Table Of ContentAN INTRODUCTION TO ELVISH
N
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AN TO
INTRODUCTION
ELVISH
And to Other Tongues and Proper Names and Writing Systems of
the Third Age of the Western Lands of Middle-Earth
as Set Forth in the Published Writings
of
Professor John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
Edited and Compiled by
JIM ALLAN
from hia own researches and from those of
NINA CARSON/ BJORN FROMEN, CHRIS GILSON, ALEXANDRA TARASOVNA
KICENIUK/ LAURENCE J. KRIEG, PAULA MARMOR, LISE MENN,
BILL WELDEN, and others.
As Authorized by the Mythopoeic Linguistic Fellowship,
a Discussion Group of
the Mythopoeic Society.
Brzans bear)
Dedicated to
Richard Plotz
AN INTRODUCTION TO ELVISH
©
copyright 1978Jim Allan
FirstPublished 1978
Second Impression 1983
Third Impression 1987
Reprinted 1995
Reprinted 2001
ISBN 905220 10 2
Printed at
The Bath Press, Bath
Bran's Head Books
Helios, Glenfinnan, Inverness-shire
.
Acknowledgments
•Quenya Grammar $ Dictionary', 'Sindarin Grammar § Dictionary*, 'Other
Tongues', 'The Evolution of the Tengwar', and 'Runes' are expansions
of material originally published as A Glossary of the Eldarin Tongues,
copyright © 1972, Canada, by James D. Allan, save as follows:
'Verbs' in the section 'The Structure of Quenya' is largely based
on 'Notes Toward a System of Quenya Verb Structure', copyright © 1974,
Canada, by Paula Marmor, published in Tolkien Language Notes 1.
'On Pronouns in Quenya' by Bill Welden is a revision of the article
of the same name published in Parma Eldalamberon 3, copyright © 1973,
U.S.A, by the Mythopoeic Society, and incorporates material from
•Eldarin Pronouns', copyright © 1974, Canada, by James D.Allan, pub-
lished in Tolkien Language Notes 2.
The comparisons between Welsh and Sindarin scattered throughout
'The Structure of Sindarin' originally appeared as 'Welsh § Sindarin',
copyright © 1974, Canada, by James D.Allan, published in Tolkien Lan-
guage Notes 1
The correspondences with non-Eldarin languages in the dictionaries
are largely from 'Mathoms' copyright © 1973, Canada, by Paula Marmor
,
and James D.Allan, published in Tolkien Language Notes 1.
'Valinorenna' by Bjttrn Fromen, copyright © 1973, Sweden, by the
'Forodrim', published in Palantiren 2.
'English-Quenya/Sindarin Index' is an expansion of 'English Index to the
Quenya and Sindarin Sections of A GLOSSARY OF THE ELDARIN TONGUES',
copyright © 1973, Canada, by Nina Carson, Alexandra Kiceniuk, and
James D.Allan, published in Tolkien Language Notes 1.
Much of the material in 'The Giving of Names' originally appeared in the
following articles:
'A Categorial List of the Proper Names in the Fiction of J. R. R.
Tolkien', 'Comments on Names in the Fiction of J. R. R.Tolkien,' 'The
Northern Names', all copyright © 1973, Canada, by James D.Allan, all
published in Tolkien Language Notes 1.
•Name Giving', copyright © 1974, Canada, by James D.Allan, pub-
lished in Tolkien Language Notes 2.
•The Queer Brandybuck Names' by Jim Allan, copyright © 1973, U.S.A.
by the Mythopoeic Society, published in Parma Eldalamberon 4.
•Tengwar Fact Sheet Notes' and 'Tengwar Fact Sheet' in the article 'The
Tengwar of Feanor' by Laurence J. Krieg appeared in earlier versions
as 'fact sheet guide' and 'Tengwar Fact Sheet', copyright © 1974,
U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society, published in Parma Eldalamberon 4.
'A Survey of Some English-Tengwar Orthographies' by Laurence J. Krieg is
reprinted with slight revisions from the article of the same name,
copyright © 1974, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society, published in
Parma Eldalamberon 4.
The following material appeals here in revised form by permission of the
Mythopoeic Society:
'An Etymological Excursion Among the Shire Folk' by Paula Marmor,
copyright © 1971, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society, published in
Mythlore 7.
Additions and corrections to the above article in a letter by
Paula Marmor, copyright © 1972, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society,
published in Mythlore 8. (This material has been incorporated in the
article as here printed.)
•The Wielders of the Three and Other Trees' by Paula Marmor,
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
copyright © 1972, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society, published in
Mythlore 8.
•On the Formation of Plurals in Sindarin' by Bill Welden, copy-
right © 1971, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society, published in Parma
Eldalamberon 1. The revised version here printed incorporates mat-
erial from 'Welsh 6 Sindarin', copyright © 1974, Canada, by James D.
