Beware, older languages below! The languages below were invented during Tolkien's earlier period and should be used with caution. Remember to never, ever mix words from different languages!

Middle Primitive Elvish

ar

root. day

A root in The Etymologies of the 1930s glossed “day” with various derivatives like ᴹQ. are, N. aur “day” and ᴹQ. arin “morning” (Ety/AR¹). In Tolkien’s later writings, the Quenya word for “day” became aurë (RC/727; S/190), and in 1957 Quenya Notes he devised a new etymology for these day-words from the root √UR “heat” as in ✶auri “heat, period of sun” (PE17/148). That opens the question whether the various 1930s Quenya “morning” words from ᴹ√AR remain valid, but many Neo-Quenya writers (including me) retain them since there aren’t really any good alternatives. They might be salvageable as derivatives of the later root √AS “warmth” (so that “day” = “hot” and “morning” = “warm”).

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/ANA¹; Ety/AR¹; Ety/TUY] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ar

root. beside, outside

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/AR²; Ety/AWA; Ety/WŌ] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ari

noun. day

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/AR¹; EtyAC/AR¹] Group: Eldamo. Published by

atyēnar

noun. anniversary day

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/YEN] Group: Eldamo. Published by

nyar

root. tell, relate

Quenya words for “tell” and “tale” began with nyar- for much of Tolkien’s life, but their derivation shifted over time. The earliest root for such words was ᴱ√NYAŘA [NYAÐA] “relate, tell” from the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s with derivatives like ᴱQ. nyara- “relate, tell” and ᴱQ. nyara “tale” (QL/68), but it had no obvious derivatives in the contemporaneous Gnomish Lexicon. In The Etymologies of the 1930s Tolkien first gave this root as ᴹ√NYAR “tell, relate”, then changed it to ᴹ√NAR² with a Quenya-only variant nyar- (Ety/NAR²; EtyAC/NAR²). This change may have been in keeping with Tolkien notion from the 1930s that palatalized dentals might have been a Quenya-only innovation (PE18/44). The root ᴹ√NYAR/NAR had derivatives like ᴹQ. nyáre/N. narn “tale” and ᴹQ. nyar- “tell”.

However, in both the Outline of Phonetic Development (OP1) from the 1940s and Outline of Phonology (OP2) from the early 1950s Tolkien indicated the primitive form of the Quenya verb was ñgyar- (OP1: PE19/36, OP2: PE19/76). This may have been in keeping with Tolkien’s later decision that initial palatalized dentals were not a feature of Primitive Elvish at all; see the entry on how [[at|[j] was lost after initial dentals]] in the Welsh-like branch of the Elvish languages for discussion of this transition. Despite this decision, Tolkien continued to use S. narn “tale” regularly in his later writings, despite there being no way it could be derived from ñ(g)yar-.

Neo-Eldarin: For purposes of Neo-Eldarin, I think it is best to ignore Tolkien’s decision to remove initial palatalized dentals from Primitive Elvish, and I recommend retaining √NYAR as the root for “tell” and “tale” in Elvish, this being the only reasonable option for retaining both Q. nyar- and S. narn.

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/NAR²; Ety/SI; EtyAC/NAR²] Group: Eldamo. Published by

atar

noun. father

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/ATA; PE21/66] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ay(ar)

root. sea

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/ÁLAT; Ety/AY; Ety/BEL; Ety/LIN¹; Ety/RAM; Ety/UY; EtyAC/AY] Group: Eldamo. Published by

nar

root. tell, relate

Middle Primitive Elvish Group: Eldamo. Published by

sel(d)

root. child, child; *daughter

A root in The Etymologies of the 1930s, initially glossed “daughter” but later “child” with derivatives ᴹQ. selde, ᴹQ. seldo, ᴹQ. selda = female, male and neuter “child” (Ety/SEL-D). In Notes on Names (NN) from 1957 Tolkien gave sel-de “daughter” (PE17/170), while S. sel(l) = “daughter” appeared in both the King’s Letter from the late 1940s (SD/129) as well as the Túrin Wrapper from the 1950s (VT50/5). The diminutive form for “daughter” appeared as Q. selyë in notes from the late 1960s (VT47/10).

Neo-Eldarin: For purposes of Neo-Eldarin, I prefer √YEL for “daughter” as a variant of ᴹ√SEL(D) under the influence of √YON “son”, mostly so I can still use the 1930s “child” words for other genders, at least in the Quenya branch. I would still use Q. seldë and S. sell for “daughter”, however, with a bit of semantic drift, with “girl” words becoming Q. nettë and S. neth.

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/SEL-D; Ety/TIN; EtyAC/TIN; EtyAC/YEL] Group: Eldamo. Published by

al

prefix. without

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/AR²] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ala-

prefix. very

Middle Primitive Elvish [PE21/41] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ata

root. father

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/ATA] Group: Eldamo. Published by

galan

root. bright

Middle Primitive Elvish [EtyAC/GAL¹] Group: Eldamo. Published by

ta

root. that

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/TA; PE18/033; PE18/060; PE23/096] Group: Eldamo. Published by

tār(ō)

noun. king

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/TĀ; PE21/55] Group: Eldamo. Published by

atū

noun. father

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/ATA] Group: Eldamo. Published by

gālæ

noun. light

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/KAL] Group: Eldamo. Published by

kalat

noun. light

Middle Primitive Elvish [PE21/56] Group: Eldamo. Published by

kwessē

noun. feather

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/KWES] Group: Eldamo. Published by

k’lā

noun. light

Middle Primitive Elvish [Ety/KAL; EtyAC/KAL; PE18/038; PE21/37] Group: Eldamo. Published by

vaiā

noun. sea

Middle Primitive Elvish [PE21/17] Group: Eldamo. Published by

preposition. at

Middle Primitive Elvish [PE21/27] Group: Eldamo. Published by