Unfortunately we can't have UTF-8 in the game itself, because Civ4 only allows a very limited character set. So for instance diacritic n isn't possible in the game. But all those other characters can at least be coded in Python using UTF-8 and then displayed in the game. I've already done something like that for the great people lists.
Almost Everything in DoC, Mapped
- Thread starter LacsiraxAriscal
- Start date
ozqar
King
DC123456789
Deity
Not sure if you've already seen it, but I vaguely remember a Google Sheets for community City Name suggestions floating around here a while ago? Might be some solutions floating around somewhere in there.
Yeah, those still exist, unfortunately the prospect of the new map kind of got that project off track. But I'm sure once the new city name manager creation process is being started they will provide a great additional source. I'll definitely include them in the opening post for that project, along with this thread.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
By the way, does a spreadsheet of the big map exist? Can I basically have any links to any representations of it? 
EDIT: fwiw I've tried running it in-game but can't get it to load for some reason/my Civ IV map editor doesn't recognise it as a valid map for some reason (possibly for being too big? or very possibly new features like islands etc EDIT2: actually not that because it loads current DoC map fine)
EDIT3 (how long can this go on): The loading crash was my end and I've fixed it now, would still love a simple excel version tho if there's one floating about
EDIT: fwiw I've tried running it in-game but can't get it to load for some reason/my Civ IV map editor doesn't recognise it as a valid map for some reason (possibly for being too big? or very possibly new features like islands etc EDIT2: actually not that because it loads current DoC map fine)
EDIT3 (how long can this go on): The loading crash was my end and I've fixed it now, would still love a simple excel version tho if there's one floating about
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I haven't made a spreadsheet so far, mostly because there are still terrain changes pending and I don't want to keep it updated accordingly all the time. But eventually, having the map in Google sheets would be helpful in many ways. I'd prefer writing some scripts to export/import Python code to/from Google sheets as a the eventual solution for this.
What exactly do you want to use it for right now?
What exactly do you want to use it for right now?
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
It's just easier to map possibly city data for various languages than placing a bunch of signs in game and having like 40 different saves. But yeah it's fair that there are terrain changes pending, I'll still have a look now I can get into the game.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
Started messing around now with positive rewrites in mind (ie not basing on original at all), here are three that I came up with.
Egypt's is based on nome capitals + Nubian cities + Levantine cities mentioned in the Amarna letters, with Egyptian names if attested and native names if not (and Greek names for poor ol' Berenice). Definitely needs a bit more messing around with but it's a start.
Vikings I tried to go for Viking cities in Scandinavia first, and then filled out with the more major modern cities where there were no Viking cities (ie Lappland). Also added way more Baltic Viking ports and stuff. British Isles are weirdly hard, you'd think there'd be more attested Viking names rather than just approximate guesses based on root words. Gave it a go and slipped into Anglo-Saxon-Jute for some of the southern ones, alas. For the very southern ones it might be Anglo-Saxon or don't include, which is a shame because Danelaw did cover the whole of England so should really get city names :/ Also added some more colonies.
China is the most drastic and definitely the most difficult of the three. First and foremost, I've just used the modern place name for all the cities I linked, just cos it makes it easier to research back when revising it (because searching through historical Chinese place names is an absolute slog). I tried to map cities that had been major throughout China's history first, then places that had been capitals of unified China, then important cities from the big dynasties, then a few minor kingdom capitals, and then where there were gaps I just plugged through a ton of place names to see which ones had stuck around. Tibet is entirely overhauled too, tried to use only Chinese names. Korea and Vietnam I've just picked out a few commandery capitals from when they were controlled by China and then in Korea plugged in gaps with major historical Korean cities. And Mongolia I picked a handful of medieval Mongolian cities.
I'll probably do another few in the coming couple of weeks, uni's slow.
