Comments by Gilruin

These are the 10 posts of 226 by Gilruin.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    The Vanity Fair Neo-Khuzdul Inscription

    Neo-Khuzdul in Angerthas Moria

    Article — February 10th, 2022

    The text on the right and left part of the doorframe, with the left part stopping after uzôiras · g... and the right picking up with ...gt ⋮ aisulna

    • ikhshisshu · milikt · ainagt ⋮ aisulna · uzôiras · ganâi · khazaddûmu: Sulna appears to be a derivation form the radical S·L·N, given in the form sulûn “to fall, descend swiftly”, the prefix ai could be related to the one we se in khazad ai-mênu “the Dwarves are upon you”. Khazaddûmu is the attested genitive of Khazad-dûm “Dwarrowdelf”, thus one could speculate that the whole phrase ai-sulna ... Khazaddûmu could mean “upon the fall of Moria”. Ikhshi is a Neo-Khuzdul word for “count”, Z·R·S is a Neo-radical for “tree”, which might be present in uzôiras.

    On the lozenge behind Disa, the writing on the sides opposing each other seems to be the same:

    • m · au · mazarb · maha(l?): Mazarb is attested as “records, documents”. Mahal is the Khuzdul name for Aulë, the creator of the Dwarves.
    • [ba?]yâ · khôzudu · dawô: Khôzudu appears to contain the radical Kh·Z·D “Dwarf”, the -u in the end could be intended as a genitive morpheme “of (the) Dwarves” like we see Khazad-dûm → Khazad-dûmu

    The door appears again in a trailer about Durin and Disa (Aug 25th), confirming the reading above.

    Neo-Khuzdul is different from Neo-Elvish in that it requires more additions to a smaller existing corpus to become usable. While for Neo-Elvish more source material is available, stricter rules for Neologism can be applied and are generally accepted amongst Neo-Eldarin scholars, then accepted or applied to Neo-Khuzdul.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    Names from Vanity Fair

    Neo-Sindarin and possibly some Mannish language

    Article — February 10th, 2022

    • Halbrand: possibly a compound of hall “exalted, lofty” + brand “steeple” or brand “towering”, likely a spin on the name Halbarad. Alternatively the first element might be hall “secret, hidden”.
    • Arondir: possibly a compound of arod “noble” + [n]dîr “man”
    • Bronwyn: Probably of Mannish origin, there is a Welsh name Bronwyn meaning “White Raven” or “White Breast”. If it is an Elvish name instead, it might be linked to the root √BOR(ON) “endure”.
    • Tirharad: The first element is probably √TIR “watch”, for the second, one would expect *sarad according to Sindarin's mutation rules, but I can't find any suitable derivation that would produce this word, so I'd assume that it is harad “south” without mutation, thus aiming for “South Watch”. The lack of mutation could be an early instance of ch (the expected mutation for h) weakening to h in Mannish usage.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    Date of the First Teaser

    A Neo-Sindarin translation in the mode of Beleriand

    Announcement Video — February 7th, 2022

    paenelui en Nínui “thriteenth of the Watery”

    • *paenelui “thirteenth” ← *paenel “thirteen” + -ui “adjective suffix” (cf. nel(edh) “three” → nelui “third”). Paenel itself is derived from pae “ten” + nel(edh) “three” according to the pattern seen in Q. quainel “thirteen”.
    • en Nínui “of the Watery” with the genitive preposition en “of [the]”. Nínui “Watery” is the second month of the calendar of the Dúnedain, thus the intended reading is “February 13th”, even though a more systematic approach at aligning the calendars would produce different results, e. g. synchronizing the Mid-year’s Day with the Northern Hemisphere’s summer solstice would result in Nínui 13th being equivalent to February 2nd.

    Note that in our attested examples of dates dolthen Ethuil “eighth day of Spring”, Gwirith edwen “second day of April”, nelchainen ned Ethuil “thirty-first day of the Stirring” do not include the Genitive preposition en.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    Teaser Poster — The Dwarven Hammer

    A transliteration of English with the Angerthas Erebor

    Poster — February 3rd, 2022

    “awake the sleeping stone”

    Teaser Poster — The Tengwar Scroll

    A transliteration of English with an unidentifiable Tengwar Mode

    Poster — February 3rd, 2022

    “kings square — view from south”

    The transcription is rather odd, it appears like an attempt to write English in a phonetic Mode of Beleriand (which is impossible since Sindarin and English have massive phonotactic differences, the Later or Westron Convention, an English full mode works differently), especially confusing is the transcription of k, g as q, g, whereas it should be either c, g or c, g according to the featural system of the Tengwar. See also Mach’s analysis.

