History and Pronunciation of the word "Geass"

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

Since inulovinkit brought up how people pronounce Lelouch's name, I thought it might interesting to post some information on the word "geass."

I've always thought the word "ギアス” referred to the English word "geis" (Also gaysh, geas. Pl. geasa, geise, according to the Oxford English Dictionary), which means "a solemn injunction, prohibition, or taboo; a moral obligation." This seems VERY appropriate, considering that Lelouch receives his "geass" as part of a bargain in which he is morally obligated to grant C.C.'s wish. He also seems to have a solemn injunction to use his geass to preserve his own life until he is able to grant that wish. Or something like that.


I've always pronounced the word as "guyss", but the Oxford English dictionary gives three pronunciations for it, all of which are correct:
/gesh/ (like guest, but with a sh at the end)
/geish/ (guys, but with a sh at the end instead of an s)
/geesh/ (like geese, but with a sh at the end)

I think we can safely justify the sh sound at the end going to an /ss/ sound as normal language change, so "ギアス" can be correctly pronounced as /guess/, /guyss/, or /geese/.

Here's the OED's history of the word, for any other word nerds lurking out there. The history of the word kind of gives some interesting insight into the possible future ramifications of Lelouch's geass.

"1880 S. FERGUSON Poems 63 This journey at this season was ill-timed, As made in violation of the gaysh. 1899 D. HYDE Lit. Hist. Irel. 344 He thought he saw Gradh son of Lir upon the plain, and it was a geis (tabu) to him to see that. Ibid. 373 Every man who entered the Fenian ranks had four geasa (gassa, i.e., tabus) laid upon him. 1928 Observer 22 Jan. 5/4 Apparently a man could be either: (1) Born under a ‘geis’ prohibiting certain actions on his part, or (2) Laid under ‘geis’ either at birth or any time during his life, either by divine or human agency. 1965 New Statesman 23 July 129/2 In a sense which most Irish people will know, this put Fallon under a geas, a moral compulsion, to say his bit."

Geasa in the past have been considered as a kind of curse, and in mythology have been known to actually lead to the person's death because the person under the geas was forbidden to do what he or she needed to do to save his or her own life.



So how about it? Is Lelouch's geass is a curse? Will it become a curse like Mao's geass (or will an eyepatch be enough)? And will Lelouch's geass ultimately cause his death because he must make a horrible choice between fulfilling C.C.'s wish and preserving his own life (which would be an EPIC ending)?

Comments

[rkold.livejournal.com]

I want to stress now, I've not read any spoilers for Season 2 other than seeing the new character designs so I'm just going with my feelings. ^^;

Speaking as a Clamp fangirl I've long suspected that C.C.'s true wish involves helping her to actually die. Call me crazy but she screams "Clow Reed" to me.

I'd also argue Lelouch has already been somewhat cursed after what happened with Euphie. One could even argue that C.C.'s preternaturally long life is a curse of sorts.

As for Lelouch's death.. I've always sort of thought he was going to die at the end of Geass, I can't really see him settling down to just live "happily ever after" not after all the choices he has had to make.

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

Yeah. There's no way he can live "happily ever after" after this. Maybe C.C. and Lelouch will both die at the end.

[inulovinkit.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think Geass is sort of a curse in a way, but C.C. warned him in the first episode, saying something like "this power will make you lonely". Besides, with the power, he's already ended up doing some pretty bad stuff for the sake of his goal.

I think it might end up with his Geass eye gouged out (come on, CLAMP designed it. Someone in here is gonna lose an eye.) but I don't think he'll die. I mean, he might just end up alive and miserable OMG NOW HE'S A SUBARU CLONE. I mean, the series isn't as heavy as opposed to, X. And amidst all the carnage and death, we have some lighthearted episodes about dressing up as cats. I think to kill him off in the end would be too heavy.

I think C.C. is gonna die, though. So, perhaps, it'll end up that Ruru's Geass will end up being the cause of everyone around him's death, but he'll topple the Britannia empire and have done what he wanted to do. But--everyone including Nunally will be dead.

While that's almost worse than his death, for a series like this (that gives me heavy DN vibes) I think it would be an appropriate use of irony. Lelouch did what he wanted to do, but everyone he did it for died.

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

That would be an awesome ending! I don't see it happening (unfortunately) but if Lelouch were to win and not have anyone to share that win with . . . that would be so wonderfully ironic.

Heh. The geass really is like the Death Note--it's both power and a curse, and how the person who uses it is probably just as psycho as Light.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

If Lulu and C.C. die...

I'll go into sad panda mode for the rest of my life.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

Then again

Euphie...
*sigh*
-sad panda mode-

[penombrelilas.livejournal.com]

Every gift is a curse at the same time. Now that his Geass cannot be deactivated anymore, he has to be careful around people he can still affect (as seen in the episode with Euphie).

Like rkold, I've seen Lelouch ultimately die since the beginning. He wants revenge, so he'll have to pay the price. He might live for Nunally's sake, but if she dies he won't have anything to fight for...

POSSIBLE SPOILER

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

Well, if Nunnaly dies, I imagine that Lelouch will continue to fight for revenge. (Kinda like what Suzaku's fighting for now that he's lost Euphie?)

A friend of mine has argued that since the series focuses on Lelouch vs Suzaku (change from the outside vs. change from inside, Japanese vs. Brittanian [in reverse!]) and since Suzaku has already lost Euphie, Lelouch will have to lose Nunnally to keep the two characters equal. That's why the character I'm most worried about for R2 is Nunnally. She hasn't been in any of the magazines . . .

Re: POSSIBLE SPOILER

[rainbow-cnxn.livejournal.com]

I don't really think (or really want) that they'll kill off Nunnally. If they do, the duality of Lelouch vs. Suzaku becomes overbearing, and all we're left with are two very angry teenagers going down the path of mutual assured destruction. And quite personally, I don't trust Sunrise enough to be able to pull off a convincing cycle of hatred between the two before devolving into some sort of "OMG THE ANTAGONIST/PROTAGONIST IS CRAZY/NIHILISTIC" trope. *cough* Granted, I only just recently read the excellent, excellent, excellent fic The Fool Ascendant (http://community.livejournal.com/caveat__lector/36047.html), which has this exactly this type of BAD END. I guess I don't trust Sunrise to be as competent as hopechan.

In short, I think that, ultimately, CG will have some sort of GOOD END, Nunnally will survive, and Lelouch and Suzaku will have to break off the cycle of hatred sometime (*insert Cagalli's lecture*) so that they don't wind up absolutely destroying Britannia and Japan for what is a very personal war for both of them. This is why you don't give large-scale weapons or political/military control to highly competent teenagers.

Re: POSSIBLE SPOILER

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

In short, I think that, ultimately, CG will have some sort of GOOD END, Nunnally will survive, and Lelouch and Suzaku will have to break off the cycle of hatred sometime (*insert Cagalli's lecture*) so that they don't wind up absolutely destroying Britannia and Japan for what is a very personal war for both of them. Very good point. I can see Suzaku and Lelouch uniting at the very end to destroy the Emperor, both of them with the help of C.C. and V.V. or something like that, but it'll take something very drastic to really cause them to unite after all the death and destruction that's gone on.

Before then, I think Suzaku is in for a bit of a fall from his usual "it's wrong to kill" morals once he's a Knight of the Round (which will move Suzaku more in Lelouch's direction). But I also see Lelouch calming down and fully realizing the pain and death he's caused and the value of individual lives (moving him in Suzaku's direction). I guess we'll have to see.

Thanks for the link to the The Fool Ascendant. I'll have to read that!

BTW, your icon makes me giggle. ^_^

Re: POSSIBLE SPOILER

[rainbow-cnxn.livejournal.com]

Lol, thanks! Giggles = good, right? :P

Yeah, I think that both boys will eventually calm down from their gung-ho, must-fulfill-personal-goals-at-whatever-cost attitudes. And I don't mind some sort of GOOD END at all, so long as it's not a HAPPILY EVER AFTER END, y'know?

And I hope that you get around to reading The Fool Ascendant eventually. It's a very...powerful fic that will likely make you depressed for the rest of the day. But it's oh-so-good.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

I think Lelouch has already paid the price. Considering that he's apparently met C.C. in his childhood, before all these events, makes it seem more ironic than coincidental that he's constantly being put up to the plate. Almost as though it's a rite toward becoming king.

It doesn't make sense to me if he dies though, because then I'll have to tell everyone, "Yeah, it's like Death Note."
And that's the last thing I'll ever want to tell anybody.

