Every community has its lingo, and Holy Worlds is no exception. Since we're fantasy writers (who have a tendency to create made-up words that are more difficult to pronounce than necessary), we practically need a dictionary to keep track of our catchphrases. So, let's compile one.

This is an informal thread to collect words and definitions that are either unique to Holy Worlds, or unique to spec fic writers in general. Feel free to suggest a better definition for any word posted here (particularly mine, since my definitions will probably be insufficient). Perhaps once we get enough of these we will make an official dictionary thread or something else fun and silly.

Here's what I remember off the top of my head. If anyone wants to write good definitions for these, or find links to cite them, that'd be great. I just wanted to write them down before I forgot...

*Cobha
*Fractalling
*Essence Mapping

Awesome, thanks for creating this thread!

Cobha (Co - va)
Anything normal in your world, that would be supernatural, unseen, or impossible in our world.
Source:
Cobha

Essence Mapping
The act of describing the essence (qualities that make up an object) in such a way that readers may view the same object, in the same or as close to same way as the author.
Sources:
Basic Essence Definition
The Essence of Essence

Fractalling
Disclaimer: I have not seen any HW official definition as to the definition of "fractalling" while I shall be doing some digging, here's my best guess.

Fractalling is based on the word "fractal" and has to do with the art of creating fractals. Fractals are a never ending pattern that are pretty complex. A "Fractalling System" would be a complex, precise pattern typically related to world building.

Okie dokie, throw some more words at me!

(First thought: Shouldn't this go in "A Writer's Life"? Or whatever "Holy Worlds Projects" got turned into? )


I think that's off on the wrong track. In "nature" (or, rather, mathematics) fractals are self-similar, produced by repeatedly applying the same pattern to the results of the previous iteration. I've only seen the term used as a verb here, but a good example of the same idea is "the snowflake method. The point of "fractalling" is that you start with something very general and repeatedly increase the level of detail.

(I started to make a post trying to explain that last night, but ran into a mental roadblock as to how to put it into a "definition" and gave up.)

Maybe I failed to articulate it well, but your definition above is in agreement with what I was attempting to say.

My point is that in "fractalling," complexity and precision depend on how far you take the process, instead of being inseparable from it. It's still fractalling if you stop after the second stage, leaving your culture or character or whatever in a state that really isn't complex yet. And a development method that produced consistently complex results but started at that final level of detail wouldn't be fractalling.

I knew someone would take care of the hard work of writing definitions for me. Thank you!

I'm leaving this in General Discussion for now, since not all of HW lingo is necessarily writer-specific. Once this is more structured I'll republish it elsewhere. It's just an info dump for now.

Fair enough.

Something that would be worth noting, here or elsewhere, is past names for the various "rooms" of the Holy Worlds forum(s). (As of each of the, what, four or so? reorganizations there have been ...) Someone browsing the archives might run across a mention of, for example, "the Citadel" and have no idea what that means. (I could use a refresher ... )

Good, then I can ask someone to write a definition for "splatitis" then.

What is a "glomp"? For some reason it always gave me the impression of someone being attacked... Or swallowed. Probably because of the word "gulped" Is it an over-zealous hug that leaves the recipient in temporary shock?

(I've only personally ever met this as a verb, not a noun, but when I went looking for the precise definition I found it listed as both. And I don't think I've ever used the word myself.) According to Wiktionary, it is "slang, chiefly fandom slang," and means

Thanks kingjon!