Creating A Mediterranean World

[Daen]

Hi Gang,

This is my first posting and I am very excited to be here.

I would like to create a fictional medieval European-style world for a book series and I am feeling stuck with mapmaking and to a lesser extent, naming.

I was thinking about something Mediterranean, Roman and especially Byzantine. I love the idea of a central capital city like Constantinople on the cusp of a new continent and between two worlds. Then there is also Palestine just south of it which is another gateway through which humanity stepped through to form civilization came through with countless historical clashes ever since.

I also love the naming of Spain. Andalusia sounds mystical yet real, with the strong L in the middle of the word giving the name of the people there “Andals” which sounds strong and fierce. George R. R. Martin has monopoly on Andals for fantasy now though. Valencia also has a nice ring to it. I would love to find a word similar to it with a mystical yet real world feel to it.

1) What are some interesting shaped peninsulas I can substitute the boot of Italy with in my version of the Mediterranean?
2) How can I make a Mediterranean/West European zone that feels different yet has a similar feel to reality like Westeros does?
3) How can I rework naming with words like Andalusia to make it my own with a strong “people’s” name as part of it.

Thank you for all your help in advance. I would appreciate any help and advice you could offer.

[ladiestorm]

an interesting shape to substitute for the boot of Italy? Have you thought about the interesting shapes surrounding fishes tails? Like a whale or dolphin tail? Or a mystical Mermaid tail? As for a blend of mediterranean and european, I like the canals and road ways of the mediterranean mixed with european style structures and buildings. As for naming... sometimes I play around with letters of words or names... for example...if you like Andalusia... and like the hard 'l' what about something like Yndusala? or Yndulsalla? or Even Ensula? Endulaysia? and the people could be Enduls? For Valencia... Bilansa, Balesia, Belansia?

Hope this helps

[Daen]

an interesting shape to substitute for the boot of Italy? Have you thought about the interesting shapes surrounding fishes tails? Like a whale or dolphin tail? Or a mystical Mermaid tail? As for a blend of mediterranean and european, I like the canals and road ways of the mediterranean mixed with european style structures and buildings. As for naming... sometimes I play around with letters of words or names... for example...if you like Andalusia... and like the hard 'l' what about something like Yndusala? or Yndulsalla? or Even Ensula? Endulaysia? and the people could be Enduls? For Valencia... Bilansa, Balesia, Belansia?

Hope this helps

Thank you. I like the idea of the dolophins tail. Finland looks like it has a pair of them "to boot" https://www.buzzfeed.com/robinedds/4...3Rn#.ktk85P2z0

[Azélor]

2) has a similar feel to reality like Westeros does?

Westeros climates don't make sense and the geography is approximate. The official map is made by how it's seen from Oldtown. It's probably as accurate as European maps of Asia during the early renaissance, very distorted as you move away from Europe.
The reality come from the historic, folkloric lore and politics background of the Seven kingdoms. That is something really hard to show on a map.

An idea to make it different would be to have it mostly as an archipelago: it should have relatively large landmasses to keep things interesting (with each islands able to sustain at least 1 middle sized or large sized kingdom). The whole area will end up covering more space the original Mediteranea.

3) How can I rework naming with words like Andalusia to make it my own with a strong “people’s” name as part of it.

Take a Germanic name: Vandal
Make it more Arab friendly Andalus
Latin/Spanish/English: add the suffix ia at the end

After 2000 years for deformation by several culture you get something like that.
A lot of names sounds great but when you learn about their history you realize that the ones who took that name had zero imagination. United States and United kingdom are blatant examples. Any federation could take the name United States since it's completely meaningless.

[Daen]

2) has a similar feel to reality like Westeros does?

Westeros climates don't make sense and the geography is approximate. The official map is made by how it's seen from Oldtown. It's probably as accurate as European maps of Asia during the early renaissance, very distorted as you move away from Europe.
The reality come from the historic, folkloric lore and politics background of the Seven kingdoms. That is something really hard to show on a map.

An idea to make it different would be to have it mostly as an archipelago: it should have relatively large landmasses to keep things interesting (with each islands able to sustain at least 1 middle sized or large sized kingdom). The whole area will end up covering more space the original Mediteranea.

3) How can I rework naming with words like Andalusia to make it my own with a strong “people’s” name as part of it.

Take a Germanic name: Vandal
Make it more Arab friendly Andalus
Latin/Spanish/English: add the suffix ia at the end

After 2000 years for deformation by several culture you get something like that.
A lot of names sounds great but when you learn about their history you realize that the ones who took that name had zero imagination. United States and United kingdom are blatant examples. Any federation could take the name United States since it's completely meaningless.

