The Great Tolkien Legendarium Thread

[Richard W]

there is no finalized Historical Grammar of the Eldarin Languages or the like

And at its simplest, time would be a 2-D structure, with one component for time within the fiction, and another for real time. Even that would have problems covering abandoned revisions (if there are any), and the issues with an elf's idiolect(s) covering millennia. Could an elf be expected to comprehend his own speech of millennia ago?

[WeepingElf]

there is no finalized Historical Grammar of the Eldarin Languages or the like

And at its simplest, time would be a 2-D structure, with one component for time within the fiction, and another for real time. Even that would have problems covering abandoned revisions (if there are any), and the issues with an elf's idiolect(s) covering millennia. Could an elf be expected to comprehend his own speech of millennia ago?

Yes, there are two dimensions of time in such a diachronic worldbuilding project (but of course, the fictional characters are only aware of one, namely the time within the fiction). I don't know how good the linguistic memories of the Elves are; it appears as if they weren't that good, and they are unaware of the changes their idiolects have undergone over time. Otherwise, one would expect their languages to be virtually unchanging, but what we see is languages that change in the same ways as languages of mortal humans, only slower. This is something Tolkien did think about, and wrote essays about it (which, however, I haven't read yet, so I can't comment on which solution(s) he found - but as with most other aspects of his creation, he probably revised them over and over again, never reaching a definite solution, though).

[zompist]

BTW, Wikipedia has a very interesting article on translating Tolkien. Tolkien was a terror to translators, since he could read a lot of the languages involved, and had strong opinions on how his text should be handled.

[Raphael]

BTW, Wikipedia has a very interesting article on translating Tolkien. Tolkien was a terror to translators, since he could read a lot of the languages involved, and had strong opinions on how his text should be handled.

And that article doesn't even mention that the German translations use a different word for "elves" ("Elben") than the one the German language uses in non-Tolkien contexts ("Elfen").

[Richard W]

One of the features associated with the two dimensions of time is etymological change. It's most conspicuous in proper names. In natural languages, the processes are folk-etymology and false etymological spellings (as the 's' in island). In some ways it's relexification, but in general most words affected have only their connotations changed. What is the name for the process in constructed languages? 'Reradicalisation' doesn't quite feel right.

[Richard W]

To begin, I shall address the claim that Quenya resembles Finnish. In my opinion, there are some resemblances, especially in morphological type. Like Finnish, Quenya is a richly inflected agglutinating language with a tendency towards fusion; it has a rich case system and possessive suffixes. Its phonology, however, shows some major differences.

Unless I'm muddling my chronolects, the sound correspondences between Quenya and Sindarin are based on those between Irish and Welsh. Getting a Finnish phonology out of that is quite hard.

[WeepingElf]

BTW, Wikipedia has a very interesting article on translating Tolkien. Tolkien was a terror to translators, since he could read a lot of the languages involved, and had strong opinions on how his text should be handled.

And that article doesn't even mention that the German translations use a different word for "elves" ("Elben") than the one the German language uses in non-Tolkien contexts ("Elfen").

AFAIK, Elb was suggested by Tolkien himself; it is the genuine German cognate of English elf, while Elf(e) is a loan from English. However, Elb was used very little before the Tolkien translation, mainly in literature about Germanic and Celtic mythology, and the reason to choose this "dead" word was that the Elves of Arda are so different from the glorified fireflies the word Elf(e) had come to mean in 20th-century German. Oddly enough, the German translators of the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game did not follow suit even though the D&D Elves are clearly closer to Tolkien's Elves than to little fairies, and most German RPG authors followed the D&D translation and also spoke of Elfen rather than Elben.

To begin, I shall address the claim that Quenya resembles Finnish. In my opinion, there are some resemblances, especially in morphological type. Like Finnish, Quenya is a richly inflected agglutinating language with a tendency towards fusion; it has a rich case system and possessive suffixes. Its phonology, however, shows some major differences.

Unless I'm muddling my chronolects, the sound correspondences between Quenya and Sindarin are based on those between Irish and Welsh. Getting a Finnish phonology out of that is quite hard.

You are muddling your chronolects. While the sound changes of Sindarin are indeed modelled on (but not identical to) those of Welsh, Quenya has nothing to do with Irish; the only thing Quenya and Irish have in common is that they did not shift /kw/ to /p/.

[Raphael]

AFAIK, Elb was suggested by Tolkien himself; it is the genuine German cognate of English elf, while Elf(e) is a loan from English. However, Elb was used very little before the Tolkien translation, mainly in literature about Germanic and Celtic mythology, and the reason to choose this "dead" word was that the Elves of Arda are so different from the glorified fireflies the word Elf(e) had come to mean in 20th-century German. Oddly enough, the German translators of the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game did not follow suit even though the D&D Elves are clearly closer to Tolkien's Elves than to little fairies, and most German RPG authors followed the D&D translation and also spoke of Elfen rather than Elben.

Ah, thank you, I didn't know that!

