orta-

verb. to rise

Tolkien defined an intransitive verb orta- “to rise” based on the root √OR “rise”, first mentioned in The Etymologies of the 1930s where Tolkien had ᴹQ. orta- glossed both transitive “raise” and intransitive “rise” (Ety/ORO). This intransitive verb reappeared in the Quenya Verbal System (QVS) of 1948 as ta-formative ort(a), contrasted with ta-causative ᴹQ. ortā́ “raise, lift” = “✱make rise” (PE22/114). In this paradigm, intransitive “rise” was distinguished from transitive “raise” mainly in its half-strong past tense oronte “rose” (or archaic †ronte), as opposed weak past ortane “raised, lifted” (PE22/115).

In QVS, Tolkien gave another intransitive verb ᴹQ. orya-, and said “to avoid the confusion with the causatives -ya was preferred for intransitives: so oryane, rose, ortane, raised” (PE22/115). This seems to indicate orya- “rise” was preferred. Despite this, intransitive orta- “rise” continued to appear in Tolkien later writings (PE17/52, 64; PE21/77; PE22/164) as an alternate to orya- “rise”, which appeared regularly as well (see that entry for details).

Conceptual Development: For purposes of Neo-Quenya, I prefer the more distinctive verb orya- for “rise”, and I use orta- only for transitive “raise”. However, some Neo-Quenya writers like the idea of a transitive/intransitive verb distinguished by different past forms. For example Helge Fauskanger used orta- for both “rise” and “raise” in his NQNT (NQNT).