.
The calendar
is based on a Great Year
, or Astronomical Year
, defined as the time it takes for the Disc to revolve once on the backs of the elephants. This lasts 800 days and contains two of each season
(Midsummer
occurs at a given point when the sun passes directly overhead, midwinter when it passes perpendicularly. However most people, especially farmers, consider four seasons to be a year, so an Agricultural Year of 400 days is used for most purposes.
The agricultural year is divided into 13 months:
Each week has eight days: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Octeday.
, and the winter solstice
from the perspective of Ankh-Morpork
. In the Astronomical Year the second midwinter (the year's midway point) is called Crueltide, but due to people using the Agricultural Year this is the same festival.
The 32nd of December, or the day before the New Year, is known as Hogswatchnight; The name is a pun on "hogwash", Hogmanay
and Watch Night, and possibly on the ancient holiday of Samhain
. Traditionally associated with pig-killing, to ensure there is enough food for the rest of the winter. Many Hogswatch traditions are parodies of those associated with Christmas
, including a decorated oak tree in a pot, strings of paper sausages, and, of course, a visit by the Hogfather. Witches
do not leave the house on Hogswatchnight more because of tradition than any practical reasons. The witch Nanny Ogg
gets around this by simply inviting everyone to her house for the holiday instead.
In the Omnian religion, Hogswatchnight is called the Fast of St Ossory. Omnians celebrate with fasting, prayer meetings, and the exchange of religious pamphlets.
Hogswatch was also a holiday celebrated in The Dark Side of the Sun
, a non-Discworld book by Pratchett.
In the Round world (following Terry Pratchett's diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease), Match It For Pratchett has called on fans to wear lilacs on 25 May in support of Terry.
The slogan of the People's Revolution is Truth, Justice, Freedom, Reasonably Priced Love, and a Hard-Boiled Egg!
. Years and centuries are also given names by the UU's astrologers. 2005 AM, for instance, is the Year of the Prawn, the fifth year of the Century of the Anchovy. The majority of the Discworld
novels are set in the 20th century AM, the Century of the Fruitbat, with the later ones entering the 21st, the Century of the Anchovy.
Other calendars count from various other events, and different schools of astronomy give the years different names. The Theocracy of Muntab has a calendar that counts down, rather than up. The reason for this is unknown, though it is agreed that waiting around for it to reach zero is unwise.
Morporkian : Language of the Discworld locations of Ankh-Morpork
, the Sto Plains, the Ramtops, Genua, and Fourecks (modified). Also, from characters' perspectives, the lingua franca
of the Discworld. Comparable to real-world English
.
Latatian : Dead Language
of the majority of Morporkian-speaking countries; Pratchett has not stated how widespread Latatian was in Discworld but it was in use beyond simply Ankh Morpork. Used, most often for humor, in novels in the mottoes of noble families, civic organizations and Guilds of Ankh-Morpork
, in legal principles, and by Discworld wizards, doctors, and scientists, the latter a satire of those professions' use of Latin to obfuscate laymen. Comparable to real-world Latin
, though Pratchett describes it as "very bad doggy Latin
". Examples: Motto of Ankh-Morpork City Watch
: Fabricati Diem, Pvnc; complete nonsense in Latin but looks like it means Make My Day, Punk. Legal Principle: Acquiris Quodcumque Rapis: You get what you grab. Discworld Professions: Sodomy non Sapiens to mean "buggered if I know".
Quirmian : Language of the Discworld country of Quirm. Comparable to real-world French
.
Ephebian : Language of the Discworld country of Ephebe. Comparable to real-world Greek
.
Klatchian : Language of the Discworld country of Klatch. Also, the font is changed to a classical "Arabian Nights"-style when Klatchian is used in the novels. Comparable to real-world Arabic. Featured most prominently in Jingo (novel)
.
Agatean : Language of the Discworld Agatean Empire. It is written in complicated pictograms. Minor differences in pronunciation alter word meanings completely. Pratchett sometimes used pictograms in the font of characters speaking Agatean. Comparable to real-world Chinese
. Featured most prominently in Interesting Times
.
Uberwaldian : Language of the Discworld region of Überwald. The font is changed to German Gothic when Uberwaldean is used in novels. Comparable to real-world German
and/or Slavic languages
. Featured most prominently in The Fifth Elephant
.
Terry Pratchett
Sir Terence David John "Terry" Pratchett, OBE is an English novelist, known for his frequently comical work in the fantasy genre. He is best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels...
's Discworld
Discworld
Discworld is a comic fantasy book series by English author Sir Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld, a flat world balanced on the backs of four elephants which, in turn, stand on the back of a giant turtle, Great A'Tuin. The books frequently parody, or at least take inspiration from, J. R. R....
fantasy novels. It consists of a large disc (complete with edge-of-the-world drop-off and consequent waterfall) resting on the backs of four huge elephant
Elephant
Elephants are large land mammals in two extant genera of the family Elephantidae: Elephas and Loxodonta, with the third genus Mammuthus extinct...
s which are in turn standing on the back of an enormous turtle
Turtle
Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines , characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield...
, named Great A'Tuin (similar to Chukwa
Chukwa
Chukwa may refer to* the Chukwa language of Tibet* an alleged World Turtle in Hindu mythology, see World-Tortoise...
or Akupara from Hindu mythology
Hindu mythology
Hindu religious literature is the large body of traditional narratives related to Hinduism, notably as contained in Sanskrit literature, such as the Sanskrit epics and the Puranas. As such, it is a subset of Nepali and Indian culture...
) as it slowly swims through space.
The Disc has been shown to be heavily influenced by magic and, while Pratchett has given it certain similarities to planet Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
, he has also created his own system of physics for it.
Pratchett first explored the idea of a disc-shaped world in the novel Strata
Strata (novel)
Strata is a comic science fiction novel by Terry Pratchett. Published in 1981, it is one of Pratchett's first novels and one of only two purely science fiction novels he has written, the other being The Dark Side of the Sun....
(1981).
Great A'Tuin
Great A'Tuin is the Giant Star TurtleTurtle
Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines , characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield...
(of the fictional species
Species
In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...
: Chelys galactica) who travels through the Discworld universe's space
Outer space
Outer space is the void that exists between celestial bodies, including the Earth. It is not completely empty, but consists of a hard vacuum containing a low density of particles: predominantly a plasma of hydrogen and helium, as well as electromagnetic radiation, magnetic fields, and neutrinos....
, carrying four giant elephant
Elephant
Elephants are large land mammals in two extant genera of the family Elephantidae: Elephas and Loxodonta, with the third genus Mammuthus extinct...
s (named Berilia, Tubul, Great T'Phon, and Jerakeen) who in turn carry the Discworld. The narration has described A'Tuin as "the only turtle ever to feature on the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram."
