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In light of the newest film interpretation of the first book, I have begun rereading the Dune Trilogy - Dune, Dune Messiah, Children of Dune.

I completed Dune a few days ago, and it was the first time I have reread the book in at least two decades. Much has changed of me in that time, specifically a better understanding of... or more honestly, being better able to RECOGNIZE words of a foreign origin (I make no claims to being multi-lingual).

So, CHOAM: the great industrial power lurking somewhere in the background of Herbert's story. Full name "Combine Honnete Ober Advancer Mercantiles". For the longest time I thought "Honnete" was a simply a name, and misread "Ober" as "uber" (from German,). I thought it was simply a mish-mash of foreign and created words for a unique, fictional company name.

I now see it as a thoroughly French name - missing the important accents that I don't know how to create here. I translate it word for word, without any reordering for better flow in English, as "a group of people or companies acting together for a commercial purpose" "honest" "obey" "to advance" "commerce"; with reordering and reinterpretation as (maybe?) "honest commercial-group obedient to the advancement of commerce".

So I humbly ask: "Toute aide de ceux qui parlent français?" And, could you please explain it in English?

[many thanks to on-line translation solutions for making this post possible]

Its kinda like 40k pseudolatin. Its not really French but very heavily pulled from French inspiration (less so modern French and more Middle/Early French and late Latin), except Ober which is Old German (your instincts of it being uber from German were accurate, just not modern German). The best translation of it would be something to the effect of "Honorable Company of Advanced Trade"

The acronym is largely unimportant. CHOAM's place in the setting is to be the organization that plans and runs the interplanetary economy of the Imperium. If it gets traded between worlds, CHOAM tells you how, where and for how much.

chaos0xomega wrote:
Its kinda like 40k pseudolatin. Its not really French but very heavily pulled from French inspiration (less so modern French and more Middle/Early French and late Latin), except Ober which is Old German (your instincts of it being uber from German were accurate, just not modern German). The best translation of it would be something to the effect of "Honorable Company of Advanced Trade"

Seems close. I don’t know much about the Early French language, but a translation from Modern French without modification would very likely lead to broken English.

I get a kick out of how “avancer” seems to be included. “L’avancement mercantile” would indicate something close to, “the advancement of mercantilism,” though the way it is written almost seems like it’s giving an order for merchants to move forward.

"Honorable Company for the Advancement of Mercantilism" or "Honorable Company for the Advancement of Trade" would probably also be a valid interpretation/translation of the name as well.