City names in their native tongues

[daft]

When playing as a specific civ I would like to be able to name cities according to my will, I like using native(not English) language versions of the city name.
Also, Ancient Egyptian city names used in the game are Hellenistic(for the most part) versions. However, Thebes was an important city in ancient Greece as well(unless they go with Thebai). Perhaps they could use ancient Egyptian names for some of these cities?

 

[Bulldog Bats]

You can re-name cities. Sometimes I number cities, with prefixes if I got them from another AI, just to make it easier to follow my empire growth.

 

[Teproc]

A problem you'd run into is different alphabets : it's not really the Russian name for Moscow (whatever that is) if it's not written in the Cyrillic alphabet.

 

[Bulldog Bats]

I think it is unreasonable to expect the computer to have all different alphabets - I would assume Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc. would also need their alphabet.

 

[Teproc]

I think it is unreasonable to expect the computer to have all different alphabets - I would assume Chinese, Japanese, Korean, etc. would also need their alphabet.

Not to mention Egypt, Assyria, Babylon.. . I agree, this is why I think it's fine to use English (or French, German or whatever) names, because it's really hard to get everyone's true names anyway.

 

[Bulldog Bats]

Again, people get too carried away with names and faces. Play as America, and you are just as likely New York will be west of Chicago.

 

[otaman1]

Well, if you want Thebes to be written in its native language (real Egyptian, not Arabic or Hellenistic Egyptian), then you gotta time travel back in time (sarcasm). Otherwise, we gotta use the Arabic or Hellenistic spelling.

 

[Krajzen]

I am the only one who has giant problem remembering Aztec city names?

You know, this is especially annoying when I am playing as one of these nations. 'Tlaxcala has a new citizen, nice... Which city is this damn Tlaxcala... Tzintzuntzen, Tepetlaoxtoc, Tequixquiac, this language is insane!'...


Lol imagine if each civilisation had city names in original language and alphabet.

NOMINEES

Egypt - hieroglyphs
Ethiopia - Ethiopian alphabet
Russia - oh my God
Poland - good luck with Świnoujście
China, Arabia, Siam, Japan - sweet Jesus

3rd place Babylon and Assyria - clay tablets motherf^###!

2nd place Huns, Zulu, Polynesia, Shoshone, Iroquis - no city names written at all! Blank city banners and when you click on proper city banner you hear oral version of this city! You have to memorise all of that

1st place Inca - Quipu. A quipu writing system usually consisted of colored, spun, and plied thread or strings from llama or alpaca hair.


Lol when I think about that it seems awesome in some insane way

OR!

When you meet new civilisation you have to learn its language in order to negotiate with leader and even see their damn city names

 

[otaman1]

A guy or gal with a beard, a building that looks like a lighthouse, and a weird looking sword ... Alexandria? Oh god, hieroglyphs already looks hard.

 

[gurocat]

Thebes - Waset
Memphis - Mennefer
Heliopolis - Iunnu
Bubastis - Per-Bast
Letopolis - Khem
Buto - Per-Wadjet or Perwadjyt
Herakleopolis - Henen-nesut, Nen-nesu, or Hwt-nen-nesu
Crocodilopolis - Shedyet
Amarna - Akhetaten or Akhetaton
Dendara - Tentyris or Tentyra
Koptos - Gebtu
Abydos - Abdju
Thinis - Tjenu
Latopolis - Iunyt or Ta-senet
Hierakonopolis - Nekhen
Edfu - Behdet
Elephantine - Abu or Yebu

 

[b7fanatix]

How about making two separate checkboxes ?

1. City names as pronounced in their native tongue, but transliterated into the Roman alphabet

2. As above without the transliteration.

Let's make this easy and start with a European country - Poland.

In english, the capitol is "Warsaw"

If you transliterate the Polish name into the Roman alphabet as we use it, it would be "Varshava"

And if you're really adventurous, and want it spelled AND pronounced the Polish way, you get "Warsawa" which actually sounds nothing like it's suppose to sound if you're used to pronouncing letters in the way western europeans do!

More examples -

Bydgoszcz - this is the Polish name with the Polish Spelling.

Using English pronounciation of those letters, it's basically unpronouncable, though it's an inherently funny word with all neverending szczszcz cluster.

Transliterate it, you'd probably call it "Bidgotsh" (bid-got-shh! with the "shh" as in "Be Quiet!")

The German name is Bromberg.

"Wroclaw" - Polish name and Polish spelling.

You can pronounce it the English way, but it won't sound anything like how the name is supposed to be said.

Romanising to "Vrotzwav" or "Vroswav" is a lot closer to the mark. Still difficult to actually get your tongue around it because this combination of syllables never appear close together in English and makes a bit of a glottal stop, but anyway.

Incidentally the Germans would rather call it "Breslau", but there was an awful lot of trouble last time they tried to have their way, so I think we're just going to have to get our heads round these difficult Slavic names!

 

[daft]

I meant Thebes was an important/large city located in ancient Greece. Egyptian Thebes was in fact called Weses or Vaset in ancient Egyptian, Memphis was called Menfe, I might be off a bit on some of the letters but that's the actual premise of this thread. Most city names for the Egyptians in the game are in their Greek Hellenistic versions.,
Secondly I did not mean using other alphabets, just not the English versions of city names but how they sound in their native form. For example Rome is really Roma, Moscow is Moskva, Constantinople was really Constantinopolis or Constantinopol.
Using native versions of city names would further enable the building of in reality the same cities but with different language versions used for each of the tribes who in the past owned or build the city.

 

[daft]

there should be no problem about the ability to found a city like Wroclaw by more than one nation. Several nations ruled that city in the past and they all deserve to use their version of the name in the game. According to this Poland would found Wroclaw, while Germany or Austro-Hungary would use the name Breslau when founding theirs, both cities are in reality one city but so is Constantinople and Istanbul, no?
Examples of cities which could be on the to be founded list by several nations but are in fact one and the same city:
Tarsus-Tars
Gordion-Gordium
Gdansk-Danzig
Nieuw Amsterdam-New York
Several cities have had more than one ruling nation in it's history, as long as they are in the game and their version is known and it was an important city in their empire, let them have it, it's only a game, we are not rebuilding the history exactly to every single point here, are we?

 

[daft]

I love the Aztec city names!

 

[Naokaukodem]

I meant Thebes was an important/large city located in ancient Greece. Egyptian Thebes was in fact called Weses or Vaset in ancient Egyptian, Memphis was called Menfe, I might be off a bit on some of the letters but that's the actual premise of this thread. Most city names for the Egyptians in the game are in their Greek Hellenistic versions.,
Secondly I did not mean using other alphabets, just not the English versions of city names but how they sound in their native form. For example Rome is really Roma, Moscow is Moskva, Constantinople was really Constantinopolis or Constantinopol.
Using native versions of city names would further enable the building of in reality the same cities but with different language versions used for each of the tribes who in the past owned or build the city.

The city names should be their common form, for people to be able to recognize them. So it depends how people name cities in reality. But I think there is no logic in that here. Some city names are "americanized", "frenchised" or even "occidentalized", some are not or their form have changed / is mutating. For example, in French we used to call China capital "Pékin", but lastly we saw the Olympic Games (les Jeux Olympiques) of "Beijing" at the TV.

there should be no problem about the ability to found a city like Wroclaw by more than one nation. Several nations ruled that city in the past and they all deserve to use their version of the name in the game. According to this Poland would found Wroclaw, while Germany or Austro-Hungary would use the name Breslau when founding theirs, both cities are in reality one city but so is Constantinople and Istanbul, no?
Examples of cities which could be on the to be founded list by several nations but are in fact one and the same city:
Tarsus-Tars
Gordion-Gordium
Gdansk-Danzig
Nieuw Amsterdam-New York
Several cities have had more than one ruling nation in it's history, as long as they are in the game and their version is known and it was an important city in their empire, let them have it, it's only a game, we are not rebuilding the history exactly to every single point here, are we?

I think that's allready the case, Firaxis have not be too literal by choosing city names, especially Iroquois ones, it have been debated several times in the General forum.

I love the Aztec city names!

But they are a little hard to pronounce and even read.

 

[daft]

completely agree with the previous post, and yes, Iroquois city names should all be in Iroqua native language. I'd much rather have the ability tov found Niagara, Oswego, Irondequoit, Susquehanna, or even Saratoga, among others, than Salamanca-it's a major Spanish city and should only be found by the Spanish, or Niagara Falls-Falls here is completely unnecessary, same with Centralia or St. Regis, these are English language versions of the city-or rather settlement/village names, not Iroquois.
If they have to borrow other neighbouring tribe's village name, who cares since those are not part of the game, just let me found cities in their native language, that would be excellent.
As far as the Aztec names, they are one of my favourite tribes to play as, their city names are original and exotic.
Ps. Wroclaw I think would properly be pronounced Vrotzwav- in English, now try and say that.