Reflections From The Pond

The last penny in the achievement a Penny For Your Thoughts is Vareesa’s Copper Coin.

Now, there is no character named Vareesa in the entire WoW universe as far as I’ve been able to ascertain. There is, however, an elf named Vereesa Windrunner.

I am guessing they are the same person, and that the confusion in spelling is similar to that of King Arthur’s wife Guinevere for example , whose name I have seen spelled Gwenhyfar or some other variety with about the same pronounciation.

So, Vereesa tossed that coin into the fountain and made her wish. “Asto’re da shan’re. Turus Fulo Il’amare. A’Talah Adore. Isera’duna…”

Do you understand what she says and what she wished for? I didn’t, I don’t speak elf, but a little detectiving and trial and erroring has made me come up with a far-flung and rather tentative guess.

Some background information on Vereesa first:

Vereesa Windrunner is a High Elf who used to live with her prominent family at the Windrunner Spire in the beautiful forests of Ouel’thalas in northern Eastern Kingdoms. Nearly all of her family were killed by orcs in the Second War or in Prince Artha’s invasion of Quel’thalas.

Her sister Sylvanas was the Ranger-General of Silvermoon, military leader of all high elven forces. She was murdered by Arthas and as a petty revenge raised as an undead to serve him. Sylvanas eventually rebelled against Arthas and managed to tear free of his control. She gathered other undeads  and powerful allies around her and named her new force the Forsaken.

Vereesa had another sister, Alleria, who was the head scout of the Alliance Expedition to Draenor (Outland) and she was believed to be dead when the portal was destroyed. She was not found when the Dark Portal was opened again and her whereabouts are still unknown.

 Vereesa herself was also a ranger, and she was assigned a simple mission to escort a human mage called Rhonin safely to his ship. The mission soon turned astray and eventually they ended up in Grim Batol, where they defeated the orcs and the Black Dragonflight and freed the Red Dragon Queen Alexstrasza.

Vereesa was appointed Alliance Ambassador by King Terenas Menethil II, last king of Lordaeron and father of Arthas. Vereesa and Rhonin toured the Alliance forces, reminding them that there were many dangerous forces still at large in the world and  that they would have to face these threats sooner or later.

During this time, Vereesa and Rhonin fell in love. They were married and had twins, Galdarin and Giramar.

Vereesa is now the leader of the Silver Covenant, a militant faction of the Kirin Tor.  

So what did Vereesa say, when she tossed that coin into the fountain?

Well, although her native High Elf tongue is Thalassian, I doubt she still speaks that as it is the language of the Blood Elves now, enemies of the Alliance and the Kirin Tor. I think she spoke the words in Darnassian, the tongue of the Night Elves.

At WoWwiki.com there was a suggestion that her wish was “I wish for my honor. I will make peace, and the people will survive. Orcs are…” , and on WoWhead there were some suggestions as to what certain words meant in the comments.

Now, if you are a Night Elf you can turn on your Darnassian language filter and everything you say will be turned into Darnassian. Other Night Elves will understand you but people who don’t know Darnassian (ie, every other race) won’t. The in-game translator is not a real translator, it merely makes words look like Darnassian based upon the number of letters in the word, so the translated words are not really translated.

But since I don’t know any Darnassian-speaking people out of game, the in-game translator was all I had to work with. I logged onto my druid Joaquime and turned on her Darnassian translator, partied up with a borrowed a human from my husband’s account and started talking. Too bad I couldn’t do it the easy way, speak Vereesa’s wish with the human and listen in my druids Darnassian, I had to have my druid speak the words and see how they looked to the human.

“Asto’re da shan’re. Turus Fulo Il’amare. A’Talah Adore. Isera’duna…”

Using the in-game translator, honor did actually come out as adore, but so did elven and grace.  Peace was translated into turus, and I guess it is close enough to turos. People, however, came out as ethala and survive as mush’al. Orc got turned into ash and green (as in greenskins) became thera.

I tried other words and quickly found a match, love came out as fulo, but a few tries later I found that so did ever, free and pain.

I found that goodbye was turned into asto’re, and so was restful.

On wowwiki you can find that adore is assumed to mean be with you, as in Elune adore – Elune watch over you, or Elune be with you, and on the same page you can find that talah means survival and shan means honor.

Now, the translator also translates name, and I found the following matches:

Sylvanas – Il’amare

Terenas – Shan’re

Silvermoon – Isera’duna

(Translate names? Well, many names have diminutives and comes in different versions in different languages, and if you have read the Appendices to Tolkien’s work you know he translated all the names as well, so I thought why not here in WoW as well?)

So, from this complete mish-mash of known translations and in-game guessworks and odd forms of the words I tried, I came up with a wish that rang true to me.

Vereesa has has been through hell and back, almost all of her family and close ones have died horribly or painfully. Her old way of living is gone and her homelands are wasted. Still, she has dared to love again and has a husband and children, and even though she is a fighter, living in perilous times, I think she wishes for peace , both for herself and for those who have died.

Asto’re da shan’re. Goodbye/rest well honoured Terenas.

Turos Fulo Il’amare. Peace for my beloved Sylvanas.

A’Talah Adore. Let us all live [through these times].  (survival be with us)

Isera’duna. Silvermoon… (I guess words failed her here as sadness and sorrow and horror overcome her)

 
I probably don’t have a single word right here, but that’s ok, and as long as noone proves me wrong I am gonna keep believing that she wished for peace.

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