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!

Early Quenya

súma

noun. nostril

Derivations

  • ᴱ√SUHYU “air, breath, exhale, puff” ✧ QL/086

Phonetic Developments

DevelopmentStagesSources
ᴱ√SUHU > sūma[suxmā] > [suxma] > [suɣma] > [sūma]✧ QL/086

Variations

  • sūma ✧ QL/086
Early Quenya [PME/086; QL/086] Group: Eldamo. Published by

nen

noun. nostril

A word appearing as ᴱQ. nen “nostril” in several documents from the 1920s (PE14/72; PE15/75; PE16/113). Its plural form nengi made it clear its stem was neng- (PE14/72; PE16/112). Its (Early Qenya) dual nenqi was also “usually used of the nose or both nostrils of one person” (PE15/75).

Conceptual Development: In the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s, the word for “nostril” was ᴱQ. sūma under the early root ᴱ√SUHYU “breath, exhale”, where its dual sunwi “nostrils” could also be used as “nose” (QL/86). The word súma “nostril” was mentioned in the contemporaneous Poetic and Mythological Words of Eldarissa along with its dual sunwi (PME/86). Under the same early root, Tolkien had ᴱQ. súne as a more ordinary word for “nose”, specifically a nose of a human (QL/86; PME/86). ᴱQ. súne “nose” survived in the documents from the 1920s (PE14/76; PE15/75; PE16/136), but “nostril” became ᴱQ. nen (neng-) as noted above.

See the entry on ᴹQ. nengwe for a discussion of later “nose” words from the 1930s.

Neo-Quenya: Since ᴹ√NEÑ-WI was the base for the word ᴹQ. nengwe “nose” in The Etymologies of the 1930s (Ety/NEÑ-WI), ᴺQ. nen (neng-) “nostril” might remain viable for purposes of Neo-Quenya as a derivative of the shorter form of this root: ᴹ√NEÑ. However, in later Quenya grammar its dual would most likely become ✱nengu, and I would use the dual only for “(pair of) nostrils” and not “nose”.

Changes

  • nēnnen ✧ PE16/112

Derivations

  • ᴹ√NEÑ “*nose”

Variations

  • nĕn ✧ PE14/072; PE14/076
  • nen ✧ PE15/75; PE16/112; PE16/113
  • nēn ✧ PE16/112 (nēn)
Early Quenya [PE14/052; PE14/072; PE14/076; PE15/75; PE16/112; PE16/113; PE16/114; PE16/115] Group: Eldamo. Published by