There is gold in your comment there. The Westeros map is what it looks like to maesters in oldtown. As Jon said to Mance, "the map is not the territory"

What I like about Westeros is it is unified with three separate cultural clusters separated by geography which went on in turn to alter their politics, culture, religion etc. I am struggling to create something similar that feels both new and famiilar like Westeros does.

[Mouse]

Andalusia...

Adralusia
Aldarusia /Eldarusia
Andarusia

Lots of similar variants - as Storm and Azelor have already pointed out. Like Azelor says, you take something imaginative that already exists and alter it. One of the best examples I can think of off the top of my head is Eragon (Sorry, Christopher Paolini), which is only one letter different from dragon - in a story about a boy and his dragon (that's a criminally simplified synopsis, by the way).

You do have to be careful however. I used this technique to generate a name I absolutely loved the sound of, but which five minutes later I discovered was actually a really common surname in India!

It pays to google words you think you've just made up for yourself, just to be on the safe side

[Charerg]

You do have to be careful however. I used this technique to generate a name I absolutely loved the sound of, but which five minutes later I discovered was actually a really common surname in India!

It pays to google words you think you've just made up for yourself, just to be on the safe side

Actually, I think this is extremely common. Chances are that whatever name you come up with has already appeared somewhere sometime in some form. There are plenty of examples from literature. For example, Steven Erikson named a character "Caladan" which is also the name of a planet in Dune. And he did that with no knowledge that he was "plagiarizing"!

Honestly, I wouldn't worry too much about "duplicate names", especially if they mean different things. Although you might not want to name a river "Gondor", for example.

[Daen]

Andalusia...

Adralusia
Aldarusia /Eldarusia
Andarusia

Lots of similar variants - as Storm and Azelor have already pointed out. Like Azelor says, you take something imaginative that already exists and alter it. One of the best examples I can think of off the top of my head is Eragon (Sorry, Christopher Paolini), which is only one letter different from dragon - in a story about a boy and his dragon (that's a criminally simplified synopsis, by the way).

You do have to be careful however. I used this technique to generate a name I absolutely loved the sound of, but which five minutes later I discovered was actually a really common surname in India!

It pays to google words you think you've just made up for yourself, just to be on the safe side

That's a great insight. I never thought about Eragon being one letter away from Dragon. I thought it was one letter away from Aragon, another kingdom by Andalusia . It's a nice double meaning.

[ChickPea]

Hi Daen, firstly, welcome to the guild.

You might want to take a look at author Guy Gavriel Kay's work for inspiration. I'd highly recommend him to any fantasy reader anyway (he's probably my favourite fantasy author) but taking bits of Europe and putting a fantasy twist on them is pretty much what he does. So, for example, he's got Esperana for Spain, Sarantine/Byzantine, Cartada/Cordoba, Silvenes/Seville, Dubrava/Dubrovnik, Arabic/Asharite etc etc. I think Ladiestorm's got the right idea above. Just swap some letters from an existing place around till you've got something distinct. I'm not sure if you want people to have the impression of real world places as they read your book? You probably don't want names to be too similar unless you're deliberately invoking thoughts of the real place.

As for an Italy-shaped substitute, well, frankly, use your imagination! It's fantasy. You can have anything you want. What would work within your story? How can you develop the shape of the land as an element of the book? What does the story need? Start from there and see what develops.

[Daen]

Hi Daen, firstly, welcome to the guild.

You might want to take a look at author Guy Gavriel Kay's work for inspiration. I'd highly recommend him to any fantasy reader anyway (he's probably my favourite fantasy author) but taking bits of Europe and putting a fantasy twist on them is pretty much what he does. So, for example, he's got Esperana for Spain, Sarantine/Byzantine, Cartada/Cordoba, Silvenes/Seville, Dubrava/Dubrovnik, Arabic/Asharite etc etc. I think Ladiestorm's got the right idea above. Just swap some letters from an existing place around till you've got something distinct. I'm not sure if you want people to have the impression of real world places as they read your book? You probably don't want names to be too similar unless you're deliberately invoking thoughts of the real place.

As for an Italy-shaped substitute, well, frankly, use your imagination! It's fantasy. You can have anything you want. What would work within your story? How can you develop the shape of the land as an element of the book? What does the story need? Start from there and see what develops.

Thank you so much for the warm welcome ChickPea. I am glad to be here.

Friends have told me that Tigana by Kay is incredible so it is on my list of books to read. I am new to the genre. Before reading ASOIAF I was a nonfiction reader. I had no idea what fiction was capable of acheiving, so that has brought me here to be your map padawan.

Bernard Cornwell said it best when descriving ASOIAF as historical fiction set in a fictional world. That's what I would like to create.