IPA has a great advantage: it's universal. Basing the guide on English pronunciation can be OK as a rough guidance, but since there are dozens of ways English-speaking natives and non-natives pronounce their vowels and consonants this approach has its hazards I think. BTW, why did you put the stress on LA and MA in alatulya and amatúlie in your guide?
Do you mind if I give further comments here? I hope I don't come across as nitpicking... You give 'come here' as A tule sinome; I think sir, sira would be better here; sinome rather means 'in this place' IMHO.
English: Come near the fire Literal: Come by the fire Quenya: A tula náressë
I think there's a perfect preposition to express 'go near, go close to, go as far as' - this is tenna:
tenna (1) prep. "until, up to, as far as" (CO), "unto" (VT44:35-36), “to the point”, “right up to a point” (of time/place), “until”, “to the object, up to, to (reach), as far as” (VT49:22, 23, 24, PE17:187)
Wow, thank for the tips and corrections on the Quenya translations! I tried to get help making sure I didn't screw up terribly on Elfling, but didn't get much interest. I'm still learning/getting used to Quenya.
I definitely agree with you on IPA. I really prefer using it. But, at the same time, most people aren't familiar with it, so I wanted something that was intuitive but could still get most of the information across. This is something that is aimed at people who don't know the finer details of IPA... causal Tolkien language fans. Seeing as my page is in English, I figured that I might as well aim it more towards an English-speaking audience. If I ever get around to getting pages translated, then it'd be aimed for those languages' audiences, with different sounds highlighted.
Good point on Tenna-, I completely missed that! I still come at this from the POV of a Sindarin user.
What's the source for Sir(a)? I don't recall coming across that when I was doing research. I'd like ot learn more about it!
Almost forgot - alatulya the stress is on LA because the LY doesn't count as a double consonant in that it doesn't add any mora to the syllable before it, thus making it heavy. The pattern I've figured with Eldarin stress is that if the second to last syllable has more than one mora, then it receives stress instead of the 3rd from last syllable.
And amatúlie... that's just a mistake. Thanks for spotting it!
+Fiona Jallings Thanks for your reply. I do think that palatalized consonants (like ly, ny ) lengthen the syllable which they close, so atarinya would be pronouncd ataRINYa, alatulya as alaTULYa etc. aTARinya just does not sound right to my ears...
Some of my remarks regarding the sindarin phrases:
Nîdh! (It hurts!) Mi van me? (Where are we?) Abarad (After today)
Could you explain these?
Tolo anin naur (Come by the fire)
Why not just tolo na naur?
Tolo ar nin (Come with me)
ar is a conjunction, not a preposition (but you can simply say aphado nin "follow me", it's almost the same)
Gi nathlam hí (We welcome [familiar] you here)
You should use the * mark, since *nathla- is NA. Btw, where does it come from? I mean, from which root?
Odulen an edraith anlen (I came for saving for [reverential] you)
odulen and *anlen should be rather udulen and *allen. Although you can simply use le, cf. Fanuilos le linnathon in the hymn of Elbereth
Odulen an edraith angin (I came for saving for [familiar] you)
I think *angin should be rather *achin (if it comes from an + *cîn).
Boe de nestad (It is necessary to heal him or her)
Where does *de come from?
Gellon ned i galar i chent gîn ned i lelig (I delight when [familiar] your eyes shine when [familiar] you laugh)
gellon: hey, you cannot create new verbs just by putting a verbal ending to a noun. :) lelig: we have an attested verb for "laugh", it’s gladh- ned: as far as I know ned means "in", cf. ned Echuir in King’s Letter (ir on the other hand probably means "when") galar: it means "they grow" (but you can use thilia-, míria- or síla-) gîn: *cîn is NA, so you should use the * mark
Man agorel? (What did you do?), etc.
Where does the personal verbal ending *l come from? I’m pretty sure it’s NA, we have, on the other hand, -dh (ð) as a 2nd person (formal) verbal ending.
Ni *'lassui (I am glad)
I think the pronoun *ni (from nin?) is also NA, so you should also use the * mark.
uin edhel (I am not an Elf)
uin means "I do not", not "I am not"
Ollo vae Dream well
It’s rather oltho vae, isn’t it?
Btw, I have a similar collection of sindarin phrases on my website, though it’s in Hungarian. :)
I'll go from bottom up, because that's easier in this format.