Great A'Tuin's gender
Gender
Gender is a range of characteristics used to distinguish between males and females, particularly in the cases of men and women and the masculine and feminine attributes assigned to them. Depending on the context, the discriminating characteristics vary from sex to social role to gender identity...
is unknown (though in The Colour of Magic
The Colour of Magic
The Colour of Magic is a 1983 comic fantasy novel by Terry Pratchett, and is the first book of the Discworld series. Pratchett has described it as "an attempt to do for the classical fantasy universe what Blazing Saddles did for Westerns."...
Pratchett describes the turtle as male), but the subject of much speculation by some of the Disc's finest scientific minds. The sex of the World Turtle is pivotal in proving or disproving a number of conflicting theories about the destination of Great A'Tuin's journey through the cosmos
Cosmos
In the general sense, a cosmos is an orderly or harmonious system. It originates from the Greek term κόσμος , meaning "order" or "ornament" and is antithetical to the concept of chaos. Today, the word is generally used as a synonym of the word Universe . The word cosmos originates from the same root...
. If, as the Discworld version of the popular "big bang theory" states, Great A'Tuin is moving to its mating grounds, then at the point of mating might the civilization
Civilization
Civilization is a sometimes controversial term that has been used in several related ways. Primarily, the term has been used to refer to the material and instrumental side of human cultures that are complex in terms of technology, science, and division of labor. Such civilizations are generally...
s of the Disc be crushed or simply slide off? Attempts by telepaths
Telepathy
Telepathy , is the induction of mental states from one mind to another. The term was coined in 1882 by the classical scholar Fredric W. H. Myers, a founder of the Society for Psychical Research, and has remained more popular than the more-correct expression thought-transference...
to learn more about Great A'Tuin's intents have not met with much success, mainly because they did not realise that its brain functions are on such a slow timescale. All they've been able to discern is that the Great A'Tuin is looking forward to something.
The other theory, described as being popular among the Discworld's academics as the Discworld version of the steady state theory
Steady State theory
In cosmology, the Steady State theory is a model developed in 1948 by Fred Hoyle, Thomas Gold, Hermann Bondi and others as an alternative to the Big Bang theory...
, which in-universe is known as the "steady gait" theory, is that he/she came from nowhere and is going to keep swimming through space to nowhere for ever. Eric shows Great A'Tuin being made instantly from nothing, seemingly in support of the theory that it came from nowhere and would continue at a constant pace into nowhere; however, the events in The Light Fantastic
The Light Fantastic
The Light Fantastic is a comic fantasy novel by Terry Pratchett, the second of the Discworld series. It was published in 1986. The title is a quote from a poem by John Milton and in the original context referred to dancing lightly with extravagance....
, in which the Great A'Tuin attended the hatching of eight baby turtles, each with four baby elephants and a tiny discworld of their own, would seem to support the Big Bang hypothesis.
The little turtles have since gone off on their own journeys. Whether this was the event the Great A'Tuin was looking forward to or merely one step towards its ultimate goal is not mentioned.
Great A'Tuin has been mentioned to frequently roll on its belly to avoid asteroid and comet collisions, or even to snatch these projectiles out of the sky which might otherwise destroy the Disc. These stunts do not affect the Disc's population, other than to induce severe seasickness on anyone who happens to be looking at the night sky at that time. A'Tuin has been known to do more complex rolls and corkscrews, but these are rarer. This is similar to real-world sea turtles' habit of rolling over with their shell down to protect themselves from sharks.
Due to the Great A'Tuin's travelling through the universe, the night sky of the Discworld, unlike that of our world, changes markedly over the course of decades, as the turtle departs older constellations and enters new ones. This means that astrologers must constantly update and alter their horoscopes to incorporate all-new zodiacs.
A tiny sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
and moon
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...
orbit the Great A'Tuin, both about 1 mile in diameter when described at the start of the series, but the description of their diameter is increased to at least 80 miles later in the chronicles. The moon is slightly closer to the Disc than the sun, and is covered, on one half, with silvery glowing plants, which feed the lunar dragons. The other half is burnt black by the sun. The moon rotates, and completes a full revolution in about a month; the full moon occurs when the luminescent side is completely visible from the Disc, the new moon when the dark side is shown. The sun's orbit is so complex that one of the elephants has to cock its leg to allow the sun to continue on its orbit.
According to Pratchett, through the wizards of Unseen University
Unseen University
The Unseen University is a school of wizardry in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. Located in the city of Ankh-Morpork, the UU is staffed by a faculty composed of mostly indolent and inept old wizards. The university's name is a pun on the Invisible College...
, Chelys galactica, and thusly Great A'tuin, are composed largely of the fictional element chelonium, the properties of which are apparently known to them (they do tests to look for it in Roundworld (the Discworld analogue of Earth) in The Science of Discworld
The Science of Discworld
The Science of Discworld is a 1999 book by novelist Terry Pratchett and popular science writers Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen. Two sequels, The Science of Discworld II: The Globe and The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch, have been written by the same authors.The book alternates between a...
), but not to readers.
The Disc
The Disc itself is described as roughly 10,000 miles wide, giving it a surface areaSurface area
Surface area is the measure of how much exposed area a solid object has, expressed in square units. Mathematical description of the surface area is considerably more involved than the definition of arc length of a curve. For polyhedra the surface area is the sum of the areas of its faces...
two-fifths that of the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
, which would make it roughly the size of the Pacific Ocean. In addition to its flatness, Pratchett gives it another principal geographic feature; Cori Celesti, a great, 10-mile-high spire of rock that lies at its exact centre and is the point of origin for its standing magical field. Cori Celesti is also the location of the Discworld version of real-world Greek Mythology
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
's Mt. Olympus, named Dunmanifestin, the home of many of the Disc's gods
Discworld gods
The Discworld gods are the fictional deities from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. The Discworld, being a flat disc supported on the backs of four elephants on top of a giant flying turtle, exists in a region of the universe where reality is somewhat less consistent than it...
. The area including Cori Celesti is known as The Hub, a land of high, icebound mountains that serves as an analogue to the real-world Himalayas
Himalayas
The Himalaya Range or Himalaya Mountains Sanskrit: Devanagari: हिमालय, literally "abode of snow"), usually called the Himalayas or Himalaya for short, is a mountain range in Asia, separating the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau...