    In the corner of the scroll there is written faintly in the mode of Beleriand:

    • Eregion “Eregion”

    Teaser Poster — The Golden Dress

    Some Cirth

    Poster — February 3rd, 2022

    There are some Cirth spelling out ...ELB... on the sleeve. This might be part of the name Elbereth.

    Teaser Poster — The Gold Ring

    Perhaps some Tengwar signs?

    Poster — February 3rd, 2022

    The pattern on the gold ring might represent some Tengwar ...vornaentu... “...vornaentul...” though this is uncertain. The end might be the start of a form of entul- “to come again, *return”. The interpretation of the first part is more uncertain, because no attested Quenya word ends in -vor or -vorna, though vorna could theoretically be a Quenya cognate of Sindarin *-born “steadfast”

    Teaser Poster — A Scroll with Pictograms?

    Non-Tolkienian

    Poster — February 3rd, 2022

    This is not a Tolkienian writing system, however it might be inspired by the Goblin Alphabet from Tolkien’s Letters from Father Chrismas.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    Title Reveal

    A Neo-Sindarin translation in the mode of Beleriand

    Title Reveal — January 19th, 2022

    hîr i chorvath “The Lord of all the Rings”
    corvath bâl “All the Rings of Power”

    • hîr “lord, master”
    • corvath “all rings”, class plural of *corf “ring”, a neologism based on Q. corma “ring” (cf. Q. parma vs. N. parf “book”). In the first part, it appears with the plural definite article in “the” causing nasal mutation in + corvath → i·chorvath. In the second phrase corvath is probably still intended to be definite (what would an indefinite class plural even mean?), but the article is left of since there is some indication that it’s not needed when the noun is modified by a genitive.
    • *Bâl “power” ← √BAL. One could argue that it is too simplistic, given that Sindarin also has a basic verb bal- “*to have power” indicating that it’s a verbal root, which would make formations like bālē > baul, balassē > balas more likely. However the word Balrog implies it’s existence to some extent, even though it is glossed as “mighty deamon”, because adjectives and nouns can have the same form in Sindarin.

    In both parts the two noun phrases just appear next to each other implying a genitive relationship, cf. Aran Moria “King of Moria”.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    The Ring Poem

    A Neo-Sindarin translation in the mode of Beleriand

    Title Reveal — January 19th, 2022

    This Reddit post has been the base for deciphering this text, which appears to be translation of the Ring Poem.

    R: cyr neledh di menel “three rings under the sky”

    • cyr “rings”, plural of cor “ring, circle”. Notice that this is different from the neologism *corf “ring (for fingers)” used in the title reveal.
    • neledh “three”. In our two attested examples of numerals modifying nouns levain tad-dail “two-legged animals” and N. lheben teil “five foot” the number appears before the noun it modifies, unlike normal adjectives which tend to follow their noun, but here the translator seems to have chosen the standard position for adjectives.
    • di menel “under [the] sky”. Given its primitive form ndī and the phrase di’nguruthos “beneath death-horror”, it is likely that di would cause soft mutation turning m- to v-, but in the similar situation vi Menel “in Heaven”, menel remains unchanged, leading to the theory that menel as a proper noun is immune to mutation.

    I: ‘nin edhil erain “of the Elf-kings”

    • ‘nin “to the”, probably a combination of an “to, for” and in the plural article “the” with the first a- being dropped as can be seen in ‘ni Pheriannath “to the Halflings”, where it additionally introduces nasal mutation.
    • erain “kings”, plural of aran “king”. The phrase edhil erain is intended to be a loose compound “Elf-kings”, though the order is unexpected: genitives like this are (outside of ancient names) expressed by placing the modifying noun second, e. g. Aran Moria “King of Moria, *Moria-King”.

    N: odog vi gond gaith “seven in stone-caverns”

    • odog “seven”.
    • vi gond gaith “in stone-caverns” ← vi/mi “in” + gond “stone” + gaith, plural of N. gath “cavern”. Again the same surprising ordering of loose compounds as in edhil erain appears. Also, while vi is generally believed to cause soft mutation (here g- → ’-), some have suggested based on vi Menel “in Heaven” (instead of **vi Venel) that this might not be the case after all. However since the translator already appears to use the alternative theory that menel is immune to mutation above, this interpretation seems unlikely, another possibility would be that the absence of mutation is caused by the abnormal word order in gond gaith.
    • G: an nogothrim thûr “to the Dwarf-?Lords”
    • an “to, for”.
    • nogothrim “dwarf-folk”, class plural of nogoth “dwarf”.
    • *thûr. From context, this should cover the “lords”-part of “Dwarf-lords” and could thus be related to primitive turū “Great Lord or King”, with t → th possibly being intended as a nasal mutation after the -m of Nogothrim. What is puzzling though, is that thûr shows no signs of pluralization, which would be required both for the noun “lords” and the adjective “lordly”. A third possibility would be a genitive phrase “Dwarf-folk of Lordship”, but in genitive phrases no mutation should happen (e. g. Amon Hen “Hill of the Eye” does not become **Amon Chen), so the exact intentions remain unclear.
      (Alternatively it could be derived from √THUR “surround, fence, ward, hedge in, secrete” from which is also thurin “secret, hidden” or from a lengthened form of √STOR “steadfast”, producing “Dwarf-folk of ?Secrecy/Steadfastness”.)