+Xandarien Elanessa I'll have to include a link to the sound I guess. Same witht he French and German sounds too, I think.
+Lőrinczi Gábor Thank you! I've been trying to get critical eyes on this for a while, but no one has seemed interested.
I looked up the "Uin" thing, and yup, you are right. I don't know how I missed that. I'll have to go through and do a lot of editing to fix that blunder.
Ollo versus Oltho. Oltho is from Tolkien's Noldorin word lists, which means, if it needs to be normalized into Sindarin, it should be. In PE17, Tolkien explains the origins of intervocalic LL, one being LD, and the other being LT. In the case of LT, it became LTH, then LLH (long voiceless L) then LL in Central Sindarin. So, OLTAA becomes Olla- in Sindarin.
For the phrasebook proper I have a list of pronouns (I need to go through and add the reconstructed marks on them - I had them in red but forgot to change it when I went to a database) but for this short phrasebook that I made for others to put on their websites, yeah, I should mark the unattested pronouns too.
-l versus -dh for different dialects works on the principle that the Noldor borrowed into Sindarin their own 2nd person reverential pronoun. Tolkien explained this in PE17, page 26.
"De" is mutated "ten" the oblique pronoun for the 3rd person singular. I have a hypothesis that the -n causes nasal mutation on the verb following it, thus often ends with it being deleted entirely. (this way, Le/De aren't exceptions to the way Sindarin pronouns are otherwise structured). You can see my early thoughts on this here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/elfling/message/35825
"Achin" versus "angin" That's what I though for a while too, but when I read PE17, I found that Tolkien intended "an" to start out as "ANA". Initially causing vocalic mutation. Then the -A drops off, and the N starts to assimilate the place of articulation of the sounds following it. The beginning of Mixed Mutation, if you will. check out the ANA entry in PE17.
"Odulen" I took my cues here from http://www.phy.duke.edu/~trenk/elvish/sindarin_past_tense.html Even though they have different vowels in their ancient roots, (TUL vs NOR), I think that analogical leveling would occur in Sindarin, making for Odul and Onur, because they both have O's in them by the time Sindarin rolls around. Also, this little phrasebook is supposed to be for the Exilic Sindarin speakers, which is why throughout it I use lots of Quenya borrowings.
Nathla- is found in PE17 as well, page 141. the root mentioned is NATH.
Abarad is an attempted reconstruction of "tomorrow". Like it?
Ar seems to be both "with/alongside" and "and", but you are right, a better translation is "follow me".
Anin/nad either could work. Nad does have the specific "to a place" meaning, so it might be better that way.
I used K in place of C in the pronunciation guide. I guessed that people would figure that out pretty quick. I might have to put in a not about Gs though.
+Tamas Ferencz Look at the syllable structure. a.ta.ri.nya a.la.tu.lya In both cases, the second to last syllable doesn't have more than one mora. I follow Helge on the idea that LY and NY are most often syllable onset sounds, thus counted as 1 consonant, rather than two.
I used K in place of C in the pronunciation guide. I guessed that people would figure that out pretty quick. I might have to put in a not about Gs though.
I mean, you left out "C" from the "Notes on the Pronunciation Guide", e.g. "(C) is always pronounced K", or something like that.
Ollo versus Oltho. Oltho is from Tolkien's Noldorin word lists, which means, if it needs to be normalized into Sindarin, it should be. In PE17, Tolkien explains the origins of intervocalic LL, one being LD, and the other being LT. In the case of LT, it became LTH, then LLH (long voiceless L) then LL in Central Sindarin. So, OLTAA becomes Olla- in Sindarin.
There is only one problem. The consonant group lth in oltho (< ÓLOS) comes from ls, not from lt. ;)
-l versus -dh for different dialects works on the principle that the Noldor borrowed into Sindarin their own 2nd person reverential pronoun. Tolkien explained this in PE17, page 26.
Well, according to PE/17:26, de was indeed replaced with le, but it is not mentioned that the Noldor ever borrowed -l as a personal verbal ending. As far as I know it is only attested as a possessive suffix, cf. lammel in PE/17:46.
Gella- I didn't actually reconstruct this one, but I think it's solid. GYEL+TA.
Mea culpa. I thought you just added a personal verbal ending to the noun gell. :)
In page 144 of PE17, it is attested as úlal - "not laughing/serious".
Fair point.
So, "Ned i" basically means "during which" and "mi van" means "in where".