, polar regions (since, although the Disc has no poles as such, it is as far as possible from the Disc's edge and thus the sun), and Scandinavia – the Hublanders share many features with vikings. Polar bears are renamed "Hubland bears", while the Disc's equivalent of the aurora borealis (described as being produced by the Disc's magical field, rather than by magnetism) is known as the "Aurora Coriolis." Directions within the Discworld are not given as North, South, East and West, but rather as directions relating to the disc itself: Hubward (towards the centre), Rimward (away from the centre) and to a lesser extent, turnwise
Sunwise
In Scottish folklore, ' or Sunward was considered the “prosperous course”, turning from east to west in the direction of the sun. The opposite course was known in Scotland as widdershins , or tuathal , and would have been counterclockwise...
and widdershins
Widdershins
Widdershins means to take a course opposite the apparent motion of the sun, to go counterclockwise or lefthandwise, or to circle an object by always keeping it on the left...
(respectively, with and against the direction of the Disc's spin).
The areas closer to the Rim are warmer and tropical, since the Disc's sun passes closer to them in its orbit. At the Rim, a great, encircling waterfall (the Rimfall) sends the Disc's oceans cascading into space. Pratchett is evasive about how the water eventually returns to refill the oceans, only saying, "Arrangements are made." The mist from the plunging waters creates the Rimbow, an eight-colour (the eighth is octarine) double rainbow consisting both of light and of magic.
Pratchett gives the Disc four main continents, along with a number of geographical and political regions and islands, some of which have not been described in detail in the novels, and the main information for which comes from The Discworld Mapp
The Discworld Mapp
The Discworld Mapp is an atlas that contains a large, fold out map of the Discworld fictional world, drawn by Stephen Player to the directions of Terry Pratchett and Stephen Briggs...
and footnotes. The majority of the Disc's landmass is described as being composed of a single supercontinent
Supercontinent
In geology, a supercontinent is a landmass comprising more than one continental core, or craton. The assembly of cratons and accreted terranes that form Eurasia qualifies as a supercontinent today.-History:...
comprising a large main region and a smaller Counterweight Continent, a Discworld Analogue to the Far East connected by a narrow isthmus
Isthmus
An isthmus is a narrow strip of land connecting two larger land areas usually with waterforms on either side.Canals are often built through isthmuses where they may be particularly advantageous to create a shortcut for marine transportation...
. This supercontinent is composed of the unnamed Continent upon which most of the novels are set, the Discworld version of Europe, and Klatch, akin to Africa, India and the Near East. In Discworld's fictional geology, there is also the island continent of Fourecks, the smallest of the four, which resembles Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. It is also known as Terror Incognita (a play on Terra Incognita
Terra incognita
Terra incognita or terra ignota is a term used in cartography for regions that have not been mapped or documented. The expression is believed to be first seen in Ptolemy’s Geography circa 150 CE...
). On these continents, Pratchett has created a large number of countries, kingdoms, cities and towns can be found; the most widely mentioned in the books being Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork is a fictional city-state which prominently features in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. As cities go, it is on the far side of corrupt and polluted, and is subject to outbreaks of comedic violence and brouhaha on a fairly regular basis...
, Lancre, the Klatchian Empire and Überwald. In the Discworld Companion, Pratchett writes "there have been other continents, which have sunk, blown up, or simply disappeared. This sort of thing happens all the time, even on the best-regulated planets."
The Disc contains a number of fictional substances. One such is octiron, a dense black metal that is a large part of the Discworld's crust. Its melting point is above the range of metal forges. The gates of Unseen University are made out of it as is Old Tom, the university's bell. It is used to make magic needles and bells. It releases magical radiation, but if it becomes negatively polarised, it can be used to absorb such radiation. It generates significant amounts of heat under pressure, accounting for most of the volcanic geological processes on Discworld. When struck (such as with Old Tom), instead of producing a sound it briefly silences anything around it. Another is fingles, insinuated, in Eric
Eric (novel)
Eric, also known as Faust Eric, is the ninth Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett. It was originally published in 1990 as a "Discworld story", in a larger format than the other novels and illustrated by Josh Kirby...
, to be an important part of human psychology. Their absence, according to the Creator, can cause psychological problems. "On the surface they were all right, but deep down they knew something was missing," as he put it, referring to the inhabitants of a world where he forgot to include any. Since Fingles do not exist on Earth, it is implied that Earth is the planet the Creator is referring to, and humanity is the species that is fundamentally incomplete because of its absence. Another is slood. First mentioned in The Last Continent
The Last Continent
The Last Continent is the twenty-second Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett. First published in 1998, it mocks the aspects of time traveling such as the grandfather paradox and the Ray Bradbury short story "A Sound of Thunder"...
, Slood is a natural substance that could be discovered by intelligent beings, but that humans on Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
have been too unintelligent to find; it is said to be much easier to discover than fire, and only slightly harder to discover than water. One of Rincewind's many accumulated positions is Reader in Slood Dynamics. The General Theory of Slood was discovered by Archchancellor Sloman, and a stained glass window representing this event is in the meeting room of the Unseen University
Unseen University
The Unseen University is a school of wizardry in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. Located in the city of Ankh-Morpork, the UU is staffed by a faculty composed of mostly indolent and inept old wizards. The university's name is a pun on the Invisible College...
college council. The University's plumbing system contains pipes for maintaining slood differential.
Magic
Magic is the principal force on the Discworld, and operates in a similar vein to real-world elemental forces such as gravity and electromagnetismElectromagnetism
Electromagnetism is one of the four fundamental interactions in nature. The other three are the strong interaction, the weak interaction and gravitation...
. The Disc's "standing magical field" is essentially the local breakdown of reality which allows a flat planet on the back of a turtle to even exist. The force called "magic" is really just a function of the relative absence of reality in the local area, much in the same way that the absence of heat is described as "coldness." Magic warps reality in much the same way as the real universe's gravity warps it's space-time. The act of performing magic is, essentially, telling the universe what you want it to be like, in terms it can't ignore. This is very draining to magic-users, due to Discworld science's Law of Conservation of Reality (which states it takes the same effort to do something with magic as it would to do it mundanely). This is why most Discworld wizards store magic in a staff (with a knob on the end) which is a sort of capacitor
Capacitor
A capacitor is a passive two-terminal electrical component used to store energy in an electric field. The forms of practical capacitors vary widely, but all contain at least two electrical conductors separated by a dielectric ; for example, one common construction consists of metal foils separated...
for magical energy.
On the Discworld, where magic has more in common with particle physics
Particle physics
Particle physics is a branch of physics that studies the existence and interactions of particles that are the constituents of what is usually referred to as matter or radiation. In current understanding, particles are excitations of quantum fields and interact following their dynamics...
than Houdini, high-level background magic (most likely a reference to real-world background radiation
Background radiation
Background radiation is the ionizing radiation constantly present in the natural environment of the Earth, which is emitted by natural and artificial sources.-Overview:Both Natural and human-made background radiation varies by location....
