Anyone here knows Serbian or Croatan? (question about Biskmatar)

[T.G. Oskar]

After having a slight brainstorm (for something completely different, not FF Tactics but Dungeons & Dragons), I stumbled upon a very bizarre coincidence. This regards the etymology of the word, "Biskmatar" (aka, Llednar Twem's class in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance).

While wandering around, I found that "kismat" is apparently a word loan from the Arab, meaning "fate or destiny" (more or less). However, the Serbo-Croatian language has a genitive of "kismata", which would suggest "person with fate/destiny". Then, I was pointed at the prefix "bez-", which means "without" or "-less" (as in, fateless or without destiny). This would suggest the word "bez kismata", which would roughly mean "person without destiny" or "fateless person".

That...sounds a bit like Llednar's calling card, don't you think?

Now, it may be a weird coincidence, but it may seem that they based the term "Biskmatar" from a degeneration of "bez kismata" (a rather weird one), specifically either "bekismata" or "bezkimata". Not saying they actually pulled that one off exactly as I said, but it may be a really interesting coincidence (or a weird hypothesis).

However, I'm stumped at how the word "bez kismata" may degenerate, and this is where I need a native Serbian or Croatan speaker (or, if the prefix "bez-" and the word "kismat" mean the same in another language that one of you may be native to, suggest) to determine. It may be that, since there are two instances of an "s" based phoneme, that there may be a case of an allophone and perhaps a contraction of the word (much like the Japanese contracts compound words). Is there the chance that, through grammatical rules and perhaps a misunderstanding or two, the term "bez kismata" may have degenerated into "Biskmatar" (even through a Japanese misunderstanding)?

If not, you're still welcome to answer whether this may be a really interesting coincidence, a word mutated into another, or a weird hypothesis built to create a coincidence.

[Che]

I don't know Serbian or Croat(i)an, but I am just coming in here to nitpick and say I hate it when people say "Anyone here knows ______?"

No, not anyone here knows. Only certain people here know. So you ask "does anyone here know?" I love you TG, this is just one of my pet peeves!

Also, I wouldn't be surprised at all by this coincidence. Square loves putting different kinds of mythology and stuff in their games.

[Xanatos]

First of all there's no such thing as Serbo-Croatian language, not anymore that is. That language only existed in former Yugoslavia and it's was a mixture of Croatian and Serbian who sound alike but grammatically are completely different. I'm a native Croatian and I would gladly help but honestly this is the first time I've heard of a word "kismata", I even asked my parents and one of my Serbian colleges, apparently they don't have a clue. There's a high chance that word kismata is still used in Bosnian language, a language that's almost same as Serbian and Croatian, well it's more a mixture of both, as still incomplete language they use a lot of loan words especially Arabian and Turkish.

Both Serbian and Croatian language have the same word for "fate/destiny" which is "sudbina", so I don't see a reason for even using such a word as "kismata". Also the word "bez" can't possibly mean "less", it only means "without".

I hope I was of some help.

[T.G. Oskar]

First of all there's no such thing as Serbo-Croatian language, not anymore that is. That language only existed in former Yugoslavia and it's was a mixture of Croatian and Serbian who sound alike but grammatically are completely different.

Thanks for clearing that out.

I'm a native Croatian and I would gladly help but honestly this is the first time I've heard of a word "kismata", I even asked my parents and one of my Serbian colleges, apparently they don't have a clue. There's a high chance that word kismata is still used in Bosnian language, a language that's almost same as Serbian and Croatian, well it's more a mixture of both, as still incomplete language they use a lot of loan words especially Arabian and Turkish.

Both Serbian and Croatian language have the same word for "fate/destiny" which is "sudbina", so I don't see a reason for even using such a word as "kismata".

Hmm...not a loan word nor an archaism, then? Granted, I used a less-than-reliable resource (Wiktionary...yes, you can go and bash me on that, and I expect at least one person to do so), but the entries suggest that it has been used on the region (and it does state it is based on an Arabic word, so it's mostly a word loan). The "-a" at the end seems to denote a genitive word, as well.

Also the word "bez" can't possibly mean "less", it only means "without".

Is it currently used as a prefix, or is it used as an adverb? Or, was it once used as a prefix in any case, by any chance?

Still, assuming the word "kismet/kismat" was used as an archaism, and assuming the grammatical rules haven't changed (and using "bez-" as a prefix, assuming again it was used correctly), is there a chance that both would degenerate into something sounding similar to "Biskmatar"? Again, this is assuming the word "kismat" was used as a word loan or archaism (or a combination between archaism and word loan, in case "sudbina" is a neologism).

I hope I was of some help.

Oh, certainly. Even if it ends on a coincidence used as an attempt to make sense of the term (such as 6¹³ x 9¹³ = 42¹³)...

[Xanatos]

Still, assuming the word "kismet/kismat" was used as an archaism, and assuming the grammatical rules haven't changed (and using "bez-" as a prefix, assuming again it was used correctly), is there a chance that both would degenerate into something sounding similar to "Bismarck"? Again, this is assuming the word "kismat" was used as a word loan or archaism (or a combination between archaism and word loan, in case "sudbina" is a neologism).

Now where heading somewhere, you see adding or removing one letter from a word can change the meaning and the sound of the same word, but you already know that. The thing is that its not that serious in English as it's in Croatian, Bosnian, Slovenian, Macedonian or Serbian language. I never heard of "kismata" but I've heard of "kismet", it's often used in Bosnian language for religious purposes. I found out that it's basically a Turkish version of word "kismata" and it's used in Bosnian language due to the fact that they have a lot of loan words from Turkey and they're of the same religion.

In some cases the word "bez" can merge with the other words creating a completely new word with completely new meaning, unfortunately not in our case. When we merge the word "bez" with any of the following words "kismet", "kismata", "kismat" we get a word that doesn't haven any meaning on all three languages nor does it sound anything like "Bismarck".To make sense of it the word "bez" must be separated from the word "kismet" so we would have "bez kismeta" which would mean "without the fate". I apologize if I haven't explained this clearly enough, grammar was never my stronger side. Oh and I also need to apologize as it seems the word "bez" can become the word "less" while combing with the adequately word.