An Auxiliary Collection of Things You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know—Madalena Cruz-Ferreira SpecGram Vol CLX, No 3 Contents Not Even Wrong—A transcript of the 2010 SpecGram Free Form Linguistics Slam

A Brief Essay on the Language and Mythology of the Ekhié and the neighbouring Mákek Peoples of the Highveld Forests and the Ancient Watmákekhié Site

By Mr. J. Doe of the International Centre for the Studies of Previously Presumed Mythical Beings and Peoples1

It was first with disgust and then with utter disfavour that I read the Dishonourable Sir CJ Cockspur’s blabbering about the NPICML (the New Pan-global International Council for Marginalising Language) in this great Language Journal—especially when he made the great forests around Eegôlee2 seem like some mythical thing from the 1980s. I have spent my entire working life studying the magnificent peoples of Watmákekhié, their language, their culture, their mythology and their architecture.3 As this is only to be a quick retort to the abysmal work of Cockspur, I will only broadly discuss the language and mythology in the way that it pertains to the language.

The Mythology of the Ekhié and the neighbouring Mákek peoples

The Ekhié people that live in the forests of the Highveld believe that they live in the best place on earth.4 They also believe that the Mákek people were cursed sometime in the past and sent to live in the quaintly-called “Stone Forest” some two days’ travel from the Highveld forests.

Ironically, the “Stone Forest” is, in fact, an ancient petrified forest of the Jurassic era and contains profuse amounts of gold ore. This is, in fact, where the gold to plate the buildings in Eegôlee comes from. As there are so-called “Middlemen” or “Broawkuers” that buy the gold from the Mákek people and sell it to the Ekhié people, the two groups are yet to learn that they are dependent on each other for their livelihoods.5

The Language of the Ekhié and the neighbouring Mákek peoples

The languages of these two groups of people have been proven by some philologists6 to both stem from the Má’hak’ékke Language Family. The Ekhié and Mákek languages are, however, the last two remaining languages of this family.7 What makes these languages especially fascinating is that they share various words (and derogatory terms) to refer to each other, even though they have not been in contact with each other for over two centuries.

The following table can be made as illustration:

Word Meaning in Mákek Meaning in Ekhié
Hoo’gha’nitte (only used towards the “Broawkuers”, as a greeting) Do you have any leklekker to sell? Do you have any gold to sell?
Simp’el’fentte (derogatory term) Meaning “the Ekhié” Meaning “the Mákek”
Gha’nê Treasure/leklekker Treasure/gold
Aah-lee’hin Those who build ‘great houses’ Those who built the pyramids8

By just looking at these few words, even the Dishonourable Sir CJ Cockspur will be able to see that here is a language that is much better suited to the use of the NPICML than their laughable “Simplified English”. The International Centre for the Studies of Previously Presumed Mythical Beings and Peoples have already made “Learn the Languages of Má’hak’ékke in 3 Months” ($199.95, including p&p) available to the other denizens of Earth. Therefore, it is quite possible that the Ma’hak’ekke languages could replace English as the proposed Lingua Franca in less than a year.9 The NPICML will also be thrilled to know that the Ma’hak’ekke languages have a combined vocabulary of 2,000 words,10 a lot fewer than even their “Simplified English”. Works of literature11 can also be translated into the Ma’hak’ekke languages without losing most of their meaning,12 like they would when translated into “Simplified English”.

I would like to know what Sir CJ Cockspur has to say about that!


1 Which includes studies regarding all types of animals, plants, fungi, amoebae and the ever-elusive phairee’dus’t of the equatorial deserts of the Sahara.

2 A local name for the “City of Gold”. Unlike other such cities, this one is actually real.

3 I am certain, for instance, that they did the groundwork for the prototype pyramid, which was stolen from Watmákek people by some migrating Neanderthals only to be built in Egypt, by using a workforce of 20,000 men and the aforementioned phairee’dus’t.

4 “Earth” has of course changed meaning from “as far as I can see” to “the country”, to “the known world”, to “the planet Earth” and have, in the last decade come to include “Venus” and “Mars” as well. This is due to some outside reading material that was smuggled in and read by some of the Elders of the people. Scholars are still trying to undo the damage of this “outside material”.

5 The Ekhié people grow a hardy tuber that is used both to prepare the Mákek’s signature national dish “leklekker” and to strengthen the mortar they use in their buildings.5.1
5.1 Some scholars are said to have found amounts of the “leklekker” in the TNT used to blast the tunnels to get to the gold. This is of course poppycock,5.2 and have yet to be proven in double-blind tests.5.3
5.2 Or at the very least, balderdash.
5.3 Or at least an experiment where a linguist is present.5.4
5.4 For the simple reason that not only other scientists should be able to blow things up and/or start accidental fires which are not due to too many fricatives being uttered in a paper-filled office, enclosed area, or while wearing clothes prone to static electricity build-up.

6 I can’t find the journal/website/blog where I had read it, though, so don’t expect any names.

7 To fund research in this area of language study, call 555-5555 for the details of my the fund’s Swiss bank account.

8 Aah-lee’hin seems to be an archaic word used to refer to ‘leaders’ of the people or of the builders in the times when the pyramids were built. Some other structures have also been found in the forests, generally only seen from the air, which cause the trees in the area around the pyramids to grow in strange formations, mostly circles.8.1
8.1 It is also interesting to note that Aah-lee’hin may mean “star”, “coming from faraway”, “stranger”, “vehicle”, “having big eyes” and is used to denote the color “grey”.

9 Although I am unable to prove it.

10 With each word generally having between 10 and 15 meanings, not including the use of suffixes, etc.

11 And random pieces of text, like blogs.

12 The languages can even be used to liven up “not so great”12.1 texts, like blogs.
12.1 And/or boring.

An Auxiliary Collection of Things You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know—Madalena Cruz-Ferreira
Not Even Wrong—A transcript of the 2010 SpecGram Free Form Linguistics Slam
SpecGram Vol CLX, No 3 Contents