What does Arcoscephale mean?

[zzcat]

Being a Chinese too, I don't think T'ien Ch'i is came from "Tianqi", Obviously the barbarian king is Mongol (the Yuan Dynasty), Why use an era even later than LA to name the nation?

Perhaps it means "Celestial dynasty", "Tian Chao" in pinyin language, or "Gift of Heaven"("Tian Ci" in pinyin)

[Zeldor]

Many names here are just to be nice and somewhat influenced by nation theme, not to really mean something.

P.S. Where are you exactly from? I am in Xi'An now.

[Twan]

No no, names give very precise information.

Arcocephale = their head is an arc... an allusion to the fact mind mages are the only good ranged unit of Arco

Man = a nation of simple men, standing no chance against magic and gods

etc...

[Sombre]

Ulm - the sound you make when you're randomly assigned them in a duel against Arcoscephale.

[Dedas]

Anyone here from Ulm?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulm

[capnq]

Maybe the capital of Arcoscephale is an arcology.

While we're on the subject, does anybody have an educated guess on how Arcoscephale is pronounced? When I look at it, I think "AR-co-seh-FAYL", but my limited knowledge of Greek makes me think it's more properly "ar-CO-seh-FA-lay".

[Agema]

Ancient Greek did not have a 'c', just kappa. Although kappa is often translated into English via the letter 'c', pronunciation should always be hard like a 'k'. In the case of Arcoscephale, all the vowels should be short (as in pAt, pOt, pEt). I think it should pronounce as 'Arkoskefaly'.

As for what it means...

"-cephale" would refer to head, as pointed out. "Arcos" would not mean arches or bridges as that's a Latin root. I think the nearest you could get to "Arcos" would probably be "arch-" rather than "arc-". The root is to be first or come before; an Archon was an ancient Greek ruler or magistrate for instance.

Hence Arcoscephale would mean literally 'head first'. You could interpret that several ways with artistic licence, but I like to do it as 'The mind is paramount'. I think it suits a nation who put great store in philosophy, science and other mental pursuits.

[Technowolf]

Twan said:
Man = a nation of simple men, standing no chance against magic and gods

I always thought it was named after the Isle of Man, a British Territory located between Ireland and Britain.

[Agema]

I think Twan might have been joking

[Professor_Dyar]

Man is a reference to the Isle of Man, which is an island in the straits between Wales and Ireland that has had an active parliament for over a thousand years. I think that the island has been likened to the fabled island of Avalon, which is why the Devs chose it.