menel

noun. the heavens, firmament, sky

A word for the firmament or “the heavens” (but not “Heaven”), derived from the root √MENEL of the same meaning (PE17/24, 152; PE21/84), possibly √MEN + √EL “✱direction of the stars” (RGEO/64). It was often used in contrasted to cemen, “earth”, “the earth” (but not “Earth”), as the surface of the world versus its (apparent) “roof”. Tolkien clarified that “these were ‘pictorial’ words, as the lore of the Eldar and the Numenoreans knew much astronomy” (PE17/24), so that menel as the dome over the world was metaphorical rather than actual.

At one point in the legendarium there was an actual dome of heaven created by Varda, but over Aman rather than the entire world:

> Later, when the Valar took refuge from Melkor, and the imminent ruin of Arda, and built and fortified Valinor in Aman, it was Varda who made the great dome above Valinor, to keep out any spirits or spies of Melkor. It was made as a simulacrum of the true firmament (Tar-menel), and the patterns were therein repeated, but with apparent stars (or “sparks”: tinwi) of greater relative size to the total visible area. So that the lesser firmament of Valinor (Nur-menel) was very brilliant (PE17/22; MR/388).

This notion was not mentioned in The Silmarillion as published, however.

Note that Quenya does not use the definite article before unique individual things like the Sun and the Moon. Likewise menel “the heavens” does not require the definite article, and i menel is almost always wrong.

Conceptual Development: At various points in his work on the legendarium Tolkien considered having a literal firmament or “upper airs”, ᴱQ. Vaitya (QL/100) >> ᴹQ. Vaiya. See for examples, his diagrams of the world in the Ambarkanta (SM/243, 245). How literal this notion was depended on whether Tolkien was considering the legendarium as a cycle of myth or as an actual description of the world. In earlier documents the term for the firmament or “outermost airs” was often ᴱQ. Vaitya >> ᴹQ. Vaiya (QL/100; SM/241-245) or Q. Ilmen (SM/241-245, LR/12 etc.), the last term surviving into The Silmarillion as published (S/99).

The term menel appeared in the 1940s, mentioned as “heaven” in an early draft of Lord of the Rings Book I (RC/671) and also appearing in The Notion Club Papers and related document of the 1940s where it was a cognate of Ad. minil or minal and derived from the ancient Elvish root ᴹ√MENEL (SD/241, 414). In these document it was distinctly “the heavens, the firmament” (SD/401), but in the 1950s Quenya prayer Átaremma, Tolkien used menel = “Heaven” a number of times (VT43/8-12), though in the final draft of the prayer he used the term Eruman for “Heaven” (VT43/12). For the most part, though, Tolkien used menel for “the heavens” rather than “Heaven” in later writings.

Menel

heavens

Menel noun "heavens" (Markirya, SA), "the heavens, the firmament" (SD:401), "the apparent dome in the sky" (MR:387). Menel Cemenyë ("k") "Heaven and Earth" (VT47:30). Found in names like Meneldil "Heaven-friend" = astronomer (Appendix A; Letters:386), Meneldur masc. name, "Heaven-servant" (Appendix A, Tar-Menelduras a Númenórean King, UT:210); menelluin "sky-blue", used as noun = "cornflower" (J.R.R. Tolkien: Artist & Illustrator p. 193). Menelmacar "Swordsman of the Sky", the Orion constellation (also called Telumehtar, Appendix E, first footnote); the older name was Menelmacil "Heaven-sword" (WJ:411); Meneltarma "Pillar of Heaven", name of the great central mountain of Númenor (SA:tar, VT42:21).Menelya fifth day of the Eldarin six-day week, dedicated to the heavens (Appendix D) Locative meneldë "in heaven"; abandoned forms menellë, menelzë (VT43:12, 16). Adj. meneldëa "(being) in heaven", evidently based on a locative form meneldë "in heaven"; abandoned forms menelzëa, menellëa, menelessëa (VT43:13, VT44:16; the last of these forms would suggest the locative form #menelessë).

