Deyevatem, the youth on Bothea
What are deyevatem?
Deyevatem is a Yevat word. As many Yevat words, it's a composed word, and can be separated into 3 parts: De - yevat - em. The Yevat is a person, also the name of their species. The 'em' at the end indicates the plural of the word Deyevat. Finally, 'de' at the beginning of a word means "unfinished," "uncompleted," "work in progress." A deyevat is a 'Yevat in progress,' but not finished; in other words, it's a child. (deyevatem = children.) |
In the Yevat society, a child is considered as such as long as the deyevat walks on four legs, and doesn't have their Rokyevat form yet (the defensive form.) They'll be considered as a young adult after these steps - even if the conditions may vary according to regions. Some tribes even have a specific rite of passage to consider a deyevat as an adult!
So basically, the word deyevat can be used to talk about the small toddler to the young adult and all the process in between. For newborns and babies, the word ideyevat (small child) will be more accurate, but not mandatory. Children can eat anything from the moment they hatched. However, as they have no teeth yet, they will need soft and flabby food in the beginning. It’s not rare to see parents chewing some food before giving it to their baby. |
Before the deyevat, the kio
The kio is the egg. Every Yevat's egg is already slightly bigger than a human baby and is elongated and oval-shaped, like a rugby ball.
The fertility rate among Yevatem is low, and if a female have one egg in her life it's already an event. A female will rarely lay two eggs or more in her life. Every mom takes care of her egg like if it was her own life. The mothers have their egg with them almost all the time, to prevents predators from stealing it. They have special clothes to hold the egg against their belly or torso! Sometimes, if the father is still here or if the mother is in couple with another Yevat(em), she can be relieved from the egg for a few hours, like to clean herself for example. An abandoned egg on Bothea is very rare. They sleep with it too! But dad, dad, how do we make eggs? A Yevat can born with a penis, a vagina, both, or none. It’s also frequent to have a Yevat with two penises or two vaginas. No matter their genitalia, a Yevat can have any gender. They can identify as male, female, or anything in the gender spectrum. They also can have the sexuality of their choice. If a bearer of penis plus a bearer of uterus mate together, there’s a small chance that the "female" gets pregnant and lay an egg a few months after. It can only happen between Yevatem who have a reproductive male and a female genitalia. Even with these conditions, their fertility rate is quite low. |
Deyevat in communities
If at the very beginning, the toddlers are the "property" of their parents, they'll become a "child of the tribe/town/city" really fast. As soon as the toddlers learn how to walk, they gain their freedom.
When a child arrives in a community, the job of education now belongs to the whole community, and everyone is expected to participate. Every Yevat must accept to talk with the children to help them learning the language, and should tell them life stories or legends to help them grow. An artist should teach the child how to engrave glyphs, a hunter should tell them what ferocious beasts are outside, a monk should explain the hierarchy with Velilyevatem, and the grumpy guy should show them that we don't always get what we want. |
Yevatem think that children who grow up only with their parents will be deeply unbalanced. For them, it's common sense to consider the whole tribe, town or city as potential parents. The cook? He's like an uncle. The old hunter and his husband guardian? They're like grandpas'! The glyph expert? She's more a mother than the actual mother, and so on.
Sometimes it's hard for the parent(s) to see their child getting so distant with them while they befriend someone else. Sometimes the parent(s) will try to keep their child close to them and avoid them having other contacts. These parent(s) are considered as mistreating, bad, and selfish, and other Yevatem will try to 'save' the child. "Deyevatem titiser ierim laska. Ve jukionik, asi rek yevat desizemteraz ahi sahatar rek nohe am rezimem mal melyster." "Children belongs to the community. You perhaps laid the egg but the person he'll become depends on us all." |
More...
A child's main life events have been moved to the page Lifespan and Life events.
NSFW content about deyevatem is prohitibed. You can read more on the rules.
Q: At what age do their horns grow?
A Yevat's horns are not bones. They have a high production of keratin, and their horns are solidified hair (a bit like rhinoceroses!) It's strong as a horn, but it can regrow if it's broken! That being said, their horns can grow at any age, and can drastically change shape when growing.
Some community artworks featuring kioem or deyevatem. Click to be redirected to one and access the artist's galery and bigger artworks:
NSFW content about deyevatem is prohitibed. You can read more on the rules.
Q: At what age do their horns grow?
A Yevat's horns are not bones. They have a high production of keratin, and their horns are solidified hair (a bit like rhinoceroses!) It's strong as a horn, but it can regrow if it's broken! That being said, their horns can grow at any age, and can drastically change shape when growing.
Some community artworks featuring kioem or deyevatem. Click to be redirected to one and access the artist's galery and bigger artworks: