New names for old races.

[Nickeris86]

I am currently working on a sword and sorcery novel in which there are three dominate races. These races were each created by one of the three Daughters of Creation who are the leaders of this worlds pantheon. Each goddess represents an aspect of existence, Life, Death and the Passage of Time between these two.

The race created by the goddess of Life are hardy, strong, and extremely passionate.They have dark skin and light colored eyes and tusks. Essentially they are Orc's who live in the dessert, think of Native African tribes with small tusks.

The race created by the goddess of Death are cold, noble and predatory. Pale skinned and dark eyed with slightly pointed ears. They are essentially vampiric elves.

The goddess of Time created humans.

These races are not inherently good or evil and they don't all pay homage to their patron goddess either.

What I am having difficulty with is creating an original name for these races (not humans). I don't want to call them Orcs or Vampires because that's not what they are, just what they are bassed on.

Any ideas.

[Apocrypha]

Do the names have to be in English?  Do they only have one "name" for each race?

The way I see it is that they could have several names.  One in the language that the Humans would use, for simplistic sake we can call that English.  Then they could have one name for themselves in their own language and then a third name in the native tongue of the other race.

For example, say we just use your basic terms:

Human tongue - Orc
Orc tongue - Hu'chi Bu'chi - Loosely translated means "Life's Children"
Vampire Elf tongue - Sa La My - Loosely translated means "Primative" (now I'm not saying they view each other as hostile, but you never know)

Human tongue - Human
Orc tongue - Snu'chi Bu'chi - translated means "Time's Children"
Vampire Elf tongue - Pa Stra Mee - translated means "Weaklings"

Human tongue - Vampire Elf
Orc tongue - Smoo'chi Bu'chi - translated means "Death's Children"
Vampire Elf tongue - Bo Lo Nee - translated "Lords of All"

Just my spin on things as I would love to help.  Just wondering what you've been thinking of so far.  And don't forget that you can create your own words out of fake languages you want to make up yourself.  Tolkien did that.

[Snowleopard]

Have you named the Goddesses?  If so, I would think that the races ought to take their names from their creator's name.  Or, at least, it's a suggestion.

[gypsymaria]

Apocrypha:  Just had to chime in because your example names cracked me up so hard.   

Another suggestion might be to mine some lesser-known mythologies.  Look up Slavic, African, Native American, South Asian... lots of cultures have fairy tales and mythological creatures.  Maybe you can find a word that clicks for you that fits the races well enough, tweak the spelling a bit or whatever.  Fantasy authors do this all the time. 

[Franziska]

Good suggestion, gypsymaria. For example a noted fantasy author, Tanith Lee, adapts names from lesser deities oe even well known historica characters  to her ends. Example: the litttle known assyrian goddess Asakira becomes the goddess Anakyre, the Roman Emperor Caesar becomes the warrior king Keshar, the corrupted princess Salome becomes the sorceress Zilumi and so on...

[Nickeris86]

Apocrypha: Yes each race has a name for the others and the vampires have their own name for their race. The Orcs are a tribal people and refer to themselves as their clan name rather than the racial name humans have given them. Not all the clans get along with each other or humans while others do. Its kinda like the various clans and tribes of the Muslim nations.

Have you named the Goddesses?  If so, I would think that the races ought to take their names from their creator's name.  Or, at least, it's a suggestion.

I've kicked a few ideas around but nothing has stuck out to me

I was thinking of a derivative of Tiamat for the goddess of death. The other two I don't really know though I am leaning towards an A name for the goddess of life.

[Apocrypha]

How will the Orc tribes be naming themselves?  After animals or virtues or traits?

I like Snowleopard's idea of them basing their names after the goddess they follow.

[Nickeris86]

it depends on the tribe. there are around fifteen major tribes

[The Corvidian]

For the desert race look more into Perisan, Jewish, and Middle Eastern Legend
For the Elves, look into obscure Norse legends, Northern European legends also take inspiration from Japanese legends.

[meg_evonne]

I'd suggest just writing it for now. The names will follow eventually. Also you may change them several times as you progress.  Often the perfect names will surface eventually.

I have spent hours on baby name/meanings etc sites and an equal amount of time experimenting with the free dictionaries on line for different languages, including Latin. You might be inspired by plugging in a few virtues or traits into some odd and different languages and see what pops up.  I think there is even a Klingdon - English variety that some readers might enjoy or recognize.

Had to modify because I remembered another great name search idea...track the word histories backward. Very good dictionaries will do that for you.  Word roots can be fascinating to play around with...and then you can get to old English, Saxon, Norman, whatever.  It's rather a fun bit of research.

Best wishes!

[Snowleopard]

Apocrypha: Yes each race has a name for the others and the vampires have their own name for their race. The Orcs are a tribal people and refer to themselves as their clan name rather than the racial name humans have given them. Not all the clans get along with each other or humans while others do. Its kinda like the various clans and tribes of the Muslim nations.

I've kicked a few ideas around but nothing has stuck out to me

I was thinking of a derivative of Tiamat for the goddess of death. The other two I don't really know though I am leaning towards an A name for the goddess of life.

Try turning Tiamat around - Tamait - nope that won't work - sounds like a tomato - maybe Tamanas.  Anyway, you can play with names and words that way.

[Franziska]

Here are some ideas:
Goddess of life: Ha-Keres from Hathor, Egyptian goddess of love, art and music and Ceres, Roman goddess of plenty and fertility
Goddess of death: Ka-Phersis from Kali, Hindu goddess of death and Persephone, Greek goddess of the Underworld
Goddess of time: Nu-Hannon from Nut, Egyptian goddess of sky and Rhiannon, the Great Goddess of Celtic mythology, who in her three aspects - the Maiden, the Mother and the Crone - represents the flowing of time.
Names of the peoples: Keresians, Phersisians, Hannians (very similar to humans, by the way...).

[Dina]

Remember that each group should have a different language, so the names should sound very different, unless the three of them had strong bonds since many years ago.
I can suggest a real name I like: ņanduti. I imagine it sounds exotic. It is a name that South American indians (from Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, and so on) give to spider web. It could be good for Death, or Death People-(Ņanduti has the acentuation on the "ti" syllabe)

Anyway, I am with Meg. Write. The names could come later.

[Nickeris86]

hmm could work for what the Vampires call humans, Spiders are actually the chosen creatures of the Goddess of Time along with the loom. thread of fate in the fabric of reality.