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Other countries not in the books?

The cultures, creatures, geography — anything about the books!

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Other countries not in the books?

Postby Geekicheep » Aug 09, 2019 11:22 am

Good Mortereve and happy Friday! :)

I've been playing with the idea of building a Narnia-themed Risk game, so I searched the web for some good Narnia world maps. I think I saw a post saying not to post links, so I won't do that, but the map I found showed something I've never seen before: This version of the map had countries far to the north, south, and west. It's especially interesting because I don't remember any of these places from the books.

1. To the north was "Bruha Gliwad" (a.k.a. Witch's Country). I got a laugh out of this one because "bruja" is Spanish for witch (and the J is pronounced H too). But what is this? I know in MN the White Witch fled to the north, and in SC the entrance to the other witch's domain was in the north as well. But I don't remember either of them having their own country (unless you count Charn or the Underworld, but neither of those are on the map I plan to use for the game ).

2. In the south, beyond Calormen, are a whole bunch of countries I've never heard of: Einuno, Dosnii, Tatlodrei, Vierneige, and Femvissi. My best guess is maybe there were some obscure references to these places in HHB or TLB somewhere? What is known about them, if anything?

3. There were also others, small islands I don't know much about, like the Bight of Calormen or Narrowhaven, but I at least know they're referenced in the books. I don't know if much is known about them either, but I'm pretty sure Caspian sailed to all of them. :)

Anyway, I'd enjoy any info you may have, and I'm sure this will be a fun discussion with those more knowledgeable than I. I thought I knew Narnia inside out and backwards, but I guess not (lol). Or is this so out there it could be a "stump Glumpuddle" question? :D
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Cleander » Aug 09, 2019 1:43 pm

That is so cool! Good luck with Narnia Risk!
I'm pretty sure none of those places are mentioned in the books. Those locations were added later on to sort of fill up the maps. I don't know if maybe Lewis told Pauline Baynes to add those names to the maps she drew, or if she or someone else came up with them.
I wonder what language "Bruha Gliwad" is in. I guess if the Telmarines were really as Spanish as they are in the movies, it would make sense if they came up with that term as a superstitious way of describing the strange lands to the north.
What is a bight, I wonder? Is it part of a mega-bight? :D
BTW, I've frequently posted links before and have yet to get in trouble for it, so I think as long as the sites themselves aren't bad in some way, you should be fine. Though you should still probably ask one of the mods.
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Geekicheep » Aug 09, 2019 2:19 pm

I like that explanation; yes, I could totally see the name coming from Telmarine superstition. That's how naming of places works; names are usually descriptions. Like New York, which obviously reminded someone of York, or Puerto Rico, which in Spanish means "rich port". Anyway, I sure don't remember it in the books. But it's on the map, so it's int he game.

By the way, that was a good one! Mega-bight! :D I looked it up, and apparently a bight is "a bend in a coast forming an open bay; also : a bay formed by such a bend." So basically it's the land surrounding a bay (though most of us would still call that a bay too).
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby aileth » Aug 10, 2019 9:28 am

The names mentioned in 1) and 2) are definitely not canon--someone must have been having fun making up names. I would suspect that it wasn't Pauline Baynes, either; could be anybody, but not at all official.

Narrowhaven is the market town on Doorn, where the governor and the castle were to be found. Felimath was the uninhabited island, and Avra where Lord Bern had his estates.
Lewis in Voyage of the Dawn Treader wrote:Doorn now lay before them, divided from Felimath by a channel about a mile wide; behind it and to the left lay Avra. The little white town of Narrowhaven on Doorn was easily seen.


Now, the bight of Calormen does sound familiar, but a cursory search of the texts didn't turn up anything. Occasionally my search function gives me grief, so that's not proof. As an aside, Avra shows up quite often as a search string in VDT, because it is also found in Mavramorn, one of the lost lords.

"Gliwad" could be Welsh, but that's merely a guess. It's the closest to a possible "real" place, though it's not in the books, because it fits in with the sort of name that Lewis himself might have chosen. His made-up names tended to follow a certain pattern, and the examples in 2) don't match. Many names (such as Aslan) might not have been familiar to us once, but were real words and places, perhaps from another language, or sometimes from mythology. Figuring out the etymology can be quite amusing. Or looking up the types of ships he mentions: many of them are obsolete (at least, I'd never heard of them, which isn't saying much :) ) but genuine medieval ships.

Bother! that "bight of Calormen" is bugging me. I'll have to look it up in Companion to Narnia next time I'm at the farm. Or maybe someone else will have a better memory than I.
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Geekicheep » Aug 11, 2019 1:28 pm

Wow, thanks for the research and insights, aileth! I do remember Narrowhaven now - I remember their adventures in the Lone Islands well, just didn't recall that name. And I knew Lewis used words from other languages in his naming (at least with Aslan, Jadis and even Narnia - there was a place in Italy, called Narni now, that used to be called Narnia; there's also supposedly a town called Narnia in Maryland, which I found by accident and is hilarious, but now I'm getting off-topic :D ).

