Tamriel:Dwemer Alphabet

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Source	A	B	C	D	E	F	G	H	I	J	K	L	M	N	O	P	Q	R	S	T	U	V	W	X	Y	Z	Unknown
Books		*		*	*	*		*										*	*				*
Wormgod
Ayleid

*Speculative

[edit] Known Examples

An Ayleid inscription which reads "Av latta magicka, av molag anyammis", which translates to: "From light, magic; from fire, life".

Very little is known about the Dwemer alphabet, commonly referred to as Dwemeris. The above chart lists all characters with known transliterations. More characters exist in the books Divine Metaphysics and The Egg of Time, but these have yet to be translated. (There is strong reason to believe that these books contain just random characters, and do not actually have any meaningful text.)

There are four examples of Dwemer inscriptions for which we have known, confirmed translations at this time. The example on the left is from an Ayleid ruin in Oblivion. Apparently, the Ayleids used the same script, or a closely related one, as the Dwemer. It reads:
,
or "Av latta magicka, av molag anyammis", which translates to: "From light, magic; from fire, life". This is a reversal (perhaps unintentional) of the phrase translated in the book: Ayleid Reference Text: "From fire, life; from light, magic." The double 'm' in "anyammis" has been truncated to a single 'm', and the 's' is too obscured to see on this inscription, but otherwise, it is clearly the same text.

A Dwemer pipe which reads "Wormgod" in Dwemer runes.

Another confirmed example of Dwemer text is to the right. This inscription appears on all of the pipes inside Dwemer ruins in Morrowind. It reads simply or "Wormgod", which was the nickname of Gary Noonan, one of the developers at Bethesda. Interesting to note is that unlike the Daedric language, this one features (minimal) punctuation. The dot underneath the last letter is probably not part of the letter, but rather an indicator of the end of the word. (Since it is repeated over and over again on the pipes.)

A Dwemer door which reads "In loving memory, Gary Noonan, Sr." in Dwemer runes.

A third known example is a tribute by Gary Noonan to his father placed on a door in Morrowind, shown below. The text reads:
,
Which translates to: "In loving memory, Gary Noonan, Sr."

A fourth example can be found in the official Knights of the Nine Official Mod. At the beginning of the quest Pilgrimage the player finds an Ayleid text written on the floor of the Anvil chapel. This text reads which translates to As oiobala Umarile, Ehlnada racuvar. According to the prophet this means: By the eternal power of Umaril, the mortal gods shall be cast down.

This text can also be found on the side of the Knights of the Nine box.

[edit]

A Dwemer banner from Redguard.

The banner on the left can be found in Redguard. If you look closely, you'll see text written in a gray color over the image. It's hard to read in places, but you can make out the following characters:

And lower down, you'll see:

S T U

The significance of these remains unknown at this time.

[edit]

Analysis of the books is inconclusive at this time. Part of the reason it's assumed that they are random characters is that certain passages are repeated verbatim, but in a different order, from one book to the next, or even on both pages of the same book. This smacks of copy/pasting by the artist who created the graphics for the pages. Also, substituting the known letters for their English counterparts does not reveal even a hint of readable text. If it's a cypher, it's not a simple one, because several different characters can be seen as single-letter words, whereas in a typical English-language cypher, you would only see two - 'A' and 'I'. A more complex cypher is still a possibility, but without knowing the key, or even the meanings of half of the letters, it would be quite a difficult task to decode it, assuming there is anything to decode.

[edit]

*T*L ITSAT**** CEK *AG_C***F A*IF GL** KO*A* SG **C**AO* E*TF TCKI*N ***MY V VG*L *V* * * R*F* * *N C*NCW CGVKC VN MFSO*I KY *T*L ITS *_AM*YE_G* E FS WA* *L WCG*YA MOA** YK * ERV*F G* * *EW M*C AT**** CEK *FG* I*_L*OGSE G INO*R* *CREN **LA* YFTKI* F*GAW* G**I*WE*K C	*M *GFTS C*Y*V *A_L *WI A*_R*I **_*WR KR_*V** *ELWNR M*O R* TW*YM *V RC *ST* OS _ROA* OW*FK EGY L* NL_ROIW*C *YOF **R MW*EK VN*O _R MF* Y T *OG *FM N* V *GCA RW S** *R * R *_ KE* YL TA** SE *LI **F*Y*_V*CK* * _*_O*EY O GFF_* YO * *WCWTN SI*** W*N* O * I*GA* F*C KWY*

[edit]

*_AM*YE_G* E FS WA* I*_L*OGSE G INO*R* F*GAW* G**I*WE*K C E*TF TCKI*N ***MY V VG*L *V* * * R*F* * *N C*NCW CGVKC VN *L WCG*YA MOA** YK MFSO*I KY *T*L ITS M*C AT**** CEK *FG* KORA* SG R*CEMAO* *AG_C***F A*IF GL** *T*L ITSAT**** CEK * ERV*F G* * *EW *CREN **LA* YFTKI*	YFTKI* M*C G* * *EW CEK GL** AT**** * C*NCW R*CEMAO* *N * KORA* SG A*IF *FG* **LA* ITSAT**** *V* MOA** CEK * ERV*F *T*L *T*L *AG_C***F ITS C *CREN WCG*YA MFSO*I KY *L YK MY VN CGVKC R*F* VG*L E*TF * V TCKI*N *** F*GAW * G INO*R* E G**I*WE*K I*_L*OGSE *_AM*YE_G* FS WA*