Archaeology
In Canterlot’s gardens, there is a fountain.
It is three metres tall and consists of three layers built entirely out of marble.
One of the towers’ moon-shaped tips is visible past the hedges. The ornate topiary is a much brighter green near the window that allows this view, and the parts that are brighter obscure the standard of the sun alongside it.
The first layer is decorated primarily by transcriptions of Xenophone’s descriptions of Luna on the east-facing hemicircle and Understudy Florican’s descriptions of Celestia facing the west. The former is in Ancient Ipparionic and the latter is in Classical Tarbian, and so the latter’s vowels can only be guessed at and have been correctly, though with a minor exception: the word for ‘carrying’ is transliterated as ‘burdened by’.
This is no fault of the transliterator: the tradition was to train the occupation’s teachers in the Misresephian dialect, not the classical, and while they were once homophones the meaning of the words have since changed.
The description of the wings is phonetic. There is a slight shift here—a little barb of a quill juts out, too small to be seen, though a foal once cut herself brushing past it—and it turns somewhat smoother and loopier. It turns back to transliteration at the horn.
The Ipparionic is perfect and unremarkable.
Its marble is unpolished, but there is no grime. Some moss has grown, but only around the edges of the east side, obscuring very little of interest but a dialogue on subjective morality. There is a very slight glow, mainly visible to pegasi looking closely, where the writing meets the moss. A studious unicorn looking closely would find that the passages are meant to glow when read, but would then criticise the piece’s enchanters for not generating Chariotkov radiation with an isotope possessing a shorter half-life.
A more studious unicorn would blame the text’s reader for being too loud.
Across its entire frame there are cracks. They go snaking from the west and stop just where the moss grows; the very tip of the furthest crack heralds beginning of the densest crop. The grass is not interrupted by this process, although a slight bit of cracked earth along the fountain’s rim refuses to be watered.
The second layer, held above the clear water by a single wide pole, is similarly ornamented. A single bit of it is missing: it is lying on the grass next to the fountain and the gap it creates lets a far greater amount of water cascade down it at once, in conjunction with the third layer’s similar defect.
The piece in the grass to the west is mostly charred and unintelligible, but what of it that can read can—and is, printed on a little bit of brass nearby half-buried in the grass like a tombstone—be translated from the Tarbian:
and the pink of her eyes betrays something other than benevolence but a deeply smiling intelligence
A small bloodstain lies wet on its side, covering a few more words, and it has for the last thousand years. Princess Celestia often jokes with her sister that she will use it if she ever needs a transfusion, and Luna glares at her for this every time. The piece from the upper layer is completely disintegrated.
The upper layer’s tip is rimmed with pure gold. The bit of marble jutting out of it and producing the ephemeral water from its tip is aluminium-plated. It is overcompensating slightly for the hole in an attempt to make up for unoccupied space, but its enchantment is holding admirably.
The fountain averages twenty visitors a month. There is a general uneasiness amongst its visitors, and they often leave quickly. It is not a very popular tourist spot, though certain Ashamites will include it in their pilgrimage; on Hajj, about a hundred or two hundred will pay their respects here.
The Royal Guard, unlike with the fountain, is very careful with their guard of the blood-smeared fragment. There is usually one standing under the shade provided by the topiary. He has developed a certain uneasiness about it, but he often notes aloud—presumably to himself—that the duty is short and pays extra.
He knows a little Otteroin; this is because, as he will tell anybody that looks at it for a while, there is an inscription in the language in a little rectangle in the middle of the middle layer, and he will gladly translate it for a visitor who looks too long:
The foundation of this great fountain laid by Otteroin unicorns, inscribed by the descendants of their originators of both West and East and presented to the goddess Celestia by the Otteroin ambassador in lieu of Emperor Florican (and here he will pause to note that this isn’t the same Florican who first wrote the western inscription) the courageous, the mighty, under the grace of Her will, in commemoration of the taking of rightful place at the head of one of the greatest bastions of the pony nation.
