ESSN 1054-7606 Number 4o - Features Nargelion (facsimile) ERR. Tolkien Nargelion and the Early Lexicons: Some Notes on the First Elvish Poem Christopher Gilson Departinents Editor's Musings 2 Publications Received 33 ELF News. 3 Resources 35Page2 = Vityar Tengwar + Number 40 April iggy > : Editor’s Musings In this issue it is my great pleasure to present, with the kind permission of the Tolkien Estate, a facsimile of Narqelion, the earliest of Tolkien's Elvish poems, together with a new analysis of the poem by Christopher Gilson. The publication last year of the complete text of the Qenya Lexicon and of ils companion Qenya Phonology, and the earlier publication of the complete Gnomish Lexicon and of the contemporary Gnomish Grammar (in the two most recent issues of Parma Eldalamberon: see the announcements on the Next two pages), make this an especially appropriate time to consider this pvem anew, in full light of the grammatical writings contemporary with its compasition. itis also my great pleasure to welcome Ivan Derzhanski as a new member of VT's review panel. Readers of VT 38 will have been acquainted with Ivan’s learned work in Telkien’s languages and in linguistics im general, and par- ticularly in symtax, semantics, and linguistic typology. I am grateful to have his advice and assistance. — Carl F. Hostetter “T might fling out the view that for perfect construction of an art-language it is found necessary to construct at least in outline a mythology concomitant. Not solely because some pieces of verse will inevitably be part of the (more or less) completed structure, but because the making of language and my- thology are related functions; to give your language an individual flavour, it must have woven into it the threads of an individual mythology, individual while working within the scheme of natural buman mythopoeia, as your word-form may be individual while working within the hackneyed limits of human, even European, phonetics, The converse indeed is true, your lan- guage construction will breed a mythology... “You must remember that these things were constructed deliberately to be pessonal, and give private satisfaction — not for scientific experiment, nor yet it expectation of any audience... Be kindly. For if there is any virtue in Uhis kind of thing, it is in its intimacy, in its peculiarly shy individualism.” — FRR. Tolkien, A Secret Vice (MC:216° 11, 213), Vinyar Tengwar is produced by the editor an a Macintosh PowerBook (3 personal romputer, using @ Mustek scanner, Microsoft Word 98, and Adobe PageMaker 6.5 VT is set in the Adobe Minion PasiScript typeface, and uses the Groeca, IPAKiel, TransCyrillic, anid TransRoman PostScript forsts available from Linguist’s Software, Inc, (hup:fiwow.linguistsaftware,com/;. VI & printed an an FIP Laserfet sMP laser primerApril 999 Vinyar Tengwar - Namber 40 ___ Pages PARMA ELDALAMBERON Tur Book oF ELveN TONGUES 4 * Number 1 — 1995 Parma is a journal of linguistic studies of fantasy literature, espe- cially of the Elvish languages and names in the works of LR.R. Tolkien. IL LAM NA:‘NGOLDATHON The Grammar and Lexicon of the ‘ GNOMISH TONGUE e ByJ.R. R. Tolkien € Edited by Christopher Gilson, Patrick Wynne, Arden R. Smith, and Car] E. Hostelter 76 pp. Available (or $15 + postage and handling ($150 USA, $2 Canada, South America, and overseas surface mail, $3 overseas airmail) from: Chris- topher Gilson, 19200 Miller Avenue #426, Cupertino, CA 95014, USA; E-mail harpwire@ify.net. All payments must he in US dollars, Make all checks pay- able to Christopher Gilson. Some back-issues are still available; write for details,Page 4 Vinyar Tengwar + Number 40__ April 99 ParMa ELDALAMBERON THE Book or Exven TONGUES Number 12 — 1998 Parma is a journal of linguistic studies of fantasy literature, espe- cially of the Elvish languages and names in the works of ].R.RB. ‘Tolkien. ‘ QENYAQETSA *, The Phonology and Lexicon of the QENYA TONGUE ByJ.R. R. Tolkien Presenting the “Qenya Lexicon” in its entirety, together with a contemporary phonology of Qenya. s Edited by Christopher Gilson, Carl F. Hostetter, Patrick Wynne, and Arden R. Smith xxii + 12 pp. Available for $20 plus postage and handling ($2 USA, $3 elsewhere in North and South America, $4 Burope, Africa, Asia and Austra- lia), from: Christopher Gilson, 10200 Miller Avenuc #426, Cupertino, CA 95014, USA; E-mail harpwire@ifn.net. All payments must be in US dollars. Afake all checks payable to Christopher Gilson. Some back-issues are still available; write for details.Apriligsy. Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 5 Ovkte Ph wavore Meal uous , : : Deva | Viv feu)at Vente - Pi ug oot Shyer voller cantar : NOS ye Karmal iolivode N * ena dbe s mee Teme Dau whir Sinploie Pp fae . woul Gwarye 99 ox basal te Sou givin len oglday : 2 he welder iawn mroativaewe Ur cuabdor bor Seas tr ata Va eyo tttmten « YWaledonno, Wd Yen loa Lew pny meh. Cas a 8 Sen Geen Aine « Ox nie Viewatiibe wemdbiiate Rennew A Tadote me Lastolite Vien areal pe fe” lt Nargelion ©1999 The Tolkien TrustPage 6 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 _ April 1999 Nargetion and the Early Lexicons Some Notes on the First Elvish Poem by Christopher Gilson Four lines from the first poem that J.R.R. Tolkien composed in Elyish were included by Humphrey Carpenter in J.R.R. Tolkien: A Bography (George Allen & Unwin, 1977, page 76), where Carpenter noted the fact that the poem contained such words as Lasselanta and Eldamar, familiar from their later use in The Lord of the Rings. There was no translation, and it tumed out that Tolkien’s handwriting was misleading in a few places, making the text seem even less like Quenya than its early date warranted. In 1988 Christo- pher Tolkien sent a photocopy of the original manuscript to Paul Nolan Hyde, along with his own transcription af it, The poem, which is called Nargefion, was published in Mythlore, No. 56 (Winter 1988, page 48}, along with Hyde's interpretation of the meaning of the poem, based on compari- sons with the rest of the Elvish corpus (hat had been published at that time. In 1990 Patrick Wynie and I presented our own interpretation of the poem in Parma Eldalamberun, No. 9 (1990, pages 6-32), coming to somewhat different conclusions. While these attempts did ascertain the meaning of some of the more straightforward portions of Nargelion with fair accuracy, they also included much tentative speculation based on inferences from ambiguous resem- blances, When we presented a copy of our efforts to