[tenshi789.livejournal.com]

He's also fighting to find his mother's killer- or something vague like that.

If Nunnally dies, he'll fight for both.

Maybe

xD

Hopefully she won't die. Because I love Nunnally <3

omg suicide icon xD

[corsette.livejournal.com]

Well. I personally view the Geass as a bad omen, not as much as a curse since even a curse can be turned around -- but yes, more of an omen. As previously mentioned, it's very possible to stop the Geass'd eye all together. Either by removing it, or (perhaps) fulfilling C.C.'s wish.

Actually, I think the bulk of the series' plot relies on C.C.'s wish -- because of this "wish", Lelouch was given the power of Geass which gives us our plot. Lulu's the main character, sure, but C.C. is the platform he stands on. (Ouch, good thing he's a noodle.) Taniguchi's said that if you figure out C.C's name, you can figure everything that's going to happen in the series and why. Let me state that I don't think C.C.'s got a famous name, though I do think the foreshadowing would rely on the kanji/katakana of her name. But maybe I'm just a non-conformist. ...Though I wouldn't be surprised if she was Joan of Ark or something. :/

I'll also admit that I, too, thought Lelouch was a dead man walking by the end of the first episode. To echo penombrelilas: he wants revenge, so he'll have to pay the price. As much I love him, I can't see him walking around after all he's done. But it's SUNRISE, so he'll have a spin-off series where he wakes up ovar 9,000 years in the future and has to fight in a Mecha. With Meer. /hit Ahem. As for C.C. ... I think a vast majority of us would agree that we can see her wish being to end her life.

Speaking of that, 'Geass' could also refer to C.C.'s unnaturally long life; surely living that long would make anyone view it as a curse. The taboo bit makes me think either Lulu or C.C. is gay, though. Ahaha why.

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

Heh. It's all fun and games until CLAMP removes an eye. :P

I hadn't heard about C.C.'s name being the key to figuring out what's going to happen. That makes me wonder where the Geass AU started. If we can figure out what war diverged Brittania from the establishment/success of the US, then maybe we *can* figure out her name. I was showing the series to a friend trying to get her up to date for R2, and we went back and watched the episode where Lelouch hears her name. When he says it to her, it seemed like it was five syllables/mora and the second one had the /i/ vowel sound. Hmmm.

*goes off to think about it*

[inulovinkit.livejournal.com]

By the way, are we even sure that "Britannia" even spawned from the US at all? I think that perhaps the AU started if America lost the Revolutionary War, because when I think 'Britannia' I think 'Great Britain'.

I would make sense, anyway, if that has something to do with it. There ARE a few parallels you can make with the US Revolutionary War and the "Rebellion" in Code Geass--not a lot, but some. But suppose this was true, then the US would be "part" of the Britannia Empire, and not the actual country it spawned from.

...Just the name "Britannia" makes me wonder if it's hinting at that.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

Britannia is Great Britain, also to note that it's also the name of a Celtic goddess of the region.

[fox-holland.livejournal.com]

Someone online said it was ...

CaaCi CaCaCii

C = consonant
So I wrote it down into my "whatever interesting stuff" notebook and noted that I was skeptic of this person's vowel choice.

Lelouch does this weird "F" movement with his mouth.
I'm not sure if it's romanized or it's correct authentic punctuation.
Then again, I'm not sure Sunrise was meant to be realistic with jaw movement.

I tried looking at Gaelic, Brythonic, and Arthurian legends and couldn't find a match.

[nokiirat.livejournal.com]

please read community guidelines.
please put most of that under a lj-cut.
also, tagged for you..please use tags in the future.

[yedijoda.livejournal.com]

I apologize about the tags--I promise I'd put the tags on when I originally posted and I'm not sure why they didn't actually post! Thank you for putting it on.

As for the community guidelines, I've read it and I thought I was following them. I haven't seen anything there I'm in violation of, unless you consider the post too long? I didn't consider the post as "lengthy/rambling text," but I'll go ahead and put it under an lj-cut. For future reference, could you specify exactly how long a text post needs to be before it has to be under an lj-cut?

Thank you.

[antieden.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, oh wow, I've always just said "Geeas". Though I've read that "geass" means compulsion? In a completely unrelated text.