He will note that somepony has before tried to use his tendency to explicate this before so as to make a run for the stone, but he turned and ran just as he got past the embedded translation. He will shrug, pause to take a deep breath and return to his duties.
To its south, facing the opening in the topiary where most visitors enter, there is a steel plaque on a pedestal. It is leafed in gold and has four words on it at the top, two of which are names. Celestia would have preferred it to be five, but she did not commission the plaque. There are a few other words, as well.
They're simple ones.
They tell the fountain’s story for anyone too busy to look at it.
Alternative title: what happens when Amit tries to describe scenery.
I actually was reading some guy's art tumblr when I saw a phrase that intrigued me, and which I will paraphrase: just a pointless doodle. The guy on the left is unimportant and has no name.
This made me started wondering what it would be like if I wrote like people drew; this is the result. I didn't start with the notion of telling my headcanon of Equestria's post-Hearth's Warming political history by describing a fountain in Canterlot, I swear. 
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This sort of threw me.
Otherwise another lovely and while faintly disturbing, fascinating piece. I'd like to see more of these if you'd be so inclined. *curtsies*
Huh. Interesting!
I wondered by partially because the title reminded me of the Brundisium Fountain
2149994
Fixed. Thank you.
2150126
Nice try, Brinnisi tourism board.
This is what happens when good authors get bored, huh?
But aren't Wanderer D who just gets drunk....
... Trying to figure out why I got a notification for this when I don't even follow you ...
2150673
I'm just that good, I suppose.
"Celestia pwned Luna here"? And the fifth word is 'regrettably'?
Writing as doodling. Interesting. I should probably try this sometime, especially since I seem to be roughly as sparse as you when it comes to describing scenery. ("THEY WERE IN A CASTLE. IT WAS BIG. [nine pages of dialogue.]")
I quite like the subtle hints of backstory placed throughout this piece. Love the final line three paragraphs especially, and the tiny, revealing joke from Celestia to Luna. Some of the lines in this story do an impressive amount of heavy lifting.
I'm going to second the request that you give us more insight and detail about your version of Equestria's political history. I realize that by asking you to talk about political history I am probably being an enabler. This is intentional.
2151065
I'm stuck between Here Celestia banished Nightmare Moon and Here Celestia banished her sister; it's a good thing ambiguity lets me be both lazy and indecisive.
2151072
I actually meant to do this somewhat with Dawn, but I'm not sure if I'll ever finish that; not enough interest (it probably has less upvotes than this, even) and holy shit that's a mammoth task I'm not equipped for.
Ipparionic and Tarbian. Oh you.
It is rather like a picture. Everyone looking at it will find different details that stand out to them alone (and everyone else who thinks in a similar way, but let's not let a little thing like objective reality get in the way of appreciating our pretties hm?) and dare I say be somewhat moved by the experience. Like the best art, it hints rather than making explicit, being suggestive rather than proscriptive.
And that little touch about the homophones? I– I'll be in my bunk.
Incidentally the wife says that this is how one should describe scenery. You've impressed her.
2151405
This is actually inspired by the Egyptian minimal pairs [ˈʃæjlæ] and [ˈʃeːlæ] (shahylah and shelah), 'carrying' and 'burden'; hence 'Misresephian', a bit of a mix between Egypt's modern Arabic name, meaning something along the lines of 'country', and Reseph, the ancient Egyptian god of horses and chariots (by analogy of the etymology of Egypt's English name, ḥwt-k-ptḥ: house of Ptah).
Even though I call this a doodle, I think I spent like five hours on it; I'm slow in the head.
Really? It seems rather cumbersome to do that when it isn't the focus.
2151564 I think she meant when it was the focus.
Sometimes I can't tell what she means at all.
Oh! I get it! Because a picture's worth a thousand words, and you literally used a thousand (and fifteen more) words to describe it! Oh Amit, you cheeky little bugger
But seriously, though, that was some form of enlightening.
2152534
I actually intended to leave it around eight-hundred-eighty-eight words, but FIMFiction's word limits are racist and force me to adhere to the principles of Western culture.