Christopher Tolkien one of his comments was tu have momentous consequences, He said it was unfortunate that more of his father’s early Lexicons could not be included in ‘The History of Middle-earth series, and foresceing nv likelihood of an occa sion for publishing them in book-form, asked for thoughts on how their publication might be accomplished. The obvious implication that the Lexi- cons must contain information that would be relevant to a better inLerpreta- tion of Nargelion was set aside, naturally, this being but a smal] part of their significance. Christopher Tolkien approved the suggestion of publishing the Lexicons in Parma Eldalamberon, and the painstaking labor of photocopying, anno- tating, transcribing, and editing the manuscripts began. There had been as yet no indication of the size or scope of the Lexicons, though Christopher Tolkien had hinted at their textual complexity, and indicated that they were the original well-spring of his father’s Elvish languages. One of the pleasant surprises along the way was learning (while in Oxford ist 1992) of the exist- ence of a Gnomish Grammar contemporary with the Texicons, a unique glimpse into Tolkien’ earliest thoughts on the syntax of both Goldogrin and Qenya. ‘The “Gnomish Lexicon” (GL) and Gnomish Grammar were eventu- ally published in 1995 and the “Qenya Lexicon” (QL) in 1998;April 1999 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 Page 7 Tt seems an appropriate time to take another close look at the poem Nargelion, now that this can be done in the full light of the early Lexicons and associated grammatical writings. The poem is dated November 1915 and March 1916, and so appears to have been written during the time that QL was being compiled, and. is probably closely contemporary with the first workings on GL, whose second layer ts dated 1927. The following notes out- line a theoretical explanation for the meanings of all of the words and syn- tactic devices employed in Nargelion, based on glosses, grammatical descrip- tions, and analogous examples drawn primarily from contemporary evidence. By far the most useful source is the Qenya Lexicon, and words cited in the following discussion are from QL unless otherwise identified. (Glosses cited from QL are often selective, and details such as stem-forma- tion have been induded only where pertinent to the discussion.} For almost every word in the poem a probable source {or sources in the case of compound words) can be found in QL, either the word itself as an entry, ora word from which it is derived or to which it seems closely related. Because there is no translation of the poem into English, there remain cer- tain problematic forms, especially where more than one potential similarity with entries in QL could be significant. (See especially the discussion of Vemaitte in line 8, Suilimarya in line 10, and nére in line 20.) The wards in QL display a rich assortment of derivational suffixes, and Tolkien apparently intended to describe the underlying system or to list their uses and meanings, when he had completed the Qenya Phonology that accompanies QL, but this projected discussion was never accomplished. By comparing the endings of words found in the poem with other forms of similar ending (in QL or within the pocm itself) inferences can be drawn as to the meanings of the derivational or inflectional endings used. There are also some useful indicators of the emerging conception of the grammar of Qenya in the contemporary discussion of the grammar of the related Gnom- ish language, which was published alongside GL. Cccasionally the forms found in later material are considered, especially where the identification of a particular grammatical device seems fairly cer- tain, and the later use er discussion (even if in an altered form due to intervening changes in conception) may throw light on Tolkier’s thinking as to how such devices might be ased. But all such comparisons must be viewed with caution, since it is quite clear that Tolkien did elaborate and alter his conception of the grammar of Qenya, and it will be seen, when the grammatical writings from the years immediately following QL and GL have been published, that these changes were oflen quite dramatic and took place must frequently in the earliest period of [olkien’s work on his languages. T wish to gratefully acknowledge the advice of Patrick Wynne, wha pointed out the meanings of certain key words in the poem whose signifi- cance had eluded me (see especially the discussion of oikta in lines 4 and 18), and suggested alternative possililities for some of the more uncertain pas-Page 8 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 _ April 1999 sages. I also want to thank Carl Hostetter for insisting that xsthetic sensibil- ity need nat be sacrificed to grammatical ingenuity. Any ubscurities or er- rors which remain in the following notes are of course entirely my own. Nargelion N-alalmino lalantila Ne-stime lasser pinea Ve sangar voro iimeai Oikta ramavoite malinai, Ai lintuilind(ov)a Lasselanta 5 Piliningwe stiyer nalla ganta Kuluvai ya karnevalinar Yrematte singi Eidamar. San rotser simpetalla pinge, Stdiimarya sildai, hiswatimpe 10 San sirilla ter i-aldar: Lilta lie noldorinwa Omalingwe lir’ amaldar Singitalla laiqaninwa. Nralaimino hyé lanta lasse 5 Torwa pior ma tarasse: ‘Tukalla sangar umeai Oikta r4mavoite karneambarai. Ai lindérea Lasselanta Nierme mintya nare qanta, 20 Title Nargelion ‘Autumn’. Although this term for the scason is later interpreted as theaning literally ‘fire-fading’ (2 compound derived in The Etymologies from the bases NAR- ‘flame, fire’ and KWEL- ‘fade, wither’), it was given a different origin in QU. There it is listed under the root NRQR ‘to wither, fade, shrivel’, where it is related to the adjective narga ‘faded, shrivelled’, the intransitive verb narqa- ‘wither’, and the noun nargele ‘a fading, withering’. The derivation of warq-ele is comparable to such nouns as Kantele “harp- ing, repetition’, lindele ‘song, music’, gingele ‘Janguor’, or fokele ‘handling’. ‘This suffix -ele, which also has a collective or augmentative sense (as in tarkele ‘great system of routs’ beside tarka ‘twot’), is used to form verbal nouns where a sense of protraction or repetition is included with the verbal notion. Thus although the root QELE- ‘perish, die, decay, fail’ did already exist at this time, it does not underlie the form nargele, and Nargelion did not refer specifically to the fading of the sun, bur rather to the withering of the