Anyway, I don't know where you got the books in a searchable format like that, but it's good to know those other "new" places don't actually appear in the books. I guess we can't do better than that! In addition to what you said about Lewis' naming of people and places, the fact that you couldn't find them in the book kind of says it all. :)

Now just for reference, here is a link to the map that I've been looking at. Now I've edited my copy for the game, because they included a lot of things that would not be used in a game of Risk, and I've also cut off the board after the Lone Islands (since they were unexplored and some uninhabited up till VDT). But it sounds like I should either cut out those other countries as well, or else get a better map (lol). But the reason I have used it is because the originals (the ones that Pauline Baynes drew) don't seem to have very clear borders between the regions of each country, or between countries. For example, the one I saw had mountains between Narnia and Archenland, but there is no line like the one in this map. So if anyone knows of a better map, I would definitely like to see it. If not, I can just keep editing what I have for the purpose of this game. And if nothing else, this has been a very interesting conversation. :)

Anyway, thanks again to aileth for a definite answer to my question! Now do I need to mark it as solved or anything like that? Some of the other forums I've been on ask for that, so I figured better safe than sorry (lol).
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby waggawerewolf27 » Aug 12, 2019 9:41 pm

Cleander wrote:That is so cool! Good luck with Narnia Risk!...

What is a bight, I wonder? Is it part of a mega-bight? :D


A bight is a geographic feature where there seems to be a great shallow chunk, curve or recess taken out of a coastline. If you look at a map of Australia, where it curves around northwards then southwards down in the south between Western Australia & Victoria in the East, we have the Great Australian Bight. At some point millenia ago, that area sat above & was joined to the round bit of Antarctica, to the west of the Ross Sea. I'm sure that there are others in the world, such as the New York Bight.
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby DiGoRyKiRkE » Aug 13, 2019 4:23 pm

The Bight of Calormen is a body of water that is notated on the original map of Narnia by Pauline Baynes.

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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Cleander » Aug 13, 2019 7:03 pm

Well now I know what a "bight" is! Thanks!
Google images doesn't reveal much in the way of maps with actual borders. IMO the map you're currently referencing might be your best bet. Most other versions are going to be based off of Pauline Baynes' map. The poster map that came out as merch for the LWW movie just shows the country of Narnia itself.
I assume the mountains ARE the borderline between Narnia and Archenland, given the way Lewis describes them in HHB. Natural formations often determine borders. (Take the Rio Grande for instance.)
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Geekicheep » Aug 14, 2019 4:32 pm

That's true. I often thought of that (and I'm still thinking about that). The same goes for the northern border, with the Shribble River is where Narnia ends and Ettinsmoor begins (like the Rio Grande, as you said). And of course even within Narnia itself there are regions, like Lantern Waste or Beruna or Beaversdam. But again, the lack of borders (even natural borders) makes identifying these places tricky.

Anyway, I think you guys have answered my questions on the subject. I do have others, but they have less to do with Narnia's world map and more with the game play. So that doesn't really fit this thread (it's no longer "talking about Narnia", but "talking about Narnia Risk"). So I think I might start a forum over on my website for discussing stuff like that, cuz it's pretty off-topic. But for now, I'd just like to thank you! This has been a fun conversation, at the very least for me, and I appreciate your help in getting this game off on the right foot. :)
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Sir Edmond the just » Oct 09, 2019 11:14 am

I know there is a Narnia total war(mod from rome total war). That has a good map but they may have added a few places i am not shure?

Are you looking to sell this game?
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby Geekicheep » Oct 11, 2019 5:32 pm

Sir Edmond the just wrote:I know there is a Narnia total war(mod from rome total war). That has a good map but they may have added a few places i am not shure?

Are you looking to sell this game?


Hey Sir Edmond, sorry for the delayed response.

Actually, I have since decided not to move forward with the game. I hadn't planned on selling it, but once Hasbro joined with Netflix or whatever I figured it would only get me into trouble. We live in a sue-crazy world with a copyright system that's totally out of whack, and I just knew it would upset someone somewhere and not end well. I don't mean to sound pessimistic, but I've seen fan games get shut down before and don't want to get involved in any of that nonsense.

But if you're interested in what I was going to use, it's in the Narnian Fan Art section of this forum. I basically took out the non-canon countries (which were the topic of this thread), resized it to 800x600, cleaned up a bunch of stray pixels, divided the map into regions (kind of like continents in regular Risk), and redid the labels. It would still work, and I bet you could print it and make a homemade board game with it, but sadly I think making a Narnia fan game would not be well-received by anyone who could make money off Narnia. Not that I'd mind them using my map (which would actually be really cool), but companies usually aren't as willing to share their stuff as the rest of us. :D

Anyway, I appreciate the info about that "total war" game. I've nver heard of those, but now I kind of want to check it out. :)
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Re: Other countries not in the books?

Postby fivestones » Feb 07, 2020 8:49 am

I came across this post when I was looking for info about these countries too. Eventually I found the answer I was looking for. The person who made that map on deviantart.com answered the questions you were asking in the comments under the map picture post he made (here: https://www.deviantart.com/jamisonhartl ... 4746867787).

Someone asked him,
So the countries at the bottom of the map are made up? Is there any information on them?
and he replied,
Yeah all made up :) The books refer to "countries to the south", as Calormen was not originally so big, but rather gained size as it took over surrounding nations. As well at the end of The Last Battle at the gate it refers to people and creatures from all over that world, not just Narnia. Their naming I did by fusing various languages for numbers crossing left to right, so "Einuno" is One in German and Spanish, and so on :)


And someone else asked,
So which countries are made up? Everthing except the northern countries and Calormen?
and he replied,
Bruha Gwilad and the five countries south of Calormen are the only made up locations, though they do represent lands that are alluded to and mentioned in the series.


So they are certainly not cannon, but I like the names he made up since I always wondered about the "other smaller countries" mentioned in The Horse and His Boy, and, also, it's a pretty great map. I've never seen a map of Underland and I was pretty excited to find someone had made one.
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