So in my book, man = drake, woman = phoenix, boy = basilisk and girl = wyvern, but since wyverns are a type of dragon, people get confused, so I want to change it. Suggestions? Perhaps I should call adult females dragonesses and young ones phoenixes?
A male duck is called a drake a phoenix is a long-lived bird that is cyclically regenerated or reborn a basilisk is a legendary reptile reputed to be king of serpents I'm surprised that it's only wyverns that are confusing your readers. I can actually go with the adult male being termed a drake, but I'd try to be similarly generic with terms for the female and the young. One of my favourites are the terms hart and hind for male and female deer - less commonly used than stag and doe - but you really need something either avian or reptilian. And the young of the species are not generally sexed...e.g., the young of swans - both sexes - are cygnets, presumably from the genus Cygnus to which the swan belongs.
Yea I'd steer clear of phoenix and basilisk as well because they're something very different. How about man = drake, woman = dragoness, adolescent = wyrm?
Golden rule I personally apply: Keep it simple. If it's confusing or too difficult to understand people will stop caring. People are lazy as hell and just want a good plot. I'd personally just use male/female and boy/girl. A drake could also be a wingless dragon.
Yea I forgot about that. I don't think wyrm is anything separate though so maybe just dragon/dragoness and wyrm for adolescents, sounds good for young dragons.
Sorry they could be! Wyrm could be dragons with no limbs. Wyrm comes too damn close to worm I'll just leave this here, I'm sorry for nitpicking.
Call them what you like! Edit: No leviathan or basilisk in that diagram. Also I'm pretty sure hydras have five heads, not three.
Personally I had no idea what a wyvern was, so I'd just take it as another made-up term for something your book defines as a wyvern. I wouldn't worry too much about this. But if a woman is a phoenix (do you mean an adult female dragon?) then the female girl dragon could be some form of baby phoenix? What are baby phoenixes called? Phoen, maybe? Or Nix? Not the most creative but it would make sense. Filg? Some derivative of Phoenix, essentially. That's the route I'd go down.
I'd agree with the rest that using terms like phoenix, basilisk, wyvern, and wyrm just to delineate different ages/sexes of the same type of dragon would be misleading. Someone who's into different types of dragon-like beasties (and I think a lot of folks know what a phoenix and basilisk are actually supposed to be thanks to Harry Potter, as well) would be confused and turned off. Using terms like 'buck' and 'doe' is probably your best bet if you don't want to just use female/male. A very cursory googling didn't turn up any reptile-specific terms like that, though.
Issue with calling dragonlikes the way you'd like is that you'd conflict with already established names. That's basically calling a pointy-eared person an orc, and a small man who lives under the ground an elf. I think if I'd do that readers will hate me. With dragonlike creatures the names are definitely less hard and known, but it's still present. I think that's a small problem. Like I said, you wouldn't call an orc a dwarf. But hey, that's just my humble opinion! Indeed, the creator missed some things, but there are so incredibly many kinds that could be considered dragonlike. Hydras are a bit tricky, Some hydras are 3 heads, some 5, some 9. If you know the standard heads of hydras please share.
A hydra can have as many heads as they like. Greek mythology stipulates they begin with nine and whenever one is cut off they grow two new ones, meaning they can gain any number of heads through battle. (Sounds cumbersome; do their bodies grow to support all those heads?) It is also stated that one head is immortal. Hercules defeated a hydra by cauterizing the stumps so the heads couldn't grow back and split in two. Also, with basilisk and phoenix, I took it from the idea that animals can be named for other animals. Maybe I should be more consistent with what animal I decide to name them after. Example: a whale is not a cow, but females are called cows, males bulls, and young are called calves. Again, I already know what baby dragons should be called (hatchlings) but I'm looking for gender-specific terms to use for adolescent dragons. So far, I think I'll call adults drakes and dragonesses. For adolescents, I still need to decide.
A young phoenix is born and reincarnated from bursting into flames, so I think a young phoenix would be called an ashling. Since dragons are born from eggs, not ashes (though they share phoenixes' affinity with fire) and -ling, at least to me, suggests a toddler, I don't think I'd use it.
Yea but it's fantasy at the end of the day so phoenix, basilisk, wyvern, etc are all okay but I agree, if it were me I'd stay away from terms that are already associated with other fantasy creatures. rktheo is right, they grow two more when they loose one unless the wound is burned after, I forgot about that. So they can have any number of heads. It's just I've always seen them with five, I think that's the general standard.
You are completely right on that, but people are so easily confused when it comes to fiction. Heck, even in real life if you take a picture of a whale and say "This is a bull" I think masses will laugh and think you're high or drunk. Imagine when it comes to fiction it's even more difficult to pull off well. I think publishers will not like it. Drakes and Dragonesses are good names, both will work. How about calling the youth simply "Youngsters"? It's simple, but effective. He definitely is! Nine felt most fitting to me but I couldn't exactly place where the feeling came from. Glad I know now again!
Predominantly most female/male titles for animals are sow/boar, cow/bull, doe/buck, hen/cock, mare/stallion, or jill/jack. Those are all used across a large & varied spectrum of animal species I'm unaware of most reptiles having gendered titles, although I think male crocodiles might be called either bulls or boars But agreed that Phoenix, Basilisk, Wyrm, Wyverns, and any established dragonesque creatures would confuse me if used for gendered terms & not specific designation of kind
I'm a tad confused about what you're referring to. But anyway... You could cheat and just call baby girl dragons Drak or Draka. Dragon >> Drag >> Drak, if you get how my thought process went. (a bit like chicken >> chick) "Drak", incidentally, does literally mean Dragon in Czech, so it wouldn't even be wrong but to the English-speaking world, it would sound fantasy-esque enough I like the term ashling, actually. If you don't mind, I may steal that term for some future use of my own, since I write fantasy, too. (but not dragons - I don't generally have much interest in them)
I don't know how many times I'm gonna have to clarify it, but I'm trying to come up with a name for adolescents, not babies. That said, I like the sound of draca...
Lol. Sorry, I had only read your original post. Anyway, adolescent... do you honestly need one?? If your world has its own languages, you could make something up based on those. Glad you like draca
Well, my characters are adolescents. I need some way to refer to them. Just something I can substitute for boy and girl.
Fledglings, like juvenile birds In birds it means the young birds have their first flight feathers, but etymologically the word simply means "quick, agile" and "ready to fly"