Allan, published in Tolkien Language Notes 1.
'A Parallel to the Tengwar' by Jim Allan, revised from 'A Source
for Tolkien's Tengwar?', copyright © 1972, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic
Society, published in Parma Eldalamberon 2.
•Proto-Eldarin Vowels: A Comparative Survey' by Chris Gilson &
Bill Welden, copyright © 1977, U.S.A., by the Mythopoeic Society,
published in Parma Eldalamberon 5.
'The Correct Tengwar and Certar Values' by Jim Allan, revised from
'Corrections to the Tengwar and Certar Values Assigned in Current
Editions of The Lord of the Rings' copyright © 1977, U.S.A., by the
,
Mythopoeic Society, published in Parma Eldalamberon 5.
FOREWORD
JN AN INTERVIEW WITH Henry Resnik (Niekas 18, Late Spring,
1967), Tolkien said:
The real seed was starting when I was quite a child by
inventing languages, largely to try and capture the
esthetic mode of the languages I was learning, and I even-
tually made the discover that language can't exist in a
void, and if you invent a language yourself you can't cut
it in half. It had to come alive—so really the languages
came first and the country after. (p. 41)
But there is little enough pure linguistic material in Tol-
kien's published writings on the first three ages of Middle-
earth, much less than many of Tolkien's readers desire.
The long-ago world shown forth in The Hobbit and The Lord
of the Rings is no Utopia. Grim horrors and evil doings
abounded then as they do now. Yet it was also a time of
great beauty, when nature had not been so dispoiled by Man,
and when Elves and other speaking races still walked openly
in the world and wrought works of wonder and enchantment.
The books whet the desire of the reader for more of the same.
0! to be able to walk through the ancient streets of old Min
Minas Tirith, to ride through the Wold with the Rohirrim,
to see and handle the skilled and cunning works of Dwarvish
hands, or to wander beneath blossoming mallow branches in
the forest of Lothldrien in the spring! But though the
reader cannot do any cf these in body, many are drawn to
come as close as they can to those enchanted times by in some
measure attempting to relive them, or to renew them.
The publication of The Lord of the Pings in 1954, 1955
inspired the foundation of numerous small local Tolkien dis-
cussion groups and societies. Others, who did not know of
such groups, worked alone, or with one or two friends,
vij
.
FOREWORD
discussing the histories of the peoples of those days,
devising Hobbit recipes, writing their own stories set in
the same world, making use of the tengwar of certar alpha-
bets, and even investigating the fragments of the old lan-
guages of the Elves that appeared in The Lord of the Rings.
Ten years later The Lord of the Rings was published in
paperback and became accessible to multitudes who otherwise
would never have known of it. There was an immense increase
in the amount of 'fan activity'. Local gr—oups prolife—rated,
and a larger number of small publications 'fanzines'
appeared dealing with Tolkien's works, with the Tolkien
—
Society of America founded and managed by New York high
—
school student Dick Plotz as a sort of super-group to which
almost everyone belonged. Matters linguistic were not neg-
lected in these publications. Several different tengwar
and certar modes were proposed and arpued over; it was dis-
covered that Tolkien's dwarf names could mostly be found in
the Norse Eddas Bob Foster attempted translations of many
;
of the Elvish personal names and place names in his Guide to
Middle-Earth which was being published in installments in
the fanzine Niekas and sparked linguistic arguments in that
,
journal's letter column.
Two fanzines are of special interest: Glyph and Caran-
daith. Glyph was founded in 1969 by Stanley Hoffman and,
after the first two issues, continued in 1970 by Frank Den-
ton. It was unique in being written entirely in tengwar and
certar characters. Carandaith s editor Alpajpuri (Paul Nov-
'
itsky) had a special interest in the Elvish tongues and cal-
ligraphy, and he wrote articles for his fanzine attempting
to translate and explain the grammar of some of Tolkien's
Elvish, and setting forth his own tengwar mode (see pp. 261-
64 of this book)
By this time there seemed to be a reasonable number of
people who had acquired a certain basic knowledge of the Elv-
ish tongues, several of them being in regular correspondence
with one another. Also, the Mythopoeic Society, a group
centered in Southern California, interested in fantasy in
general and in the works of Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, and Charles
''lliams in particular, had become the second largest of the
Tolkien oriented fan groups, and by far the most active in
publishing. There were in the Mythopoeic Society a few
persons in the Southern California area who had got very much
into Tolkien's languages and into invented language in gen-
eral, and it seemed that it might be desireable that some
publication appear, under the aegis of the Mythopoeic Soci-
ety, to provide a central focus for the study of Tolkien's
languages and names and writing systems, and the languages
in the works of C. S. Lewis, and other such tongues found in
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