Glossary of terms used on this site

Nac. = Nacateca,  Min. = Minidun

abea (Min./Nac.)

Marijuana, which grew indigenously in Bergonia before the coming of the Europeans.  Mentioned often in the giant corpus of pre-Columbian literature & records.
acuslei (Nac.) Homosexual, homosexuality.  From "turned around backwards."  Not a pejorative term.
acutle, (Min.) "affectations," "masks," "bullshit."

atrei (Min./Nac.)

A person of native Bergonian stock or ethnicity, as distinct from a person of European, African or other non-Bergonian ethnic stock.  People of the native Bergonian races, or descended from the native Pre-Columbian Bergonians. An accepted term in all European and Bergonian languages.  Corrupted from a Nacateca word meaning "prey" or "one who flees," used in early colonial times by Bergonians to describe themselves in relation to Europeans.  This term has never been used as a pejorative.
acutle (Nac.) "Affectations," or "masks," cultural forms, cultural detritus. "that which conceals and reveals."  nothing to take literally, or too seriously, the stuff of fun.  Masks have always figured prominently in festivals and mythological & secular drama, and as a literary motif.
bunec (Min.) Government: The county, the basic subdivision into which lesre/states are divided.
chiatle (Min) chatle (Nac) The great room and living area in a Bergonian house, sometimes divided by screens.  The great room opens onto the atrium or courtyard.
chiconatrei (Nac.) Honesty and fair-dealing, based on mutual respect and inviolable precepts of honor.  This virtue was much hailed both by the banda warrior class and the merchant class.

commune (Fr.)

cumoi (Nac.) cumun (Min.)

Government:  The most local level of government in Bergonia-- the self-organizing village or neighborhood that makes final decisions on lease allotments, street repairs, drainage problems and new construction.
copaca (Nac./Min.) Food:  A couscous-like concoction made from durum wheat, served often for lunch and dinner.

cuotei (Nac.)

portan (Min)

A group of people who live in the same village, neighborhood or apartment building and who organize to share some living arrangements and finances.  Communes engage in many activities for the families who participate: sometimes running a common kitchen or cafeteria or store, buying in bulk, operating a daycare coop, maintaining a common garden, owning tools, cars or trucks in common, and vacationing together at discount rates.  Often the apartment building or neighborhood complex is leased to the commune, and people join the commune in order to get an apartment.  Often communes include vastly extended families.  About 42% of the population belong to communes.  
curei (Nac.) ore. (Min.) Peasant, peasantry.  This term is still used to describe all farmers.
edelei (Nac.) Mythology:  Winged sky spirits, invisible to human eyes, visible to animal eyes, that bring blessings from the Gods and occasionally console afflicted people and animals, descended from Aslinare, god of wind.  
gatlerin (Min.) Law:  This word is most often translated as "commonwealth," and means literally "sharing with one another," and refers to a harmonious, peaceful society and orderly state.  It connotes a society at peace with itself.  Fairness and mutual consideration are implicit in this term.  It became a term of art among the ancient Tan, and meant a society that conscientiously tended to everyone's welfare.  It has been used in the nation's official name since 1790:  Democrai Gatlerin Bergonia (Min.)
guvremun (Nac) Law:  In both ancient and modern jurisprudence, the most serious class of crimes and civil wrongs.  Guvremun in ancient times were punished by death, banishment, enslavement, beating, disfigurement of the body, including the ancient Kuan infliction of humiliating tattoos, and restitution.
iregemi (Nac. & Min.) The traditional native term for "landed gentry"-- the nobles of ancient and modern times who lived in country estates, who had rights to a share of the peasants' harvests (usually one quarter), and who had power to police and exploit the peasants in their villages.  Here is more info on the Iregemi
ishra, (Nac.) Religion:  The manifestation of the Godly presence, the "Divine," that presides over the world, within the individual person.  Ishra is the personal manifestation of vai.
lesre (Min) States, provinces.
maficorei (Nac.)/ maficu (Min.) Religion:  Ritual purification
miase (Min.)  carelessness, lack of self-discipline, impulsiveness; a bad trait, seen as stupidity.
otei (Nac) Law:  Any autonomous, culpable legal entity, including corporations.  
paice (Nac) Law:  Legal maxims, summarizing concepts of equity; original sources of law.  see law.
paira (Nac.) Religion: principle of pei/natural law, affecting everything from movement of stellar bodies to personal responsibility, axiom of wisdom, axiom of law or dogma. philosophy: fundamental truth, a priori proposition from which to launch logical arguments.
pei (Nac) Religion:  The full integral body & network of divine law, including the laws of science and the moral law.
pineapples Bergonians love them, and cannot get enough of them.  Pineapples were certainly not indigenous to Bergonia, but with the very first one imported, probably in the early 1800's, Bergonians have been crazy about them.  Pineapples have been the objects of theft at various times in the 1800s and early 1900s.  Bergonian chefs add a lot of fruit in cooking entrees and in addition to grapes, raisins, currents, apples and cherries (all indigenous) they use pineapple.
 pratlarei (Nac.), pralatri (Min.) proletariat, working class.