You know, it's funny, mi van (as a question) means "what’s up?" in Hungarian. :P
Btw, what’s the problem with ir? :)
"De" is mutated "ten" the oblique pronoun for the 3rd person singular.
Are you referring to ten from Ae Adar nín? As far as I know it is supposed to mean "it", not "him" or "her". I think it would be an eithad if you used the pronoun "it" as a substitute for a person. :)
"Achin" versus "angin" That's what I though for a while too, but when I read PE17, I found that Tolkien intended "an" to start out as "ANA".
Oh yes, you are right. I always forget this stupid new mutation system of an and na. :)
"Odulen" I took my cues here from http://www.phy.duke.edu/~trenk/elvish/sindarin_past_tense.html Even though they have different vowels in their ancient roots, (TUL vs NOR), I think that analogical leveling would occur in Sindarin, making for Odul and Onur, because they both have O's in them by the time Sindarin rolls around. Also, this little phrasebook is supposed to be for the Exilic Sindarin speakers, which is why throughout it I use lots of Quenya borrowings.
And tell me, how do you say "I came" in Quenya? ;)
Nathla- is found in PE17 as well, page 141. the root mentioned is NATH.
Well, there is a word nathlo, but it is a question whether it's an infinitive form of a verb *nathla- or rather a noun.
Nîdh is found in VT 46 page 4
It's true, but is was rejected by Tolkien.
Abarad is an attempted reconstruction of "tomorrow".
So, I guess it is from ab- + arad.
I usually use aur dolel (or *ordolel), lit. "coming day" for "tomorrow".
Nad does have the specific "to a place" meaning, so it might be better that way.
Speaking of the stress in alatulya, I agree with Tamas, since Tolkien himself said that the word ciryaquen (mariner) was stressed cirYAquen, so it seems that combinations like ly, ny, qu, etc. indeed lengthened the previous syllable.
Moreover, it is very clear from Tolkien's analysis of Galadriel's Lament in The Road Goes Ever On (2nd ed., pp.66,76) that all the palatals are treated as double consonants medially. Thus the stress is on the penult in both _hiruvAlye_ and CalacIrya.
Aha... you are right on the Quenya stress... Thanks for including a citation I could check out. Oh.... this is going to take so much editing...
+Lőrinczi Gábor First, how did you get the text to be bold like that? I'm still learning the ropes of Google+, and I don't know all of the tricks yet.
"Notes on the Pronunciation Guide" are notes on the pronunciation guide, not on Tolkien's orthography choices. The pronunciation guide is designed to be the same for all of the languages. If people want to learn about the pronunciation themselves, they'd go to the pages describing the pronunciation in detail.
OLOS - I don't know. In Sindarin there is ôl and evidence for an ancient OLO precursor, but I don't know if the S survived in the Telerin branch.
On -dh vs -l... Exactly. The possessive suffixes eerily echo the verbal suffixes, and there is the use of lîn… making me think that they used L as the basis for the polite “you”, replacing entirely the D-root of Sindarin.
‘I came’ in Quenya is “Tullen”, unless you were referring to the perfective, “utúlien”. I see your point. They’d still know that the root is TUL not TOL.
Nathlo… well, it’s rather rare for Sindarin nouns to end up with a vowel at the end, isn’t it? And, there’s the much more typical of Sindarin “Nathal” also listed. And that it has the verb “to be kind to” listed directly after it… it seemed like a safe assumption to make.
How do we know that Nîdh was rejected?
Actually, for “coming day” I think Tolor/Tolarad might be better. Tolkien did note that I-verbs can be present participles (and nouns?) without any affixes added to them, and they can be put on the beginnings of words... but what you propose is certainly plausible too.
Na(d), it’s in the same entry with ANA and “na” and “nan”. It says, “nat-, nad-, towards place. na-chaered.”
Again, thank you so much for doing this. I’m having a lot of fun discussing Elven languages seriously with people, something that I end up starved for in RL. Also, you guys are being insanely helpful with your suggestions and pointing out little errors and things that I missed. It’s been too long since someone’s turned a critical eye to my translation work or my little Neo-Elvish hypotheses.
Oh, I forgot "ten". My thoughts on this is that Tolkien decided later on that in Sindarin the S-roots were used in demonstratives (thus Hain echant and Si - though Tolkien kept having second guesses on the later), which makes Ten a general 3rd person singular word. Aren't there also a few examples of "tîn" being used for persons too? (bess dîn is the example I can think of at the moment).