menel acúna

the heavens bending

The twenty-fourth line of the Markirya poem (MC/222). It consists of another subordinate clause menel acúna “heavens bending”, with the noun menel “heavens” followed by the infinitive of the verb cúna- “to bend”. The prefix a- in acúna marks the infinitive as an object of the primary verb, which is the verb “see” of the previous phrase.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> menel a-cúna = “✱heavens (object)-bending”

Conceptual Development: In the first draft, Tolkien used na- for the object-prefix, which he first retained in the second draft before changing it to a- (MC/222).

Nur-menel

nur-menel

Nur-menel noun the lesser firmament, a great dome covering Valinor, made by Varda and full of star-imagines (see tinwë, nillë). It was a simulacrum of Tar-menel, the true firmament (MR:388)

nur-menel

place name. *Under Heaven

A term for the “lesser firmament” created by Varda in imitation of the true heavens Tarmenel (MR/388). It is probably a compound of some form of nu “under” and menel “the heavens”.

tarmenel

place name. High Heaven

A term for the “true firmament” where the stars dwelled. It is a compound of tar- “high” and menel “heaven” (properly, “the heavens”).

Conceptual Development: The name ᴹQ. Tarmenel first appeared in Lord of the Rings drafts from the 1940s within Bilbo’s poem at Rivendell (TI/97). This name was retained in the published version of this poem (LotR/235) making it canonical, but its exact cosmological significance is unclear. In Tolkien’s “Unfinished Index” of The Lord of the Rings, he described Tarmenel as the “Region of the Wind” (RC/216).

In one version of Tolkien’s cosmology from the mid-50s, the Tarmenel was distinct from the Nur-menel “✱Under Heaven” (“lesser firmament”) that Varda created as a barrier over Valinor against the depredations of Melkor (MR/388). The idea of a lower heaven (and the terms Tarmenel and Nurmenel) did not survive into the published version of The Silmarillion, but that book did describe the Ilmen, region of the stars through which the Sun and Moon travelled (S/99), which seems conceptually similar to Tarmenel.

In the incomplete Alcar mi Tarmenel na Erun prayer from the 1960s (translating the first two lines of Gloria in Excelsis Deo into Quenya), Tolkien used the term Tarmenel to refer to the Christian Heaven, though elsewhere he used the name Eruman for “Heaven”.

imbi menel cemenyë menë ráno tië

between Heaven and Earth goes the path of the Moon

Menel

Menel

The word is understood as men "towards" + el "star" meaning "the Direction of the Stars". The loremaster Quennar is attributed as having devised the word Menel ("heavens, firmament").

átaremma i ëa han eä

our Father who art in Heaven

The first line of Átaremma, Tolkien’s Quenya translation of the Lord’s Prayer. The first word Átaremma “our Father” is atar “father” with the 2nd-person-plural-exclusive suffix -mma consistent with the 1st edition of The Lord of the Rings (after the 2nd edition of The Lord of the Rings, this suffix would be -lma).

The remainder of the phrase i ëa han Eä “who art in Heaven” is a circumlocution, literally meaning “✱who is beyond Creation [the Material Universe]”. This allowed Tolkien to avoid an explicit name for Heaven, though he did use Eruman for “Heaven” in the fifth line of the prayer.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> Átar-emma i ëa han Eä = “✱Father-our who is beyond Creation [the Material Universe]”

Conceptual Development: The form Ataremma for “our Father” appears in all versions of the prayer, sometimes preceded by the interjection a or Ai “O”. Wynne, Smith and Hostetter suggested that the long Á of Átaremma in versions V to VI of the prayer may be a coalescense with this interjection (VT43/13).