    S: neder an amarth “nine for doom”

    P: fîr edain “[of] mortal men”

    • fîr “mortals”, plural of Feir “mortal [men]”, in this case probably used as an adjective to describe edain. While adjectives usually follow the nouns they modify, in poetry the order can be reversed (cf. galadhremmin ennorath “tree-tangled middle-lands”).
    • edain “Men”, plural of adan “human”. The whole phrase amarth fîr edain might be intended to form a genitive “[the] doom of mortal Men”.

    O: mîn ani dúhaur “one to the Dark-Despicable one”

    • mîn “one”.
    • ani “for the”, ← an “to, for” + i “the” (cf. ’ni Pheriannath “to [all] the Halflings”, possibly the same an + in compound with the plural article causing nasal mutation and the a- being elided).
    • dúhaur “?Dark-Despicable one”. One might expect that ani would either cause soft mutation like the definite article on its own, indicating that the unmutated form of this word would be ?túhaur or mixed mutation which can be seen in other compounds with the article, which would allow for both ?túhaur and ?dúhaur (though in all attested cases an -n intervenes that we don’t see here: uin aran “from the king”, ben genediad “according to the reckoning”). Since I can’t find suitable elements producing ?túhaur — judging by the context in the Ring poem, this should be a name for Sauron — , I would assume it’s the latter despite the missing -n (an alternative explanation is that ani is intended to cause soft mutation and Dúhaur resists it as a proper noun just like Menel above). In this case, dúhaur might be a compound of dû “night, dimness; dim, dark” and the soft mutated form of saur, which appears in one note connected to Q. saura “foul, vile”, the base element of Sauron, but is itself glossed “bad (of food), putrid” and as Tolkien reverted back to the root √THAW “cruel” as the base of Sauron at the end of this note and there gave Gothaur as Sindarin form of his name, Dúhaur is rather odd.

    W: archadh(?)/or châdh dîn dûr “(?on) his dark throne”

    • archadh “throne”, probably based on arahadw but substituting a neologism *hâdh “chair” derived from the bare root √KHAD “sit”, instead of the attested word hadhw from khadmā, which is hard to explain. Alternatively it might read or châdh “above (on?) [his] seat” with N. or “above” and the same neologism *hâdh with liquid mutation.
    • dîn, soft mutated from tîn “his”. For inanimate objects we only have the possessive pronouns attested together with an article, e. g. i eneth lín “your name”, while for animate nouns we see no article, e. g. sellath dîn “your daughters”. It is somewhat unclear whether this represents a genuine pattern or is just an effect of our limited examples, but it would indicate that an article should be present in this phrase.
    • E: danin gardh mordor “upon the region of Mordor”
    • danin “upon the” ← dan “back to, against, down upon” + i “the” with the intervening -n that was missing above in ani Dúhaur. The in the phrase dan i ngaurhoth “against the werewolf-horde”.
    • gardh “region”.
    • Mordor “Balck Land”, gardh Mordor is again a genitive “region of Mordor”.

    R: ias caedar úgelain “where un-lights lie”

    • *ias “where”, based on Q. yasse “where” and ennas “there”.
    • caedar “[they] lie”, present of *caeda- “to lie down”, with an -r indicating a plural subject. *Caeda- itself is a neologism based on Q. caita- “to lie (down)”.
    • úgelain “un-lights”, plural of *úgalan, derived from ú-, the negative prefix, and the soft mutated form of calan “(day)light”.

    As pointed out by Ryszard Derdzinski this might have been inspired by a translation by Christopher Gilson and Bill Welden in Vinyar Tengwar #13, p. 13.

  • Elvish from Amazon’s Rings of Power

    This is a thread to collect all the bits and pieces of Elvish (that being both translation into one of the Elvish languages, such as Sindarin or Quenya and transcriptions into one of the Elvish writing systems, such as Tengwar, Sarati and Cirth) as a more or less comprehensive resource to link to. I'll generally try to discuss where their translation diverges from usual conventions of Neo-Elvish and point out where Tolkien’s published notes point to a different conclusions; however it must be mentioned that this is not necessarily a good source to learn or practice Elvish with. If you wish to learn more, refer to our collection of Links & Resources.

