Turtle Recall Part 11

ASTFGL Azaremoth [ E ]

Beezlemoth, Earl [ E ]

Drazometh the Putrid, Duke [ E ]

QUEZOVERCOATL.

Riinjswin [ E ]

Urglefloggah [E]

Vizzimuth [ E ]

Winswin [ E ]

WXRTHLTL-JWLPKLZ.

Demurrage, Aliss. Black Aliss. A very powerful witch, who lived near the forest of Skund (itself an area of strong residual magic). Some of her best-known exploits involved turning a pumpkin into a royal coach and sending a whole palace to sleep for a hundred years.

She was not called Black Aliss because of her exploits, which were the result of bad temper rather than actual malice. She was called Black Aliss because of her fingernails. And her teeth. She had a sweet tooth and as a result used to live in a real gingerbread cottage (similar to the one still standing when discovered by RINCEWIND and TWOFLOWER in The Light Fantastic); this followed early experiments with broccoli and bran cottages, which didn't seem to have the same frisson and smelled a lot worse. All the same, modern witches declare that she never really ate anyone. Well, perhaps a few people, but only rarely, and more or less by accident and short-sightedness, and that hardly made her a cannibal. A couple of kids shoved her into her own oven in the end.

She is generally spoken of by modern witches, who live in more democratic times when such ungoverned excesses of power are frowned upon, with a sort of wistful disapproval.

Detritus. A troll. In many ways, the troll. He is the troll many people in Ankh-Morpork, particularly University students, think of when they hear the word, bringing back as it does vague memories of sudden concussion and extreme pain.

He is rangy rather than huge (for a troll) and is widely and wrongly, on the whole believed to have an IQ the size of a walnut. His knuckles drag on the ground, but that is not unusual among trolls, although his ability to touch the ground with his lower lip when moving fast is the envy of many. Like most of his fellows, when not employed in some office that requires a uniform he wears a ragged loincloth to cover whatever it is that trolls feel it is necessary to conceal.

Lacking any other skill and finding even unskilled labour mentally taxing, Detritus found work anywhere a hired fist was required. When first encountered, he was working as a splatter at the Mended DRUM in Ankh-Morpork (like a bouncer, but trolls use more force) but he has since become upwardly mobile, or at least horizontally portable. His career began to move when he found employment hitting people in the HOLY WOOD moving picture industry, where he met RUBY, a singer.

It is obvious that her influence caused him to rethink his life goals, because he later became an acting-constable and then a sergeant in the Ankh-Morpork City WATCH, a profession in which his unquestioning obedience to orders and a loud voice proved a major, or at least sergeant, advantage. His Watch armour gleams almost as brightly as that of Captain CARROT, although in Detritus' case this is because he often forgets to stop rubbing. He now carries a specially adapted 200lb siege crossbow, which he calls 'The Piece-maker', which is capable of blowing open the front and back doors of a house simultaneously. He built it himself, from a siege weapon. Within the Watch, Detritus has bloomed, and there are hints that although he is quite thick he is also, in many ways, not entirely stupid.

Devant-Molei, Rosie. Runs the Sunshine Sanctuary for Sick Dragons in Ankh-Morpork. Described as having the build of someone who could pick up carthorses in one hand and shoe them with the other. One of the particular type of high-born lady who is seldom seen not wearing rubber boots. [GG]

Devereaux. Innkeeper in Genua. Not fat or red-faced, and this was practically a hanging offence under Genua's strange laws. [WA]

Device, the. (Cube). A sort of dwarf machine. No one knows who made them. They might be older than the world. They have been found in volcanoes and the deepest rocks. The deep down dwarfs have most of them. They come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and are unbelievably valuable, especially the cubes. [T!]

DeVice, Amanita. One of DIAMANDA'S coven in LANCRE. She had a dagger and skull tattoo on her arm (drawn in ink). [LL]

de Worde, William. A professional scribe. Ankh-Morpork has a number of these, who will write letters home for you, or draft a pet.i.tion to the PATRICIAN. Son of Lord de Worde (a man with definite, and rather unpleasant, views on how Ankh-Morpork should be run) and the product, therefore, of a wealthy family who are used to getting their own way. The family motto is Le Mot Juste. Their family's town house is at 50 Nonsuch Street. His elder brother, Rupert was killed in battle in Klatch.

William, who is the youngest son, was educated at HUGGLESTONES, where he enjoyed swordsmanship and merely survived everything else. He enjoys reading and writing and he loves words. William is less than typical of the great ma.s.s of scribes because of two personal inventions.

One is the Standard Letter. Movable type had not at the time been invented in Ankh-Morpork and most printing of things like playbills and posters was done by wood block engravers. It occurred to William ('Thynges Written Downe') de Worde to make use of this facility, because so many of the letters he had to write were so similar.

William de Worde's related concept was his 'letter of thynges that have happened'. The basic idea wasn't new. Many n.o.bles, foreign dignitaries and expatriate Ankh-Morporkians employ scribes to send them regular letters to keep them up to date with city affairs. But, again, William realised that all he needed do was write one letter with suitable s.p.a.ces to allow for things like 'To my n.o.ble Lord the . . .', trace it backwards on pieces of boxwood provided for him by the engraver and then pay the said engraver twenty dollars to carefully remove the wood that wasn't letters and make twenty impressions on sheets of paper.

However, a chance encounter with Gunilla GOODMOUNTAIN, and coincidentally with an out-of-control cart full of lead, led William to found Ankh-Morpork's first newspaper, The Ankh-Morpork Times. In fact it would be true to say that he didn't found it, it found him. His editorial style has been likened to someone with their b.u.m stuffed with tweed. Without ever actually meaning to, William invented a primitive form of journalism (that is, one not yet so advanced as to consist entirely of things made up) and such a.s.sociated ideas as The Public Interest and the Freedom of the Press. He appears to have survived despite this suicidal mind-set. No doubt Lord VETINARI thinks he will be useful. His lordship is quite happy for people to annoy him, provided they annoy other people even more. [TT, MR]

Diamanda. Her real name is Lucy Tockley, but she felt that Diamanda was more witchy, and the mere fact that someone could think a phrase like that should tell us everything about them that we need to know. And, indeed, she does paint her nails black, and wears black lace and a floppy black velvet hat with a veil and does all the other necro-nerdy things that people do when they are young and therefore immortal. This naturally skinny seventeen-year-old was the leader of the self-taught coven of young girls in LANCRE, up until Granny Weatherwax found out about it. [LL]

Dibbler, Cut-Me-Own-Throat. Claud Maximillian Overton Transpire Dibbler. Wheresoever two or three are gathered together, someone else will turn up and try to sell them something hot in a bun. This person will probably be C. M. O. T. Dibbler.

Dibbler is the purveyor of absolutely anything that can be sold hurriedly from an open suitcase in a busy street. He likes to describe himself as a merchant adventurer; everyone else likes to describe him as an itinerant pedlar whose money-making schemes are always let down by some small but vital flaw, such as trying to sell things he doesn't own or that don't work or, sometimes, don't even exist. Quite often they describe him as someone they would like to catch up with.

He is not, strictly speaking, a criminal.

In his natural state i.e., when not inspired to take advantage of some pa.s.sing fad or problem in Ankh-Morpork Dibbler sells meat pies and sausages-in-a-bun from a tray around his neck or, when funds permit, a barrow. There is no need to describe these items, even as food. Dibbler takes the view that anything that has at any time been any part of a pig, or even near a pig, or possibly even within earshot of a pig, can be called pork. His guiding principle is that with enough mustard people will eat anything (his brief foray into ethnic food for trolls, a silicareous species, proved that Dibbler was even capable of finding stale rock).