Egypt's is based on nome capitals + Nubian cities + Levantine cities mentioned in the Amarna letters, with Egyptian names if attested and native names if not (and Greek names for poor ol' Berenice). Definitely needs a bit more messing around with but it's a start.
Vikings I tried to go for Viking cities in Scandinavia first, and then filled out with the more major modern cities where there were no Viking cities (ie Lappland). Also added way more Baltic Viking ports and stuff. British Isles are weirdly hard, you'd think there'd be more attested Viking names rather than just approximate guesses based on root words. Gave it a go and slipped into Anglo-Saxon-Jute for some of the southern ones, alas. For the very southern ones it might be Anglo-Saxon or don't include, which is a shame because Danelaw did cover the whole of England so should really get city names :/ Also added some more colonies.
China is the most drastic and definitely the most difficult of the three. First and foremost, I've just used the modern place name for all the cities I linked, just cos it makes it easier to research back when revising it (because searching through historical Chinese place names is an absolute slog). I tried to map cities that had been major throughout China's history first, then places that had been capitals of unified China, then important cities from the big dynasties, then a few minor kingdom capitals, and then where there were gaps I just plugged through a ton of place names to see which ones had stuck around. Tibet is entirely overhauled too, tried to use only Chinese names. Korea and Vietnam I've just picked out a few commandery capitals from when they were controlled by China and then in Korea plugged in gaps with major historical Korean cities. And Mongolia I picked a handful of medieval Mongolian cities.
I'll probably do another few in the coming couple of weeks, uni's slow.
Enyavar
Prince
- Joined
- May 16, 2015
- Messages
- 510
I am often surprised by the devotion and stubbornness in this game's community. But this tops most of the efforts I've seen so far. You, ma'am, are an absolute Civ Fanatic in doing that, and I mean this sincerely in a positive way.
Even Egyptologists seem to use ahistorical names like "Thebes" and "Memphis" more often than the historical ones for even the times when Waseth and Meni-nefr were capitals of ancient K'mt. The area had multi-ethnical inhabitation of 3000+ years when they finally got their Greek and Roman labels which seem stuck until today.
It needs history geeks to remind people that "Cleopatra" is not an Egyptian name (and the pyramids weren't built by pharaohs...
)And yes, the Chinese renamed (and re-founded etc.) their cities more often than the Egyptians. The naming taboos alone cause severe headaches, and "slog" only starts to describe the problems, when we have to consider that they purposefully reconceptualized and rewrote their history books multiple times over. I really feel with you.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
Aw shucks 
I've been mapping stuff for a while now, mostly for the Civ V community, but my roots were always here so I figured it was about time I braved the task.
Yeah I think the main reasons behind Greek in particular being the fault probably have to do with 1) Egyptian pronunciation not really whittled down until recently, 2) as a result, them being more recognisable and 3) genuinely, them being harder to pronounce for most western language speakers. Thebes is particularly hilarious given there's the Greek city of the same name that constantly gets confused with it... although that's probably why Luxor has sort of crept above it in common parlance (even though that's even more "wrong").
Was Khufu not a pharaoh? What's the distinction between him and later monarchs?
And yeah the Chinese city names are so incredibly variable that it just becomes easier to use modern names and work backwards. Outside of them changing literally every era, there's no real way to accurately historically portray them, outside of a few more lasting examples of historical names (Lin'an for Hangzhou, Wuchang for Wuhan and of course Chang'an for Xi'an).
I've been mapping stuff for a while now, mostly for the Civ V community, but my roots were always here so I figured it was about time I braved the task.Yeah I think the main reasons behind Greek in particular being the fault probably have to do with 1) Egyptian pronunciation not really whittled down until recently, 2) as a result, them being more recognisable and 3) genuinely, them being harder to pronounce for most western language speakers. Thebes is particularly hilarious given there's the Greek city of the same name that constantly gets confused with it... although that's probably why Luxor has sort of crept above it in common parlance (even though that's even more "wrong").
