The Heroic Legend of Arslan - Naming Confusion

Naming Confusion

The fictional world of this story created in the anime, manga, and its novels is heavily based on Persian art, history and culture and those as well of Central Asian art, languages, and religions. This is quite clear in the naming of the characters (the names of most Parsian characters comes from ancient Persian legend, such as 'Shahname'), although there is some controversy over how each character's name should be spelled and pronounced. In the manga, for instance, the title character's name is actually spelled in several different ways, and in turn the anime pronounce characters differently in order to fit his or her speaking style. The main protagonist has been referred to as "Ars'laan", "Arislaan", "Aslaan", and "Arisulan" depending episode, language used and country being broadcast in. Likewise, the character of Daryoon has had his name spelled/pronounced differently from "Darün" to "Dariun".

When the first two episodes of the OAV were released in America by U.S. Manga Corps, all of the character and kingdom names were "translated" into equivalent-sounding names, primarily in Indian languages and subsequently in Persian languages as well. When subsequent episodes were translated, they came with a footnote stating that the Japanese company who owns the rights to the anime took issue with how the names were translated, and insisted upon a literal translation of the names as they are pronounced in the series. Thus, the official names of the characters sound more like Japanese mispronunciations than they do actual titles—such as Gieve becoming "Guibu". Others, however, have been returned to actual Persian, Indian and Central Asian names, such as Darün and Farangis.

The only exceptions to the naming theme is Narsus/Narcasse and Hirmes. Hirmes may be an alternate name of Hermes, which is the name of a god; although he is Greek in his origins, the Greeks were well known to the Persians, as the Persian Empire was in conflict with the Greeks during the Greco-Persian Wars, Alexander the Great's conquest, and the Roman-Persian Wars. Narcasse's name is neither Persian, Central Asian nor Indian; the closest equivalent appears in Greek, with the name "Narcissus". Though the name might be equivalent to the Persian Shah Narseh during the Sassanian dynasty whose name has been spelled as Narses, Narseus and Narsus as well.