+Fiona Jallings there are currently 3 simple markup possibilities to make text bold etc. in G+:
* asterisks around text (without the spaces) make it bold * bold text _ underscores around text make it italic _ italic text - dashes around text makes it strikethrough - strikethrough text
These work across several lines, too, provided you don't leave more than one space between sentences.
On *ten: as Bill Welden points out in VT 44:25, den in caro den i innas lin can very well be a plural form, used as an indefinite pronoun like "they" or "people" in English ("may they/people do thy will" = "thy will be done"). This also chimes with the use of the plural estathar as an impersonal form in the King's Letter.
OLOS - I don't know. In Sindarin there is ôl and evidence for an ancient OLO precursor, but I don't know if the S survived in the Telerin branch.
Well, I have checked oltha- in Salo's book (GtS) and he gives its etymology as S oltha- < OS *olsa- < CE *olosa- < ÓL-OS.
On -dh vs -l... Exactly. The possessive suffixes eerily echo the verbal suffixes, and there is the use of lîn… making me think that they used L as the basis for the polite “you”, replacing entirely the D-root of Sindarin.
Yes, they may have used it, but there is no evidence, so it is still NA as a verbal ending. :)
How do we know that Nîdh was rejected?
According to VT/46:4, it was listed in a deleted entry.
To be continued... :) (I don't have PE/17 with me at this moment.)
Tamas Ferencz Jan 23, 2013 (09:50)
BTW, why did you put the stress on LA and MA in alatulya and amatúlie in your guide?
Tamas Ferencz Jan 23, 2013 (10:28)
You give 'come here' as A tule sinome; I think sir, sira would be better here; sinome rather means 'in this place' IMHO.
Tamas Ferencz Jan 23, 2013 (10:43)
Literal: Come by the fire
Quenya: A tula náressë
I think there's a perfect preposition to express 'go near, go close to, go as far as' - this is tenna:
tenna (1) prep. "until, up to, as far as" (CO), "unto" (VT44:35-36), “to the point”, “right up to a point” (of time/place), “until”, “to the object, up to, to (reach), as far as” (VT49:22, 23, 24, PE17:187)
Fiona Jallings Jan 24, 2013 (00:15)
I definitely agree with you on IPA. I really prefer using it. But, at the same time, most people aren't familiar with it, so I wanted something that was intuitive but could still get most of the information across. This is something that is aimed at people who don't know the finer details of IPA... causal Tolkien language fans. Seeing as my page is in English, I figured that I might as well aim it more towards an English-speaking audience. If I ever get around to getting pages translated, then it'd be aimed for those languages' audiences, with different sounds highlighted.
Good point on Tenna-, I completely missed that! I still come at this from the POV of a Sindarin user.
What's the source for Sir(a)? I don't recall coming across that when I was doing research. I'd like ot learn more about it!
Fiona Jallings Jan 24, 2013 (00:27)
And amatúlie... that's just a mistake. Thanks for spotting it!
Tamas Ferencz Jan 24, 2013 (09:43)
_sir(a)_ is the old allative of the particle si-, source is VT48:
sir (2), also sira, adv. “hither” (primitive ¤sida, ¤sidā) (VT49:18) [HKF's wordlist]
Tamas Ferencz Jan 24, 2013 (13:38)
Thanks for your reply. I do think that palatalized consonants (like ly, ny ) lengthen the syllable which they close, so atarinya would be pronouncd ataRINYa, alatulya as alaTULYa etc. aTARinya just does not sound right to my ears...
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 24, 2013 (16:05)
Some of my remarks regarding the sindarin phrases:
Nîdh! (It hurts!)
Mi van me? (Where are we?)
Abarad (After today)
Could you explain these?
Tolo anin naur (Come by the fire)
Why not just tolo na naur?
Tolo ar nin (Come with me)
ar is a conjunction, not a preposition (but you can simply say aphado nin "follow me", it's almost the same)
Gi nathlam hí (We welcome [familiar] you here)
You should use the * mark, since *nathla- is NA. Btw, where does it come from? I mean, from which root?
Odulen an edraith anlen (I came for saving for [reverential] you)
odulen and *anlen should be rather udulen and *allen. Although you can simply use le, cf. Fanuilos le linnathon in the hymn of Elbereth
Odulen an edraith angin (I came for saving for [familiar] you)
I think *angin should be rather *achin (if it comes from an + *cîn).