[WeepingElf]

Also, the word Alb, which survives in the terms Albtraum and Albdruck (both meaning 'nightmare'), is a southern (Upper German) dialect variant of Elb with Umlauthemmung (in Upper German dialects, umlaut fails to occur before certain coda consonants). In Middle High German, the plural was elbe. That the standard German cognate of English elf should be Elb was suggested by the Grimms in the Deutsches Wörterbuch, but the word saw little usage until it was used in the German translations of Tolkien's novels.

The etymology of the Germanic "elf"-word (whose declension class varies: North Germanic requires *albaz while West Germanic points to *albiz) is uncertain. It is probably a cognate of PIE *h₂elbh- 'white, bright', more likely than a connection to Sanskrit rbhuh which refers to a group of three divine artificers (but as we don't know the etymology of the latter, it is not impossible that both connections are correct, the Sanskrit word reflecting a zero-grade u-stem based on the same root; the change *l > r is regular in Sanskrit). I fancy that the Germanic and Celtic traditions of Elves to date back to encounters with a prosperous, sophisticated culture in Bronze Age Britain, who, descending from the Bell Beaker people, spoke a (lost) IE language and used the PIE word as a self-designation, referring to their lighter pigmentation compared to the pre-IE Neolithic people.

[alice]

BTW, Wikipedia has a very interesting article on translating Tolkien. Tolkien was a terror to translators, since he could read a lot of the languages involved, and had strong opinions on how his text should be handled.

By a coincidence so bizarre as to be mind-boggling, last night I finished reading the Reader's Companion to LotR, which has the entirety of Tolkien's "Guide to the Names in The Lord of the Rings" at the end. It's very interesting reading in itself and a kind of Gold Standard for Tolkien wannabees.

ISTR somewhere there's a list of many of the names in LotR and their foreign translations, but I can't find it; does anyone know better?

[Travis B.]

Also, the word Alb, which survives in the terms Albtraum and Albdruck (both meaning 'nightmare'), is a southern (Upper German) dialect variant of Elb with Umlauthemmung (in Upper German dialects, umlaut fails to occur before certain coda consonants). In Middle High German, the plural was elbe. That the standard German cognate of English elf should be Elb was suggested by the Grimms in the Deutsches Wörterbuch, but the word saw little usage until it was used in the German translations of Tolkien's novels.

The etymology of the Germanic "elf"-word (whose declension class varies: North Germanic requires *albaz while West Germanic points to *albiz) is uncertain. It is probably a cognate of PIE *h₂elbh- 'white, bright', more likely than a connection to Sanskrit rbhuh which refers to a group of three divine artificers (but as we don't know the etymology of the latter, it is not impossible that both connections are correct, the Sanskrit word reflecting a zero-grade u-stem based on the same root; the change *l > r is regular in Sanskrit). I fancy that the Germanic and Celtic traditions of Elves to date back to encounters with a prosperous, sophisticated culture in Bronze Age Britain, who, descending from the Bell Beaker people, spoke a (lost) IE language and used the PIE word as a self-designation, referring to their lighter pigmentation compared to the pre-IE Neolithic people.

Interestingly, the native word for 'elf' in ModD and MD is alf even though it ostensibly comes from PWGmc *albiz and *a is one of the few PWGmc vowels that underwent i-umlaut in Dutch. It exists in a doublet with elf, which of course is borrowed from English.

[Axas mlö]

That said, I don't think we can excuse Tolkien for having so few female characters, or for being so cavalier about the swarthy=dubious trope.

Yes, and amplifying your point, the non-White people portrayed negatively are not just the "swarthy" people: the hobbits "were disturbed to see half a dozen large ill-favoured Men lounging against the inn-wall; they were squint-eyed and sallow-faced." Return of the King, p. 307 of the edition I have here.

Doesn't "sallow" here just mean "sickly pale"?

I think it can mean that too. I could be wrong, of course, but the juxtaposition of the skin color and the eyes is what made me think it was a racial description.

[Man in Space]

Another legacy of Tolkien on common parlance: “dwarves”.

Old English plural dweorgas became Middle English dwarrows, later leveled down to dwarfs. The use of dwarves for the legendary race was popularized by J.R.R. Tolkien. As an adjective, from 1590s.

[rotting bones]

Hitler was brought down by the industrial and military prowess of the United States

For old conservatives like Tolkien, the victory of any industrial power was bad, but Hitler was definitely worse.

Personally, I'm very pro-technology, much more so than most of the 21st century left. Tolkien, however, seemed to think it was some kind of temptation to rise beyond one's lot in life. He was worried it would disenchant the world, banishing little grottos like Tom Bombadil's forest folk.

Of course, it's your right to refuse to interpret the text that way. All I'm saying is, hippies weren't idiots for thinking the LotR aligns with their views. It is very easy to read them into the text, and that is because Tolkien was thinking similar thoughts. This is no reason for you not to come up with your own interpretations.

Tolkien clearly said that Hitler was a "little ignorant" who entirely lacked the grandeur of Sauron who after all was a powerful fallen angel.

Back then, a lot of people in the West pretended to be shocked at the war crimes of the Japanese, as if the French hadn't done comparable things in Algeria.

But the races of Middle-earth do not correspond to specific nations of the 20th century world, even if the Shire is inspired by the rural England he so fondly remembered from his childhood.

