chemistry

Syldavian

Syldavian is a chemistry topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Syldavian rather than just read about it. In short: Syldavian is a fictional West Germanic language created by Hergé as the national language of Syldavia, a fictional Balkan kingdom that serves as a major setting in many of The Adventures of Tintin stories. Hergé modeled the language on Brusselian, a dialect of Dutch spoken in and around Brussels.

Key takeaways

Syldavian belongs to chemistry; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Syldavian to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Syldavian from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Syldavian is a fictional West Germanic language created by Hergé as the national language of Syldavia, a fictional Balkan kingdom that serves as a major setting in many of The Adventures of Tintin stories. Hergé modeled the language on Brusselian, a dialect of Dutch spoken in and around Brussels. The entire corpus of the language has been analyzed by Mark Rosenfelder.

Characteristics As presented in the Tintin books, Syldavian has a superficial resemblance to certain Central European languages, particularly Polish and Hungarian, due to its orthography. Like Serbian, it uses both the Cyrillic and Latin scripts, although apparently in somewhat different contexts; it is most commonly written in the Cyrillic alphabet, albeit with the Latin alphabet by the royal court. It shares numerous orthographic features found in various Eastern European languages, most notably the "sz" and "cz" of Polish. However, the language is clearly a Germanic language. Its vocabulary and grammar resembles that of Dutch and German and has little in common with any Slavic languages. But while Brusselian, Hergé's native dialect, was used as a basis for the language, Syldavian has a much more complicated grammar, with other Central European influences added. The language also appears to have been influenced by Bordurian (another fictional language), Slavic languages and Turkish. The Syldavians often bear names of Slavic origin, such as Wladimir; the dish szlaszeck that Tintin encountered also appears to be a borrowing. (Szaszłyk is the Polish word for shish kebab, borrowed in turn from Turkish.) Many words are based on common French slangs. For examples, klebcz is constructed on the French Parisian slang clebs meaning "dog". This language, which is Germanic but bears a great resemblance to Polish, may be likened to the artificial Romance language Wenedyk, or to the endangered Wymysorys language.

Phonology Syldavian boasts a rich range of sounds.

Vowels In addition to the diacritical marks shown in the chart below, there are acute and grave accents that may indicate stress. Roman letters are on the left, Cyrillic letters on the right.

In addition to these letters, Syldavian also contains several digraphs and letters for which the pronunciation is uncertain:

⟨â⟩ - uncertain, possibly /æ/ ⟨ï⟩ - uncertain. Likely a diaeresis indicating to pronounce as syllabic /i/ rather than /j/, or for the benefit of French-speakers so they do not mispronounce ai as /ɛː/ instead of the correct /aj/. ⟨oe⟩ - /ø/ ⟨ou⟩ - /ou/ ⟨eu⟩ - uncertain: perhaps the vowel /œ/ or /ø/, perhaps a diphthong /eu/ or /ɛu/. It is only seen in one word: teuïh ("door"). ⟨ei⟩ - /ei/

Consonants Roman letters are on the left, Cyrillic letters on the right.

Note: As in Czech, the letter ⟨r⟩ can be syllabic, as seen in names such as Staszrvitch and Dbrnouk. There are some additional digraphs and trigraphs, including ⟨tch⟩ (used in names and pronounced with /t͡ʃ/, the apparent Syldavian version of the common Serbo-Croatian/Balkan surname ending -ić), ⟨chz⟩ (uncertain, but may be an alternative form of ⟨cz⟩ /t͡ʃ/), and ⟨th⟩ /t/. These demonstrate that the Latin-based orthography has a number of irregularities, or else these are old inconsistent spellings that have been preserved in family names but are no longer used in the standard orthography (as in Hungarian, where for example one may find the family name Széchenyi retaining a traditional spelling rather than the orthographically correct *Szécsenyi). Note that Syldavian Cyrillic diverges in some important respects from Cyrillic as used in real-world languages, most notably by porting over Latin digraphs into the Cyrillic alphabet (for example, /ʃ/ is written "сз" instead of "ш"), and to use a few Cyrillic letters (щ, ю) for sounds for which they are never used in the real world. This, together with the use of Latin script in old medieval manuscripts, may suggest that the Syldavians adopted the Latin alphabet first, and the Cyrillic later, which is the reverse of several real-world languages (most notably Romanian) which switched from Cyrillic to Latin.

Grammar

Plurals Native words are pluralized with -en: klebczen - "dogs"; fläszen - "bottles" Loanwords are pluralized with -es: zigarettes - "cigarettes"

Definite articles Unlike Marols, but like German (shown in italics in the table), Syldavian definite articles are extensively inflected.

Indefinite articles Singular: on - "a" Plural: onegh - "some"

Adjectives Adjectives precede nouns:

forwotzen zona 'prohibited area'; Zekrett Politzs 'Secret Police'. There is no sufficient evidence to tell whether adjectives change form. The rules of Dutch, a control language of Syldavian, are very complex. Note: the derivation Klow > Klowaswa is merely one of many adjectivizations, however, compare Zyldav 'Syldavian' Adjectives can be used to modify verbs like adverbs:

Nadja Wladimir zekrett löwt. 'Nadja secretly loves Vladimir' Dzapeih wzryzkar eszt on vaghabontz. 'The guy is surely a tramp.'

Pronouns

Personal pronouns

3rd person singular neuter objective and possessive and 2nd person plural pronouns are reconstructed based on Dutch and German.

Demonstrative pronouns czei - this tot - that

Verbs Verbs are either weak or strong. This decides how they are conjugated.

Conjugation Strong verb: blavn 'to stay'

Weak verb: löwn 'to love'

The 2nd person conjugations are unknown, with reconstructions shown with asterisks. Corresponding German verbs and the 2 pl. imperative were used as a guideline in the reconstructions, with -szt in 2 sing. based upon German -st, although -szcz and -eh (the latter written -ещ in Cyrillic, which would be -esht in Bulgarian Cyrillic) are other possibilities.

Negatives To negate a sentence, the particle nietz is placed after the subject, in auxiliary position.

Müsstler nietz dzem könikstz löwt. 'Müsstler does not love the king.' In copulative sentences, nietz is placed after the verb (or czesztot) :

Müsstler eszt nietz güdd. 'Müsstler is not good.' Czesztot wzryzkar nietz on waghabontz! 'That's surely not a vagabond!'

Adverbs Most adverbs tend to be identical to adjectives in form. Adverbs can be used to modify verbs:

Nadja Wladimir zekrett löwt. 'Nadja secretly loves Vladimir' Dzapeih wzryzkar eszt on vaghabontz. 'The guy is surely a tramp.'

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Syldavian

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Syldavian claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In chemistry, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Syldavian before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Syldavian ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Syldavian

In research: Syldavian appears in chemistry research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Syldavian in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Syldavian is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Constructed languages, Constructed languages introduced in the 1930s, Culture in Brussels, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Syldavian outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

Ask Teacher Smith questions about this articleOpens your AI tutor with a question about “Syldavian” →

Affiliate

Preply — study more efficiently by working with a personal tutor. 50% off.

How to study Syldavian in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Syldavian means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Syldavian out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Syldavian in simple terms?

Why does Syldavian matter?

Because it connects several chemistry ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Syldavian?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Syldavian.