Sendings

The Languages of Abode
by Howard Yune ("Kir")

LONGRIDER
(indigenous language of the “Asiatic” natives of West Junsland; begins to be supplanted by Junnish in the generation or two before The Wild Hunt: Mender’s Tale)

The language of the Longriders, the “Asiatic” herdsmen of West Junsland seen in The Wild Hunt: Mender’s Tale, has not been explicitly described. However, given that only six years passed between the Wild Hunt’s flight from East Junsland (Second Elfquest 30) and the beginning of Mender’s Tale (Second Elfquest 32), it seems more likely that Mender and Yun, in speaking with their new human neighbors, are using a language they already knew before moving into the area. The Longriders do have many unique words unknown in the Djunate (“yarga”, “demujan”), and their proper names have a different etymology from those in the east, so it’s likely they had (and may still have) a native, non-Junnish speech (as English and Pilipino coexist in the Philippines today). If this human tribe is indeed speaking the language of the Djuns, they probably acquired it over a few generations of contacts with the “white” easterners, - through trade, migration and possibly intermarriage. At the time of Mender’s Tale, Junnish could now be the primary speech of the Longriders, with the native Longrider tongue declining but not yet extinct.

A final word concerning the human influence on the elfin language

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