Dibbler's coat of arms He is skinny, and when regarding him people are moved to recall that humans have some kind of small rodent somewhere in their ancestry. He speaks very quickly, with many a sidelong glance, and usually wears a huge overcoat, full of pockets, none of which have exact change. He is known to have premises in a cellar near the SHADES in Ankh-Morpork. No one knows where he actually lives. Since going to sleep might involve missing a wonderful business opportunity he possibly never does so.

Dibbler is also the seller of mail-order lessons on the Path of the Scorpion, a self-defence system, under the name of Grand Master Lobsang Dibbler. He also served short stints as moving pictures mogul and music industry promoter, two occupations that came as near to suiting his peculiar talents as any he has ever tried.

He feels that it is not his fault that perfectly sound business propositions have a habit of exploding or tasting awful.

Dibblers have turned up in various parts of Discworld, which just shows the effects of parallel evolution. Wherever there are people prepared to eat terrible food, there will be someone there to sell it to them. These incarnations have included: Al-Jiblah [J]

Dib Diblossonson [TLC]

DISEMBOWEL-MESELF-HONOURABLY DIBHALA [IT].

Fair Go Dibbler [TLC]]

May-I-Be-Kicked-In-My-Own-Ice-Hole Dibooki [TLC]

May-I-Never-Achieve-Enlightenment Dhiblang [TLC]

Swallow-Me-Own-Blowdart Dlang Dlang [TLC]

Dibbler, Solstice ('Soll'). C. M. O. T. DIBBLER'S nephew. Was heavily involved in the moving picture industry, where he showed a business ac.u.men very nearly equal to that of his uncle. But he has a more modern outlook. Should mobile phones ever be invented on the Discworld, one feels, then Soll will be the first to have one (although he will not have anyone to talk to, of course). [MP]

Didactylos. Ephebian philosopher. This short, bald, blind man in a grubby toga and with a petulant, reedy voice is nevertheless one of the most quoted and popular philosophers of all time. His wise sayings are quoted throughout the multiverse (and include such axioms as 'There'll be another one along in a minute', 'It's a funny old world', 'It'll all end in tears', 'You cannot trust the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds an inch,' and so on). At one time he carried a lantern, telling people that he was looking for an honest man, but this was probably just a pose and an attempt to get money. He lives in a barrel and would probably benefit from bathing rather more often, or at all.

He reasoned that if the Disc is 10,000 miles across and light travels at about the speed of sound, then the sun has to travel at least 35,000 miles in its...o...b..t every day, or twice as fast as its own light. This means that it is, from the standpoint of modern physics, a tachyon (a scientific term meaning magical thing).

He was made a bishop of the Omnian church despite not believing in any G.o.ds, although this is perfectly OK for a modern bishop. [SG]

Dijabringabeeralong. Major town in x.x.xx, reached by a wooden bridge over the bone-dry La.s.situde River. There is a huge windmill on a metal tower with the words: 'Dijabringabeeralong: Check Your Weapons' that is to say, check that they work. The sign is important, because otherwise you might be unaware that you'd ridden through a town. The architecture could be described as 'vernacular', which means 'made up, with a lot of swearing'. Dijabringabeeralong is famed for its Annual Regatta, cancelled on one famous occasion because the river filled up with water. [TLC]

Dil. Embalmer in the Kingdom of DJELIBEYBI. Thirty-five years' experience in the funeral business. A solid and thoughtful man, with that tranquillity of mind and philosophical outlook that comes from spending most of your working day up to the elbows in a dead king. [P]

Dinwiddie, Dr. A. A., DM (7th), D.Thau, B.Occ, M.Coll, BF. The Bursar at Unseen University, Ankh-Morpork. Aged 71. The Bursar is kept on the right side of apparent sanity by a regular dosage of dried frog pills, which make him hallucinate that he is sane.

Dios. High Priest in DJELIBEYBI. First Minister and High Priest among High Priests.

Dios was (or is, or will be certain temporal uncertainties make the choice of tense very difficult) a tall, bald man with an impressive nose. In his role as general adviser to the ruler he spoke (speaks, etc.) softly but carried a big stick, in this case his staff of office symbolic snakes wrapped round an allegorical camel prod.