) occurs when a very powerful spell hits, creating a myriad of sub-astral particles that severely distort local reality. Building a house in (or even walking into) a region where this has happened is extremely dangerous as it is mentioned that an individual may not remain the same species, shape or level of sanity, as they were when they entered. Medium levels cause odd effects, such as coins landing on their edges and turning into caterpillars. Areas with larger than normal quantities of background magic tend to display unusual qualities, even for the Disc. Very high quantities of magic can knock a hole in Discworld reality, leading to an invasion by Lovecraftian monstrosities from the Dungeon Dimensions, or, almost as bad, the world of the Elves
Elves (Discworld)
In Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, elves are extradimensional inhuman monsters.Elves on the Discworld are based more on the nastier kind of fairy-folk in European folklores than elves as portrayed in most modern fantasy fiction. They are not native to the Disc, but come from a "parasite...
. In the Discworld universe, magic is broken into elementary particulate fragments in much the same way that energy and other forces are in real-world quantum physics. The basic unit of Discworld magic is the thaum (from the Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
thauma, marvel), equal to the amount of mystical energy required to conjure up one small white pigeon, or three normal-sized billiard ball
Billiard ball
A billiard ball is a small, hard ball used in cue sports, such as carom billiards, pool, and snooker. The number, type, diameter, color, and pattern of the balls differ depending upon the specific game being played...
s. Several SI
Si
Si, si, or SI may refer to :- Measurement, mathematics and science :* International System of Units , the modern international standard version of the metric system...
-modifiers have been applied to it (e.g. millithaum, kilothaum) in the books. Magic can be measured with a thaumometer, which is described as a black cube with a dial on one side. A standard thaumometer is good for up to a million thaums, beyond that level, Discworld reality starts to break down. The thaum also appears to be a particle; the Discworld physics equivalent of the atom
Atom
The atom is a basic unit of matter that consists of a dense central nucleus surrounded by a cloud of negatively charged electrons. The atomic nucleus contains a mix of positively charged protons and electrically neutral neutrons...
. "Splitting the thaum" revealed that it was in fact composed of numerous sub-particles, called resons ("thingies") which in turn are created from a combination of up to five "flavours": up, down, sideways, sex appeal, and peppermint (see the real-world quarks).
In the opening books, the number eight is generally significant and has magical properties on the Disc, (e.g. the number of the colour of Magic, octarine) and should never be spoken by wizards especially in certain places. Doing so may allow the ancient dungeon dimension creature "Bel-Shamharoth the sender of eight" to break through (this is taken to a somewhat-extreme end in one book, as even the narrator takes great pains to avoid saying the word). On the other hand, eight turns up in many places one would expect the number seven in the real world (e.g. the Discworld week contains eight days, not seven). After The Colour of Magic
The Colour of Magic
The Colour of Magic is a 1983 comic fantasy novel by Terry Pratchett, and is the first book of the Discworld series. Pratchett has described it as "an attempt to do for the classical fantasy universe what Blazing Saddles did for Westerns."...
, both the colour and the number eight no longer appeared as dangerous.
The Disc's magical field is centred on the Cori Celesti. Everyday natural forces, such as light and magnetism
Magnetism
Magnetism is a property of materials that respond at an atomic or subatomic level to an applied magnetic field. Ferromagnetism is the strongest and most familiar type of magnetism. It is responsible for the behavior of permanent magnets, which produce their own persistent magnetic fields, as well...
, are muffled by the power of the Disc's magical field, and rather than a magnetised needle, navigators on the Disc use a compass with a needle of the magical metal octiron, which will always point towards Cori Celesti. Light is so oddly affected by magic that, as it passes into the Disc's atmosphere, it actually slows down from millions to hundreds of miles an hour. One odd effect of this is that the Disc has time zones, when, as a flat world, it shouldn't. Another effect is that, as reported in Thud!
Thud!
Thud! is Terry Pratchett's 34th Discworld novel, released in the United States of America on September 13, 2005, the United Kingdom on 1 October 2005. Thud! was released in the U.S. three weeks before it was released in Pratchett's native UK, to coincide with a United States signing tour...
, the red-
Redshift
In physics , redshift happens when light seen coming from an object is proportionally increased in wavelength, or shifted to the red end of the spectrum...
and blue-shifting of light becomes noticeable when travelling at speeds of merely a hundred and twenty miles per hour.
The power of belief
Reality is spread thinly on the Disc, so events may be affected by expectations, especially those of 'intelligent' species such as humans, dwarfs etc. As such, the Discworld is not governed by real-world physics or logic but by belief and narrative resolution. Essentially, if something is believed strongly enough, or by enough people, it may become true. Jokes such as treacle minesTreacle mining
Treacle mining is the fictitious mining of treacle in a raw form similar to coal. The subject purports to be serious but is an attempt to test credulity. Thick black treacle makes the deception plausible...
and drop bear
Drop bear
A drop bear is a fictitious Australian marsupial. Drop bears are commonly said to be unusually large, vicious, carnivorous koalas that inhabit treetops and attack their prey by dropping onto their heads from above...
s are real on the Disc; in reality lemmings don't actually rush en masse off cliffs; on the Disc, they do, because that is what people believe (actually, since mass suicide would seriously foul up natural selection
Natural selection
Natural selection is the nonrandom process by which biologic traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution....
, they tend to abseil (or rappel)
Abseiling
Abseiling , rappelling in American English, is the controlled descent down a rock face using a rope; climbers use this technique when a cliff or slope is too steep and/or dangerous to descend without protection.- Slang terms :...
down them instead). These concepts of Discworld physics are also exploited in both wizard and witch magic. For example, when a character wishes to turn a cat into a human, the easiest way is to convince the cat, on a deep level, that he is a human. In fact, the main reason the Auditors of Reality
Auditors of Reality
The Auditors of Reality are fictional godlike beings in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. They are one of the major recurring villains in the series, although they lack the necessary imagination to be truly evil....
dislike sentient beings in the Discworld universe is because the Auditors are the personifications of the real-world laws of physics, but the Discworld physics' power of belief and the humans' ignorance constantly remake the world, making their work fruitless.
More significantly, it is also belief that gives Discworld's gods their powers. Discworld gods start off as tiny spirits, and gain power as they gain believers; this is explored most thoroughly in Small Gods
Small Gods
Small Gods is the thirteenth of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, published in 1992. It tells the origin of the god Om, and his relations with his prophet, the reformer Brutha...
. A similar effect has led to the personalisation and "reification" in the Discworld universe of mythological beings symbolising abstract concepts, such as Death
Death (Discworld)
Death is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series and a parody of several other personifications of death. Like most Grim Reapers, he is a black-robed skeleton usually carrying a scythe...
, the Hogfather and other anthropomorphic personifications. In Hogfather
Hogfather
Hogfather is the 20th Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, and a 1997 British Fantasy Award nominee.The Hogfather is also a character in the book, representing something akin to Father Christmas. He grants children's wishes on Hogswatchnight and brings them presents...