Boe de nestad (It is necessary to heal him or her)
Where does *de come from?
Gellon ned i galar i chent gîn ned i lelig (I delight when [familiar] your eyes shine when [familiar] you laugh)
gellon: hey, you cannot create new verbs just by putting a verbal ending to a noun. :)
lelig: we have an attested verb for "laugh", it’s gladh-
ned: as far as I know ned means "in", cf. ned Echuir in King’s Letter (ir on the other hand probably means "when")
galar: it means "they grow" (but you can use thilia-, míria- or síla-)
gîn: *cîn is NA, so you should use the * mark
Man agorel? (What did you do?), etc.
Where does the personal verbal ending *
lcome from? I’m pretty sure it’s NA, we have, on the other hand,-dh(ð) as a 2nd person (formal) verbal ending.Ni *'lassui (I am glad)
I think the pronoun *ni (from nin?) is also NA, so you should also use the * mark.
uin edhel (I am not an Elf)
uin means "I do not", not "I am not"
Ollo vae Dream well
It’s rather oltho vae, isn’t it?
Btw, I have a similar collection of sindarin phrases on my website, though it’s in Hungarian. :)
http://parf-en-ereglass.hu/phrases.html
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 24, 2013 (16:13)
Oh yes, and you left out "C" from your pronunciation guide. ;)
Tamas Ferencz Jan 24, 2013 (16:42)
uin edhel (I am not an Elf)
uin means "I do not", not "I am not"
"I don't do Elf" - probably said by an eldophobic Dwarf:)
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 24, 2013 (17:12)
Jenna Carpenter Jan 24, 2013 (18:27)
Fiona Jallings Jan 24, 2013 (19:50)
+Xandarien Elanessa I'll have to include a link to the sound I guess. Same witht he French and German sounds too, I think.
+Lőrinczi Gábor Thank you! I've been trying to get critical eyes on this for a while, but no one has seemed interested.
I looked up the "Uin" thing, and yup, you are right. I don't know how I missed that. I'll have to go through and do a lot of editing to fix that blunder.
Ollo versus Oltho. Oltho is from Tolkien's Noldorin word lists, which means, if it needs to be normalized into Sindarin, it should be. In PE17, Tolkien explains the origins of intervocalic LL, one being LD, and the other being LT. In the case of LT, it became LTH, then LLH (long voiceless L) then LL in Central Sindarin. So, OLTAA becomes Olla- in Sindarin.
For the phrasebook proper I have a list of pronouns (I need to go through and add the reconstructed marks on them - I had them in red but forgot to change it when I went to a database) but for this short phrasebook that I made for others to put on their websites, yeah, I should mark the unattested pronouns too.
-l versus -dh for different dialects works on the principle that the Noldor borrowed into Sindarin their own 2nd person reverential pronoun. Tolkien explained this in PE17, page 26.
Gella- I didn't actually reconstruct this one, but I think it's solid. GYEL+TA.
For more information on NA words I use, you'll find them here: http://www.realelvish.net/reconstructed_sindarin.php
We also have Lal- a borrowing from Quenya Lala-. In page 144 of PE17, it is attested as úlal - "not laughing/serious".
Galar... whoops. It should be Gelir. I'd prefer a word related to glîn, but I'll take what I can get.
"Ned i" and "mi van" - I wrote about this on Elfling http://groups.yahoo.com/group/elfling/message/36088 and in my textbook http://your-sindarin-textbook.realelvish.net/index.php?id=34 So, "Ned i" basically means "during which" and "mi van" means "in where".
"De" is mutated "ten" the oblique pronoun for the 3rd person singular. I have a hypothesis that the -n causes nasal mutation on the verb following it, thus often ends with it being deleted entirely. (this way, Le/De aren't exceptions to the way Sindarin pronouns are otherwise structured). You can see my early thoughts on this here: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/elfling/message/35825
"Achin" versus "angin" That's what I though for a while too, but when I read PE17, I found that Tolkien intended "an" to start out as "ANA". Initially causing vocalic mutation. Then the -A drops off, and the N starts to assimilate the place of articulation of the sounds following it. The beginning of Mixed Mutation, if you will. check out the ANA entry in PE17.