He ate (we will settle on the past tense) no meat, believing that it diluted and tarnished the soul, and lived for 7,000 years by regularly sleeping in a pyramid, which renewed him or, more accurately, recycled him. In fact it could be said that he was only 7,000 years old from the point of view of an external calendar; more realistically, he had for most of that time been living the same day over and over again. Since the palace days on Djelibeybi were a complex network of rigidly observed ritual, this suited him quite well. There was never any need to do anything differently.

Consequently he was a man of tradition and organisation indeed, he considered that there are no things more important.

Dios, although a devout priest, was not a naturally religious man. He felt that it was not a desirable quality in a high priest; it affected your judgement, and made you 'unsound'. He felt that the G.o.ds were necessary, but he required that they should keep out of the way and leave him to get on with things. [P]

Discworld, the. As all will know, the Discworld is a flat planet like a geological pizza, but without the anchovies. It offers sights far more impressive than those found in universes built by Creators with less imagination but more mechanical apt.i.tude. It exists right on the edge of Reality; the least little things can break through from the other side. It is allowed to exist either because of some impossible blip on the curve of probability, or because the G.o.ds enjoy a joke as much as anyone else. More than most people, in fact.

It was the Ephebian philosopher EXPLETIUS who first proved that the Disc was 10,000 miles across. It is about thirty miles thick at the Rim, although it is believed to be considerably thicker towards the Hub, possibly to accommodate the internal layer of molten rock which powers the volcanoes and allows the continental plates to move. Exactly how this molten state is maintained, and how the water that pours ceaselessly over the rim from the Circle Sea is replaced, are but two of the unfathomable mysteries of the world. A tenable theory is that the heat is generated by vast ma.s.ses of octiron under pressure. The octiron theory also accounts for the Disc's vast standing magical field.

Whatever the explanation, the fact is that the surface features of the Discworld uncannily mirror those of spherical rocky worlds, as though the Creator had seen one somewhere but had to go ahead without a chance to examine the works.

The continents certainly have moved around (possibly on wheels of some kind, if the molten rock theory is discounted). Discworld time is always a tricky thing to measure, but by inference it must have been several hundred million years ago that the supercontinent of Pangola was struck by a giant meteorite, which may have killed off those lifeforms not equipped by a neglectful Nature to survive impact with flaming rock travelling at several thousand miles a second, and also instigated the break-up which led eventually to the Discworld of today.

Inspection of residual magic in deep sea rocks and very old trolls suggests that it was also around this time that the Discworld first changed its direction of spin, a phenomenon that appears to occur every hundred thousand years or so, possibly for the comfort of the elephants.

About one hundred million years before the present day, in the period described by the wizard and geologist BORa.s.s as the Bora.s.sic era, the proto-continent had clearly split into two vast land ma.s.ses Howondaland (named after the continent where his researches were largely carried out) and Lauragatea (partly named after the empire that occupies much of the Counterweight Continent, and partly after his mother). A generally confused banging-about as the spin direction changed raised most of the mountain ranges visible today.

It was the second, smaller continent of Lauragatea which, some thirty million years before the present, lost the even smaller and deeply mysterious continent known only as x.x.xX, which wandered off by itself (according to Bora.s.s) in search of the geographical equivalent of a cool drink.

Of course, it is only a theory. The truth might be stranger (see, for example, ELEPHANT, the Fifth).

Of course, none of this explains the sheer beauty of the whole thing . . .

Viewers from s.p.a.ce can appreciate in full the Discworld's vast, 30,000-mile circ.u.mference, garlanded by the long Rimfall, where the seas of the Disc drop endlessly into s.p.a.ce. It gives the impression, with its continents, archipelagos, seas, deserts, mountain ranges, that the Creator designed it specifically to be looked at from above.

The Disc revolves at a rate of about once every 800 days. This means that, except at the Hub, a full astronomical year contains eight seasons, or two each of the cla.s.sical four (see CALENDARS).

