I said it hard, but If the author said it was intended to be soft (in the context of his invented world) then it is soft.

I always thought it was C as in Cookie...that's good enough for me.

Since first reading the 70-80:s comic, I´ve said "Konan the Chimmerian". Although I early on realised this was wrong, it still "sounds" like Chimmerian in my head when I read Cimmerian.

Quote from: Arminius;919199There's no such thing as a soft "C" in Greek or classical Latin. Same with "G". Herodotus and Tacitus would have used the hard consonant for Cimmerians, Celts, Germans, etc. Later evolution of the Romance languages gave us the soft "C" and "G" but if the contemporary pronunciation had been "Simmerians" they would have used "S" or sigma to represent it.

Howard was inspired by history but not bound by it--he can do whatever he likes.

(Tolkien, though, specified hard "C" in his pronunciation guides, IIRC, so "Celebrimbor" is like "Kelebrimbor", etc.)

+1 to this. The historical peoples would have been pronounced with a hard "C" or "K" sound in Latin and Greek. Though "Kimmerian" sounds a bit weird to our ears, there is no reason to assume they were called anything else.

However, I don't think Howard, who tended to take what was cool out of history and leave the rest, ever specified the pronunciation for his fictional people of the same name.

Completely off-topic, but Tim Kask INSISTS that the bulette is pronounced 'boo-lay'. Of course, he's wrong and nobody really gives a shit what Tim Kask thinks anyways.

Everyone know bulette is properly pronounced "Land Shark"!!

Quote from: Spinachcat;921115Everyone know bulette is properly pronounced "Land Shark"!!

I thought it was pronounced "Candygram" :confused:

Wait. Is that a hard C or a soft C? :eek:

Quote from: Madprofessor;921087However, I don't think Howard, who tended to take what was cool out of history and leave the rest, ever specified the pronunciation for his fictional people of the same name.

Yeah, I was pretty sure that the term for the historical people was pronounced "Kimmerian". But I also thought that that sounded wrong for Conan (perhaps simply because of the 1982 film).

I was pleased to discover, as a result of this thread, how REH pronounced it! That was a cool surprise. (Though I do think "Simmerian" sounds too close to "Sumerian".)

But wow -- this thread is 3 pages long now?

Oddly I thought for years Cimmeria was some play on Cimarron Texas. Or the Cimarron Trail.

Is historical Cimmeria the origin of Samaria then? And Samarkand? Samaritans?

Quote from: S'mon;921165Is historical Cimmeria the origin of Samaria then? And Samarkand? Samaritans?

No. Just simmilar names. The Cimmerians are based off a very different people. Theres some overlap here and there but overall the setting is a mix of cultures in odd locations.

Since I had to research all this for the RPG way back heres some insights.

A huge chunk of what would be considered Europe is in the African landmass.
Pictland covers alot of where Morrocco is.
Nordheim and Cimmeria cover Algeria more or less.
Aquilonia covers parts of Mali and Muritania.
Hyperboria is kinda where Lybia is now.

And so on. The map is essentially what youd get if you smashed Africa into Europe and most of the action takes place in the equivalent of Africa. Its not an exact match by any means. But at a glance you can tell were things would be possibly. Vendya is about where India is and past that things get hazy.

Quote from: Omega;921236No. Just simmilar names. The Cimmerians are based off a very different people. Theres some overlap here and there but overall the setting is a mix of cultures in odd locations.

Since I had to research all this for the RPG way back heres some insights.

A huge chunk of what would be considered Europe is in the African landmass.
Pictland covers alot of where Morrocco is.
Nordheim and Cimmeria cover Algeria more or less.
Aquilonia covers parts of Mali and Muritania.
Hyperboria is kinda where Lybia is now.

And so on. The map is essentially what youd get if you smashed Africa into Europe and most of the action takes place in the equivalent of Africa. Its not an exact match by any means. But at a glance you can tell were things would be possibly. Vendya is about where India is and past that things get hazy.

That is just spectacularly incorrect. This map was drawn by Robert E Howard and shows the Hyborian age map superimposed over Europe.

Quote from: Deathdealer;921275That is just spectacularly incorrect. This map was drawn by Robert E Howard and shows the Hyborian age map superimposed over Europe.

That matches overall the one I was basing off of. Except the map matches to Africa. No clue when that shifted. (Probably Marvel?). I should have clarified and given both examples. Sorry.

Theres two or three versions of Howard's map that I know of. But have only seen that one you posted and one other. Both have Aquilonia around where France is and Zingara where Spain is. The other one I saw had Cimmeria covering more of the British isles. Stygia is about where Libya and Egypt are while Koth covers a little more of France and Greece. Nemedia didnt change much and still covers about where Germany is.

Richards map though for the comic was kind of what youd get if you reversed Howards map and overlaid the Hyborian locales on a loose map of Europe. With the parody Howardian place names sometimes relocated sometimes by quite a bit. Which was what the game used.

The the similarity of the Hyborian Age map's outline to modern Africa is coincidental. Howards idea was not that the continents moved but rather that there was a massive cataclysmic change. For example, Pictland was not along the western edge of northern Africa, but rather that the last remaining vestiges of Pictland are now bits of Wales, England,Scotland, Portugal and all of Ireland and the rest has gone under the sea.

Deathdealer is correct. Robert E. Howard himself, in an essay entitled appropriately enough, 'The Hyborian Age', lays out pretty clearly his vision for the setting, and most of the action most definitely wasn't taking place in modern-day Africa.

It is also pertinent to mention that latter-day ideas of plate tectonics and continental drift were only vaguely beginning to take shape when Howard was writing, and in any case he was taking his inspiration from contemporary popular ideas about lost continents like Atlantis, Mu and Lemuria.

Quote from: S'monIs historical Cimmeria the origin of Samaria then? And Samarkand? Samaritans?

No. Samaria and Samaritans are a Palestinian off-shoot of Jews, and they still exist. Samarkand is in Central Asia (modern Uzbekistan). The historical Cimmeria was the Crimean Peninsula. It's possible that they fought against the Assyrians before eventually being absorbed by the Scythians as they migrated west.