In versions I-IV, Tolkien use menel for the word “Heaven” in various configurations, most involving an assimilated locative, such as meneldea “in Heaven”. In other writings, Tolkien said that menel referred to the dome of the sky or “the firmament”, and therefore was not proper for “Heaven” (MR/387, PE17/152). Perhaps because of this, in version V he switched to the circumlocution i ëa pell’ Eä, with an assimilated form of the preposition pella “before”. In version VI he changed the preposition to han, as above.

In the earliest version (I), Tolkien used the word na for “is”, added at the end of the phrase, but it was omitted later.

| |  I  |IIa|IIb|III|IV|V|VI| | |A|Ai| | |Ataremma|Átaremma| | |i| |i| |{menellea >>}|menelzea|meneldea|ëa pell’ ëa|ëa han ëa| |na| |

cemendë tambe erumandë

on Earth as [it is] in Heaven

The fifth line of Átaremma, Tolkien’s Quenya translation of the Lord’s Prayer. The first word cemendë “on Earth” is an assimilated locative form of cemen “earth”. The word tambë likely corresponds to “as”, while Erumandë “in Heaven” is an assimilated locative form of Eruman “Heaven”. The English words “it is” are not represented in the Quenya phrase.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> cemen-dë tambe Eruman-dë = “✱earth-on as [it is] Heaven-in”

Conceptual Development: In earlier versions of this phrase (I-V), Tolkien used menel for “Heaven”. Elsewhere, Tolkien said that menel referred to the dome of the sky or “the firmament”, and therefore was not proper for “Heaven” (MR/387, PE17/152), which is probably why he changed the word to Eruman in version VI of the prayer.

Tolkien experimented with various ways of comparing Earth to Heaven: ier ... ar tér (I), ier ... tier (IIa), ya(n) ... ar san (IIb) and san ... ya (III-IV), each probably meaning something like “as ... so ...”, as suggested by Wynne, Smith and Hostetter (VT43/16-7). In versions V and VI Tolkien switched to a single word “as”: sívë (V) and tambë (VI).

The English words “it is” are only expressed in version III-IV, with the Quenya verb na, appearing at the end of the phrase as is typical of declarative statements.

| |  I  |IIa|IIb|III|IV|V|VI| |{yé >> ye >>}|ier|ya(n)|san| | |menelle|menelze|menelde|cemende| |ar tér|tier|ar san|ya|sívë|tambe| |{kemenze >>}|cemenze|cemende|menelde|Erumande| | |na| |

eruman

place name. Heaven

The Quenya name for Heaven in the final draft of Átaremma, Tolkien’s translation of the Lord’s Prayer (VT43/12), attested only in the assimilated locative form Erumande. Its initial element is Eru “God” and its final element is probably related to the root √MAN “good, blessed, unmarred” also seen in the names Aman and Manwë, as suggested by Patrick Wynne, Arden Smith and Carl Hostetter (VT43/16).

Conceptual Development: In earlier versions of Tolkien’s legendarium, the name ᴱQ/ᴹQ. Eruman was used for the wasteland north of Valinor (LT1/91, Ety/ERE), but in the materials used for the published version of The Silmarillion, that name was changed to Q. Araman (MR/123). This freed Tolkien to use the name Eruman for “Heaven”, as suggested by Patrick Wynne, Arden Smith and Carl Hostetter (VT43/16-17).

In earlier versions of the Átaremma prayer, Tolkien used menel for “Heaven”, but it was rejected and elsewhere Tolkien said that menel referred only to “the heavens, firmament” where the stars reside (MR/387, PE17/152). In writings from the 1940s, Tolkien used ᴹQ. ilúve for “Heaven” (MR/355, SD/401), but later ilúvë meant “the whole, the all”, and was equated to Eä “the Universe” (WJ/402, Ety/IL).

hellë

sky

hellë noun "sky" (3EL; a distinct word hellë "frost" was struck out, see KHEL.)

ilwë

sky, heavens

ilwë noun "sky, heavens" (LT1:255), "the middle air among the stars" (LT1:273). VT49:51, 53 also mentions an obscure prononominal element ilwë.

menel

noun. the heavens, firmament, region of the stars

A word for the “the heavens, firmament, region of the stars”, a loan word from Quenya (MR/387; RGEO/64). See the entry on Q. menel and √MENEL for further details.