, the assassin Mr. Teatime tries to kill the patron of Hogswatch by using an old magic that involves controlling a person with a part of their body (in this case, the teeth collected by the Tooth Fairies), in order to stop children from believing in him, and almost succeeds.
Narrative causality
The Disc's nature is fundamentally teleologicalTeleology
A teleology is any philosophical account which holds that final causes exist in nature, meaning that design and purpose analogous to that found in human actions are inherent also in the rest of nature. The word comes from the Greek τέλος, telos; root: τελε-, "end, purpose...
; its basic composition is determined by what it is ultimately meant to be. This primary element, out of which all others spring, is known as narrativium, the elemental substance of Story. Nothing on the Disc can exist without a Story first existing to mold its destiny and determine its form. This is, perhaps, a take on the fact that nothing can ever happen on the Disc unless it is written in a story
Metafiction
Metafiction, also known as Romantic irony in the context of Romantic works of literature, is a type of fiction that self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction, exposing the fictional illusion...
by Terry Pratchett. On the Disc, if a story or legend is told often enough and believed by enough people, it becomes true. This is known in in-universe physics as the law of narrative causality.
For example, characters in Guards! Guards!
Guards! Guards!
Guards! Guards! is the eighth Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett, first published in 1989. It is the first novel about the City Watch. The first Discworld computer game borrowed heavily from Guards! Guards! in terms of plot.-Plot:...
describe the marauding (noble) dragon as an "impossible" creature, yet it is able to fly and breathe fire because that is what dragons are expected to do. Similarly, a witch gone bad may meet a bad end after building a house of gingerbread
Hansel and Gretel
"Hansel and Gretel" is a well-known fairy tale of German origin, recorded by the Brothers Grimm and published in 1812. Hansel and Gretel are a young brother and sister threatened by a cannibalistic hag living deep in the forest in a house constructed of cake and confectionery. The two children...
. If a miller has a third son, he will invariably leave him only his cat
Puss in Boots
'Puss' is a character in the fairy tale "The Master Cat, or Puss in Boots" by Charles Perrault. The tale was published in 1697 in his Histoires ou Contes du temps passé...
. A hero will always win when outnumbered, since million-to-one chances are dramatic enough to "crop up nine times out of ten", but always lose when faced with "a little bald wrinkly smiling man" who is almost always highly trained in martial arts.
Discworld witches often employ narrative in their magic, but consider it ethically tricky since it interferes with free will
Free will
"To make my own decisions whether I am successful or not due to uncontrollable forces" -Troy MorrisonA pragmatic definition of free willFree will is the ability of agents to make choices free from certain kinds of constraints. The existence of free will and its exact nature and definition have long...
. Discworld wizards avoid doing so because narrative that severely strains credibility requires outright sources of magic to feed on, sometimes indiscriminately. Knowledge of stories, their use and how to change them forms the basis of many forms of magical power in Discworld physics. Pratchett characters who use and/or change stories include Lilith, Black Aliss, and Granny Weatherwax. The habit of many Discworlders to take metaphor
Metaphor
A metaphor is a literary figure of speech that uses an image, story or tangible thing to represent a less tangible thing or some intangible quality or idea; e.g., "Her eyes were glistening jewels." Metaphor may also be used for any rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via...
literally has combined with the power of belief to produce some very odd areas on the Discworld. The Place Where The Sun Does Not Shine, for instance, is a deep crevasse in Lancre, incidentally located between A Rock And A Hard Place.
Octarine
The colourColor
Color or colour is the visual perceptual property corresponding in humans to the categories called red, green, blue and others. Color derives from the spectrum of light interacting in the eye with the spectral sensitivities of the light receptors...
of magic on the Discworld, also often called the eighth colour. This fictional colour is strongly indicative of magic and can only be seen by wizards (who sometimes describe it as resembling a fluorescent greenish-yellow purple) and cats. As in conventional human colour vision, colour opponency
Opponent process
The color opponent process is a color theory that states that the human visual system interprets information about color by processing signals from cones and rods in an antagonistic manner...
prevents the perception of reddish-greenish or yellowish-bluish colours; it would therefore be impossible to perceive a colour as "greenish-yellow purple". If greenish-yellow
Yellow
Yellow is the color evoked by light that stimulates both the L and M cone cells of the retina about equally, with no significant stimulation of the S cone cells. Light with a wavelength of 570–590 nm is yellow, as is light with a suitable mixture of red and green...
and purple
Purple
Purple is a range of hues of color occurring between red and blue, and is classified as a secondary color as the colors are required to create the shade....
lights were shone together, a shade of grey
Grey
Grey or gray is an achromatic or neutral color.Complementary colors are defined to mix to grey, either additively or subtractively, and many color models place complements opposite each other in a color wheel. To produce grey in RGB displays, the R, G, and B primary light sources are combined in...
would result; with pigments, the result would be brown. The normal human visual system works by the presence of cone
Cone cell
Cone cells, or cones, are photoreceptor cells in the retina of the eye that are responsible for color vision; they function best in relatively bright light, as opposed to rod cells that work better in dim light. If the retina is exposed to an intense visual stimulus, a negative afterimage will be...
s and rod
Rod cell
Rod cells, or rods, are photoreceptor cells in the retina of the eye that can function in less intense light than can the other type of visual photoreceptor, cone cells. Named for their cylindrical shape, rods are concentrated at the outer edges of the retina and are used in peripheral vision. On...
s in the eye; the ability of Discworld wizards to see octarine is explained by the additional presence of octagon cells.
Lifeforms
Pratchett has created or adapted a variety of fictional lifeforms for the Discworld setting, both sentient and non-sentient.Sentient species
Pratchett has populated the Discworld with his interpretation of numerous classic fantasy and mythological races as well as humans. While humans are portrayed as the main inhabitants of the major Discworld cities, many other races have left their traditional domain and integrated with other, sometimes hostile, species in Discworld's cities. Pratchett has different characteristics for some of these races when compared to other noted authors, such as Discworld trolls, instead of turning to stone, as Tolkien's trolls do, being made of stone and real-world mythologies, such as Discworld Furies retaining physical similarities to the real-world Greco-Roman mythological version but not having similar roles, though the Discworld versions are often inspired by the other authors' version or the real-world mythological version. Discworld races are followed by the real-world inspiration for them.Dwarfs
Dwarfs (Discworld)
Sam leighton is dwarf kingDwarfs in Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels are similar to the Dwarves of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, to which they largely started out as a homage, and dwarves in other fantasy novels. They are short, stocky, bearded metal-workers, generally seen wearing chain mail...