Its tiny orbiting sunlet, with prominences no bigger than croquet hoops, maintains a fixed elliptical orbit, while the Disc revolves beneath it. The little moon shines by its own light, owing to the cramped and rather inefficient astronomical arrangements.

The Hub, dominated by the spire of CORI CELESTI, is never closely warmed by the weak sun and the lands there are permanently locked in permafrost. The Rim, on the other hand, is a region of sunny islands and balmy days. From the RAMTOPS' highest peaks you can see all the way to the Rim Ocean that runs around the edge of the world, since the Discworld, being flat, has no horizon in the real sense of the word.

There appear to be at least four major continental ma.s.ses: The (unnamed) continent of which the STO PLAINS and the Ramtops are a major feature: this stretches all the way to the Hub and finishes, at least in the area of Ankh-Morpork, at the CIRCLE SEA. Less than half of it has been covered in the chronicles, and there must be far more land on the far side of the Ramtops. So far we know only of GENUA and some miscellaneous small countries.

KLATCH (the continent): this is detailed elsewhere, but here and now we might not be far wrong in thinking of Klatch as the Discworld's Africa, with a collection of 'Mediterranean' countries shading into the large, and more or less unexplored, plains of HERSHEBA and HOWONDALAND.

The COUNTERWEIGHT CONTINENT: smaller than either of the above, and occupied by an advanced civilisation.

'x.x.xX': the name as it appears on maps of the mysterious fourth continent, once reached by people from Ankh-Morpork, then lost, found again and, now, fully a part of Discworld and performing a valuable role in the supply of opera singers, bartenders, backpackers and so on.

There have been other continents, which have sunk, blown up or simply disappeared. This sort of thing happens all the time, even on the best regulated planets.

And there, below the mines and sea-ooze and fake fossil bones put there (most people believe) by a Creator with nothing better to do than upset archaeologists and give them silly ideas, is Great A'TUIN.

Chaotic as it sometimes appears, the Discworld clearly runs on a special set of natural laws, or at least on guidelines. There is gravity. There is cause-and-effect. There is eventuality things happen after other things. After that, it becomes a little more confusing. The following theory can be gingerly advanced: The Discworld should not exist. Flatness is not a natural state for a planet. Turtles should grow only so big. The fact that it does exist means that it occupies an area of s.p.a.ce where reality is extremely thin, where 'should be' no longer has the veto it has in the rest of the universe. The Discworld creates an extremely deep well in Reality in much the same way as an incontinent Black Hole creates a huge gravity well in the notorious rubber sheet of the universe.

The resulting tension seems to have created a permanent flux which, for want of a better word, we can call magic. There are several secondary effects, because the pressure of reality is so weak. Things that might nearly exist in a 'real' world back up there on the rubber sheet have no difficulty at all in existing in quite a natural state in the Discworld universe; so here there will be dragons, unicorns, sea serpents and so on. The rules are relaxed.

But there are additional factors which make up Discworld 'physics'. These could be called: a) Life force b) The Power of Metaphor and Belief c) Narrative Causality Life, it has been said, has a tendency to exist. It has even been argued that the Universe has been designed in order that this should happen, although of course it is hard for a life that does not exist to look around and declare that the Universe has clearly been designed not to come into being. Certainly on the Discworld life is a very common commodity. Whatever obstacles there are to life elsewhere are that much weaker on Discworld. Almost anything can be alive and develop, if not intelligence at least a point of view. Rocks, thunderstorms and even entire buildings can, in the right circ.u.mstances, demonstrate their literal vitality.

