Way Back Wednesday: Akatil Yixox

[aldersprig]

Early 1970's

Reid found the goblin who was dubiously named Akatil Yixox where he'd expected to find him - miles deep inside the machinery, tinkering.

"'Keel."

"Reid." The tiny man pushed his goggles onto the top of his head. "I'm working."

"I got an offer. And it includes both of us." He paused. "Mo made the offer, actually."

"You're obviously going to take it."

"It's got a lot of merit. And it involves teaching."

"And you want me to come along."

"They don't have a good Unutu guy." Reid could barely say the word. "And, besides, you owe me seventeen and one-half favors."

Comments

[thnidu]

:-) + ????

(Well, I might understand it better if I knew the background -- no blame to you!)

"Akatil Yixox" looks Mayan or Incan. And "Unutu" ≈ "Ubuntu". Just sayin'.

[aldersprig]

Well, you could read Addergoole. *looks innocent*

Akatil Yixox is the professor of Technology at the school, although he shows up very rarely.

Unutu is the Word for Worked Things (A massively over-useful category).

And neither of them are words I made up, in this case. My notes say it's modified from the Sumerian.

[thnidu]

Heh. :-) Спасибо.

[aldersprig]

c'mooooon, I ... oh, yeah, Google Translate.

You're welcome.

[thnidu]

Hee hee. (Geek evil humor.) ((WhaddoI mean, evil humor? I find my self in excellent Humour, good sir!))

[thnidu]

And I had a sort of extra weird giggle (and extra-weird giggle) when you said it was Sumerian. See, if it were Mayan or Incan, the x's would stand for "sh" sounds, because at the time of the Conquista, Spanish had that sound and wrote it with an "x". That's why the French form of "Quixote", as in the opera, is "Don Quichotte".

But for Sumerian, odds are very good that the "x" represents a "kh" sound, as in "Bach" or "chutzpah". And then "Yixox" is AFAICT just like the Klingon verb form "yIHoH", meaning "Kill!" (or "Kill him/her/it/them!"). A very common word in Klingon, it seems.
}}}:-)>

(Sudden double-take after writing the above and rereading the post.) "'Keel!" ... Is that a nickname for (A)k(at)il?

Yes, I do have a pun engine always running in the back of my head. Why do you ask?

[aldersprig]

I hate to ruin your fun, because that's awesome, but I meant (Sorry for being unclear), that unutu came from the Sumerian. (In my world, the Sumerians stole it from the Ellehemaei, but eenh, sam thing).

But OTOH, Akatil Yixox is Not the name he was born with, and he certainly could have gone for the Klingon.

Yes. Keel. Ah-ka-teel. Reid is not great with nicknames. :-)

[clare_dragonfly]

I bet coming to Addergoole uses up a lot of those favors.

Or maybe he'll stay for seventeen and one-half years...

[aldersprig]

Heeheee