: Short, stocky, bearded metal-workers, generally seen wearing chain mail and brandishing axes. They are similar to the Dwarves
Dwarf (Middle-earth)
In the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, the Dwarves are a race inhabiting the world of Arda, a fictional prehistoric Earth which includes the continent Middle-earth....
of J. R. R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
's Middle-earth
Middle-earth
Middle-earth is the fictional setting of the majority of author J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy writings. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings take place entirely in Middle-earth, as does much of The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales....
, to which they largely started out as a homage. (Other definitions)
Trolls :Trolls on the Discworld are, essentially, living, mobile rocks. Trolls have grown to overcome those vicious stereotypes of yore and have lived very prosperous lives in heavily populated cities with (relatively) little killing. (Other definitions
Troll (disambiguation)
A troll is a mythological creature, related to elves, dwarves, or monsters.Troll may also refer to:-Places:* Troll , a Norwegian Antarctic research station on Queen Maud Land** Troll Airfield, an airfield nearby...
)
Golems
Golems (Discworld)
Golems in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series are derived from golems in Jewish mythology; early forms of a clay robot, supposedly awakened by a spell or priestly words to do people's bidding....
: A form of a clay robot
Robot
A robot is a mechanical or virtual intelligent agent that can perform tasks automatically or with guidance, typically by remote control. In practice a robot is usually an electro-mechanical machine that is guided by computer and electronic programming. Robots can be autonomous, semi-autonomous or...
, awakened by a spell or priestly words to do people's bidding. (Jewish folkloric definition
Golem
In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....
)
Gnomes : Ranging in size from six inches to two feet, they are, Pratchett says, more or less interchangeable with the Nac Mac Feegles. (English folkloric definition
Gnome
A gnome is a diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, first introduced by Paracelsus and later adopted by more recent authors including those of modern fantasy literature...
)
Undead
Undead (Discworld)
In Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, the undead are seen less as monsters, and more as characters with unusual cultural quirks. They even have their own bar in Ankh-Morpork....
: (Other definitions
Undead
Undead is a collective name for fictional, mythological, or legendary beings that are deceased and yet behave as if alive. Undead may be incorporeal, such as ghosts, or corporeal, such as vampires and zombies...
) Species in the Discworld novels categorised as undead include: Zombies (Other definitions
Zombie
Zombie is a term used to denote an animated corpse brought back to life by mystical means such as witchcraft. The term is often figuratively applied to describe a hypnotized person bereft of consciousness and self-awareness, yet ambulant and able to respond to surrounding stimuli...
), Banshees (Celtic folkloric definition
Banshee
The banshee , from the Irish bean sí is a feminine spirit in Irish mythology, usually seen as an omen of death and a messenger from the Otherworld....
), Ghouls (Other definitions
Ghoul
A ghoul is a folkloric monster associated with graveyards and consuming human flesh, often classified as undead. The oldest surviving literature that mention ghouls is likely One Thousand and One Nights...
), Ghosts (Other definitions
Ghost
In traditional belief and fiction, a ghost is the soul or spirit of a deceased person or animal that can appear, in visible form or other manifestation, to the living. Descriptions of the apparition of ghosts vary widely from an invisible presence to translucent or barely visible wispy shapes, to...
), Mummies (Other definitions), Bogeymen (Other definitions), Werewolves (Other definitions
Werewolf
A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope , is a mythological or folkloric human with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or an anthropomorphic wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse...
), and Vampires (Other definitions
Vampire
Vampires are mythological or folkloric beings who subsist by feeding on the life essence of living creatures, regardless of whether they are undead or a living person...
)
Elves
Elves (Discworld)
In Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, elves are extradimensional inhuman monsters.Elves on the Discworld are based more on the nastier kind of fairy-folk in European folklores than elves as portrayed in most modern fantasy fiction. They are not native to the Disc, but come from a "parasite...
:Are based more on the nastier kind of fairy
Fairy
A fairy is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term...
-folk in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
an (and other) folklore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
s than elves as portrayed in most modern (post-Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...
) fantasy fiction. (Other definitions
Elf
An elf is a being of Germanic mythology. The elves were originally thought of as a race of divine beings endowed with magical powers, which they use both for the benefit and the injury of mankind...
)
Gods
Discworld gods
The Discworld gods are the fictional deities from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. The Discworld, being a flat disc supported on the backs of four elephants on top of a giant flying turtle, exists in a region of the universe where reality is somewhat less consistent than it...
: On the Discworld, are divided into major gods that are parodies of the Pantheon
Pantheon (gods)
A pantheon is a set of all the gods of a particular polytheistic religion or mythology.Max Weber's 1922 opus, Economy and Society discusses the link between a...
s of Greece and Rome and "Small gods" that are relatively powerless but by acquiring more believers may graduate to the Discworld Pantheon
Centaurs: Believed by Discworld characters to be the result of magical mutation. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Fauns: Believed by Discworld characters to be the result of magical mutation. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Furies: Furies are birdlike creatures from Ephebe who can be trained to target a single individual, forcing people away from him/her. In that sense they act like guard dogs, whether their "master" likes it or not. They appear to be barely sentient. Featured in Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals is the 37th novel in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. The novel satirises football , and features Mustrum Ridcully setting up an Unseen University football team, with the Librarian in goal. It includes new details about "below stairs" life at the university...
. (Greco-roman mythological definition)
Goblins: "Nasty cowardly little bastards who collect their own earwax", as described in-universe by the victims of the war that engulfed the Unholy Empire. Of course, victims on both sides of the war both say this, and somehow, depending on who is telling the tale, all the goblins apparently fought for the other side. (Other definitions
Goblin
A goblin is a legendary evil or mischievous illiterate creature, a grotesquely evil or evil-like phantom.They are attributed with various abilities, temperaments and appearances depending on the story and country of origin. In some cases, goblins have been classified as constantly annoying little...
)
Gorgons: It is mentioned that a Gorgon had joined the Ankh-Morpork City Watch
Ankh-Morpork City Watch
The Ankh-Morpork City Watch is a fictional police force within the Discworld series of books by Terry Pratchett. It is based in the city-state of Ankh-Morpork on the Discworld. The Watch was originally two units, the Day Watch and the Night Watch which were combined after the events of Men at Arms...
and accidentally turned 3 people to stone. Referenced in Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals is the 37th novel in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. The novel satirises football , and features Mustrum Ridcully setting up an Unseen University football team, with the Librarian in goal. It includes new details about "below stairs" life at the university...
. (Greek mythological definition
Gorgon
In Greek mythology, the Gorgon was a terrifying female creature. The name derives from the Greek word gorgós, which means "dreadful." While descriptions of Gorgons vary across Greek literature, the term commonly refers to any of three sisters who had hair of living, venomous snakes, and a...
