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Pert Em Hru, Dammit!
Sep. 12th, 2015 01:08 amOkay, so in the episode right before Yuugi goes to duel Dark Malik, Ishizu convinces Seto to witness the duel (and help increase Yuugi’s chances of winning from 3% to 20%, according to his “master calculations” or some such) by saying the words pert kertu.
This is just ONE example of Yu-Gi-Oh! series creator Kazuki Takahashi trying to get something right and failing, just a little. There are three main Egyptian-related ones that bug me.
1) The thing Ishizu is referring to is a funerary prayer. She says as much. She recites it –a poem written from a friend to a deceased friend (the Pharaoh). She reveals it is the same person who was dueling the Pharaoh depicted on the tablet–[Priest] Seto! Of course, modern-day Seto won’t buy any of this occult nonsense, but he still ends up going to the Duel Tower and handing over his Devil’s Sanctuary card, NOW thinking that watching Yuugi try and make a miracle out of 20% will at least be “entertaining.”
The actual funerary prayer is called Pert em hru, a.k.a. “Going Forth By Day,” a.k.a. The Book of the Dead.
Of course, the text of the Book of the Dead is customizable, so I guess we’re supposed to assume that the poem that Priest Seto wrote for the Pharaoh was just one of the customized parts–the whole actual Book would NOT have fit on a single tablet (especially if that tablet was also somehow describing the duel itself, the people depicted in the duel, why they were dueling, what monsters/spells/traps they were dueling with, etc.)
Now, she also says it’s in Hieratic, which is basically Egyptian hieroglyphic cursive. WHERE? I can’t find examples of it being used on STONE (in real history), either. Do they just like saying HIERATIC TEXT a lot? (BTW, when they say “There’s Hieratic Text on the Ra God Card,” they are actually being accurate about that. So if you look at the Ra card and try and find similar writing on the Stone of Memories, you won’t find it. The Stone/Tablet only has hieroglyphs.)
And where are the “missing” chunks of the tablet that supposedly featured the Pharaoh’s name? Are we to believe they were never inscribed, because sealing the Pharaoh’s name also meant sealing away the darkness that he dueled to prevent from destroying the world? (After all, the Pert em hru is supposedly written by the SURVIVOR/WINNER of the duel, Seto.)
2) Ishizu. NO. In the Ancient Egyptian arc, Takahashi got it right by calling her “Eye-shi-zu” (Aishizu in Japanese romaji), which is basically the Japanese pronunciation of “Isis.” And there is NO GOOD REASON why the modern-day woman could not have been named Isis as well. There’s NO GOOD REASON why the dub had to perpetuate the mistake, either.
3) Speaking of mistakes that thankfully WERE NOT perpetuated by the dub (which felt the need to edit and change everything else), the Millennium Item that Isis/Ishizu/whoever owns is called a “Tauk” (Ta-u-ku) in the Japanese manga and anime.
There is no such thing as a tauk. The correct pronunciation of the type of necklace Isis wears (a torque) is Toruku. So the dub did better by not bothering with the correct name for the specific type of necklace, but just calling it the “Millennium Necklace.”
I guess that’s far simpler than why the “Ring” is actually a pendant, and the Puzzle is too, because it wasn’t always a Puzzle, and the Ankh is actually a Key, but still an ankh in shape… At least the Eye, Scale and Rod are self-explanatory.
This is just ONE example of Yu-Gi-Oh! series creator Kazuki Takahashi trying to get something right and failing, just a little. There are three main Egyptian-related ones that bug me.
1) The thing Ishizu is referring to is a funerary prayer. She says as much. She recites it –a poem written from a friend to a deceased friend (the Pharaoh). She reveals it is the same person who was dueling the Pharaoh depicted on the tablet–[Priest] Seto! Of course, modern-day Seto won’t buy any of this occult nonsense, but he still ends up going to the Duel Tower and handing over his Devil’s Sanctuary card, NOW thinking that watching Yuugi try and make a miracle out of 20% will at least be “entertaining.”
The actual funerary prayer is called Pert em hru, a.k.a. “Going Forth By Day,” a.k.a. The Book of the Dead.
Of course, the text of the Book of the Dead is customizable, so I guess we’re supposed to assume that the poem that Priest Seto wrote for the Pharaoh was just one of the customized parts–the whole actual Book would NOT have fit on a single tablet (especially if that tablet was also somehow describing the duel itself, the people depicted in the duel, why they were dueling, what monsters/spells/traps they were dueling with, etc.)
Now, she also says it’s in Hieratic, which is basically Egyptian hieroglyphic cursive. WHERE? I can’t find examples of it being used on STONE (in real history), either. Do they just like saying HIERATIC TEXT a lot? (BTW, when they say “There’s Hieratic Text on the Ra God Card,” they are actually being accurate about that. So if you look at the Ra card and try and find similar writing on the Stone of Memories, you won’t find it. The Stone/Tablet only has hieroglyphs.)
And where are the “missing” chunks of the tablet that supposedly featured the Pharaoh’s name? Are we to believe they were never inscribed, because sealing the Pharaoh’s name also meant sealing away the darkness that he dueled to prevent from destroying the world? (After all, the Pert em hru is supposedly written by the SURVIVOR/WINNER of the duel, Seto.)
2) Ishizu. NO. In the Ancient Egyptian arc, Takahashi got it right by calling her “Eye-shi-zu” (Aishizu in Japanese romaji), which is basically the Japanese pronunciation of “Isis.” And there is NO GOOD REASON why the modern-day woman could not have been named Isis as well. There’s NO GOOD REASON why the dub had to perpetuate the mistake, either.
3) Speaking of mistakes that thankfully WERE NOT perpetuated by the dub (which felt the need to edit and change everything else), the Millennium Item that Isis/Ishizu/whoever owns is called a “Tauk” (Ta-u-ku) in the Japanese manga and anime.
There is no such thing as a tauk. The correct pronunciation of the type of necklace Isis wears (a torque) is Toruku. So the dub did better by not bothering with the correct name for the specific type of necklace, but just calling it the “Millennium Necklace.”
I guess that’s far simpler than why the “Ring” is actually a pendant, and the Puzzle is too, because it wasn’t always a Puzzle, and the Ankh is actually a Key, but still an ankh in shape… At least the Eye, Scale and Rod are self-explanatory.
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