"Odulen" I took my cues here from http://www.phy.duke.edu/~trenk/elvish/sindarin_past_tense.html Even though they have different vowels in their ancient roots, (TUL vs NOR), I think that analogical leveling would occur in Sindarin, making for Odul and Onur, because they both have O's in them by the time Sindarin rolls around. Also, this little phrasebook is supposed to be for the Exilic Sindarin speakers, which is why throughout it I use lots of Quenya borrowings.
Nathla- is found in PE17 as well, page 141. the root mentioned is NATH.
Nîdh is found in VT 46 page 4, and it's mentioned in this article: http://www.phy.duke.edu/~trenk/elvish/verbs.html
Abarad is an attempted reconstruction of "tomorrow". Like it?
Ar seems to be both "with/alongside" and "and", but you are right, a better translation is "follow me".
Anin/nad either could work. Nad does have the specific "to a place" meaning, so it might be better that way.
I used K in place of C in the pronunciation guide. I guessed that people would figure that out pretty quick. I might have to put in a not about Gs though.
+Tamas Ferencz Look at the syllable structure. a.ta.ri.nya a.la.tu.lya In both cases, the second to last syllable doesn't have more than one mora. I follow Helge on the idea that LY and NY are most often syllable onset sounds, thus counted as 1 consonant, rather than two.
Fiona Jallings Jan 24, 2013 (19:51)
Fiona Jallings Jan 24, 2013 (20:13)
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 26, 2013 (03:50)
I used K in place of C in the pronunciation guide. I guessed that people would figure that out pretty quick. I might have to put in a not about Gs though.
I mean, you left out "C" from the "Notes on the Pronunciation Guide", e.g. "(C) is always pronounced K", or something like that.
Ollo versus Oltho. Oltho is from Tolkien's Noldorin word lists, which means, if it needs to be normalized into Sindarin, it should be. In PE17, Tolkien explains the origins of intervocalic LL, one being LD, and the other being LT. In the case of LT, it became LTH, then LLH (long voiceless L) then LL in Central Sindarin. So, OLTAA becomes Olla- in Sindarin.
There is only one problem. The consonant group lth in oltho (< ÓLOS) comes from ls, not from lt. ;)
-l versus -dh for different dialects works on the principle that the Noldor borrowed into Sindarin their own 2nd person reverential pronoun. Tolkien explained this in PE17, page 26.
Well, according to PE/17:26, de was indeed replaced with le, but it is not mentioned that the Noldor ever borrowed -l as a personal verbal ending. As far as I know it is only attested as a possessive suffix, cf. lammel in PE/17:46.
Gella- I didn't actually reconstruct this one, but I think it's solid. GYEL+TA.
Mea culpa. I thought you just added a personal verbal ending to the noun gell. :)
In page 144 of PE17, it is attested as úlal - "not laughing/serious".
Fair point.
So, "Ned i" basically means "during which" and "mi van" means "in where".
You know, it's funny, mi van (as a question) means "what’s up?" in Hungarian. :P
Btw, what’s the problem with ir? :)
"De" is mutated "ten" the oblique pronoun for the 3rd person singular.
Are you referring to ten from Ae Adar nín? As far as I know it is supposed to mean "it", not "him" or "her". I think it would be an eithad if you used the pronoun "it" as a substitute for a person. :)
"Achin" versus "angin" That's what I though for a while too, but when I read PE17, I found that Tolkien intended "an" to start out as "ANA".
Oh yes, you are right. I always forget this stupid new mutation system of an and na. :)
"Odulen" I took my cues here from http://www.phy.duke.edu/~trenk/elvish/sindarin_past_tense.html Even though they have different vowels in their ancient roots, (TUL vs NOR), I think that analogical leveling would occur in Sindarin, making for Odul and Onur, because they both have O's in them by the time Sindarin rolls around. Also, this little phrasebook is supposed to be for the Exilic Sindarin speakers, which is why throughout it I use lots of Quenya borrowings.
And tell me, how do you say "I came" in Quenya? ;)
Nathla- is found in PE17 as well, page 141. the root mentioned is NATH.
Well, there is a word nathlo, but it is a question whether it's an infinitive form of a verb *nathla- or rather a noun.
Nîdh is found in VT 46 page 4
It's true, but is was rejected by Tolkien.
Abarad is an attempted reconstruction of "tomorrow".
So, I guess it is from ab- + arad.
