Operencia - Weird word! Where does it come from?
Operencia is kind of a weird word, isn't it? Why would we possibly call a game that?! Buckle up, it’s going to be history and linguistics today!
If you watched our Dev Diary video last week, you might recall our writer Chris touching on the origins of the Operencia name -- that he kept seeing the word pop up as he researched Central European folktales.
It does roughly translate to ‘far, far away,’ but there's far more to it than that -- and it's very interesting if you ask me.
The land of Operencia is a mythical faraway land referenced in countless tales, usually as ‘even farther than the Operencia Sea’ or ‘this character came from a land even farther than Operencia’. Even for Hungarian, which has its share of weird-sounding words (I should know -- I live here), this is very unique and sounds foreign.
Image source: https://kertaizalan.artstation.com/
There are multiple competing versions for where the word actually comes from, but probably the most agreed-upon variety is that of soldiers of Hussar regiments in the 18th and 19th century.
You see, Hungary was under Habsburg rule, and their solution to prevent rebellions was transferring army units from their country of origin to faraway stations. This happened to many Hungarian soldiers who were stationed in Upper Austria, behind the river Enns. Keep that river name in mind - it’s important.
I made this in paint
Over the Enns translates to Ober Enns in German. Hungarian has a habit of roughing up foreign words -- so ‘Oper Enc’ became ‘Operencia’, as adding ‘ia’ to a word usually means it’s a country or a land of sorts.
These lands seemed so far for the returning soldiers that they always referred to it as very far away, ‘even further than…’. This trickled into the common tongue of Hungary and eventually landed in folktales and legends.
Hope you enjoyed this -- we’re here every week.
Erőt, egészséget!
Strength and Health!
If you watched our Dev Diary video last week, you might recall our writer Chris touching on the origins of the Operencia name -- that he kept seeing the word pop up as he researched Central European folktales.
It does roughly translate to ‘far, far away,’ but there's far more to it than that -- and it's very interesting if you ask me.
The land of Operencia is a mythical faraway land referenced in countless tales, usually as ‘even farther than the Operencia Sea’ or ‘this character came from a land even farther than Operencia’. Even for Hungarian, which has its share of weird-sounding words (I should know -- I live here), this is very unique and sounds foreign.
Image source: https://kertaizalan.artstation.com/There are multiple competing versions for where the word actually comes from, but probably the most agreed-upon variety is that of soldiers of Hussar regiments in the 18th and 19th century.
You see, Hungary was under Habsburg rule, and their solution to prevent rebellions was transferring army units from their country of origin to faraway stations. This happened to many Hungarian soldiers who were stationed in Upper Austria, behind the river Enns. Keep that river name in mind - it’s important.
I made this in paintOver the Enns translates to Ober Enns in German. Hungarian has a habit of roughing up foreign words -- so ‘Oper Enc’ became ‘Operencia’, as adding ‘ia’ to a word usually means it’s a country or a land of sorts.
These lands seemed so far for the returning soldiers that they always referred to it as very far away, ‘even further than…’. This trickled into the common tongue of Hungary and eventually landed in folktales and legends.
Hope you enjoyed this -- we’re here every week.
Erőt, egészséget!
Strength and Health!