Translation correction help

John D. #3320

So I'm tying to create a inscription for the ring I want to propose with and I took a crack at restructuring what I want to say and translating it to Quenya and I'd appreciate some feedback on if it's any good? Or if I should just rather go with a direct English to Tengwar translation.

Original - Autumn Love, Winter Sunlight/Warmth/Heat, Spring Sun, Summer Blessing, marry/join us forever/eternally.

Attempt 1 - Endien melmë, Hesin aurë, Tuilë anar, Ellairë almë, verya me oialë.

Attempt 2 - Endien melmë, Hesin aurë, Tuilë anar, Ellairë almë, tharverya oialë.

Ellanto #3327

Hey John D.

You seem to be using very old words here, and I mean that in an out-of-universe sense, i.e. draft words that Tolkien used in the earlier developmental stages of the language and discarded later. These are the normal words for the seasons:

  • Autumn: Yávie.

  • Late autumn: Quelle.

  • Winter: Hríve.

  • Early spring: Coire.

  • Spring: Tuile.

  • Summer: Laire.

I would also suggest áre "sunlight, warmth (especially of the sun)", instead of aure which simply means "day, daylight".

A further thing to note is declension: "Autumn['s] love" - Yáviéva melme / Quelleva melme; "Winter['s] sunlight" - Hríveva áre; "Spring['s] sun" - Coireva Anar / Tuileva Anar; "Summer['s] blessing" - Laireva alme. Or, alternatively, you could use adjectival forms of the seasons (e.g. "wintery sunlight" as opposed to "sunlight of winter"): Quellea melme, Hrívea áre, Coirea/Tuilea Anar, Lairea alme (admittedly I am not sure how yávie would form an adjective here, Quenya is not my area of expertise).

As for the final clause - "marry us forever" - here you would need an imperative construction I believe; furthermore, I would replace oiale with tennoio, since the event of marrying something (as opposed to the marriage itself afterwards) is not a long process. Thus you would have áme verya tennoio, or better yet with a dual pronoun in this case, ámet verya tennoio. That being said, it may also be worth considering the validity or verya- as the verb "to marry" (here used transitively); some Quenya scholars will argue that one should instead use vesta-.

Which now leads me to the most important thing to point out -- the Quenya language is inherently incomplete, and our knowledge and understanding of it continuously changes and shifts with new research and with the publication of new materials. Furthermore, concensus amongst Elvish scholars is a rare commodity, and there are many questions for which you would receive different (though perhaps equally confident) answers depending on who you ask (for example the question of verya- vs. vesta-). Lastly, I must also caution you that my own expertise is somewhat limited.

This is all to say a simple thing: it is generally not recommended to use Elvish for anything permanent or valuable, such as tattooes or ring inscriptions, because what may be the best possible translation now may in a few years become outdated, "good for its time but not good anymore". My recommendation, and that of any other scholar, would be to inscribe the English words using the Tengwar script.

You can use Tecendil for good transcriptions: like this. You may also want to consider whether you want to use the orthographic transcription (as I linked above) or the phonemic transcription, like this (note however that the specifics of the phonemic transcription might depend on your dialect of choice, but I don't think there's a way to automotically account for that).

John D. #3373

Hi Ellanto

I can't thank you enough for your help even if you don't consider your knowledge limited, you've still been massively helpful and I'm taking your advice to hear about the ring engraving though I may still use the words in some other.

Thank you again, and thank you to this community for existing as it was a wonderful discovering it.

Do you know any way I can make some kind of donation as a gesture of my gratitude?