Then there is metaphor. On Discworld, metaphor has a disturbing tendency to take itself seriously. Death as a robed skeleton is not just a metaphor for the process of mortality; he really is a robed skeleton, with a rich existence of his own. On Discworld, belief is a potent force. What is believed in strongly enough is real. (Conversely, what is not believed can't be real regardless of the fact of its existence. For example, the dog GASPODE can talk. But most people cannot hear him when he does because they know, in their soul, that dogs do not talk. Any dog that appears to be talking, says their brain, is a statistical fluke and can therefore safely be ignored.) Discworld G.o.ds exist because people believe in them, and their power waxes and wanes with the strength of that belief. There is nothing very magical in this. After all, half the power of witches and wizards, too, for that matter lies in the fact that they advertise what they are. The pointy hats are a kind of power-dressing; they're no different from the white coats worn by any actor hawking washing powder. If people believe you can do magic you're halfway there already.

Finally, there is narrative causality, the power of stories. This is perhaps the strongest force of all and, again, weaker echoes of it are found in this world. Not for nothing do we say: History repeats. History does have patterns, cliches of time. People find themselves again and again in situations where they are playing roles as surely as if a script had been thrust into their hands: the Marital Row, the Job Interview, the Man Behind has Shunted You at the Traffic Lights, the b.a.s.t.a.r.d. And there are the bigger patterns: the rise of empires, the spread of civilisations . . . Again and again humans tread the same dance through life, and with each dance the path becomes deeper and harder to leave.

The sense of predestination permeates Discworld. History Monks observe history to make sure that it happens 'according to the book' (although now, thanks to the discovery of quantum uncertainty, it's hard to know which book). When a princess is saved by MORT, History itself conspires to kill her. The process is focused in Lily WEATHERWAX, who forces the lives of people into stories and also in DIOS, the high priest of DJELIBEYBI, who has been practising the same daily rituals for so long that he is incapable of dealing with anything new.

On Discworld, the future is written. The role of humans, thanks to b.l.o.o.d.y quantum, is to choose which book.

Disma.s.s, Old Mother. Also called Gammer Disma.s.s. Beryl Disma.s.s's clothes have the disarray of someone who, because of a detached retina in her second sight, lives in a variety of times all at once. [WS, WA, SALF]

Dis-Organiser, the. A little demon in a box which can be used to store information, appointments, record conversations and memos, etc. The more recent Mk 2 is advertised as the very latest in thaumaturgic design, although it is still guarded by an extremely carefully worded warranty.

The Mark V is known as the Gooseberry. It is now cased in a smart brown box, with a pointy-eared small green imp inside. The new version includes the handy-to-use Bluenose Integrated Messenger Service, the games of Splong and Guess My Weight in Pigs. iHum can remember up to 1500 of your all-time favourite tunes. [J, TT]

Djelibeybi. (The name means 'Child of the Djel', after the river which flows through this land.) Also called the Kingdom of the Sun and the Old Kingdom. Princ.i.p.al crops: melons, garlic and, since they are increasingly encroaching on the fertile agricultural land, pyramids.

Djelibeybi is two miles wide and 150 miles long and is on the CIRCLE SEA coast of KLATCH. Almost entirely underwater during the flood season and both threatened and protected on either side by stronger neighbours (TSORT and EPHEBE). It was once great, but all that now remains is an expensive palace, a few dusty ruins in the desert, and the pyramids. The entire economic life of the country is, until after the events of Pyramids, devoted to building them. As a result, Djelibeybi is permanently bankrupt.

The kingdom is 7,000 years old. In the Pyramid era, even the heat was old. The air was musty and lifeless, pressing like a vice. Time moved slowly in Djelibeybi, and even then only in circles.

And this was, once again, because of the pyramids. Pyramids slow down time and prevent decay, a fact known to ancient Egyptians and modern Southern Californians. So many had been built in the Old Kingdom, however, that their c.u.mulative effect was to act as a temporal brake of major proportions. In fact (again until events chronicled in Pyramids) the thousands of pyramids in the necropolis, a city of the dead occupying some of the kingdom's best land and second only to Ankh-Morpork as the biggest city on the Disc, were actually preventing time from moving at all. The pyramids were acting as time acc.u.mulators, sucking in fresh time as it occurred and, around sunset, flaring it off from their tips. As a result the kingdom spent thousands of years re-using the same day.