)
Kvetch: Creatures covered from head to foot in hair who fled their native Mouldavia for Ankh-Morpork after a war broke out. Sam Vimes snidely remarks that Vetinari will demand some are allowed on the Watch before too long.
Lizard Men: Near-extinct, exceptionally unintelligent creatures who make ideal henchmen for Dark Lords. Evil Harry Dread had two lizard men in his horde, both named "Slime". Featured in The Last Hero
The Last Hero
The Last Hero is a short novel, the twenty-seventh of the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett. It was published in 2001 in a larger format than the other Discworld novels and illustrated on every page by Paul Kidby.-Plot summary:...
. (Other definitions)
Orcs: A near extinct race who were bred/made from men (as goblins, according to Discworld character Lord Vetinari, were not vicious enough) to be weapons in a great war. So far only one living orc (by name "Mr Nutt") is known to exist although it is suspected that others exist in the wilds of far Überwald. Mr Nutt initially had to hide his species, even from himself, due to the brutal reputation and legends about orcs. Orcs themselves are shown to be not necessarily 'bad' creatures; given the opportunity they can easily educate themselves, gain wisdom and a great sense of honesty and morality. However many were forced into battle by men and knew only lives of cruelty thus giving rise to their fearsome reputation. They possess exceptional levels of strength, as well as a special organ hidden deep inside their body that is designed to heal the orc, even capable of bringing them back from some types of death. Featured in Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals
Unseen Academicals is the 37th novel in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. The novel satirises football , and features Mustrum Ridcully setting up an Unseen University football team, with the Librarian in goal. It includes new details about "below stairs" life at the university...
. (Other definitions
Orc
An orc is one of a race of mythical human-like creatures, generally described as fierce and combative, with grotesque features and often black, grey or greenish skin. This mythology has its origins in the writings of J. R. R. Tolkien....
)
Other life
Pratchett has also created a variety of other fictional life on the Discworld. Like the sentient species, these also have a real-world connection, although most of these connections take the form of slight changes to existing real-world animals, as shown in the .303 bookworm, which is a worm that evolved differently due to the danger of consuming magic books or the hermit elephant, which is an elephant who has evolved hermit crab-like living conditions.Calendar
The Discworld's Unnamed Continent's fictional calendar was first defined in a footnote in The Colour of MagicThe Colour of Magic
The Colour of Magic is a 1983 comic fantasy novel by Terry Pratchett, and is the first book of the Discworld series. Pratchett has described it as "an attempt to do for the classical fantasy universe what Blazing Saddles did for Westerns."...
, and has been expanded upon in later novels and The Discworld Almanak
The Discworld Almanak
The Discworld Almanak is a spin-off book from Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels, in a similar format to the Diaries and Nanny Ogg's Cookbook...
(2004). It has numerous oddities, the chief of which is its length.
The calendar
Calendar
A calendar is a system of organizing days for social, religious, commercial, or administrative purposes. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months, and years. The name given to each day is known as a date. Periods in a calendar are usually, though not...
is based on a Great Year
Great year
The Great Year is an archaic cosmological conception, found in different cultures, which acquired new interpretations with the development of astronomical knowledge In the Western tradition Plato has been the main source for the idea, so it was also frequently called 'Platonic year'...
, or Astronomical Year
Year
A year is the orbital period of the Earth moving around the Sun. For an observer on Earth, this corresponds to the period it takes the Sun to complete one course throughout the zodiac along the ecliptic....
, defined as the time it takes for the Disc to revolve once on the backs of the elephants. This lasts 800 days and contains two of each season
Season
A season is a division of the year, marked by changes in weather, ecology, and hours of daylight.Seasons result from the yearly revolution of the Earth around the Sun and the tilt of the Earth's axis relative to the plane of revolution...
(Midsummer
Midsummer
Midsummer may simply refer to the period of time centered upon the summer solstice, but more often refers to specific European celebrations that accompany the actual solstice, or that take place on a day between June 21 and June 24, and the preceding evening. The exact dates vary between different...
occurs at a given point when the sun passes directly overhead, midwinter when it passes perpendicularly. However most people, especially farmers, consider four seasons to be a year, so an Agricultural Year of 400 days is used for most purposes.
The agricultural year is divided into 13 months:
- Ick (16 days) (the "Dead Month")
- Offle (32 days)
- February (32 days)
- March (32 days)
- April (32 days)
- May (32 days)
- June (32 days)
- Grune (32 days)
- August (32 days)
- Spune (32 days)
- Sektober (32 days)
- Ember (32 days)
- December (32 days)
Each week has eight days: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Octeday.
Hogswatchnight
The first of Ick is Hogswatchday, the Disc's New YearNew Year
The New Year is the day that marks the time of the beginning of a new calendar year, and is the day on which the year count of the specific calendar used is incremented. For many cultures, the event is celebrated in some manner....
, and the winter solstice
Solstice
A solstice is an astronomical event that happens twice each year when the Sun's apparent position in the sky, as viewed from Earth, reaches its northernmost or southernmost extremes...
from the perspective of Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork is a fictional city-state which prominently features in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. As cities go, it is on the far side of corrupt and polluted, and is subject to outbreaks of comedic violence and brouhaha on a fairly regular basis...
. In the Astronomical Year the second midwinter (the year's midway point) is called Crueltide, but due to people using the Agricultural Year this is the same festival.
The 32nd of December, or the day before the New Year, is known as Hogswatchnight; The name is a pun on "hogwash", Hogmanay
Hogmanay
Hogmanay is the Scots word for the last day of the year and is synonymous with the celebration of the New Year in the Scottish manner...
and Watch Night, and possibly on the ancient holiday of Samhain
Samhain
Samhain is a Gaelic harvest festival held on October 31–November 1. It was linked to festivals held around the same time in other Celtic cultures, and was popularised as the "Celtic New Year" from the late 19th century, following Sir John Rhys and Sir James Frazer...
. Traditionally associated with pig-killing, to ensure there is enough food for the rest of the winter. Many Hogswatch traditions are parodies of those associated with Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
, including a decorated oak tree in a pot, strings of paper sausages, and, of course, a visit by the Hogfather. Witches
Witches (Discworld)
A major subset of the Discworld novels of Terry Pratchett involves the witches of Lancre. They are closely based on witches in British folklore and a slightly tongue-in-cheek reinterpretation of the Triple Goddess....
do not leave the house on Hogswatchnight more because of tradition than any practical reasons. The witch Nanny Ogg
Nanny Ogg
Gytha Ogg is a character from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. She is a witch and member of the Lancre coven.- Personality :The character of Nanny Ogg is based on the Mother stereotype of the Triple Goddess myth...
gets around this by simply inviting everyone to her house for the holiday instead.
