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Q&A Coming up with names for species in fiction?

When you are writing a story that is set in a fantasy world (maybe our world with just one made-up element, or a completely different world), what is a good way to come up with names for species th...

3 answers  ·  posted 12y ago by Canina‭  ·  last activity 5y ago by System‭

Question fiction naming
#4: Attribution notice removed by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-11T18:55:49Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/6002
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T02:26:38Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/6002
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T02:26:38Z (almost 5 years ago)
When you are writing a story that is set in a fantasy world (maybe our world with just one made-up element, or a completely different world), what is a good way to come up with names for species that aren't just names of Earth species with minor variations? It's easy to call a bird of prey a Tlkachtian hawk, for example, if you have a region in your world named Tlkachtia, but it's not particularly imaginative, and lots of people are likely to focus on the "hawk" part when it might in fact be very different from a hawk. And what if there is nothing in Earth's fauna or flora that is similar in the respect that you want to emphasize?

I found a number of questions and plenty of good answers and resources centered around naming characters and places, but essentially nothing about naming species.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2012-06-25T17:40:05Z (over 12 years ago)
Original score: 11