My Oxford English Dictionary defines roynish (and its alternate spelling roinish) as:
"covered with scale or scurf; scabby, scurvy, coarse, mean, paltry, base."
I've always assumed it meant uncultured and unkind, and maybe also not very good-looking.
Lexicon of the Land - ur-Vile Vocabulary
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en.wiktionary.org/wiki/roynishSavor Dam wrote:Once upon a time (back when Carter was President and I was first reading the Chrons), I looked up this word and many of the other unfamiliar words SRD peppered throughout the books.
Roynish is a synonym for mangy; meaning shabby or worn out in spots. I can't say this definition felt completely appropriate in the context SRD used it as an adjective related to the urviles, but that's what my notes from the time say.
Now there are a variety of on-line resources, many of which provide the same definition. What other definitions are out there, I will leave as an exercise for those who may care to look.
1. (obsolete) Mangy; scabby; hence, mean; paltry; troublesome
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I've always thought of the word to mean dog-like. Maybe that comes from when SRD refers to the 'roynish barking of the Ur-viles' (or however that line went, it's close enough)
And I've always thought of the Ur-viles to look like the Alien, just shorter
And I've always thought of the Ur-viles to look like the Alien, just shorter
Linden should have quailed. His certainty was as bitter as the touch of a Raver: it should have defeated her. But it did not. How often had she heard Lord Foul or his servants prophesy destruction, attempting to impose despair? And how often had Thomas Covenant shown her that it was possible to stand upright under the weight of utter hopelessness?