Please note that it was not the same as repeating the same day. People were born, grew and died (and, if they were important enough, they were placed in a pyramid). It was similar to the 'time' in DEATH'S domain. Plants grew and flowered. There was an ongoing history. But it took place, as it were, in the temporal equivalent of an unaired room the stale time could be detected in the kingdom's obsessive reverence for the past and its resistance to, or even ignorance of, the possibility of doing things differently. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same . . .

This impa.s.se was finally broken with the construction of the Great Pyramid, which put so much additional pressure on the local dimensions that the entire kingdom was temporarily removed from them.

The country has an enormous number of local G.o.ds, unknown to the world outside. Its ruler, the Pharaoh, is also a G.o.d, although in human form. He wears a gold mask (the Face of the Sun) and during his official functions carries the Flail of Mercy, the obsidian Reaping Hook of Justice, the Honeycomb of Increase, the Asp of Wisdom, the Sheaf of Plenty, the Gourd of the Water of the Heavens, the Three-p.r.o.nged Spear of the Waters of the Earth, the Cabbage of Vegetative Increase and the Scapula of Hygiene. He may well lose points for dropping any of these.

Under the current ruler, Queen PTRACI I, it is quite likely that the mask has been sold and the money spent on plumbing.

Dog Guild. No motto; no coat of arms, not even a little tartan one. Led by the Chief Barker. The Guild consists of dogs who have all been 'bad dogs'; every dog has to have run away from his or her owner. It controls scavenging rights, night-time barking duties, breeding permissions and howling rotas. [MAA]

Dolly. Kitchen girl at the Unseen University. [SM]

Dolly Sisters. Once a separate village in Ankh-Morpork, but the city sprawl had rolled over it. Residents still consider themselves apart from the rest of the city, with their own customs Dog t.u.r.d Monday, Up Needles All and almost their own language.

Dongo. Barman in a pub in DIJABRINGABEERALONG, x.x.xx. He is a crocodile, though he wears a grubby shirt and a pair of shorts. He's called 'Crocodile' Crocodile, because of the fact of him being a crocodile. [TLC]

Door, Bill. Name adopted by DEATH while temporarily alive and working for Miss FLITWORTH. [RM]

Doorkeeper, Brother. A member of the ELUCIDATED BRETHREN OF THE EBON NIGHT. A baker by trade. [GG]

Dopplepunkt, Sgt. One half (the largest half), with Cpl Knopf, of the Bad Blintz official Watch. [TAMAHER]

Dorfl. A GOLEM by species, and a butcher by trade until the events recounted in Feet of Clay caused him to look for a new life as a Watchman. He lurches a little, because one leg is shorter than the other, and like most golems he wears no clothes because he has nothing to conceal. His surface is mottled where fresh clay has been added over the years. Originally, some attempt had been made to depict human musculature, but the endless repairs have nearly obscured these. Dorfl in fact looks hand-made and, by now, those hands have mainly been his own. Incredibly strong, like all golems. And also the world's first ceramic atheist. The G.o.ds really hate that sort of thing. [SM, FOC ]

Downey, Lord. White-haired Master of the a.s.sa.s.sINS' GUILD. He is an amiable-looking man whose speciality is poison, in particular (it is believed) poisoned peppermints. He was a large and unpleasant bully when he was a student at the Guild.

Downspout. Constable in the Ankh-Morpork City WATCH. A gargoyle with huge pointy ears. Somewhat of a lonely soul, like all gargoyles, but an incredibly good officer on a stake-out. [FOC]

Dragon King of Arms. Manipulative vampiric head of the Ankh-Morpork Royal College of HERALDS. And we are not talking here about lah-di-dah modern vampires who wear ponytails, fancy waistcoats and agonise all the time about being forced to look cool and live for ever. We are talking about a vampire of the old school, where all the agonising is done by other people. We are talking a voice from the crypt and not going out in daylight, no, not even in stylish shades. [FOC]