In the Omnian religion, Hogswatchnight is called the Fast of St Ossory. Omnians celebrate with fasting, prayer meetings, and the exchange of religious pamphlets.
Hogswatch was also a holiday celebrated in The Dark Side of the Sun
The Dark Side of the Sun
The Dark Side of the Sun is a science fiction novel by Terry Pratchett, first published in 1976. It is similar to the work of Isaac Asimov. According to Don D'Ammassa, both this and Pratchett's 1981 sci-fi novel Strata are spoofing parts of Larry Niven's Ringworld...
, a non-Discworld book by Pratchett.
The Glorious Twenty-Fifth of May
The 25th of May is quietly celebrated by the survivors of the People's Revolution, which ended the reign of Lord Winder. They wear a sprig of lilac and gather at the Small Gods Cemetery to honour the Watchmen who fell: Cecil Clapman, Ned Coates, Dai Dickins, John Keel, Horace Nancyball, Billy Wiglet, and (albeit temporarily) Reg Shoe.In the Round world (following Terry Pratchett's diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease), Match It For Pratchett has called on fans to wear lilacs on 25 May in support of Terry.
The slogan of the People's Revolution is Truth, Justice, Freedom, Reasonably Priced Love, and a Hard-Boiled Egg!
Usage
The calendar in general use in the Sto Plains and Ramtops ("Ankh-Morpork years") uses the agricultural year, and counts from the founding of Unseen UniversityUnseen University
The Unseen University is a school of wizardry in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. Located in the city of Ankh-Morpork, the UU is staffed by a faculty composed of mostly indolent and inept old wizards. The university's name is a pun on the Invisible College...
. Years and centuries are also given names by the UU's astrologers. 2005 AM, for instance, is the Year of the Prawn, the fifth year of the Century of the Anchovy. The majority of the Discworld
Discworld
Discworld is a comic fantasy book series by English author Sir Terry Pratchett, set on the Discworld, a flat world balanced on the backs of four elephants which, in turn, stand on the back of a giant turtle, Great A'Tuin. The books frequently parody, or at least take inspiration from, J. R. R....
novels are set in the 20th century AM, the Century of the Fruitbat, with the later ones entering the 21st, the Century of the Anchovy.
Other calendars count from various other events, and different schools of astronomy give the years different names. The Theocracy of Muntab has a calendar that counts down, rather than up. The reason for this is unknown, though it is agreed that waiting around for it to reach zero is unwise.
Languages
Pratchett has given Discworld a variety of fictional languages, though most, if not all, of these are versions of real world languages renamed to match country names created for the novels. Alongside those of the non-human species (such as Dwarfs, Trolls and orangutans), the Disc's fictional human languages include:Morporkian : Language of the Discworld locations of Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork
Ankh-Morpork is a fictional city-state which prominently features in Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels. As cities go, it is on the far side of corrupt and polluted, and is subject to outbreaks of comedic violence and brouhaha on a fairly regular basis...
, the Sto Plains, the Ramtops, Genua, and Fourecks (modified). Also, from characters' perspectives, the lingua franca
Lingua franca
A lingua franca is a language systematically used to make communication possible between people not sharing a mother tongue, in particular when it is a third language, distinct from both mother tongues.-Characteristics:"Lingua franca" is a functionally defined term, independent of the linguistic...
of the Discworld. Comparable to real-world English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
.
Latatian : Dead Language
Language death
In linguistics, language death is a process that affects speech communities where the level of linguistic competence that speakers possess of a given language variety is decreased, eventually resulting in no native and/or fluent speakers of the variety...
of the majority of Morporkian-speaking countries; Pratchett has not stated how widespread Latatian was in Discworld but it was in use beyond simply Ankh Morpork. Used, most often for humor, in novels in the mottoes of noble families, civic organizations and Guilds of Ankh-Morpork
Guilds of Ankh-Morpork
In Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of fantasy novels, there are almost 300 Guilds in the city of Ankh-Morpork. Nanny Ogg's Cookbook, The Thieves' Guild Diary and the Death's Domain map all quote Guild publications. Guilds known include:...
, in legal principles, and by Discworld wizards, doctors, and scientists, the latter a satire of those professions' use of Latin to obfuscate laymen. Comparable to real-world Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
, though Pratchett describes it as "very bad doggy Latin
Dog Latin
Dog Latin, Cod Latin, macaronic Latin, or mock Latin refers to the creation of a phrase or jargon in imitation of Latin, often by directly translating English words into Latin without conjugation or declension...
". Examples: Motto of Ankh-Morpork City Watch
Ankh-Morpork City Watch
The Ankh-Morpork City Watch is a fictional police force within the Discworld series of books by Terry Pratchett. It is based in the city-state of Ankh-Morpork on the Discworld. The Watch was originally two units, the Day Watch and the Night Watch which were combined after the events of Men at Arms...
: Fabricati Diem, Pvnc; complete nonsense in Latin but looks like it means Make My Day, Punk. Legal Principle: Acquiris Quodcumque Rapis: You get what you grab. Discworld Professions: Sodomy non Sapiens to mean "buggered if I know".
Quirmian : Language of the Discworld country of Quirm. Comparable to real-world French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
.
Ephebian : Language of the Discworld country of Ephebe. Comparable to real-world Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
.
Klatchian : Language of the Discworld country of Klatch. Also, the font is changed to a classical "Arabian Nights"-style when Klatchian is used in the novels. Comparable to real-world Arabic. Featured most prominently in Jingo (novel)
Jingo (novel)
Jingo is the 21st novel by Terry Pratchett, one of his Discworld series. It was published in 1997. The rising of a previously submerged island and the subconstituent sovereignty dispute were inspired by the real-life island of Ferdinandea.-Plot:...
.
Agatean : Language of the Discworld Agatean Empire. It is written in complicated pictograms. Minor differences in pronunciation alter word meanings completely. Pratchett sometimes used pictograms in the font of characters speaking Agatean. Comparable to real-world Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
. Featured most prominently in Interesting Times
Interesting Times
Interesting Times is the seventeenth novel in the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett.The opening lines explain that the title refers to the phrase "may you live in interesting times".-Plot summary:...
.
Uberwaldian : Language of the Discworld region of Überwald. The font is changed to German Gothic when Uberwaldean is used in novels. Comparable to real-world German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
and/or Slavic languages
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages , a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages, have speakers in most of Eastern Europe, in much of the Balkans, in parts of Central Europe, and in the northern part of Asia.-Branches:Scholars traditionally divide Slavic...
. Featured most prominently in The Fifth Elephant
The Fifth Elephant
The Fifth Elephant is the 24th Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett. It introduces the clacks, a long-distance semaphore system. The novel was nominated for the Locus Award in 2000.-Plot summary:...
.