G+ LoME Archive
Post CRUhdgwvahb
Александр Запрягаев, Ben Christel, Discussion

Ben Christel Jul 17, 2016 (18:46)

Suilad *ilphen - has anyone here done much research into the possibility of a muta cum liquida stress rule in Sindarin? I have seen it discussed elsewhere(^1) with no consensus reached, and I'm wondering if more recent publications contain more evidence for or against.

AFAICT, the strongest evidence against it is that Appendix E spells out the stress rules of "Eldarin" with no mention of muta cum liquida. The evidence for it is the handful of Sindarin words embedded in mostly-English verses that wouldn't scan properly without muta cum liquida... plus comparison to real-world languages, where it's close to a universal rule in languages that permit syllable-initial clusters(^2).

*ilphen = "everyone" c.f. http://eldamo.org/content/words/word-3266229707.html
1: http://archives.conlang.info/gho/bhelgho/gaulfhapoen.html
2: https://linguistlist.org/issues/8/8-647.html

Александр Запрягаев Jul 17, 2016 (19:45)

I don't believe that any of the wrongly stressed words in Sindarin (Nargothrond - what else?) would require for their stress explanation anything but the possibility of compounds to stress following the stresses of separate elements. Of course, there are some proper names in the Lays which stress their final syllable, but that is an apparent Englicization. The stress rules for Leeds Quenya were expressed in great detail in PE14, but no corresponding for Noldorin, if I remember well. Anyway, no grammars of Noldorin starting from the 1930s were published yet, so, in fact, the new information since PE13 is limited.

Ben Christel Jul 17, 2016 (21:02)

Imladris (Boromir's poem at the CoE) is another one from LotR. Also Menegroth from the Lay of Leithian, IIRC. Both of these could be explained by compound elements keeping their stress, though.

Александр Запрягаев Jul 29, 2016 (13:06)

+Ben Christel Well, NargoTHRond is not a muta cum liquida from the start :D And I think saying ImlAdris in Boromir's riddle actually improves the rhythm (it was not iambic, anyway). Unless there is Tolkien's recording of this? The Q corresponding Imbeláris PE22:127 seems to imply strongly that Tolkien spoke ImlAdris to me.

In any case, the stress in Noldorin/Sindarin still remains something of a mystery. Does it affect epenthetic vowels? I think not, and we should have DAgorlad — but it is never stated. When does the compound become fixed enough to shift the stress? And that overmystifying AnnÛn (once definitely, once possibly) — does the overlong vowel attract the stress? Do we have AmrÛn as well? Or even echUIr?