Category Archives: Book

Title: Making Money
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 2007
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: In this Discworld book we have two turtle references, but not to A’Tuin! The first reference is made by the lawyer and concerns the turtle, which had a function that was rather rare for these reptiles:

“Oh, but it can, Mr. Lipwig, it can!” said Slant, with lawyerly glee. “There is a huge body of case law. There was even, once, a donkey who was ordained and a tortoise who was appointed a judge. Obviously the more difficult trades are less well represented. No horse has yet held down a job as a carpenter, for example. But dog as chairman is relatively usual.”

The second mention is about turtles in the context of… torture “devices”:

“Mr. Lipwig, Mr. Lipwig, Mr. Lipwig, will you never learn?” said Vetinari, sheathing the sword. “One of my predecessors used to have people torn apart by wild tortoises. It was not a quick death. He thought it was a hoot. Forgive me if my pleasures are a little more cerebral, will you? Let me see now, what was the other thing. Oh yes, I regret to tell you that a man called Owlswick Clamp has died.”

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Wee Free Men
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 2003
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: This book is unusual, because turtles are… only in the polish version (in Dorota Malinowska-Grupińska’s translation), but not in the original. We mention it as a curiosity. Said excerpt in english:

Anyway, she preferred the witches to the smug handsome princes and especially to the stupid smirking princesses, who didn’t have the sense of a beetle.

Polish version of this fragment and our translation of that, back into English:

W każdym razie czarownice podobały jej się bardziej niż dumni przystojni książęta, a na pewno dużo bardziej niż te głupie uśmiechające się z wyższością księżniczki, które najbardziej przypominały jej żółwie.

In any case, she liked witches more than proud handsome princes, and certainly much more than those silly smiling princesses who resembled turtles.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Last Hero
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 2001
Publisher: Victor Gollancz

Why in Database: Four turtle references appears here in the text layer, and they are all about A’Tuin! The first is a standard outline of the nature of the disc, the others are statements of characters important to this world, with a piece about a turtle drawing between them. This book was published in an illustrated version, this graphic layer also includes, of course, turtle elements, for example, a vision of a dead A’Tuin. Additionally, on two pages a schematic drawing of a turtle serves as a background for the text.

The place where the story happened was a world on the back of four elephants perched on the shell of a giant turtle. That’s the advantage of space. It’s big enough to hold practically anything, and so, eventually, it does.
People think that it is strange to have a turtle ten thousand miles long and an elephant more than two thousand miles tall, which just shows that the human brain is ill-adapted for thinking and was probably originally designed for cooling the blood. It believes mere size is amazing.
There’s nothing amazing about size. Turtles are amazing, and elephants are quite astonishing. But the fact that there’s a big turtle is far less amazing than the fact that there is a turtle anywhere.

“With respect,” said Ponder, without respect, “we cannot. The seas will run dry. The sun will burn out and crash. The elephants and the turtle may cease to exist altogether.”

Inside, lightnings crackled among the falling sands. Outside, a giant turtle was engraved upon the glass.
I THINK WE SHALL HAVE TO CLEAR THE DECKS FOR THIS ONE, said Death.

“I don’t know,” said Carrot. “You know, I’m not sure I ever really believed it before. You know… about the turtle and the elephants and everything. Seeing it all like this makes me feel very… very…”

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Thief of Time
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 2001
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: Another Discworld book with two turtle references, both of them about A’Tuin:

A chessboard appeared, but it was triangular and so big that only the nearest point could be seen. Right on this point was the world—turtle, elephants, the little orbiting sun and all. It was the Discworld, which existed only just this side of total improbability and, therefore, in border country.

A year ago astronomers across the Discworld had been puzzled to see the stars gently wheel across the sky as the world-turtle executed a roll. The thickness of the world never allowed them to see why, but Great A’Tuin’s ancient head had snaked out and down and had snapped right out of the sky the speeding asteroid that would, had it hit, have meant that no one would ever have needed to buy a diary ever again.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Truth
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 2000
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: In this Discworld book, the turtle references are differentiated, there are three, and each is a different kind! The first is the most standard, A’Tuin mentioned by Patrician:

“A thousand years ago we thought the world was a bowl,” he said. “Five hundred years ago we knew it was a globe. Today we know it is flat and round and carried through space on the back of a turtle.” He turned and gave the High Priest another smile. “Don’t you wonder what shape it will turn out to be tomorrow?”