Was Khufu not a pharaoh? What's the distinction between him and later monarchs?
And yeah the Chinese city names are so incredibly variable that it just becomes easier to use modern names and work backwards. Outside of them changing literally every era, there's no real way to accurately historically portray them, outside of a few more lasting examples of historical names (Lin'an for Hangzhou, Wuchang for Wuhan and of course Chang'an for Xi'an).
Enyavar
Prince
- Joined
- May 16, 2015
- Messages
- 510
The pyramids were mostly built until 2200 BCE, with Ahmose's pyramid being a late (and shoddy) replica around 1500 BCE.
Around 1200 BCE, the monarchs of K'mt were addressed with a "pharaoh" (among the many other titles the monarchs already had). The first time that this office was used to describe the kingship itself, was around 900 BCE. At least, that is what archeologists have deduced from inscriptions.
Simplified from here.
Also, your signature cracks me up - being a cartographer myself, I know the distinction between good ol' manual cartography, GIS, and GoogleMaps. But it's the effort that counts, and you put a huge one into this project.
Around 1200 BCE, the monarchs of K'mt were addressed with a "pharaoh" (among the many other titles the monarchs already had). The first time that this office was used to describe the kingship itself, was around 900 BCE. At least, that is what archeologists have deduced from inscriptions.
Simplified from here.
Also, your signature cracks me up - being a cartographer myself, I know the distinction between good ol' manual cartography, GIS, and GoogleMaps. But it's the effort that counts, and you put a huge one into this project.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
Ah, interesting! What does pharaoh mean in that context apart from just 'monarch' then?
And to keep it vaguely back on topic... yes I'd love to make fancier prettier maps but my eye for aesthetic is very poor. One day I'll practice hard at developing a style, but today is not that day. In the mean time the maps I do are at the very least useful to someone
And to keep it vaguely back on topic... yes I'd love to make fancier prettier maps but my eye for aesthetic is very poor. One day I'll practice hard at developing a style, but today is not that day. In the mean time the maps I do are at the very least useful to someone
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
Here's my next batch: Mali, Kongo, Babylon & Khmer, all very WIPy.
For Mali I used a map of Malinese and Songhai cities that I made a while back to map out the historical area (given the civ essentially represents both). Then used various other West African Kingdoms' capitals to fill some space around them, as that's what the current list does (albeit less extensively). There's still some areas it's seemingly impossible to find cities for, namely the coast of Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Cote D'Ivoire.
Kongo is a more minimal affair atm - I just mapped on a few cities of Kongo and nearby kingdoms, essentially all the ones I could find that weren't so close to Mbanza Kongo as to be the same tile. It's worth saying even on the big map, the actual extent of the Kongo Empire is probably about 4 tiles, and the area further up the Congo river where their AI generally settles is very ahistorical and not areas that were urbanised or organised prior to colonisation. The sad truth is modern cities are likely to be the only options round there, especially as historical information on pre-colonial Congo is obviously incredibly difficult to find.
Babylon was relatively simple. Mesopotamia is very self-explanatory, but I did do a fair bit of research to determine which settlements were most prominent of the various city-states. The Levant is mostly made up of important cities when it was controlled by Assyria/Neo-Babylon, and then filling out with a few others that I could find Akkadian names for. There's a couple of native names further towards Negev. For the northern areas I used important citties of Mitanni, Urartu and the Hittite Empire, again with Akkadian names if possible and native names if not. I think going for those cities best encapsulates what Babylon represent, which is to say the ancient civilizations of the Middle East.
And then Khmer. The current Khmer city list is drawing with Aztecs as one of my least favourites in the current build (both are holdovers from RFC, natch). The map I've done follows similar principles to the Babylonian one - Khmer first, then fill in with contemporary civilizations, with the awareness that Khmer are representative of more than just Khmer in-game (as evidenced by their various dynamic names). This one was very unproblematic to assemble.
