Dougram nomenclature

I have chosen to translate “太陽の牙” (taiyō no kiba) as the “Fang of the Sun” because it is short, it is within the range of literal readings and it seems generally accepted in English-language fandom. Since Deloyer has two suns, and the group has several members, the intended meaning is probably “the suns as jaws”, opening and closing a metaphorical maw in the sky as they go in and out of alignment with Deloyer, but this is never clarified. Both translations look equally bad to me.

In Japanese, the humanoid vehicles on the show are called “combat armour”, for no apparent reason. I’ve chosen not to use that term because the word “armour” would naturally include tanks—which also appear in combat on the show but are not ”combat armour”—and is not countable in English grammar, requiring some ill-fitting secondary noun like “suit”.

As usual with this type of production, Dougram also has a lot of non-Japanese names presented in Japanese. In fact, the only native Japanese word used for a name is Nanashi (“nameless”). Even that is only spelled phonetically. There are no traditional Japanese names and no explanations.

Some of the proper nouns are fanciful. Any alphabetic spelling of them, even on screen, should be regarded with suspicion. At worst, they are made up for a monolingual Japanese audience by a monolingual Japanese editor or background artist with minimal insight and concern, so I haven’t looked for official Japanese publications that may suggest an official spelling. My choices are summarized here, followed by any credible alternatives that occurred to me or that I’ve seen floating around in fandom. As you can see, I’m not following any particular scheme, nor is this list complete. I have excluded a lot of minor characters, place names and mecha. I’m open to criticism.

• ダグラム: Dougram, by convention. Could be Daglam, Dugrum etc.
• カシム: Cashim. Could be anything up to Kasimu.
• クリン: Crin.
• ドナン: Donan.
• フィナ: Fina. Could be Feena etc.
• ラビン: Rahvin. The plain transliteration, Rabin, is too close to “rabbi” and “rabid”.
• サラ: Sarah.
• ロイル: Royle.
• レーク: Reik. This could be either of the common nouns “rake” and “lake”.
• デイジー: Daisy.
• ロッキー: Rocky.
• キャナリー: Canary. I assume the bird—kinshijaku in Japanese—is the ultimate referent.
• チコ: Chico. No apparent relation to Chico Marx.
• ビリー: Billy.
• ハックル: Huckle. I base this on his surname, Thompson, implying an Anglo background perhaps influenced by Huckleberry Finn. Otherwise I would have gone with a misreading of Häckel.
• フェスタ: Festa.
• ジョルジュ: George in its French form. There is risk of confusion with a lesser character in episode 12 who seems to be named George in the name’s English pronunciation, so some fans use “Giorgio” and other poor fits.
• サマリン: Samarin. The Russian surname, not the brand of antacid.
• カルメル: Carmel. No obvious relation to Israeli or other sites by this name.
• ジョーク: Jork.
• J・ロック: J. Locke, perhaps from John Locke. If it had not been credited in this form, I would have assumed it was actually “Jayrock” because everybody says both the initial and surname every time.
• バックス: Bux. Could be Bucks etc.
• ザルツェフ: Zaltsev.
• ザナ: Zana.
• デオル: Deol.
• バスク: Basque. If there was any intention it may have been “Bask”, like the verb, but I suspect an allusion to Basque separatism in line with the revolutionary underdog theme of the show.
• ラコック: Lacoque.
• ラルターフ: Lartav. Could possibly be Lertov, Le Rutaffe etc.
• オーセル: Ouzel, like the thrush.
• デスタン: Destin, French for “fate”. Could be Destan.
• ネルオーダー: Neruoda. Could be Nellorder etc.
• ダロウェイ: Dalloway, like the Woolf character.
• オレナ: Olena.
• グランフェルド: Granfäld. It’s sort of cromulent.
• アール・シルバ: R. Silba, because this spelling is seen on a plaque. Wikipedia does not render アール as the letter R.
• フォン・シュタイン (sometimes without the dot): Von Stein.
• ミゲロ: Miguelo.
• ジュディア・オハラ: Judea O’Hara.
• ダーク: Dirk.
• ガルシア: Garcia.
• オッペ: Oppé.
• ハンズ・ドリップ: Hans Dripp.
• ロイ・ゲイダ: Roy Geider.
• フリッツ・マノン: Fritz Manon.
• デロイア: Deloyer, by convention. It could, for instance, be a softened English-style corruption of the Spanish phrase “de roja”, meaning “of red”, assuming the planet is named for its deserts as they appeared from space before irrigation.
• メドール: Medohr, or possibly an acronymous reading of “MDR”, an abbrevation seen in episode 59.
• ローディア: Rhodia. Could be Roadia, Rōdia etc.
• コホード: Kohǒd. The accent mark is an arbitrary back formation from the longer second vowel sound.
• カーディナル市: Kardinal City. This spelling is shown on screen in episode 3. It seems likely to me that the English word was intended, but if the reference is to a cardinal, that reference might still be in one of the languages that spell the word with a K. No cardinal, or cathedral, is shown.
• スパ市: Supa City. Like “Kardinal”, this spelling is shown on screen, albeit on a boat in the city’s harbour, in episode 23. The spelling is spurious, but there is no indication that the city is named after a spa.
• バラフ: Baraf.
• アンディ: Andy. This is the Latin spelling shown in episode 46. I would otherwise have gone for Ande, but there is no circumstantial support for the mountains being “the new Andes”.
• スタンレー: Stanray. It can hardly be “stun ray”, since it refers to a hill, but the sound doesn’t allow for “Stanley” either.