The second reference is in the context of Om and the pendand associated with him:

The speaker was a priest, dressed in the black, unadorned, and unflattering habit of the Omnians. He had a flat, broad-brimmed hat, the Omnia’s turtle symbol around his neck, and an expression of almost terminal benevolence.

The last mention is about ordinary turtles in philosophical terms:

William grimaced. It shows the truth, he thought. But how do we know the truth when we see it? The Ephebian philosophers think that a hare can never outrun a tortoise, and they can prove it. Is that the truth?

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Fifth Elephant
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 1999
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database:

In this book, as in many entries about Discworld, all three turtle references all about A’Tuin:

They say the world is flat and supported on the back of four elephants who themselves stand on the back of a giant turtle.
They say that the elephants, being such huge beasts, have bones of rock and iron, and nerves of gold for better conductivity over long distances.

He knew the legend, of course. There had once been five elephants, not four, standing on the back of Great A’Tuin, but one had lost its footing or had been shaken loose and had drifted off into a curved orbit before eventually crashing down, a billion tons of enraged pachyderm.

Sometimes, though, knockermen came back. And the ones that survived went on to survive again, because surviving is a matter of practice. And sometimes they would talk a little of what they heard, all alone in the deep mines…the tap-tapping of dead dwarfs trying to get back into the world, the distant laughter of Agi Hammerthief, the heartbeat of the turtle that carried the world.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Carpe Jugulum
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 1998
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: Quite a turtle book, mainly because one of the essential characters is the priest of Om, so there are some references to the events of Small Gods and established by the events of this book, Om-Turtle symbolism.

The first reference, however, is more traditional – about A’Tuin.

It was also said, although not by the people who lived in Lancre, that below the rim, where the seas thundered continuously over the edge, their home went through space on the back of four huge elephants that in turn stood on the shell of a turtle that was as big as the world.
The people of Lancre had heard of this. They thought it sounded about right. The world was obviously flat, although in Lancre itself the only truly flat places were tables and the top of some people’s heads, and certainly turtles could shift a fair load. Elephants, by all accounts, were pretty strong too. There didn’t seem any major gaps in the thesis, so Lancrastrians left it at that.

The first mention of Oats pendant:

He carefully lowered his holy turtle pendant into place, noting its gleam with some satisfaction, and picked up his finely printed graduation copy of the Book of Om. Some of his fellow students had spent hours carefully ruffling the pages to give them that certain straight-and-narrow credibility, but Oats had refrained from this as well. Besides, he knew most of it by heart.

The next references to turtles is more general, it is about similarity of a certain phenomenon to them:

She’d seen Hodgesaargh occasionally, around the edges of the woods or up on the moors.
Usually the royal falconer was vainly fighting off his hawks, who attacked him for a pastime, and in the case of King Henry kept picking him up and dropping him again in the belief that he was a giant tortoise.

The next three are about the pendant:

“I am protected by the hand of Om,” he said.
Nanny inspected the pendant. It show a figure trussed across the back of a turtle.
“You say?” she said. “That’s a good wheeze, then.”

“And this is the holy turtle of Om, which I believe should make me cringe back in fear. My, my. Not even a very good replica. Cheaply made.”
Oats found a reserve of strength. He managed to say “And how would you know, foul fiend?”
“No, no, that’s for demons,” sighed the Count. He handed the turtle back to Oats.

Oats’s hands clasped his turtle pendant for comfort as he tried to remember.

Next is a direct reference to the events of the Small Gods:

“It is said three thousand people witnessed his manifestation at the Great Temple when he make the Covenant with the prophet Brutha and saved him from death by torture on the iron turtle—”

Nie tylko Om jest wspominany w żółwim kontekście, Igor wspomina także nieokreśloną sadzawkę Świętego Żółwia:

“Thith ith water from the Holy Turtle Pond of Thquintth,” said a voice above them. “Blethed by the Bithop himthelf in the Year of the Trout.” There was a glugging noise and the sound of someone swallowing. “That wath a good year for beatitude,” Igor went on. “But you don’t have to take my word for it. Duck, you thuckerth!”