leaves in Autumn.April i999 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 9 The derivation of Nargelion from nargele is comparable to the formation of names for other times of the year: Lirillion “the first half of January’ derived from Lirillo ‘the Valu of Song’, Brintion ‘the second half of January” derived from Erinti ‘the Vali of love, music, beauty, and purity’, and Amillion ‘February’ derived from Amillo ‘one of the [lappy Folk (the Valar), Hilary’. With regard to these three Valar, and the months or half-months named after them, it is interesting to note that Tolkien's birthday is in the first half of January, his wife Edith’s in the sccond half of January, and his prother Hilary’s in February. We seem to have a hint here of the sometimes very personal origins of the earliest form of Tolkien’s mythology. Linea Nealalmino. In the QL entry alalme (3) ‘elm (tree)’ the form of citation indicates that the stem is alalmi-, realized as alalme when it occurs without any suffix. The stem is seen in the name Alalmi-nére ‘Land of Elms’. The phrase malalmino occurs twice in the poem, here and in line 15. The context in both places is about the fall of leaves {or of a leaf), which suggests that nalaimino means ‘from the elm-tree(s)’ ot something very much like this. There is no extant grammatical description of Qenya contemporary with Nargelion (only the Qenya Phonology, the companion piece to QL), but there is a Gnomish Grammar that dates from 1917 or earlier, and it contains several allusions to the grammar of Qenya, mentioned for purposes of his- torical comparison between the related languages. The section on the noun. begins with the statement: “Nouns have three cases (as those marked for the article) properly in Goldogrin as in Qenya” (NG:9). The three cases listed are (1) inessive or nontinative, (2) genitive, and (3) allative or dative. The genitive case is described as “denoting derivation and used by itself usually as a pussessive or partitive but also employed with all prepositions etc. of ablative or derivative sense. It is occasivnally used by itself in an ablative sense, as in bara ‘from home, away, out, abroad” (19). That some or all of these uses of the genitive case apply to the grammar of Qenya is implied by the subsequent observation regarding the Gnomish case: “It is tot used in reference as in Q enya] (cp. Q nustalen mara ‘good by nature’) the case here employed in G[oldogrin] being the nominative (nds mora ‘good by nature’) or occasionally dative (nosi mora)” (10). This also provides an example of one of the inflectional forms of the Qenya genitive. QL has nostule “species, kind’, and mara ‘mighty, powerful, doughty; of things, good, useful’, and the phrase sostalen mara ‘good by nature’ must contain the genitive form of nostale. Tolkien tabulates the “signs of these cases” that are commonly used in Goldogrin nouns. For the genitive-ablative (“gen. abl.”) they are singular -a or -n, and plural -iom or -than, For each of these Tolkien compares the corresponding Qenya ending and gives the indicated etymology: “with -ion ep. Q -ion, both being double plural -j + 6 + n; with -a ep. Q -0, [from] 0;Page 10 Vinyer Tengwar - Ni miber qo ___Apnilsg99 with -thor cp. Q -ron, where -r- is from the nom[inatives,] for -son; ... with -n cp. Q-n” (10). The same etymological material produced the case-forms of the Goldo- grin article, though generalized along different analogical lines. The root of the article was i, which “gave in the phural cither 7 or #7 and in the genitive in, but hefore words beginning with nasalized-explosives nd, snb, ng (a fairly mumerous dass originally) in- also was developed in other cases” (LNG). ‘This led to the abandonment of a distinction in number, so that for example the nominative case had simply a preconsonantal form é and prevocalic in- used with both singular and plural nouns, Case distinctions were preserved, and the usual form of the genitive (possessive and ablative) was preconso- natal na- and prevocalic nan, which came from older ing and inan- by “apocope”. These were double genitive endings derived from “i +'n genitive +a suffixal genitive” (9), ie. by a combination of the same Goldogrin geni- tive endings -11 and -2 mentioned above for the noun. Final -a in Goldogrin comes from original final lony -d, -é, or -d. That the final -a in ina: is the same cognate of Qenya -o from 5 mentioned above is corrobarated by the archaic Goldogrin variant inan, where the original vowel quality is pre- served, as it is in nouns like galda, gen. goldon, and the plural genitive suf- fixes -ton and -thon, ‘The doubling up of the genitive endings in the Goldogrin article was probably a counteraction to the increased ambiguity of the older genitive in, which was homophonous with the oid nominative plural in- and the new Prevecalic nominative singular in-. If we extrapolate from nostale ‘species, kind’, genitive nostaien (‘by nature’), we can infer the possibility that alalme, alatmi-'elm-tree’ had a genitive “alalmin. Alongside this the double genitive form ‘alalmino (= alalmi- + -n + -0) may have atisen to provide greater distinction fromm derived adjectival forms in -in, such as aurin ‘warm’ (be- side ure, auri- ‘sunlight, sunshine, warmth’), or nouns such as Matin ‘shade, shadow’ (beside lame, l6mi- ‘dusk, gloom, darkness’). A clue to the faction of the prefixed n- in n-alalmino is also provided by the Gnomish Grammar. Toikien states that, parallel to the development of the forms na- and nan from ina and inate, “the form in- similarly gives 1 very frequently, written n- or ‘n-” (9). The common condition for the op- tional apocope of initial 7 in these forms must be the lack of any stress on the article when modifying a noun. This condition presumatly applied in Qenya as well. The definite article is not listed separately in QL, but it occurs in a few entries, such as i Sovaile ‘the Purification’ and i-Pondnr ‘the Northlands, Scandinavia’, These are apparently nominative singular and plural construc- tions. This form also occurs in the poem in line a1: San sirilla ter intdar, which probably means ‘then flowing through the trees’. The Goldogrin allative-dative is used to exptess movement towards, as a pure dative, or a dative of advantage. The nominalive-inessive is used for subjects of sen-April i999. Vinyar Tengwar_- Number 40 Page nt lences, and with all locative or inessive prepositions, or occasionally by itself as a locative. The construction ter taldar seems to fit the nominative- inessive