Abydonian

**Abydonian** is a language spoken by the Abydonians on the planet Abydos and is a derivative language from Ancient Egyptian.

## History

When the Abydonians were taken from Earth by the Goa’uld Supreme System Lord Ra 6626 years ago in order to work the Naquadah Mines they still spoke their native Egyptian dialect. The were forced on this new planet to worship Ra as a god. Not much later, Ra's slaves on Earth rebelled and buried their Stargate. It was around this time that Ra banned all written language on Abydos, so that they wouldn't learn what happened on Earth and do the same thing on their new planet of Abydos. This is why their Egyptian dialect over thousands of years of only oral learning and speaking changed into its own unique language, Abydonian.

Only after the Tau'ri came to Abydos and helped them overthrow Ra did they start learning their written language again, while also starting to learn English.

## Initial Difficulties and Changes

When SG-0 arrives on Abydos initially Dr. Daniel Jackson had much difficulty with placing the language since it evolved so far away from the extinct Ancient Egyptian, even though he had much expertise in Ancient Egyptian and other ancient languages.

Then after finding some written language, Dr. Jackson quickly picked up on the changes that happened between Ancient Egyptian and Abydonian one of these changes was the loss of the difference between the sounds t and t (similar to English ch), both merged to t, as Daniel discovers when pointing to the figures representing gods in the walls of the site of the Cartouche of Nagada, pronouncing the Ancient Egyptian neter “god”, being corrected by Sha're to the Abydionian naturu. A symmetrical change occurred in d (English j, dj), that merged with d, as Sha’re shows by pronouncing the Ancient Egyptian nedet “slave” as Abydonian neda. Primarily vowel changes had occured within the language.

## Examples

bani we "how sweet!", "how pleasant!"

miratutu "you both will love each other!", where mira- translates "will love, will want", and -tutu is the dual second person.

nati na maryunak we "that you didn't want me", that can be analised as nati "that", na "don't", maryu- "want(ed)", -na- negative infix, -k "you" (singular) and we "me".

yanak Kasuf “I am Kasuf”.

yimyu ma’e naturuti “take a look at your gods”, that can be analised as yimyu “to give”, ma’e “to look”, naturu “god(s)”, the suffix –t “your” (plural) and a possible dative –i “to” (as seen in Arabic). So, litterally “give looking to your god(s)”.

yishsi khipr ’ay “what happened here?”

yishsi khipr Daniel “what happened with Daniel?”

'ay: ʕ3 “here”

bani: poss. bnr “sweet, pleasant” (here we can see the loss of final –r, as in nafi “good”, one of the possible rules learned by Jackson)

baya: bj3 “mineral, metal”

bayaka: b3k “work”

gas: gzj, gzt “speed, run”

haibe: ḥbbt “water”

harm: ḥr m “why”

-i: dative (Arabic –i)

khipr: ḫpr “to happen” (here the –r has not been lost, maybe because it is not after a vowel)

ma’e: m33 “to look”

maryu "wanted, loved" , mira "will want, will love" [00:59:31], Ancient Egyptian mrj "want, love"

nafe: nf “wrong”

nafi: nfr “good, beautiful, well” (note the loss of final –r)

naney, -nan: nn “not”

nate: ntr "god" [01:09:31], naturu: ntrw “gods”

neda “slave”: ndt “serf”

sabat: sbt “laugh, laughter, mirth”

sek: sʕq “cause to enter, send in”

sibuy “gate”: sb3 “door” [01:30:24], sibuyau "gates": sb3w "doors"

Sibuy sibe "Stargate": sb3.sb3 "star-door"

sipru: zpr “to arrive, come, reach”

sheshe’tayu “(sand)storm”: h3h3tj “storm”

-t: t “your”

tiw: tjw “yes”

we “me”: wj “I, me, my”

wu: wʕ “one (1)”

yanak: jnk “I am”

yimyu: jmj “to give”

yishsi: jšst, jšzt “what?”

yuyu: jj “to come”

## List of Sound changes

This table lists the changes that had led the Ancient Egyptian to the Abydonian Egyptian. These changes were observed and described by Dr. Daniel Jackson.

When Jackson learned those changes in relation to Ancient Egyptian, and the vowels that should fill the words, he was finally able to speak and understand the Abydonian language.