Folken's title in Japanese is gunshi, 軍師, a word/role translating to strategist or tactician, particularly of warfare. In subs/dubs, his title strategos is Greek, "army leader/general," which, through Latinised strategus arrives at the English strategist, French stratègiste, Italian stratego, Spanish/Portuguese estratego. I figure it's the English translation's way of burying the lede on the whole Atlantis thing.
And, given how Escaflowne views Europe, potentially signal the western world's obsession with the neoclassical... since that's Dornkirk's whole deal. His view of the future comes through a romanticised, mythologised ideal past, much like any fascist. The real enlightenment of the series comes through accepting the reality and responsibilities of the present, on which a future may be built, honestly, openly, communally.
Aaaanyway. I stumbled upon the given name Bólkōn in a Greek-Spanish dictionary;
Βόλκων, -ωνος, ὁ
Bolcón estratego siracusano en 452 a.C
For my own writing (and fun) one of the things I pay attention to is the transformation of sounds/letters over time or between regions, and the way sounds are transcribed/transliterated into languages that don't share them. Using J/Y when translating Й, for example.
G/Q/K is a big one when trying to translate Arabic into English. K is often approximated for the hard g, and the Arabic q sound, low in the throat, doesn't appear in English, so either of the other two letters may tag in.
When it comes to V/B/P/PH/F, very few languages have historically employed all of them because they're incredibly similar to one another. V pronounced as B in Spanish attests to this— in Medieval Spanish there was no conventional orthography and they'd switch places randomly. There was also no V or K or Q in Irish prior to colonisation— our V equivalent is mh/bh, V is present only in loanwords. Irish C is always hard (but has broad or slender pronunciation) negating the need for K.
A name like "Van" or "Folken" is using sounds without 1:1 parallels, so you may see it written as "Ban" or "Paan" or even as different as "Volkern." In these cases, there's usually an agreed-upon romanisation to maintain continuity, but when it comes to languages that use completely different alphabets for sounds not present or accounted for in English, it's rounding up to what's closest. Not "incorrect" so much as "not consensus."
[φ] represented a separate sound from f, and [β] a sound separate from v, but this is what they've come to represent in modern Greek. one semi-relevant example (to me) is φανάριον, fanarion, and φαναρίου, fanariu, which means light/torch/lantern and is a diminutive of the word phanos, meaning bright/shining/resplendent.
That type of research is exactly the sort which lead me to this
Mercury
Hey, remember how Zaibach is likely named for the Arabic for Mercury, al-ziybach? Remember how their mechs are full of liquid silver?
sources: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4
Mercury the element is named after Mercury the planet, which is in turn named after the Roman god of financial gain, commerce, eloquence, messages, communication including divination, travelers, boundaries, luck, trickery, and thieves; he also serves as the guide of souls to the underworld, a mediator between the realm of the dead and kingdom of the living. Let's see how he interacts with other gods...
Finally Mercury was sent to Vulcan, primed with a most diplomatic request to honor high Olympus with his presence; but all Mercury’s eloquence and persuasions failed to induce the god of the forge to leave his sooty abode, and the messenger god was forced to return alone and report the failure of his attempt.
Vulcan, son of Jupiter and Juno, god of fire and the forge, seldom joined the general council of the gods. He had once been tenderly attached to his mother, lavished upon her every proof of his affection, and had even tried to console her when she mourned Jupiter’s neglect. On one occasion, intending to punish Juno, Jupiter hung her out of heaven, bound by a golden chain; and Vulcan, seeing her plight, tugged at the chain, drew her up, and was about to set her free, when Jupiter returned, and, in anger at his son’s interference, kicked him out of heaven.
Although Vulcan had risked so much and suffered so greatly in taking his mother’s part, she never even made the slightest attempt to ascertain whether he had reached the earth in safety. Hurt by her indifference and ingratitude, Vulcan vowed never again to return to Olympus, and withdrew to the solitudes of Mount Ætna.
Vulcan is primarily associated with fire, metallurgy, and craftsmanship. He was believed to have created the strongest and most sophisticated items of ancient lore, including Jupiter’s lightning bolts and Mercury’s winged helm. Additionally, he is linked to volcanoes, emphasizing his connection to both destructive and creative aspects of fire.
Roman tradition maintained that vulcan is connected to lightning (fulgur, fulgere, fulmen), which in turn was thought of as related to flames. Others interpret it as meaning lustre.
Damn, that's rough. But what the hell am I doing— that's not especially related, is it? So let's move on.
You know, there's something really interesting about the planet Mercury. This might be a little convoluted, but bear with me...
Newton's Law gave the wrong prediction for the precession of the perihelion of Mercury's orbit. Mercury's orbit is elliptical, as predicted by the Newtonian theory of gravity, but the ellipse doesn't stay in precisely the same place all the time. Its perihelion (the point in orbit at which a body is closest to the sun) should, according to Newtonian laws of gravitation, advance by 531 arcseconds per century. In the nineteenth century, however, it was observed that the actual advance is 574.
This is because Mercury, being the closest planet, has its orbit most affected by the warping of spacetime near the Sun.
Hey, that's pretty crazy!
Does anyone remember which tarot card Folken represented in the deck which was released with the film?
Gimme one second, I'll go check...
#01 — The Magician. Is that the card that represents new beginnings, psychic powers, and the manifestation of human will? Yes it is! What else is it associated with?
The Magician card is numbered One – the number of new beginnings and opportunities – and associates with the planet of Mercury, symbolizing intelligence, communication, and skillful use of resources.
Well, look. Tarot doesn't really mean anything to me personally. I do like astronomy though! Remember from earlier about how Mercury acts weird?
Vulcan (/ˈvʌlkən/) was a proposed planet that some pre-20th century astronomers thought existed in an orbit between Mercury and the Sun, responsible for the then-unexplainable shifts in Mercury's orbit.