category, SO we are not surprised that it has the same form as -Portdrir. If Qenya i, & derives from the same root 7 mentioned in the Gnomish Grammar, the plural form presumably reptesents the primitive plural in 7 rather than in, with both singular and plural shortened lo # when unstressed, These probably go with the root I- ‘here it is’, from which the derived adverb ine ‘to-day’ preserves the long vowel in stressed position. If valalmino means ‘from the elm-tree’, then its ablative sense goes with the genitive case (for which we have suggested a double genitive case-sullix -n0). The prefixed genitive article n would derive by apocope from ‘in, a Qenya case-form derived in turn from the prehistoric genitive in = 7 + -, as de- scribed in the Gnomish Grammar. lalantila, QL has fanf- ‘drop, fall’ and Janta ‘a fall, falling’, with a cross- reference to the entries lasselanta ‘the Fall, Autumn’ (under lasse ‘leaf}) and morilanta ‘nightfall’ (containing, mari ‘night'). The poern has Lasselanta in line 5, and lanta lasse (presumably ‘falls a leaf’) in Jine 15. The reduplication of the beginning of the root-syllable in la-fantila is used to intensify the basic idea of the word. When the result of reduplication would be euphonic and unambiguous in Qenya without alteration of the sounds involved (as usually when the root ends in r, for example) the entire base is repeated. Thus per-pere- ‘endure ta the end, suffer great anguish’ is the intensive of pere- ‘go through, pass, endure, undergo’. There is an alter- native pattern with reduplication of the initiat consonant and vowel of the root, probably originating wherc the second consenant of the root was sub- ject to loss or modification, as in su-sitima ‘full of wind’ (an intensive adjec- tive related to silime ‘wind’, the root being SUHYU, SUHU, SUFU). This pattern is found in multiplicative adjectives, like lin-ti-tinwe ‘having many stars’ or lé-ne-neldora ‘having many beeches’. The ending of Jalant-ila is comparable to that in mirmila ‘rippling’, for which QL gives an example phrase, mira mirntila (i.e. ‘rippling wine’), and pampila ‘tremulous’, related to papa- ‘tremble’ (past tense pampe-). So Jalantila is an intensive or multiplicative verbal adjective or participle de- rived from lant- ‘drop, fall’, meaning something like ‘dropping continually, falling repeatedly, one by one till all have fallen’. This participle modifies lasser ‘leaves’ in the next line (see below), which is the subject of the verbal notion, in short ‘falling leaves’, but with the intensifted meaning of the verb. We know that in the later conception a Quenya participle is not necessarily marked as plural when modifying a plural sun, as shown by the example of rémar sisilala ‘wings shining’ and ruxal’ ambonnar ‘upon crumbling hills’ in the latest version of Oilima Mar- kirva (MC:222~23). This appears to be true already of the conception of Qenya here as well.Page 12 Vinyar Tengwar « Number 40 April 1999 Line 2 Nestime. As with malabmino this phrase is especially enignsatic because it involves two puzzles — the meaning of the component fe, and the function of the ending -me, Under the root SUHYU, SUHU, SUFU ‘air, breathe, exhale. puff QL has severa) derivatives, including s# ‘noise of wind’, Tstiye ‘airs, breezes, winds’, stilime ‘wind’, and others. “The Poetic and Mythologic Words of Eldarissa” (a list of excerpts from QL compiled at about the same time) glosses sti as ‘(noise of} wind’, Since stiyer occurs in line 6 of Narge~ fion, in what could well be an echo of the image expressed here, it is not unlikely that we have a derivative of si ‘wind’ in the phrase ne-stime. The ending -me can have a fairly abstract sense, as in loime ‘thirst’ (from. loyo- ‘be thirsty’) or saime ‘harp-playing, music of lyres’. But it is often used to derive terms for places or locations, most dearly in such nouns as kaime “dwelling, home’, kirme ‘cleft, gully’, mime ‘west’, orme ‘summit’, and tolome ‘island’. Pechaps in these words the ending -me derives ultimately from root MI (whence mitta ‘in, into, inwards’) said to be connected with the root IMI ‘in, into’, The preposition mi- ‘in’ is not fisted separately in QL, but is probably the second element in the name of the Moon King, given as Uole-mi-Kiime (under the entry for Korosintl, the name of his palace), in which Uole is the proper name of the Moon-fay (according to the entry for the cognate C! in GL), and the epithet ai-Krme presumably means ‘in (the) Moon’. It may also occur at the end of the name of the Sun, Qorindini, literally ‘drowned in the Sea’ {cf qorin ‘drowned’ and © ‘the sea’), although the ending here may be influenced by the feminine -i seen in other names like Erinti, Fui, Nuri, or Urinki. For the possibility of mi- producing a form -me, compare the rout VI, VII ‘as’ with derivatives ve “as, like’, vea ‘similar, like’, alongside vika ‘like’. If stime is a derivative comparable to kaime and kirme, it may mean ‘the air’ as ihe place where the wind ts located, But if these derivatives do in fact contain mi- ‘in’ in the form of a suffix (with lowering of the unstressed final vowel yielding -me), then some of them must have arisen ultimately from the substantive usage of an adverbial (with *mi in post-position), such as aime “dwelling, home’ < *kai-mi < *kaya + ‘ii = ‘in (the location of} rest, where rest takes place’ or kirme ‘gully’ < *hir-mi < *hifi + tmi = ‘in the cut, where the split is’. And stime may then actually preserve this adverbial force and mean ‘in the wind, where the wind is, accompanied by the wind’. Albeit speculative, this interpretation is supported to a certain extent by the fact that tierme in line 20 can be understood in context by appeal to a similar derivation (on which sce further below). There may be an analogous use of the suffix -me in the later conception of the language, for example in the phrase lenéme ihivatiren ‘with leave of [Ihtvatar]’, occurring in The Notion Club Papers, and referring to the permission obtained by the Valar before they changed the world and destroyed Niimenor ($D:246),April 1999 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 13 Patrick Wynne and I suggested previously (Parma Eldalamberon 9, p. 22) that the phrase re-stimte might be parallel ta Gnomish i-walt ne Vanion ‘the luck of the Valar’ (LT1:272). But it turns out that the correct reading of this phrase in GL (as we learned from seeing photocopies of the notebook text itself} is -walt ua Vanion, with the familiar genitive form of the article