Language: Imaskar

Imaskar
Region(s): Deep Imaskar, Raurin Desert Race(s): Human

The earliest of all known records from the steppes, and Var the Golden describe the great empire of Imaskar. Ruled by powerful godless human wizards, this empire was centred in what is now the Raurin Desert. Its borders were vast, reaching from The Endless Wastes to the Golden Water and from the Alamber Sea to the very frontiers of Kara-Tur.

Each tribe on the Raurin steppe now has its own language, but all these languages have a common root in ancient Imaskar, the empire that once extended its rule into the southern steppe. The Imaskari called their language Roushum, though it is commonly known simply as Imaskar - as in: Imaskar writings.

Few people in the world at large realize that the Raurin nomads still speak an approximation of the original language, for they are illiterate and cannot read Roushum in script. For this reason the nomads are considered to speak a dialect of Roushum, while the actual script is simply known as Imaskar writing, or Imaskari for short. The Roushum language itself is considered dead, though it secretly lives on in Deep Imaskar.

The written language of the Imaskari is a complex of swirling lines, right to left, bottom to top, intersected by dots. One should always be careful if one stumbles upon a piece of their ancient writings. Attempts to magically decipher the writings have often met with disastrous results. Given their twisted and malicious sense of humour any valuable or important piece of writing is quite probably filled with ways that would kill the reader if he decided to employ magic to comprehend its meaning.

It is for example a jest among wizards that the best way to get rid of a not-so-esteemed colleague is to send him an ancient Imaskari text promising unimaginable power.