“Deshi Basara” The Dark Knight Rises Chant: What Does It Mean?

After watching The Dark Knight Rises, or even after watching its trailer, you may be left wondering the meaning behind the chant repeated throughout.

TDKR’s score was the work of famed composer Hans Zimmer. Asked by MTV News about the chant, Zimmer said it’s villain Bane’s theme: “It really came from the script. I was reading the script and I kept saying to Chris [Nolan], ‘I think we need to have something primeval, what about a chant?’ and he sent me over two words, ‘Deshi Basara’ and nobody’s worked out the language yet so that’s our last secret, but it’s a legitimate language and it means: Rise up.”

As Zimmer admits, Nolan was incorrect about the language. “Deshi Basara” appear to be (Moroccan) Arabic for either “He Rises” or “Rise Up” depending on which translation you believe. Least, it’s not just “Rise” as translated by the trailer.

Zimmer expounds how he made the chant, crowdsourcing from thousands of strangers: ”…[the chant] really become foundation for [Bane’s theme] and then a little problem was ‘I think it should be hundreds of thousands of people,’ and when you’re in the middle of keeping things private and a little secretive it’s a little difficult to find a hundred thousand of your closest friends who are going to keep their mouths shut. I started out with 11 of my friends and then we went to the Internet.”

MTV News adds that UJAM.com facilitated contributions to the chant. The UJAM page gives a phonetic chant: “Deh-Shay Deh-Shay Bah-Sah-Rah.” Thousands of contributors from “107 countries” took part.

Zimmer continues on Collider.com: “The chant became a very complicated thing because I wanted hundreds of thousands of voices, and it’s not so easy to get hundreds of thousands of voices. So, we Twittered and we posted on the internet, for people who wanted to be part of it. It seemed like an interesting thing. We’ve created this world, over these last two movies, and somehow I think the audience and the fans have been part of this world. We do keep them in mind. And I thought it would be something nice, if our audiences could actually be part of the making of the movie and be participants in this. So, we’ve got this website up, UJAM where you can go on and be part of it. It was fantastic.”