na- (see above), and there is in fact no Gnomish preposition *ne. Interestingly cnough the publication of the full text of GL provides an- other potential cognate for this Q ne, and a clue to further evidence of its possible meaning. In GL under the entry for the verb na- ‘is’, which is “quite irregular”, the participle of and preterite thi are given. The form thi emerged by a change in the manuscript from the form i, At the time that Nargelion was composed the conception of the verb ‘to be’ in Qenya was presumably consistent, insofar as its (internal) historical connection, with this Gnomish conception elaborated no more than a year or two later. The preterite of the verb ‘to be’ is not given in QL, but this tense-form is listed for many verbs, and frequently identified as such. The Qenya preterite has a variety of formations, but one of the familiar types is seen in kanda- ‘blaze’, pret. kandane. Some other examples that illustrate the general pat- tern include alfu ‘wash’, pret. allure; apaitya ‘conquer’, pret. apaiksine; tyosto ‘to cough’, pret. tyostone; palwa- ‘make wander’, pret. paltune; and poita ‘cleanse’, pret. poine. What these inflections have in common is the suffix -ne, It is possible that forms like kanda-ne actually arose as a construction with the verb-stem plus a form of the verb ‘to be’, ie. that a meaning like ‘blazed’ derived syntactically as in such English phrases as ‘was blazing’ or ‘did blaze’, with an originally tenseless form of the stem kanda- ‘(to) blaze, blazing’ combined with the past tense expressed in the ending -ne ‘was’. The present tense of the verb ‘to be’ is given in QL as na ‘it is’ (also meaning ‘se, yes"), and if the preterite is né or ne, there would be a parallel with cerlain other verbs where the present vs, preterite is marked solely by a change of -a to -e, as in panta- ‘open, unfold, spread’, pret. pantte, ot sanga- ‘pack tight’, pret, sange, And Q *né, ne- would correspond to (the rejected) Goldogrin i, much as Q Ie ‘with’ (from root LE and cited as Q /é in GL) corresponds to Goldogrin fi ‘with, and’. If ne- = ‘was, were’, then ne-siiee could mean ‘was (or were) in the wind’. Possibly the stem ne- can be used participially to mean ‘having been, being’. (Preterite stems are used this way to express accompanying circumstances in the “Secret Vice” poem Oilirna Markirya, e.g. vea falastane ‘the sea surging’, MC:213-14.) lasser. QL has lasse (e} ‘leaf’ and this occurs as such in line 15 of the poem. The form of the citation shows that the stem of the noun is Jasse-, to which the plural ending -r has been added. This Qenya suffix is mentioned in the Gnomish Grammar, where it says that the Goldogrin plural noun suffix “rh is original and same as Q -r”. An alternative “conjecture” is also mentioned, “that G -it does not represent Q -r, but that -r is a true plural ending (i.e. rPagers __Vinyar Tengwar - Number go Apriligo9 liquid)” (LNG:10). With regard to the former explanation note that accord- ing to the Qenya Phonology primitive p > d> z >1 in word-final position in Qenya (Q:20} Same examples of the use of this suffix in QL include aimaktur ‘martyrs’ {mentioned under perpere-), plural of aimaktu; i Torgeler ‘the tropics’ (ef. jorgele ‘tropic heat’); and the feminine plural Vatir (used in the entry her?), corresponding to the singular Vali (used in the entry Erinti). Other plural nouns appearing in the poem include sangar in lines 3 and 1, siyer in line 6, rotser in line 9, taldar in line 1, and pior in live 16. Presumably Jasser ‘leaves’ is the subject of ne-stime, as an indicative ‘leaves were in the wind’ (or perhaps as a circumstantial participle meaning some- thing like ‘leaves having been in the wind, leaves being in the wind’). Since it also scems to be modified by the ablative-genitive and participle in the pre- vious line aalatmino lalantila ‘falling one by one from the elm-tree’, the combination means ‘leaves falling from the clm-tree were in the wind’ or “from the elm-tree leaves were falling in the wind’. The word order may create the effect that in English could be expressed by ‘from the elm-tree falling in the wind there were leaves’, The relative freedom of word-order is familiar from later examples of Quenya, ¢.g. poetic laurié larttar lassi ‘like gold fall the leaves’, for prosaic lassi lantar laurié ‘leaves fall golden’, Placing the subject after the verb and adjective keeps it in focus and facilitates its comparison to the subsequent images of the poem. pinea ‘small’ is given in QL (under the root PIKI, PINE, PI) together with pinge ‘slender, thin’, which also occurs in the poem in line 9. The use of the singular raises the question of what is being described as small. The elm-teee is certainly not small. The wind could be a gentle breeze, for instance; but since the fall of all the leaves in autumn is ultimately evoked here, and indeed leaves flying away in the wind as though they were birds {as will be seen below), it seems that the idea of a strong gust of wind is as likely to be meant here as that of a gentle breeze. Also note that if pinea were intended to modify stime, and assuming that the analysis given so far is correct, it would become unclear why Tolkien did not use a less confusing word-order like ne lasser stimne pinea to convey this idea. Thus of all the possibilities the most likely seems to be that pinea modifies lasser, despite the fact that the adjective is not marked as plural to agree with the plurality of the noun, In some languages in which an adjective is nor- mally declined to agree with its noun in number and case there are excep- tional adjectives which are not declined at all, retaining the same form in ail uses. In Finnish for example, the adjectives ensi ‘first, next’, eri ‘separate’, keko ‘whole, al, and pikku ‘little’ are each indeclinable (Arthur H. Whitney, Finnish, 1956, p. 66; Charles N. Blial, A Finttish Grammar, 1890, p. 44). There are also some Finnish adjectives, such as kulta ‘dear and polo, polonen ‘poor’, which form a sort of compound with a noun (though written sepa-April 1999 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 15 rately) such that only the second word in the pair (whether adjective or noun) is inflected. Thus ‘with the poor boy’ would be either poika polosetta or polo pojalla (Eliot, 29). This phenomenon of singular adjectives modifying plural nouns is fairly prominent in the poem, and may extend beyond the situation seen in Kinn- ish with a small nurnber of exceptions to its general rule of adjective-noun