I usually use aur dolel (or *ordolel), lit. "coming day" for "tomorrow".
Nad does have the specific "to a place" meaning, so it might be better that way.
nad???
Olga García Jan 28, 2013 (15:17)
Björn Fromén Jan 28, 2013 (16:44)
Fiona Jallings Jan 28, 2013 (20:50)
+Lőrinczi Gábor
First, how did you get the text to be bold like that? I'm still learning the ropes of Google+, and I don't know all of the tricks yet.
"Notes on the Pronunciation Guide" are notes on the pronunciation guide, not on Tolkien's orthography choices. The pronunciation guide is designed to be the same for all of the languages. If people want to learn about the pronunciation themselves, they'd go to the pages describing the pronunciation in detail.
OLOS - I don't know. In Sindarin there is ôl and evidence for an ancient OLO precursor, but I don't know if the S survived in the Telerin branch.
On -dh vs -l... Exactly. The possessive suffixes eerily echo the verbal suffixes, and there is the use of lîn… making me think that they used L as the basis for the polite “you”, replacing entirely the D-root of Sindarin.
‘I came’ in Quenya is “Tullen”, unless you were referring to the perfective, “utúlien”. I see your point. They’d still know that the root is TUL not TOL.
Nathlo… well, it’s rather rare for Sindarin nouns to end up with a vowel at the end, isn’t it? And, there’s the much more typical of Sindarin “Nathal” also listed. And that it has the verb “to be kind to” listed directly after it… it seemed like a safe assumption to make.
How do we know that Nîdh was rejected?
Actually, for “coming day” I think Tolor/Tolarad might be better. Tolkien did note that I-verbs can be present participles (and nouns?) without any affixes added to them, and they can be put on the beginnings of words... but what you propose is certainly plausible too.
Na(d), it’s in the same entry with ANA and “na” and “nan”. It says, “nat-, nad-, towards place. na-chaered.”
Again, thank you so much for doing this. I’m having a lot of fun discussing Elven languages seriously with people, something that I end up starved for in RL. Also, you guys are being insanely helpful with your suggestions and pointing out little errors and things that I missed. It’s been too long since someone’s turned a critical eye to my translation work or my little Neo-Elvish hypotheses.
Fiona Jallings Jan 28, 2013 (23:42)
It's a pet hypothesis of mine.
Fiona Jallings Jan 29, 2013 (06:59)
Tamas Ferencz Jan 29, 2013 (11:25)
* asterisks around text (without the spaces) make it bold * bold text
_ underscores around text make it italic _ italic text
- dashes around text makes it strikethrough -
strikethrough textThese work across several lines, too, provided you don't leave more than one space between sentences.
Björn Fromén Jan 29, 2013 (16:53)
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 30, 2013 (17:43)
OLOS - I don't know. In Sindarin there is ôl and evidence for an ancient OLO precursor, but I don't know if the S survived in the Telerin branch.
Well, I have checked oltha- in Salo's book (GtS) and he gives its etymology as S oltha- < OS *olsa- < CE *olosa- < ÓL-OS.
On -dh vs -l... Exactly. The possessive suffixes eerily echo the verbal suffixes, and there is the use of lîn… making me think that they used L as the basis for the polite “you”, replacing entirely the D-root of Sindarin.
Yes, they may have used it, but there is no evidence, so it is still NA as a verbal ending. :)
How do we know that Nîdh was rejected?
According to VT/46:4, it was listed in a deleted entry.
To be continued... :) (I don't have PE/17 with me at this moment.)
Lőrinczi Gábor Jan 30, 2013 (22:18)
Nathlo… well, it’s rather rare for Sindarin nouns to end up with a vowel at the end, isn’t it?
Indeed, but it could be an archaic form, cf. etlō (> edlon) or oϸlō on the same page.
Actually, for “coming day” I think Tolor/Tolarad might be better.
Maybe, but neither of them are tuneful enough (at least to my ears). :) Of course it's your choice, after all it's your phrasebook. ;)
Na(d), it’s in the same entry with ANA and “na” and “nan”. It says, “nat-, nad-, towards place. na-chaered.”
Erm, did you see the note under this entry? :) It was rejected.
Fiona Jallings Jan 30, 2013 (22:28)
Fiona Jallings Feb 01, 2013 (22:32)
Tamas Ferencz Feb 01, 2013 (22:34)
Fiona Jallings Feb 01, 2013 (22:35)