Might well get another couple in beforethe Nintendo Direct completely absorbs my attention for the evening I go to bed. Any requests?
For Mali I used a map of Malinese and Songhai cities that I made a while back to map out the historical area (given the civ essentially represents both). Then used various other West African Kingdoms' capitals to fill some space around them, as that's what the current list does (albeit less extensively). There's still some areas it's seemingly impossible to find cities for, namely the coast of Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Cote D'Ivoire.
Kongo is a more minimal affair atm - I just mapped on a few cities of Kongo and nearby kingdoms, essentially all the ones I could find that weren't so close to Mbanza Kongo as to be the same tile. It's worth saying even on the big map, the actual extent of the Kongo Empire is probably about 4 tiles, and the area further up the Congo river where their AI generally settles is very ahistorical and not areas that were urbanised or organised prior to colonisation. The sad truth is modern cities are likely to be the only options round there, especially as historical information on pre-colonial Congo is obviously incredibly difficult to find.
Babylon was relatively simple. Mesopotamia is very self-explanatory, but I did do a fair bit of research to determine which settlements were most prominent of the various city-states. The Levant is mostly made up of important cities when it was controlled by Assyria/Neo-Babylon, and then filling out with a few others that I could find Akkadian names for. There's a couple of native names further towards Negev. For the northern areas I used important citties of Mitanni, Urartu and the Hittite Empire, again with Akkadian names if possible and native names if not. I think going for those cities best encapsulates what Babylon represent, which is to say the ancient civilizations of the Middle East.
And then Khmer. The current Khmer city list is drawing with Aztecs as one of my least favourites in the current build (both are holdovers from RFC, natch). The map I've done follows similar principles to the Babylonian one - Khmer first, then fill in with contemporary civilizations, with the awareness that Khmer are representative of more than just Khmer in-game (as evidenced by their various dynamic names). This one was very unproblematic to assemble.
Might well get another couple in before
Wow, took a look through this and very impressed. Also enjoy some of the comments on some cities. "Will this city's name ever be spelled right?"
Interesting that the USA has all of Australia mapped considering I've never seen the USA colonize Australia in game, but I suppose that's open to the human player.
May I ask, you mentioned above, what is your reasoning for mapping the Tibetan cities using Chinese names? Is that just because that's the way it was done before?
Also, would you consider taking a look at name lists for other Old World civs that are likely to encounter Aztec/Inca? Currently it's only European civs which seems to reflect pre-DoC concerns as other non-European civs are now pretty well set to conquer the New World... especially under human player. In fact I'd say Arabia/Egypt/Tamil are more likely to discover the Old World than Russia, which does have name lists for Mexico.
Interesting that the USA has all of Australia mapped considering I've never seen the USA colonize Australia in game, but I suppose that's open to the human player.
May I ask, you mentioned above, what is your reasoning for mapping the Tibetan cities using Chinese names? Is that just because that's the way it was done before?
Also, would you consider taking a look at name lists for other Old World civs that are likely to encounter Aztec/Inca? Currently it's only European civs which seems to reflect pre-DoC concerns as other non-European civs are now pretty well set to conquer the New World... especially under human player. In fact I'd say Arabia/Egypt/Tamil are more likely to discover the Old World than Russia, which does have name lists for Mexico.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
I think the comment you're referring to there was on "Than Hoa", more properly spelt Thanh Hóa. Interestingly, while doing the Khmer map, I found the source of this misspelling! It's this awful map, still the first thing you see on the Wikipedia article for "Champa". Don't believe everything you read, folks.
USA's mapping of Australia is weird - almost like the USA is standing in for all 'first world' English colonies, given it has Canada too (though that makes more sense in DoC than in RFC, given Canada use the American city list too).
Actually, in the current map both China and Tibet's languages are functionally identical but for Lasa vs Rasa and the renaming of Pataliputra. My intention when making the Chinese map was to distinguish the Chinese names from the Tibetan ones, so that a Tibetan language map is more distinctive (ie uses the Tibetan language names).
