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nayabaru:society:tattoo

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Table of Contents

Nayabaru tattoos encode several bits and pieces of information:

  • Profession
  • Source community
  • Responsible Lashal

It's important to understand that tattoos follow their own alphabet, but it nonetheless is an alphabet. Having a Nayabaru tattoo is like wearing a shirt with your profession displayed on it in large letters.

However, there are strong regional variations to the designs for specific tattoos, which may be a hindrance to ease of understanding. The farther a Nayabaru travels, the more likely their tattoos are to be difficult to understand or outright unintelligible without careful scrutiny.

Which body parts are marked by the tattoo tends to depend on the profession (although here, too, there may be regional variations):

  • Backside for Hesha
  • Forearms for the Yeresoa
  • Back of the neck and arms for Seklushia
  • Neck, chest and belly for Lashala (later expanded to arms and legs with each title given, until no space on the Lashal's body remains)

The one thing that Nayabaru culture agrees on is that a Lashal's tattoo must either initially or eventually cover their entire body. While they would never word it that way, the idea is that the death of the Nayabaru is almost assured if there was ever a reason for them to lose their tattoo.

Lashala are responsible for the application of tattoos. This is not usually a one-time matter, but a ritual recurrence - tattoos will fade with age and need to be freshened at regular intervals.

Alphabet

The Nayabaru make a difference between vowels and consonants.

Consonants

The consonants are defined by three segments that have specific angles to each other, combined with two possible strokes.

The tsha͡um (“sharp”) stroke brings the angled segments together in a sharp-tipped manner, each running together as two (or in the rare constellations where more than two segments share a single joint, all three) distinct lines with their own flow.

The fega͡uri (“hollow”) stroke brings the segments together as though they were being nestled against an invisible circle at the joint and merges the flow of the segments into an inner curve.

The angles themselves are defined through a triangular grid forming a basal hexagon (or for particularly wide-angled ones, two overlapping hexagons).

The length of individual segments as well as the rotation of the entire glyph are irrelevant. Take for example the letter T. All three of the following arrangements are the letter T:

Similarly, for the strokes, the direction of the joint can be arbitrary (although there is usually only one obvious aesthetically pleasing arrangement, unless the joint is combining segments at a 180° angle):

There are 15 different angular arrangements in use, combining with the two strokes into 30 consonants. Here they are, arranged for ease of human consumption:

B (tsha͡um) BT (tsha͡um) CH (tsha͡um) D (tsha͡um) F (fega͡uri)
G (fega͡uri) GM (fega͡uri) GS (fega͡uri) H (tsha͡um) J (tsha͡um)
(archaic)
K (tsha͡um) KS (tsha͡um) KT (fega͡uri) L (fega͡uri) M (tsha͡um)
MT (fega͡uri) N (tsha͡um) P (tsha͡um) R (tsha͡um) S (fega͡uri)
SH (tsha͡um) SR (fega͡uri) T (tsha͡um) TG (fega͡uri) TK (fega͡uri)
TL (tsha͡um) TM (fega͡uri) TP (fega͡uri) TSH (fega͡uri) V (fega͡uri)

This is how the Nayabaru would arrange them when teaching the meanings to young Nayabaru:

M (tsha͡um) K (tsha͡um) T (tsha͡um) SH (tsha͡um) B (tsha͡um)
P (tsha͡um) CH (tsha͡um) N (tsha͡um) TL (tsha͡um) H (tsha͡um)
D (tsha͡um) R (tsha͡um) KS (tsha͡um) BT (tsha͡um) J (tsha͡um)
(archaic)
GM (fega͡uri) TK (fega͡uri) TSH (fega͡uri) L (fega͡uri) V (fega͡uri)
TP (fega͡uri) G (fega͡uri) GS (fega͡uri) F (fega͡uri) TM (fega͡uri)
TG (fega͡uri) MT (fega͡uri) S (fega͡uri) KT (fega͡uri) SR (fega͡uri)

Vowels

nayabaru/society/tattoo.1578453336.txt.gz · Last modified: 2020-01-08 03:15 by pinkgothic