Conceptual Development: This word began to appear as an element in Sindarin in late Lord of the Rings drafts (SD/45) and drafts of Lord of the Rings appendices (PM/130) from the early 1950s. In the Sindarin prayer Ae Adar Nín from the mid-to-late 1950s, Tolkien used Menel for “Heaven” as in ae Adar nín i vi Menel “our Father who [art] in Heaven” (VT44/21), but this seems not to be the proper Elvish usage, so could perhaps be considered a Mannish misconception (or Tolkienish vacillation on the meaning of the word). Elsewhere Tolkien only used S. menel for “the heavens”, such as in o menel aglar elenath “from heaven [the firmanent] on high the glory of the starry host” from the A Elbereth Gilthoniel poem (LotR/238, 1028; RGEO/63-64). Note that menel did not appear in the earliest drafts of Elbereth Gilthoniel from the 1940s (RS/394).

Menel

noun. Firmament

_n. _Firmament. o menel aglar elenath ! lit. 'from Firmament glory of the stars !'.

Menel

noun. sky, high heaven, firmament, the region of the stars

Menel

noun. the heavens

_n. _the heavens, the apparent dome of the sky. Probably a Quenya word introduced into Sindarin. It was a 'pictorial' word, as the lore of the Eldar and the Númenoreans know much astronomy.

menel-vîr síla díriel

*heaven-jewel shines having watched [for us]

The second phrase of Lúthien’s Song (LB/354). Three translations of this phrase are:

• Patrick Wynne: “✱a heavenly jewel shines silver, having watched” (NTTLS/11)

• David Salo: “✱having watched ... shines like a jewel in the sky” (GS/211)

• Bertrand Bellet and Benjamin Babut: “✱jewel of the firmament, shines on the watch [for us]” (GTLC)

The first word menel is the Sindarin word for “the heavens, firmament”. The second word vîr is the lenited form of mîr “jewel”. The third word síla “shines” is the present tense of the verb síla- “to shine”. The last word díriel “having watched” is the lenited form of tíriel, the past active participle form of the verb tiria- “to watch, gaze”.

ae adar nín i vi menel

our Father who [art] in Heaven

The first line of Ae Adar Nín, Tolkien’s Sindarin translation of the Lord’s Prayer (VT44/21). The first word Ae is probably a variation of the vocative a “O”. The second word is adar “father”, modified by the possessive pronoun nín “my”, with the adjectival element following the noun as is usual in Sindarin. The fourth word is i “who” followed by vi the lenited form of mi “in” and menel “heaven”. There is no Sindarin word for “to be” in this phrase, as there is in English (“art”).

Both Bill Welden and David Salo point out (VT44/22, GS/231) that Tolkien’s use of the 1st-person-singular possessive pronoun nín “my” in this first phrase (where the original prayer had “our”) is somewhat peculiar, since elsewhere in the prayer he used mín for the 1st-person-plural possessive “our”. Bill Welden suggested that Tolkien may have use the 1st-singular here to connote greater intimacy (VT44/22).

As pointed out by Bill Welden (VT44/23-4), Tolkien did not use Q. menel for the Christian Heaven in the final Quenya version of the prayer, replacing it with the name Q. Eruman. Elsewhere, S. menel properly referred only to “the heavens” (holding the stars) and its application to the Christian Heaven would not be appropriate (MR/387). Perhaps Tolkien would have replace S. Menel with a Sindarinized form ✱Eruvan of the Quenya name, if he had made the same change in the Sindarin prayer.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> ae Adar nín i vi Menel = “✱O Father mine who [art] in Heaven”

bo ceven sui vi menel

on Earth as [it is] in Heaven

The fifth line of Ae Adar Nín, Tolkien’s Sindarin translation of the Lord’s Prayer (VT44/21). The first word is the preposition bo “on” (possibly a mutated form for po), followed by ceven “earth”. The third word is the preposition sui “as”, followed by vi the lenited form of mi “in” and menel “heaven”. There is no Sindarin equivalent for English “it is” in this phrase.