agreement, but the underlying cxplanation could be similar. Other examples in the poem are vikta and rdmavoie in lines 4 and 18 (mudifying sangar in lines 3 and 17), ganta in line 6 (apparently a predicate adjective modifying the subject siiyer), possibly pinge in line 9 (ii modifies rotser), and torwa in line 16 (modifying piar). The adjectives inflected as plurals are about equaliy numerous (see the notes on tieneai and karnevalinar, below); so in Qenya poetry it seems that the agreement of adjective with plural noun is more or Jess optional, at least about half of the time. ‘There may be an underlying connection with the fact that adjectives fre- quently form the first component in compounds (with nouns or other ad- jectives), as in Karnevalinar ‘red-brown’, laiqaninwa ‘green-blue’, or karne- ambarai ‘red-breast’. When the whole compound is marked as plural, only the final element receives an inflection, as seen in the first and third of these examples. We are perhaps to understand a predicate construction like siiyer nalla qanta ‘airs being full’ (see below) as a poetic ellipsis for *suyer nalla qantasiyer “airs being full-airs’, i.c. the singular ganta is really equivalent to the stem-form in a cognate plural compound. Then laser pinea is to be understood as a further ellipsis of lasser (alla) pinea ‘eaves being small’, though it is in effect a poetic reversal of the compound "pinea-lasser, equiva- lent in meaning to the phrasc *péneai fasser ‘smail leaves’, Line 3 Ve sangar. QL has the noun sange ‘throng, tight mass, crowd’ and the verb sanga- ‘pack tight, compress, press’, and savigar must be the plural of one of these. voro. QL lists the forms vor, vero ‘ever, always’. This adverb modifies the following adjective tameai ‘large’, and seins to convey that, while the throngs may expand or contract as they move through the air, perhaps exchanging members, they continue to be large. uimeai. This seems to derive from QL dimen “large”. The inflexional combina- tion -ai occurs fuur more times in the poem: wralinat in lime 4, kuluvat in line 7, sildai in line 10, and karneambarai in line 18, The last of these is a replacement in the manuscript for a repetition of salinai (and lines 4 and 18 are otherwise identical), so that we can infer that the endings are similar in these two words because they are parallel in syntax. The forms without -i would be matina, silda, kulteva, and karneambara, and each of these is listed as an adjective in QL. So we seem to have a characteristic adjectival plural suffix -i.Page 16 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 April iy99 Apparently in sangar voro vimeni ‘throngs ever large’ the adjective timea has a plural inflection (dimea-i) to mark the fact that it modifies the plural sangar. (If alternatively sangar were a verb ‘they pack tight’, then vimeai would agree with the plural subject, presumably the leaves; but il seems to me that the interpretation of sangar as a noun makes more sense in context.) Given this reading of sangar voro timeai, and the fact that pinea ‘small’ and timeaé ‘large’ are actually opposites, it seems likely that the simile expressed by ve ‘as, like’ must be a comparison of some other feature(s) not connected with size as such. The next line makes this clear with the adjectives ramavoite ‘having wings’ and malinai ‘yellow’ (see below), qualities which the leaves share, either metaphorically or literally. Note that the incidental syntactic contrast between pitea (which is only implicitly plural because it describes each of the plural lasser) and tmeai (which is explicitly plural) serves to reinforce the contrast between them. Althongh each leaf is small, the individual throngs are large precisely be- cause each one consists of many leaves. This asserts a significant conse- quence of the comparison — although the fall of each individual leaf is small event, insofar as the leaves are like throngs the cumulative effect of their movement is overwhelmingly large. Line 4 Oikta. QL has the noun oi “bird, hen’. The suffix -kta occurs in two deriva- tives, the adjective kolmekta ‘pointed’ derived from kolme ‘tip, point’, and the noun palukta ‘table’ related to palo (x) ‘plane surface, plain, the flat’, for which the citation form shows that the stem is palv-. The etymological sense of kolmekta ig clearly ‘having a point or points, consisting of point(s)’, as in ‘(sharp-)pointed spear’ or ‘five-pointed star’, And this also would explain palukta, iFit originated as an adjective meaning ‘having or consisting of a flat surface’. Thus oikta seems to mean ‘consisting of birds, having birds (in it)’ and is an adjective modifying sangar ‘throngs’ in the previous line. Note that the diseresis mark over the 7 in oikta indicates thal the word is to be pronounced as three syllables, o-ik-fa. This is called “breaking” of the diphthong, and is mentioned in the Qenya Phonology, under the discussion of accent (Q:27). Two of the examples that illustrate the conditions under which this occurs are antaista (with breaking) and antaika (without break- ing). Clearly the two consonants following the diphthong ai in antaista con- stitute a crucial factor Jeading tv the breaking, analogous for exarnple to the contrast between oikta and oika ‘poor’. Apparently not all similar situations resulted in breaking, but another examaple in QL is aiirgila (beside aurigilea) ‘golden, sunlit’. rémavoite, ‘having wings’. malinai, We have seen that this is probably the plural of malina ‘yellow’, so rémavoite malinai might perhaps mean ‘having yellow wings’, if we suppose that the implicit plural rémar ‘wings! underly: ing the derived adjective rdmavoite could be modified in turn by the explic-April 1gg9 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 17 itly plural adjective malinai, But since the topic so far has been autumn leaves falling in the wind, and they are imagined as like great flacks of birds, then each leaf may correspond to a whole bird, and we need not suppose that it is only the wings of the birds that are yellow. This whole line, ofkta rdmavoite malinai ‘consisting of birds, having wings, (and} yellow’, may be a seties of three adjectives each modifying sangar, with the plural inflection applied to the third and final word, as though this were a single compound adjective * oikta-rdmavoite-malinai ‘bird-winged-yellow’, structurally similar to karnevalinar or laiganinwa. The punctuation at the end of the first four lines of the poem is hastily written, It looks more like a comma than a period, and if this is correct it would suggest that these lines form an intreductory phrase in apposition to what follows. This would coincide with the alternative suggestion above that ne-stime = ‘being in the wind’. If the punctuation is really a period, then we presumably have an indicative sentence in these lines; and this would go with the interpretation that ne:stime = ‘were in the wind’. Taken together the lines mean something like: ‘From the elm-tree small leaves were falling in the wind, like ever large throngs of yellow birds on the wing’. This meta- phoric allusion to birds is reinforced by the following line: Ai lintuilind(ovja Lasselanta. Line § Ai! ‘oh! ha!’ This interjection marks the beginning of a kind of four-line refrain, and is repeated at the beginning of the final couplet of the poem. fintuilind(ov)a. QL has tintuilinda ‘many-swallows{,| of autumn’, which is presumably connected with tuilindo ‘swallow’. The form written in the poem as fintuilind(ov)a seems to imply that a longer alternative form of the word is lintuilindova, with an extrametrical syllable, showing that the word is adjectival in origin, from lin- ‘many’ + tuilindo ‘swallow’ + the adjectival suffix -va. ‘This suffix is seen also, for example, in kuluva ‘of gold’ (beside kul “gold’), mériva ‘nocturnal’ (beside méri ‘night’), and roldova ‘belonging lo the gnomes’ (beside noldo ‘gnome’). Lasselanta ‘the Fall, Autumn’. The implicit connection of the word lintuilinda with Autumn is made explicit in this following word in the poem, which means literally ‘leaf-fall’. ‘The phrase Hintuilinda Lasselanta presum- ably means ‘Autumn of the many swallows, Autumn with its many swai- lows’. Line 6 Piliningwe. This word was changed from Pilivinge in the manuscript of the poem, apparently at the time it was written. The fact that the original e was incorporated into the beginning of the w has led to the previous misreading of the form as *Piliningeve (obscured even further as *Pilingeve in Carpen-Number 40 April 1999 Page 18 __ Vinyar Tengwor ter). The same change of original -inge to -ingwe is seen in QL with the entry ulumpingwe ‘caterpillar’. This word appears to be derived from ulumpe ‘camel’, and in origin probably alludes to the fact that caterpillars form a hump with the middle sections of their bodies as they move. The ending of the word ulumpingwe is similar to that of telpingwe ‘silver- fish’ (derived from telpe ‘silver’). Although this is the name for a kind of insect (like wlumpingwe) the English equivalent suggests an association with ingwe ‘fish’. (And of course there is no reason to assume that the Qenya compound cannot alse apply generically to any silver fish, just as the English can.) The influence of this form might also be seen in lingwe ‘snake’, which is synonymous with lin, Hing- ‘snake’, and might be an analogical alteration of the shorter stem. So perhaps ingwe, at least in compounds, has a looser application to all of the lower orders of animal life, especially to those which like the fish are fluid of motion. If so, since QL gives pilin ‘feather’, piliningwe may mean basically “feathered animal’ or ‘creature propelled by its feathers’. An alternative possibility is suggested by comparison with dmalingwe. It is noted below that this might be divided éma-lingwe and mean ‘voices spiral- ing or coiling’ (through the trees). But if this were divided dmuli-ngwe, then the first part of the word could contain the multiplicative suffix -H, ie. dmali- ‘many voices’. And we can propose a similar interpretation of pilini- ngwe, i.e. that il contains the plural pilin ‘feathers’. If so there would be a parallel between piliri-ngwe and émali-ngwe in structure. And given this parallel we can note the general circumstances of the usage of each word in its context: piliningwe referring to the feathers of birds (like falling leaves) filling the airs (siyer nalla qanta, sce below); émalingwe referring to the many voices of the Gnomes singing tenderly (lir’ amaldar, see below) as they dance through the trees. We might compare the Goldogrin prefix gwa-, go- ‘together, in one’, In GL this is said to derive from *rya-, which corresponds to Q ma-. (In LNG 4 was used to represent @ in in the original manuscript. The sound y is a consonantal pronunciation of 4, i.e. an unemphatic w-sound.) While ini- tially the combination sw- may yield Q m-, in medial position it becomes -ngw- according to the Qenya Phonology (cf. Q:15, 16). If this connection is valid then the final e must be a secondary development, perhaps marking the form as adverbial rather than adjectival. Also compare Goldogrin gwe ‘ye, you’, which is plural only, so that its sense could be approximated as ‘you’ = ‘all those who are together with you’. Omali-ngwe could be ‘many voices together as one’, of ‘together with many voices’, with -ngwe being used as a kind of comitative suffix indicating accompaniment or accompanying circumstances, Pilini-ngwe would then mean ‘with feathers’, and combined with qanta at the end of this line the sense would be ‘full of feathers, filled with feathers’, referring to the many swallows implied by the adjective lintwilinda in the previous line. We haveAprilig99_ _ Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 Page 19 seen evidence that the grammar of Qenya was conceived of at this time as including a nominative-inessive case, a genitive-ablative case, and a dative- allative case. The Gnomish Grammar also says, “There are various other suffixes of similar significance that are purely adverbial, not used with prepositions and only occasionally used with nouns.” If the proposed inter- pretation of the sullix -me in ne-stime ‘were in the wind’ (line 2) and nierme Sn grief, in sorrow’ (line 20) is correct, this may exemplify a similar variety of adverbial suffixes in Qenya, also occasionally used with nouns. The suffix -me could be an alternative inessive (i.e. locative) suffix. Along similar lines the suffix -ngwe in piliningwe ‘with feathers’ and émalingwe ‘with many voices’ may be a comitative or instrumental suffix, with occasional applica- tion fo nouns. stiyer. This appears to be the plural form of stiye ‘noise of wind; airs, breezes, winds’, mentioned above. nalla qanta. QL lists qanta ‘full’ along with a verb ganta- ‘fill, complete’. That the line as a whole means something like ‘feath- ered creatures are filling the airs’ or ‘the airs are full of feathers’ would fit the context. Lf so, nalla may be a form of the verb ‘to be’ derived from