小编闲话
美国HBO奇幻大剧《权力的游戏》第七季已落下帷幕，收视创下新高。今天为大家奉上的词汇表汇集了维斯特洛大陆的自然世界中各种亦真亦幻的动植物。所有词汇均取自原著小说《冰与火之歌》系列。让我们一边回味一边学习，一边学习一边期待吧！
World-building in
Game of Thrones:
a glossary of the natural world
B
Basilisk: a legendary creature in our world; really exists in Westeros, where it is a reptile with venom that can drive warm-blooded animals to madness. Traditionally, a basilisk results from a serpent brooding on a hen’s egg.
巴吉里斯克毒蜥。我们世界中一种传说的生物；在维斯特洛，这是一种真实存在的爬行动物。它的毒液可以让温血动物发疯。传统上讲，巴吉里斯克是巨蛇在鸡蛋上孵化而出的。
Bloodfly: an insect that combines the worst attributes of the stinging horsefly and the blowfly: “large as bees, gross, purplish, glistening… [they live] in stagnant pools, [drink] blood from man and horse alike, and [lay] their eggs in the dead and dying.”
血蝇。一种昆虫，结合了叮人的马蝇（horsefly）和绿头苍蝇（blowfly）最坏的特性。“大小如蜜蜂，被毛，略带紫色，体表反光……[它们生活在]死水塘里，[饮]人类和马类的血，在腐尸和将死动物体内产卵。”
Broadleaf: in Westeros, a type of deciduous tree that turns red and gold in the autumn. The term can refer to one of a few species of tree in our world.
阔叶树。维斯特洛的一种落叶树，秋季树叶会变成红色和金色。这个词汇也可以指我们世界的一些阔叶树种。
C
Courser: as in Oxford Dictionaries, “a large, powerful horse ridden in battle or tournament.” Like many English words referring to genteel life, courser comes from French (coursier), a consequence of the Norman Invasion. First use in English c1300.
在牛津词典中，该词定义为“用于作战或比赛骑行的大型而有力的马匹”。像很多指代上流社会生活的英语词汇一样，courser源自法语（coursier），随诺曼征服而来。英语中首次使用在约14世纪。
D
Destrier: a war horse; the name comes from the practice of having one’s squire lead the horse, for which he naturally uses his right hand. From French (see courser): Middle English destrer, Anglo-Norman destrer, Old French destrier. First use in English c1300.
一种战马。由于过去都由骑士的扈从引领马匹，自然而然，扈从会用右手牵马，由此形成该词。源自法语（参见courser）：从中世纪英语destrer，经由盎格鲁-诺曼语destrer，到古法语destrier。英语中首次使用在约14世纪。
Direwolf: an enormous species of wolf that lives north of the Wall. In our world, dire wolves lived some 11,000 years ago in the Americas; they were about the same size as the largest wolves today.
冰原狼。一种大型狼种，生活在北境长城以北。在我们的世界，冰原狼生活在约1.1万年前的美洲地区，体型大小与现在最大的狼近似。
Dray: a dray is a sledge or cart that has no wheels; it derives from Late Middle English dray, “sledge,” and ultimately Old English dragan, “to pull.” In Westeros, a dray is a cart-horse.
一种没有轮子的雪橇或马车。该词源自中世纪后期的英语dray，即“雪橇”，而最初源自古英语dragan，意为“拉”。在维斯特洛，该词指拉车的马。
F
Firewyrm: a dragonlike creature in Westeros that spits flame and tunnels through the earth. May be purely mythological.
火焰之龙。维斯特洛的一种龙形生物，可在地下穿行，能喷射火焰。这可能纯粹是神话动物。
G
Garron: a small horse of indifferent quality. From Gaelic gearran, Irish gearrán. First use 1540.
矮马。一种中等品质的小型马匹。该词出自盖尔语gearran和爱尔兰语gearrán。英语中首次使用是在1540年。
Giants: an enormous breed of human-like creatures, standing between ten and fourteen feet. They speak the Old Tongue and reason like men. Thormond Giantsbane, a wildling chieftain, who has boasted of exercising his sexual prowess with various dangerous creatures, claims that he once mated with a giantess, who bore issue. If he is telling the truth, then giants are not a different species from humans—or, at least, the two species are close enough to interbreed, much as (millennia ago) Neanderthals and Homo Sapiens are known to have interbred.
【Fun fact: George R. R. Martin named one of the giants Wun Wun after the New York Giants player Phil Simms—jersey number 11 (one one).】
巨人。一种巨大的类人生物，站立高10—14英尺（3—4米），讲古语，可像人类一样思考。巨人克星托蒙德（Thormond Giantsbane）是野人族长，自吹与多种危险生物发生性行为，声称曾与女巨人交配，并使其受孕。如果他说的是事实，那巨人就是和人类一样的生物——或至少近似，以至可以异种交配。就像十数万年前，尼安德特人与智人进行过杂交。
【有趣的事实：马丁在书中将一位巨人命名为Wun Wun，这实际上取自美国橄榄球纽约巨人队球员Phil Simms的11号球衣，即11（one one）。】
Griffin: in our world, a griffin is a mythological animal that has the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. In Westeros, griffins may or may not be purely mythological. They appear in statues and heraldry.
格里芬。在我们的世界，它是狮身鹰首鹰翼的一种神兽；在维斯特洛，它或许并非纯粹的神话动物。它们出现在各类雕像和纹章上。
Grumkin: a Westerosi name for a supposedly imaginary monster that lives in the north. Grumkins seem to be small and human-shaped—at least, Tyrion Lannister reflects that he looks a little like one—and they can “magic up” swords. Grumkin might be a transformation of our word gremlin, which refers to a “mischievous sprite.” The United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force first used the word gremlin as slang for dogsbody in the early 20th century; before long, pilots were fancifully blaming eldritch gremlins for mechanical problems.
一种生活在北境的虚构怪物的维斯特洛名称。它们看起来略小，至少是人形，可“魔法变身”刀剑。提利昂·兰尼斯特曾说他自己看起来就像一个grumkin。该词可能是我们世界中的单词gremlin（小精灵）的变形，指一种”淘气的精灵“。20世纪初，英国皇家空军首次将gremlin（小鬼）用作俚语，指代勤杂工；不久，飞行员们别出心裁地将机械问题归咎于邪术小鬼。
Gyrfalcon: in our world, the gyrfalcon is a predatory bird that lives in northern and arctic regions. In Martin’s fiction, nobles sometimes use them as trained hunting birds.
矛隼。在我们的世界，这是生活在北极和近北极地区的一种捕食鸟类。在马丁的小说中，贵族有时将它们训练为猎禽。
（整理自公众号“牛津辞典”）
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