Hylian Language

The Hylian Language is the main language that is used throughout the Legend of Zelda series. The language is spoken within the lands of Hyrule, Termina, Holodrum, Labrynna, and almost all other surrounding regions, although some other languages such as Sky Writing and the Language of the Minish are also used by other races. Although used by the majority of the people, the language has often seen dramatic changes throughout its history. So far, there are known to be at least four different versions of Hylian, most of which are syllabic.

Old Hylian syllabary
The earliest form of Hylian to be known to be used was the Old Hylian syllabary, which was likely invented by the first Hylians. This early form of Hylian was very angular in appearance and was best suited for carving in stone and wood. Old Hylian also made no spaces between words, only in sentences. Eventually this version of Hylian would come to be replaced by both the Hylian Alphabet in the Child Timeline, and the New Hylian syllabary in the Adult Timeline (see Split Timeline Theory, although this version would still be used further into the future by people surviving from this age).

Hylian alphabet
Used around the time of Zant's Invasion of Hyrule, the Hylian alphabet would be the script to replace Old Hylian in the Child Timeline. Unusual for a Hylian language was the fact that this version was an alphabet made up of individual letters instead of a syllabic script, as a result previous versions of the Hylian alphabet being based on Japanese, whereas the Hylian letters used in Zant's time were based on English. It also put spaces in-between the letters in its sentences.

New Hylian syllabary
New Hylian Syllabary, a language that served as a successor to the Old Hylian syllabary, is used in the Adult Timeline just before the Great Flood. The language made further refinements to the previous version of Hylian Syllabary. In this timeline, the people also use a new spoken language; the Ocarina of Time-era Hylian is considered an "ancient tongue" and is understood by very few people, the only ones in The Wind Waker being Ganondorf (presumably), Medli, Daphnes Nohansen Hyrule (King of Red Lions), Jabun, Tingle, Great Deku Tree and Valoo. This was the first Hylian script to include numerals.

Logographic Hylian
Used around the time of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, this version of the Hylian language is a logographic language, which is composed of visual elements arranged in a variety of ways, rather than using the segmental phoneme principle of construction used in other forms of Hylian. As a result, it is relatively easier to remember or guess the sounds of letters and symbols in other Hylian scripts, while the meaning of words is easier to guess in this version of Hylian. The font used in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past originally had designs of a vulture and an ankh. These designs were based on Egyptian hieroglyphs which carry religious meanings, and were altered in the English version.

Behind the scenes
The Hylian written language is derived from Japanese hiragana, katakana, romaji, and sometimes English. The script is syllabic or more precisely moraic, and each symbol represents either a vowel, consonant-vowel combination, or a syllable final n.

Note that the character set and structure of the written language has changed dramatically. The Hylian text in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is easier and less complex than the one used in The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. The Ocarina of Time version of the script made no distinction between voiced and voiceless consonants, palatalized consonants and geminate consonants. The Wind Waker version of the script makes all these distinctions. Also, The Wind Waker's script is more suited to being written with a brush, whereas the old script was more angular, suited to being carved in stone. The Hylian Text was also uniquely different in the Japanese and English versions of A Link to the Past.

The script used in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess is not the same as any previous form of Hylian. Unlike previous texts, the Twilight Princess version of Hylian can be directly translated from English into Hyrule's native language. Due to the fact that the Wii version of the game was mirrored from the GameCube version, the Hylian Alphabet is read from right to left in the Wii version, and left to right in the GameCube version.

Inconsistencies
Up until The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, any previous form of Hylian was an unreadable language and had no meaning to its words whatsoever. Although all of the Hylian languages that came after A Link to the Past were readable, how words in the Hylian Language were spoken remains a mystery. The only time Hylian is ever heard throughout the series is from Valoo, the Great Deku Tree, Jabun, and Midna, respectively. The words that they speak, however, are untranslatable. Assuming that the letters in Hylian are pronounced the same as their Japanese or English counterparts, then there would be no difference between the pronunciation of English/Japanese from Hylian words. Also, despite the fact that the letters of the Old and Modern Hylian syllabary are pronounced the same, the people of The Wind Waker don’t seem to understand the ancient Hylian language. Further complicating matters is the fact that the majority of Midna's voice clips are chosen at random and very few are locked into a specific set of dialogue.

Translating Hylian-English
There are two ways to translate while using the Hylian alphabet. The first is to translate English words into Hylian, or vice-versa Hylian words into English. Described below are the two distinct procedures to follow to perform these tasks. Note that this method of translation will only work for the Hylian Alphabet. To translate Old or New Hylian Syllabary, simply translate the Hylian syllables into Japanese syllables using this guide.

Hylian to English

 * 1) First, use the chart as shown above to translate Hylian letters into Latin ones., for example, translates into Zelda.
 * 2) If you are using the Wii version, then the Hylian text will be written backwards. Simply read from right to left instead of left to right.

English to Hylian

 * 1) Remove any question marks or exclamation marks and replace them with periods.
 * 2) Because Hylian has no numerical set of numbers, all numbers must be spelled out as words (for example, 10 would be written as ten).
 * 3) If you want the text to look like the Wii version, rewrite everything you just wrote from right to left.
 * 4) Translate the letters of the English word or sentence into the Hylian letters shown above.

Trivia

 * In Japan, a translation guide of the Modern Hylian alphabet was printed on the back of the instruction manual, and above the Japanese text in the game were Hylian letters. However, as the language can not be directly translated to English, this feature would be unhelpful for foreign audiences, and was removed.


 * In The Wind Waker, Phantom Ganon's sword says Zubora and Gabora, the names of the mountain sword smiths from The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask.


 * On the face of the Nintendo GameCube disc for The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, there is a banner in New Hylian Syllabary, that extends through the middle, that says, "Zeruda no Densetsu Kaze no Takuto" (The Wind Waker's Japanese title).


 * The library books in The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap say "Triumph Forks", a reference to The Wind Waker, and "The Legend of Zelda: Nut of the Mysterious Tree", the Japanese title of The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons.


 * In the production of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, two versions of Hylian were used before the final version was chosen. The first was New Hylian Syllabary and the second was a syllabic version of the Hylian Alphabet. Ironically, all three versions of Hylian can be found in the final version of the game.


 * Strangely enough, the headbands of Koume and Kotake are written in New Hylian Syllabary, each band simply says "Koume" and "Kotake" respectively.

Logographic Hylian

 * The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
 * The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening 

Old Hylian syllabary

 * The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
 * The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

New Hylian syllabary

 * The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
 * The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures
 * The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap
 * The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass

Hylian alphabet

 * The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess