ANCIENT LANGUAGE

When O'Neill interfaced with the Ancient repositories on P3R-272 and P3X-439, he began to unwillingly speak the language of the Ancients. The Ancient language is related to post-Medieval Latin, and Daniel has since become an expert in the translation of the Ancient writings that SG-1 has encountered on many worlds.

The language is written left-to-right using symbols with a squared or block appearance, but SG-1 also discovered that the stargate glyphs themselves represent a kind of alphabet. Each symbol on the stargate has a corresponding sound so that a planet's address can be spoken aloud as a word. Thus, "Praclarush Taonas" is not only the name of a planet, it is also a gate address, with each of the six syllables corresponding to six individual glyphs: 35 (pra) - 3 (cla) - 31 (rush) - 29 (ta) - 5 (o) - 17 (nas). The point of origin symbol for Earth is pronounced "at."

See Also: Alien Dictionaries

Cross Reference: Ancients, Ancient Repository, Glastonbury, Praclarush Taonas

Episode Reference: The Fifth Race, Window of Opportunity, Lost City, Avalon, The Quest, Talion