My Classical Nahuatl Translation for the Aztecs + Sound Samples

Age of Empires II: DE II - Discussion
1

Ahoy,

Being that the Aztecs in-game don’t speak their proper language (or any Uto-Aztecan language), thought I’d do a translation to give their units a more fitting dialogue. This could also be used for a mod that adds the Toltecs, and the hope is that a translation will get added to the game sooner or later.

Nahuatl pronunciation is a little unintuitive if you don’t have some experience with it, so I’ve included some voice samples to give you all an idea how the words sound (not that my pronunciation is entirely perfect). I’m also looking for someone who can do some credible recordings of the female voices.

Villagers:

Villagers2
Villagers2760×493 373 KB

Select 1 Teotlaquiltitzino (Good afternoon)
Female Select Cualli Tonalli (Good day)
Male Select 2 Niltze (Greetings)
Select 3 Quenamicatzintli (How are you?)
Select 4 Tle quinequi moyollo? (What does your heart desire?)
Task 1 Niyaya - (I am going)
Task 2 Quema - (Yes)
Task 3 Nitequipanoz - (I will work)
Task 4 Nitequipoloa Motecuiyo - (I serve my lord)
Build - Nitepanchiuhqui (I am a bricklayer)
Female Chop Nitepozhuia (I am chopping)
Male Chop Nicuacuahui (I am a woodcutter)
Female Farm Nimilchiuhqui - (I am a farmer)
Male Farm Nitlalchihuaz - (I will work the land)
Male Fisherman Nimichitzquiā (I fish)
Female Fisherman Nimichoani (I am a fisher)
Female Forage Nipepena xocotl (I gather fruit)
Male Forage Nixocotequi (I pick fruit)
Female Hunt Niami (I go hunting)
Male Hunt Niami (I go hunting)
Female (gold) Mine Teocuitlatl Nioztotl - (I mine gold or silver)
Male (gold) Mine Teocuitlatl Nioztotl - (I mine gold or silver)
Female (stone) Nitetzontzonqui - (I am a stoneworker)
Male (stone) Nitetlapanqui - (I am a stone cutter)
Male Repair Nitoltecatl - (I am a great craftsman)
Female Repair Nicualchihchīhua - (I repair)
Female Attack Nicalacahuiz (I will attack!)
Male Attack Nixixiliz (I will stab them)

Military:

Epic Jag2
Epic Jag2498×566 45.2 KB

Select 1 Quēn nozo nel? (What is to be done?)
Select 2 Niyaotlalia - ( I am ready to attack)
Select 3 Niyaochichihua - (I am armed for war)
Move 1 #################### (We march swiftly)
Move 2 Tzicuictic Huitzitziqyotica (Agile as a hummingbird)
Move 3 Cuauhyotica, oceloyotica! (Like eagles, like jaguars!)
Attack 1 Ticalacahuizceh - (We will attack!)
Attack 2 Teoatl tlachinolli! (“Blood and fire!” - war cry)
Attack 3 Ezquizaceh! (They will bleed!)
Attack 4 Amo timahuiliāh Mictlantecuhtli! (We do not fear the lord of death!)

Monks:
Night temple

Select 1 Nitlahuenmana Teteoh - (I am making an offering to the gods)
Select 2 Teotlaquiltitzino - (Good afternoon)
Select 3 Nitemachia Quetzalcoatl - (I trust in, or wait for, Quetzalcoatl)
Select 4 Quema, Tecuhtzin - (Yes, lord?)
Move 1 Niyaya - (I’m going)
Move 2 Teoamoxtin nechomactia (The holy books guide me)
Move 3 Neltocazceh - (They shall believe)
Move 4 Niquintlamachtizceh macehualtin (I will teach the common people)

King:

King2
King2448×629 37.6 KB

Select 1 Quema? (Yes?)
Select 2 Nitlahtoani (I am the one who speaks/I am the ruler)
Select 3 Tlen tinequi? (What do you want?)
Select 4 Noyollo nequi huey tequitl (I desire much tribute)
Move 1 Tihualtecalaquizceh - (We will raze the earth by war!)
Move 2 Mahuiztlizceh notocatzin (They will fear my great name)
Move 3 Nimotlaloa (I am running)
Move 4 Tipanhuetzizceh! (We will ascend/We will achieve honor).
Move 5 Niyaya (I’m going)

18 Likes
4

I hope this makes it in, and I appreciate your work, but I’ll just point out that apparently Microsoft saw fit to censor one of the military unit quotes.

4 Likes
5

Yeah, the implementation of censorship on here has been quite silly for a while.

I’ve removed the links to an external site for audio hosting, and replaced them with Mp4s on the page. It will say “video cannot be rendered,” but there’s no video anyway, and you can still play the sounds.

6

By far the best post in a long time
Forget about balance or OP units, this has to be a must, it should be one of the priorities for the devs

5 Likes
7

Great work! The devs should definitely implement it!

4 Likes
8

Age of Empires 3 Aztecs speak correctly?

9

Nah, they copy-pasted the same nonsense translation used for AoE2. The wiki claims that AoE3 uses “an unknown variant of Nahuatl,” which is a nice way of saying that it bears no hint of resemblance to the actual language. I’m genuinely curious how they came up with the hodge-podge of dialogue that the Aztecs speak - some of the terms workers use are traceable to Mayan languages, but most of the military selection/command quotes seem to be pure balderdash.

Either way, a weird choice given how well attested Nahuatl is, and how many Nahuatl words have been incorporated into English/Spanish vocabulary.

4 Likes
10

Nahuatl is still a living language, and yet they managed to make something completely unrelated. I really wish they would fix it and some other languages (Goths, Italians, Byzantines).

I also wish they’d replace the Portuguese’s dialogue with something more appropriate for the time period, maybe Galician-Portuguese.

5 Likes
11

Hunnic dialogue (20 characters)

12

That would be unfortunately impossible since unlike the other languages mentioned here it is unattested, but maybe they could speak Chuvash (a language theorized to be the closest living relative to Hunnic) or Gothic (since they had Gothic subjects)

13

I might take a crack at Gothic in a month or so since I have experience with related languages, and that’s my other major regional interest outside of the Americas.

TBF I don’t think Gothic is a great choice for Huns given their wildly diverging origins, even if they came to share a few cultural similarities through contact. Chuvash sounds interesting though. As it is, I think having them share the same language as the Mongols is one of the better bad choices.

14

Man this sounds like actual Nahua instead of the gibberish we have in-game. I hope the devs decide to include it in the official version!

I also appreciate the multiple cultural references (sacred animals, gods’ names, social positions and such)!

8 Likes
15

Big agree

(20 characters)

16

You nailed the tone of a unit dialog. I hope this gets implemented somehow.

1 Like
17

BTW, there’s an Age of Mythology mod that also went out of its way to include actual accurate Nahuatl voice lines, if you contact them they’ll definitely receive your help with open arms since they desperately need to record voice lines for all their units.
It’s called Return of the Gods for the record.

4 Likes