    The translator has been confirmed to be Carl F. Hostetter, member of the Elvish Linguistic Fellowship (EP Lindsey Weber & Showrunner Patrick McKay interview, 1:15), it is however probably unreasonable to assume that he did all items from this list, dialect coach Leith McPherson spoke of a “team appointed by the estate” and also said that otherwise unpublished material has been used (The Rings Of Power Wrap-up #007, 34:00, 36:30).

    (I would appreciate if discussions of the items or further speculations could be kept to different threads to keep this one nice and uncluttered. Naturally everyone is encouraged to submit new entries as they appear though, this is collaborative!)

    This analysis is based on discussions with and suggestions from many others, who I would like to thank for their contributions, especially Sid, Quirinius, TolkienGuide, zionius, machsna, Elaran, Röandil, Lokyt, EruannoVG and Ríon from the Vinyë Lambengolmor Discord server, u/NachoFailconi, The Dwarrow Scholar and TengwarTeacher.

  • [Deleted]

    Right now it feels like all the sections are used more or less interchangeably for asking questions by most people. Of course I don't know how to make the categories work better, but since I believe the main strength of Parf Edhellen is it's collaborative approach, I think that it would be useful to separate the tools for this from the general discussion board and somehow enforce their correct use. I could, for example, imagine a system like this dividing the sections into two categories (of course only if it isn't too hard to implement):

    Discussion

    In this category people can create fee-form posts. It could include the following:

    • FAQ: A section for links to other resources, an FAQ about Elvish (perhaps Elaran would share the r/Sindarin FAQ, “Neologisms aren't pure invention” and “Naurhîr”?) and a place to which other common questions like How did Tolkien use accents in his languages? could be moved. Read only for regular users.
    • General Conversation: discussions about anything related to Tolkien, his works, various communities and Parf Edhellen... well, anything appropriate really!
    • Translation Requests: ask members of the community for help with translations.
    • Translation Review: share your Elvish translations here!
    • Questions: ask questions about Tolkien's languages

    (Perhaps there should be a category for “high level discussions” as well, but I don't have an idea for a good name and I believe most of them would happen on Vinye Lambengolmor anyway)

    Posts From Elsewhere on Parf Edhellen

    Aggregated view of posts from elsewhere on Parf Edhellen. People can't freely make posts there all threads in this category must be attached to a gloss, profile etc.

    • Glosses: questions and discussions about dictionary entries. (Browse to a word in the dictionary and open a thread about it with the <comment-icon> icon.)
    • Contributions: questions and discussions about user-created contributions, particularly phrases and additions to the dictionary. (???, I don't know how the review of an actual Contribution would look like)
    • Phrases: questions and discussions about various phrases, including fan-created poetry. (Browse to a phrase and comment under it to open a thread here)
    • Profiles: aggregated view of engagements on peoples' profiles. (Browse to a profile and comment under it to open a thread here)

    Gilruin

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  • Question on definition of the name "Faramir"?

    It is indeed very much possible that Faramir contains some derivative of the root SPAR "hunting", whichever it may be.

    Assuming that the beginning of his name is Noldorin as his brother's was...

    Around the 1930s Noldorin was the name of the Welsh-like, common Elvish language, that Tolkien later revised to become Sindarin. That means that from an in-universe perspective Noldorin doesn't exist (*) and the first elements in Boromir, Faramir are Sindarin. When a lexicon entry say "Boromir likely contains (Noldorin) bôr", that just means that bôr as a separate word is only attested from before the revision, to Boromir himself, bôr would be a Sindarin word. That doesn't make your argument wrong, it's just something to be aware of.

    Parf Edhellen means elvish book. Another example that a Noldorin word (parf) can be carried over to Sindarin (sometimes with certain changes to match the revisions made by Tolkien) because they are essentially different itarations of the same language.

    (*) there are some things to make the matter more confusing: After the revision, the word Ñoldorin (the tilde is important for distinction but sometimes left off nevertheless) can be used for the Quenya dialect of the Ñoldor. If used in that way its has nothing to do with the Noldorin from above. Also some people wrongly conflate the Noldorin from above with the Sindarin dialect of the Ñoldor in exil, but the first is a term about how Sindarin developed during Tolkien's life and the second describes a dialect in Middel-Earth itself.

  • Gloss “Hantanyel” by Melda Maryetille

    The formation hanta-nye-l is problematic. It comes from a time when most Neo-Quenya writers assumed that there are object suffixes for all persons. However Tolkien tells us:

    The inflexions are subjective but -s (singular), -t (plural, dual) may be added as objectives of 3rd person, utuvienye-s “I have found it” (from a draft of a letter to David Masson written around 1955, PE17/110).

    which seems to indicate that object suffixes only exist for the 3rd person. A safer formula would be hantan lyen with a separate dative plural.

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