Editing Lapine language (section)

==History==
The words of the Lapine language were developed by Adams piecemeal and organically as required by the circumstances of the plot. In a [[Reddit]] [[AMA (Reddit)|"Ask Me Anything" interview]], Adams noted that "I just constructed Lapine as I went—when the rabbits needed a word for something so did I." Reflecting on his inspirations for the words, Adams stated that "some of them are [[onomatopoeic]] like ''hrududu'' (motor vehicle), but overall they simply came from my [[subconscious]]".<ref name=adams2014/><ref>{{Cite web |last=Adamsrichard |date=2013-09-25 |title=I am Richard Adams, author of Watership Down, Shardik, and other novels. AMA! |url=http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1n3quw/i_am_richard_adams_author_of_watership_down/ |access-date=2023-12-30 |website=r/IAmA}}</ref> Adams commented that the motivation for the sound of Lapine was that it should sound "wuffy, fluffy" as in the word "Efrafa".<ref name=rogers/><ref name=adams2005/> Writing for ''[[The Guardian]]'', Keren Levy described the Lapine language as "somehow easy to accept as [a language] we have always known. It is the language of the countryside, of its copses and beeches and of the weather."<ref name=levy/>

The sound of Lapine has been ascribed to influence from [[Welsh language|Welsh]],<ref name=hickman/> [[Irish language|Irish]], [[Scottish Gaelic]]<ref name=rogers/> and [[Arabic language]]s.<ref name=cain/><ref name=oltermann/> Author [[Stephen Cain (poet)|Stephen Cain]] bolsters the Arabic connection by noting in particular that "Adams had occasion to study [Arabic] during his military service in the [[Middle East]]."<ref name=cain/> The Lapine language has also been frequently compared to [[Sindarin]] (the language of the Elves in [[J.R.R. Tolkien]]'s ''[[Middle-earth]]'' series) in terms of its effect on setting in the novels.<ref name=henning/><ref name=murray/> Following the success of ''Watership Down'', Richard Adams would go on to invent another constructed language for his [[Beklan Empire|Beklan]] novels, ''[[Shardik]]'' (1974) and ''[[Maia (novel)|Maia]]'' (1984).