Mapping the New World for civs that didn't historically settle there presents lots of interesting challenges. Let's assume for instance that the Japanese conquer Mexico; what city names are we to use here? A simple transliteration of a city like, say, Veracruz is one option (which I guess would be Berakuruzu, or thereabouts). But naturally this is assuming the Japanese when conquering Mexico would have translated a Spanish name, which seems farfetched. Then again, a simple translation doesn't work either - why would the Japanese, a Shinto/Buddhist nation who were intolerant to Christianity throughout much of their history, name a city "Holy Cross"? Translations of native names seem safer, and are far less without precedent, given the amount of place names in the Americas and Australia that derive from mangled western tongues making sense of place names already ascribed by the native population. But while this is easy for, say, the valley of Mexico, it becomes harder for places like the Sonora Desert, or the central American isthmus, where organised, urbanised settlements were virtually nonexistent. There's no right way of approaching this, but I think the challenge is worth looking at, given how often Arabia especially finds their way to the New World first.
USA's mapping of Australia is weird - almost like the USA is standing in for all 'first world' English colonies, given it has Canada too (though that makes more sense in DoC than in RFC, given Canada use the American city list too).
Actually, in the current map both China and Tibet's languages are functionally identical but for Lasa vs Rasa and the renaming of Pataliputra. My intention when making the Chinese map was to distinguish the Chinese names from the Tibetan ones, so that a Tibetan language map is more distinctive (ie uses the Tibetan language names).
Mapping the New World for civs that didn't historically settle there presents lots of interesting challenges. Let's assume for instance that the Japanese conquer Mexico; what city names are we to use here? A simple transliteration of a city like, say, Veracruz is one option (which I guess would be Berakuruzu, or thereabouts). But naturally this is assuming the Japanese when conquering Mexico would have translated a Spanish name, which seems farfetched. Then again, a simple translation doesn't work either - why would the Japanese, a Shinto/Buddhist nation who were intolerant to Christianity throughout much of their history, name a city "Holy Cross"? Translations of native names seem safer, and are far less without precedent, given the amount of place names in the Americas and Australia that derive from mangled western tongues making sense of place names already ascribed by the native population. But while this is easy for, say, the valley of Mexico, it becomes harder for places like the Sonora Desert, or the central American isthmus, where organised, urbanised settlements were virtually nonexistent. There's no right way of approaching this, but I think the challenge is worth looking at, given how often Arabia especially finds their way to the New World first.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
I think that's fair - after all, we're already in the realm of alt history, so why not dunk our heads into it? For regions where native names are harder to come by, there's always a temptation to rationalise a similar naming inspiration for a different language. Arabia, when settling the California Bay Area, would be unlikely to name a city after the Christian Saint Francis - but could they have named it after Al-Ghazali, for instance?
trevor
Warlord
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2002
- Messages
- 266
On playing ahistorically with east Asian civs I've used names from Kim Stanley Robinson's The Years of Rice and Salt or crude transliterations of local features/back history of names (for example, the original name of Denver was Auraria so when I settled the place as China I popped 'mountain gold town' into google translate for Shānjīnzhèn (山金鎮)).
Or, you know, just took the next random city name from the list.
Or, you know, just took the next random city name from the list.
I mean that's even another step further. I was mostly thinking that if we assume the etymology of Tenochtitlan actually means "rock of the prickly pear", we could for example say Opunteia no Ganseki (excuse my probably garbled Japanese) is a Japanese name for the city.
LacsiraxAriscal
Below Settler
They're good examples. I would say I'd want to find someone who spoke the language when concocting those names, just because Google Translate tends to be very fishy on East Asian languages in particular (obviously, that's not going to be possible with Ancient Egyptian...) I know we have a Chinese speaker on the forums and presume we have someone at least semi fluent in Japanese by merit of it being a video game forum
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