See the entry for the first line of this prayer for a discussion of the (mis)use of menel for “Heaven” in this phrase.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> bo Ceven sui vi Menel = “✱on Earth as in Heaven”

o menel aglar elenath

from heaven on high the glory of the starry host

o menel palan-diriel

from heaven gazing far

Menel

heaven

menel (i venel), pl. menil (i menil)

menel

heaven

(i venel), pl. menil (i menil)

menel

root. heavens, firmament, heavens, firmament, [ᴹ√] sky

This root was first mentioned in notes on the Adûnaic language from the 1940s with the meaning “heavens, sky” (SD/414), and √MENEL appeared in Common Eldarin: Noun Structure from the early 1950s with the gloss “heavens, firmament” (PE21/84). Both Q. and S. menel appear quite regularly in Tolkien’s writings from the 1940s forward.

In the 1940s conception, √MENEL was ancient enough that it was able to influence the Adûnaic language indirectly via Avari, producing Ad. minal or minil (SD/414). However, in the 1950s Tolkien said “thus it is reported that √MENEL ‘heavens, firmament’ was devised by Quennar of Túna in ancient days while both Noldor and Vanyar dwelt in Tirion, and so is part of the Vanyarin (Quenya) speech and of Noldorin, but not of Telerin” (PE21/84). In notes from The Road Goes Ever On published in 1967 Tolkien said of menel: “The word was a Q. invention from men (direction, region) + el (the basis of many star words)” (RGEO/64). Thus it seems his later idea was that it is was originally a Quenya-only word, later borrowed into Sindarin.

Note, though, that Ad. minal remained in later writings as well, as an element in the city name Arminalêth (PM/145). These two competing conceptions can be reconciled if Ad. minil is likewise a loan word from Quenya in the First Age, adapted in a period where ancient Adûnaic did not have short e, and then later altered to minal. This was, in fact, an alternate scenario that Tolkien considered in the 1940s, though in that period he considered it more likely that √Ad. MINIL was more ancient than that (SD/414).

menel

noun. heaven, sky

menel

noun. *the heavens

ell

noun. sky

An element meaning “sky” in several names from The Etymologies of the 1930s: N. Elfaron “Sky-hunter” (Ety/SPAR) and N. Elthoron “Eagle of the Sky” (Ety/THOR). It was derived from the root ᴹ√ƷEL “sky” which had an Old Noldorin form: ON. elle (Ety/ƷEL). However, Tolkien said “In Noldorin and Telerin this is confused with EL star”, implying that the word was not used in modern language; an earlier but rejected version of this entry had archaic N. †ell, el “sky” (EtyAC/ƷEL).

Neo-Sindarin: Despite the above statements, ell is probably the best attested option for “sky” in Neo-Sindarin, and I would use it as such, since it is in fact distinct from S. êl “star”, a word that is itself archaic/poetic versus more common S. gil.

menel

noun. the heavens (draft)

A draft Adûnaic word for “the heavens”, later replaced by minal (SD/305).

menel-tûbal

place name. Menel-Tûbal

A draft version of the Adûnaic name for the Pillar of Heaven, Minul-târik (SD/363). There are several variations, one of which, Meneltyūlā, might either be a Quenya word or from a draft version of Adûnaic that is closer to Quenya.

minil

root. heaven, sky

A Primitive Adûnaic root glossed “heaven, sky” that Tolkien used as an example of an “early borrowing” from Primitive Elvish: the Primitive Elvish root √MENEL became ✶Ad. √MINIL from whatever Avari language influenced Primitive Adûnaic (SD/414).