The last three, again revolve around the (lost) pendant and what Oats finally got instead:

Oats reached to his neck for the security of the turtle, and it wasn’t there. It has cost him five obols in the Citadel, and it was too late now to reflect that perhaps he shouldn’t have hung it from a chain worth a tenth of an obol. It was probably lying in some pool, or buried in some muddy, squelching marsh…

“What happened to your holy hat?”
“It got lost,” said Oats abruptly. Granny peered closer.
“Your magic amulet’s gone too,” she said. “The one with the turtle and the little man on it.”
“It’s not a magic amulet, Mistress Weatherwax! Please! A magic amulet is a symbol of primitive
and mechanistic superstition, whereas the Turtle of Om is…is…is…well, it’s not, do you
understand?”

“Oh.” Verence looked nonplussed, but kings learn to swing back upright. “I’m sure you know your own mind best.” He swayed slightly as Magrat’s elbow grazed his ribs. “Oh…yes…we heard you lost your, er, holy amulet and so this afternoon we, that is to say the Queen and Miss Nitt… got Shawn Ogg to make this in the mint…”
Oats unwrapped the black velvet scroll. Inside, on a golden chain, was a small golden doubleheaded ax. He stared at it.
“Shawn isn’t very good at turtles,” said Magrat, to fill the gap.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: The Last Continent
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 1998
Publisher: Doubleday

Why in Database: Another discworld book with many turtle references. The first three are related to A’Tuin:

Against the stars a turtle passes, carrying four elephants on its shell.
Both turtle and elephants are bigger than people might expect, but out between the stars the difference between huge and tiny is, comparatively speaking, very small.
But this turtle and these elephants are, by turtle and elephant standards, big. They carry the Discworld, with its vast lands, cloudscapes, and oceans.
People don’t live on the Disc any more than, in less hand-crafted parts of the multiverse, they live on balls. Oh, planets may be the place where their body eats its tea, but they live elsewhere, in worlds of their own which orbit very handily around the center of their heads.

“There’s not a single star I recognize,” said the Senior Wrangler.
Ridcully waved his hands in the air. “They change a bit all the time,” he said. “The Turtle swims through space and—”
“Not this fast!” said the Dean.

“I think it’s what we call the Small Boring Group of Faint Stars. It’s about the right shape,” said Ponder. “And I know what you’re going to say, sir, you’re going to say, ‘But they’re just a blob in the sky, not a patch on the blobs we used to get,’ sir, but, you see, that’s what they might have looked like when Great A’Tuin was much closer to them, thousands of years ago. In other words, sir,” Ponder drew a deep breath, in dread of everything that was to come, “I think we’ve traveled backwards in time. For thousands of years.”
And that was the other side of the odd thing about wizards. While they were quite capable of spending half an hour arguing that it could not possibly be Tuesday, they’d take the outrageous in their pointy-shoed stride. The Senior Wrangler even looked relieved.

The fourth and last reference is one of the allusions to the world of the sphere, i.e. the earth, that occurs from time to time:

Rincewind lay back. Even the flies were merely annoying. Things began to sizzle in the bushes. Snowy went and drank from the tiny pool with a noise like an inefficient suction pump trying to deal with an unlucky turtle.
It was, nevertheless, very peaceful.

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Jingo
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 1997
Publisher: Victor Gollancz

Why in Database: There is only one turtle mention in this book:

“It puts me in mind,” said Leonard, “of those nautical stories about giant turtles that sleep on the surface, thus causing sailors to think they are an island. Of course, you don’t get giant turtles that small.”

Author: XYuriTT

Title: Hogfather
Author(s): Terry Pratchett
Release year: 1996
Publisher: Victor Gollancz

Why in Database: In this Discworld book, there is only one turtle mention, about A’Tuin:

Author: XYuriTT