preba (Min.) 

  prepa (Nac.)

The preba cat is a great mountain wild cat, not quite as lean as, and slightly smaller than the North American cougar, with a tawney variety and a silver-gray variety, sometimes with black face and feet. Prefers the mountains and defiles. Prebas for centuries have made horrible visitations upon the sheep of the hill people, but many rulers throughout Bergonian civilization compensated shepherds for any sheep killed by a preba, in order to keep the shepherds from hunting the noble, semi-sacred cats.
satlei (Nac.) Religion:  One of the 60 signs in the ancient Bergonian "Oracle," signifying one of the 60 elements underlying the univese.
secita (Nac.) The universal term in pre-columbian society for "scribe," "literati," "scholar," "writer," "clerk."  See literacy.
seiudun (Nac.) History: The rules governing polite conversation that arose from the banda warrior disciplines.  It came to dominate courtly interlocutions in the times of early Shufrantei. Seiudun depended on good form restraining individual passion.  The style and etiquette that governed conversation among "worthy men and women" in ancient Bergonia.  Seiudun arose from the banda warrior disciplines, and then in the early Shufrantei era it dominated courtly interlocutions. Seiudun meant that good form restrained individual passion.  Seiudun later revived in altered form by Tan, when it prescribed public manners, forms of address, and permissible limits on display of emotion.
sherei (Min.) Person of mixed atrei and European blood.
thuase (Min.) Religion:   A quality of mind requiring conscious self-discipline, consisting of  "watchfulness, deliberateness. patient thought, consideration."  See Miradi religion.
tieri (Nac.) History:  In ancient times, the chief of a tribe, traditionally elected by the assembly of warriors.  In Shufrantei and medieval times, the ruler of a state.  Roughly equivalent to the European term of "king," since most tieris ruled with king-like powers.  There was no rule of primogeniture in Bergonia, and the tieri traditionally designated his heir with a sworn will.  In later times, an executive council appointed the tieri, but once appointed the tieri served for life.  This unlimited tenure to his rule was what distinguished the office from other executive offices.
tluca (Min. and Nac.) ghouls who eat human flesh. see cannibals
tunec (Min.) Law:  Municipal county, the form of government for big cities, usually cities about around 500,000, on the same level as a bunec, county.
turanai Middle school.
uleishe  (Nac.) Religion:   prophet
ushe  (Nac.) Humans, humankind.
vai  (Min.) Religion:  The divine, the divine element within all things in the Miradi pantheistic universe. (In Nac. trans as fe.
zampo (Min.) Religion:  public debates among the learned priests and teachers on the steps and in the courtyards of  the temples. Ancient Ceiolai.

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