Quenya
eä
noun. Creation, the (Material) Universe, Cosmos, World; it is, let it be, Creation, the (Material) Universe, Cosmos, †World; it is, let it be, [ᴹQ.] all that is
Derivations
- √EÑ “be, exist” ✧ PE22/147; VT49/28
Element in
- Q. Átaremma i ëa han Eä “our Father who art in Heaven” ✧ VT43/13; VT43/14
- Q. Eämbar “Creation as a Whole”
- Q. Eärambar “Walls of Eä”
- ᴺQ. ëavëa “universal, natural”
Elements
Word Gloss ëa- “to be, exist, to be, exist, [ᴹQ.] have being, be found extant in the real world” Phonetic Developments
Development Stages Sources √EŊE > ëa [eŋa] > [eɣa] > [ea] ✧ PE22/147 Variations
- Ëa ✧ MR/007; VT43/13
- Ea ✧ MR/039; PE22/138
- ëa ✧ PE22/147; VT43/14; VT49/28
A term for all Creation, it is simply the present tense or imperative of the verb Q. ëa- “to exist”, literally meaning “it is” or “let it be” (Let/286; MR/39; NM/231). In various notes from the late 1960s Tolkien clarified its meaning:
ëa ... properly cannot be used of God since ëa refers only to things created by Eru directly or mediately (PE22/147).
ëa, which is all “nature”, but was not held to include [souls?] and spirits (VT39/20 note #20).
Eä “it is” = the total of Ambar: the given material and its processes of change. Outside Eä is the world/sphere of aware purpose and will (NM/231 note #5).
Thus it seems Eä is limited in scope to the material universe, as opposed to other terms like ilu and ilúvë which also include the spiritual realm. Tolkien occasionally translated Eä as “World”, but probably only in a poetic sense. The term Ambar is more proper when referring only to the world itself rather than the entire Cosmos.
Conceptual Development: The term ᴹQ. Ea “all that is, the World” was first introduced in the Quenya Verbal System of the 1940s along with the verb ᴹQ. ea-, but in that document the verb ea- was the general verb for “to be” rather than being limited in sense only to existential statements (PE22/122).