9yqLKQYLRwK — G+ LoME Archive

Tamas Ferencz Dec 13, 2016 (09:43)

Eldamo glosses the Quenya word to as an adverb meaning "as a rule" based on the Q sentence lairesse nihare to tarassi, yo unta hrívesse landannar in PE22:125; the sentence is translated by Tolkien as "In summer I live in the hills as a rule, and come down to the plains in the winter."
See http://eldamo.org/content/words/word-771384677.html

I don't think to means "as a rule"; I read it simply to be the superessive preposition "on, on the surface of"; see the rough list of prepositions in LVS 14 in PE22:168:
tŏ on, [???] above, on [???}

I think "as a rule" is not verbatim in the sentence but expressed by the tense and meaning of the verb har- "dwell, abide, reside (permanently)".

+Paul Strack

Eldamo : Quenya : to

ᴹQ. to adv. “as a rule”. Reference ✧ PE22/125.1901 ✧ “as a rule”. Element In. ⇒ ᴹQ. lairesse nihare to tarassi, yu unta hrívesse landannar “in the summer I live in the hills as a rule, and come down to the plains in the winter” ✧ PE22/125.1818.

Александр Запрягаев Dec 13, 2016 (10:35)

Indeed. 'As a rule' here sits in the definition of har as well as the aorist.

To must be a preposition because tarassi is at this stage already barely possible as a locative (number markers precede all). Tarass-i can only be an ACC plural for sg. taras(s) and thus requires a preposition unless transitive, which har does not give the impression of belonging to.

Paul Strack Dec 13, 2016 (20:44)

That all sounds probable to me. I usually can't spend a lot of time analyzing individual sentences when I am entering them, so there are plenty of mistakes like these in Eldamo.

I will make a note to fix this in the next version. Thanks for the correction.

Tamas Ferencz Dec 13, 2016 (21:36)

The fact (or rather possibility) of a mistake is a minor point, Paul, and I don't think there are plenty of such in Eldamo as you suggest. I am rather more thrilled by the fact that we now seem to have a very useful preposition available to us ☺️