Of course not specific nations. But if the Elves are not akin to Greeks, why do they wear circlets on their brows like Greek archons were famous for?

Edit: Old conservatives used to think the Greeks were basically supernaturally intelligent. Greeks were also famous for having a highly dramatic mythic past, where they were obsessed with the sins of the fathers even before Christianity.

[rotting bones]

There is no east: Mordor touches the east side of the map. The Men who supported Sauron came from Harad or Rhûn, its neighbors to the south and north.

It says here Rhûn is called "the East": https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Rh%C3%BBn

Could be a "nomads vs. settled peoples" trope.

I recall little of the Silmarillion, but IIRC all the elves we meet in LOTR are Moriquendi ('dark elves') except Galadriel. No elves followed Sauron in the Third Age.

The Silmarillion is what mainly talks about dark elves doing bad things. I get the feeling that when the Silmarillion talks about dark elves, it's not talking about the Sindar. Probably the progenitors of the Silvan Elves, who were a sinister lot to outsiders (think the elves of Mirkwood) even in the Third Age except when convinced to ally with the other races to fight Sauron. Of course, their homelands are a paradise like all elven realms.

Note that Elrond may be Half Elven, but he is descended from Idril, a Noldor like Feanor, the OG fallen angels. Legolas' father is Sindar. Círdan is OG Sindar.

Regarding the master race, the Vanyar are blond, but they are so holy, they never descend from heaven. They are not blond beasts of prey. Generally speaking, in Tolkien's work, there tend to be good and bad members of all races, even though most of the heroes do tend to come from noble parentage.

[rotting bones]

The problem I see with that interpretation, even though it's been sort of endorsed by Tolkien himself, is that stereotypically, dwarves, both in Tolkien and elsewhere, are generally portrayed as being very "physical" and not at all "intellectual", which is the exact opposite of many stereotypes about Jews, both friendly and hostile.

See also Nathan Goldwag's interesting claim that supposedly, Tolkien's dwarves aren't Jews, but Pratchett's are: https://nathangoldwag.wordpress.com/202 ... es-jewish/

I feel like these are hyperfine distinctions. In the past, there were racist people who were very non-racist for their time. They might have thought the stereotypical character flaws of black people or Jews are failings some groups are more prone to than others, but they certainly don't apply to every member of that group. Like the article says, on Middle Earth, no non-Vanyarin is perfect. The other Elves are equally hungry for lore or something, and humans, possibly worst of all, for raw power. This doesn't prevent there being heroes in every race.

As for fighting, Tolkien could have been thinking of the OT Jews, who were kind of fractious. Personally, I doubt he put that much thought into it. Aesthetics tends to be superficial, inexact gut reactions.

[rotting bones]

What makes it difficult to interpret Middle Earth as a symbolic precursor of our world is that in all symbolic systems of our world, light is associated with the East. This is very important for many of our systems of symbolism. In Middle Earth, the light is associated with the West.

[zompist]

There is no east: Mordor touches the east side of the map. The Men who supported Sauron came from Harad or Rhûn, its neighbors to the south and north.

It says here Rhûn is called "the East": https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Rh%C3%BBn

I already answered this twice, and also in the very line you quoted. Yeah, Rhûn is east of the Shire. Where is it from Mordor? North. What's east of Mordor? Nothing, just the edge of the page. It's supposed to be a planet so I'm not denying something was theoretically there, but Sauron doesn't seem to know or care. He's just lucky Gollum, leaving Mordor, didn't think to go east; he'd never be found.

Admittedly this is how an ancient Briton or Norseman would think of the world. But Tolkien wasn't an ancient Briton, he was writing in the 1940s. The Conan stories have a para-India and a para-China; Tolkien's pal Lewis had a para-India. On the other hand, maybe it's just as well: at least Tolkien didn't mess around with countries he didn't understand.

[WeepingElf]

It indeed seems as if Tolkien didn't have many ideas about what lay beyond the LotR map's edges; it may be because, as you say, he did not understand the cultures of India, China or Africa well enough to do justice to them, or wanted to avoid colonialist stereotypes about those parts of the world. One can quite safely assume that the power of Sauron did extend beyond the map's edge to some degree, but the idea that all the vastness out there was under Sauron's rule seems nonsensical to me. Well, these regions did not matter much to the plot, and the people of the northwest did not know much about them, so Tolkien could leave them unexplored.

Of course, many Tolkien fans and especially roleplayers are curious about these unexplored lands, and creatively fill them in. There is a poster map of Middle-earth by the authors of the Middle-earth Role-Playing game, and the roleplaying group I was in in the early 1990s used a different map made by yours truly, in which the lands where LotR was set were western additions to the Europe we know, under the assumption that they sank beneath the ocean at the end of the Fourth Age; there also is an online project exploring those areas. All that, alas, is no longer Tolkienian canon but mere fanwankery. But well, this is not the Bible, and creative additions of this kind are IMHO legitimate, as long as one doesn't forget that it is not Tolkien's own creation.

[Raphael]

or wanted to avoid colonialist stereotypes about those parts of the world.

Given who he was, that seems rather unlikely to me.