One of the aesthetic ideals in my stories is that I want to find the most mundane scenarios I can think of and still make an interesting story out of it. Then you come and beat all my attempts by somhow crafting an entire story around a friggin fountain!
Your longest paragraph is six lines, and it is the paragraph that contains the guard's transliteration of the fragment. Your next longest paragraph is five lines. Most of the rest are three. Two are four.
Your shortest paragraph is four words.
I like it. Brevity can be impactful.
I got here from reading Gardez's fic about a cloud fort.
There's always something interesting in describing objects and places. I guess the exotic names sort of flew over my head, since some other comments make them out to be some sort of reference.
also hey Amit
Contextually interesting that it obscures something about subjective morality on the east side...
I know there's a missing word in there somewhere. I forget where, though.
2538967 I wouldn't be at all surprised if some of the exotic stuff is referenced here, and nowhere else, ever.
2538967
They're almost all just ponified or calqued translations of actual names. Understudy Florican, for example, is the literal translation of the name of Caliph Uthman, the man who compiled and wrote the Quran; Xenophon wrote the Cyropaedia, a study on the education of a perfect ruler.
2539256
So symbolic, amirite?
Well, Machiavelli was inspired by the Cyropaedia and I'm pretty sure a great deal of work has referenced the Quran, so.
2151142
I think I prefer Here Celestia Destroyed Luna. The writers of the time probably weren't too clear on the specifics of what happened to Nightmare Moon. To them, she was there, she and Celestia fought, and then she was gone.
this was a delightful read, though i'm not sure it's label as a description of scenery is quite accurate. this is much more about meaning and importance left in words inscribed on something and their meaning thereof than it is about the thing itself. it makes the object immensely more interesting, and i imagine an attempt to impart any meaningful emotion purely from describing what something looked like in a mundane fashion would be almost impossible... but that's not to say it wouldn't be interesting to see an attempt.
i feel you leaned a little too heavily on modifiers in parts, where the physical description without embellishment would have accomplished the same thing. i also think the unexplained referential headcanon is a bit distracting, though it's what gives the piece its charm. maybe we can just assume there is depth where we do not have grasp of understanding, and be all the better for playing along.
you should also probably just indent or line-separate your paragraphs, not both.
written in february... are we going to see any stories amidst the snarky blogposts in the future, Amit?
2734781
Fimfiction's word limit makes fools of us all; the entire reason that there's a spoken sequence at all is to appease it. I've shaved what microcruft I could see on a single pass, but there wouldn't actually be anything related to the thing's backstory if there wasn't one.
No clue. I've been working on a book - getting feedback is hard enough with pony, but this? murder - and I can't really think of any good fic ideas I'm good enough to write. There's was the April chapter of Getting Laid, of course, and I suppose that's a 2deep4u as per usual, but that took a few months to write so I don't think it counts.
I think the thing I found most interesting about this piece was the author's note—which is not a knock on the rest of it, mind. But I felt the single best line in this story, by far, was:
It has a quality that immediately brought the late Iain Banks to mind, and in a work of description I find it much more powerful than the rest. So to see that the author's note makes mention of such a similar line elsewhere, in a substantially different context? That very much took me by surprise.
In any case, this is excellent. I love it.
It's one of those stories that remind me I should slow down my reading. It's brilliant.
...But what's with the Scootaloo tag?
3779664
3784942 holy cow that's a brilliant example of telling a story with more than words!
Fountains of blood
I enjoyed this a lot more than I thought, for reasons I can't quite grasp. I think it might have something to do with the story caring to explain the hidden detail behind something people would otherwise not give a second thought, which is something I always love in a story.
The phrase
made me crack a huge grin the instant I saw it. It's probably a lot to do with the irony of the phase, but there's also a section of my brain that swears up and down it's seen similar remarks on the unremarkability of certain subjects in actual history texts.
Some real nice scenery porn here.
Fascinating glimpse at so much history in just one object and its surroundings. I'm glad I finally read this.