the root NA ‘be, exist’. There are four other words in the pocm ending with -Ha: simpetalla in line 9, siriHa in line un, sirtqitalia in line 14, and tukalia in line 17. In the case of sirilla especially, since the verb-stem siri- ‘flow’ is given in QL as well as the words in the surrounding context (timpe ‘fine rain’, san ‘then, at that time’ and i-aldar ‘the trees’, on which sce above), the meaning is fairly clear: ‘fine rain then flowing through the trees’. The precise syntactic force of the construction is hard to determine, whether it is used as an indicative verb or as some sort of infinitive, gerund, or participle. QL bas some nouns of similar form, such as lirifla ‘lay, song’ (cf. liri- ‘to sing’), mirilla ‘faint smile? (cf. miri- ‘to smile’), and pusilla ‘puff, whiff, breeze’ (cf, pus- ‘puff, snort’). So perhaps we have a verbal noun ending -lia, and can infer that nalia means ‘being’ in the sense ‘existence, affirmation, possession (of an attribute or status)’. But if alla takes the place of a noun here, it is difficult to see how it fits into the context. Possibly it stands as an appositive to Lasselanta. But a similar interpretation does not seem Lo work with the subsequent examples of this ending. It will be shown below that in line 14 we probably have a textual variation between the forms singitaila and [singit}diar. If the latter is a plural form of *singitdla, then we might compare the ending with lalantila in line 1. Per haps -ila, -clu, and -alla axe etymologically related endings, inflexions of the same verbal adjective or participle category, with slight variatiun according to the shape of the verb-stems with which they are associated. A participial expression of circumstances accompanying the situation described would seem to be a reasonable explanation of each of these constructions — laluntila lasser ‘leaves falling’, rotser simpetalla ‘pipes playing’, ete.Page 20 Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 April iggy Thus Piliningwe siiyer nalla ganta would mean ‘the airs being full of feath- ers’. In this phrase nalla seems to be redundant, since *piliningwe stiyer qunta ‘the airs full of feathers’ means essentially the same thing. In QL the entry nd is actually glossed ‘(it is,) 50, yes’, presumably indicating that the use of this word for ‘sa, yes’ is derived from its literal meaning of ‘it is’. Apparently the Qenya verb ‘to be’ can have an emphatic, affirmative sense. ‘Thus nalla may have the sense ‘being so, being indeed’, and the phrase nalla qanta ‘heing indced full, being so full’. As in English this emphasis might serve rhetorically to introduce a qualifying simile or metaphor. (See further under Y’ematte, below.) Line? Kuluvai. This is the plural of the adjective kutuva ‘of gold’ mentioned above. ya. QL lists the word ya(n) ‘and’. Por a similar optional final n in a short functional word compare sé, sen ‘as, like, in manner of”. The variation may depend on stress or on phonological context, such as whether the following word begins with a vawel or consonant. karnevalinar. There was originally an entry karvevalin in QL, later changed to karnewalin before being deleted. This was said to mean the same thing as karmalin (-da) ‘russet, orange-red’. The latter entry originally gave the form as karwalin, which was itself said to derive from karn- + walin. Presumably karnewalin is derived similarly from karne ‘rec!’ + *walin{a) ‘brown’. The form in the poem has an additional plural suffix, karne + walina + -r = karnevalinar. The variation of w to ¥, retained in the poem but eliminated fram the entry in QL, may reflect an alternative interpretation of this compound. Ultimately the entire group of words under the root GWALA™ including ‘walin(a) ‘brown’ was rejected, and the entry karnewalin also deleted, though karne and karmalin were retained, the latter probably under a new interpretation, with its second element related to salina ‘yellow’. Perhaps karnevalinar in the poem is then to be associated with the root VALA and its derivatives Valar, Vali, with karnevalina meaning something like ‘Vali- nérean red’, The next line of the poem includes the wards singi ‘gems, metals’ and Eldamar, so that an association of the color karnevatina with the Valar seems to be contextually plausible, On the other hand, if valin(a) expresses a particular kind of red, we might expect this component to come first in the compound (cf. karneambara below). The original gloss karnevalin ‘russet, orange-red’ remains the only indication of what hue is teferred to here. Whether there are rules determining the choice of suffix -i or -r in plural adjectives is difficult to say from the examples we have. For instance if kuluvai ya karnevalinar “gold and russet’ refer to different preceding words by virtue of the different endings, it might be that kurevalinar reters lo the ‘swallows’ of lirttuilinda (or the ‘feathers’ of piliningwe), this being an aptApriligss Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 Page 2 description of the color of the throat of the common swallow, while kuhever could refer to the color of the elm-leaves, implicit in Lasselanta (or explicit earlier in the Jasser of line 2). But even if these associations are the correct ones, it remains difficult to correlate the choice of adjectival ending with the syntax of the antecedent noun. The plural ending -i is used on a-stem adjectives (meni, malinai, kulu- vai} but not on a-stem nouns, while the plural ending -r is used on nouns (sangar, aldar) as well as adjectives {karnevalinar, amaldar). We also know that in later examples of Quenya adjectives can be used substantivally, i.e. in the place of nouns. Thus in Treebeard’s greeting, A vanimar, vanimalion nostari‘O beautiful ones, parents of beautiful children’, the adjective vanima ‘beautiful, fair’ is used substantivally, to mean ‘beautiful one’, and as such it takes the plural endings of the noun, -r and ~1i, in contrast with the normal adjectival plural. Tn this later conception a-stem adjectives normally have plurals in -e: vanima, pl. vanime. This is the conceptual continuation of the -ai ending seen in Nargelion, and indeed from the internal historical point of view -ai is the early Quenya source of Third Age Quenya -e, as we can infer from the statement in Quendi and Eldar about the “possessive” inflection in -va, that it “was and remained an adjective, and had the plural form -ve in plural attribution (archaic Q -vai}” (W]:407). Tf the suffix -r was already employed for substantive use of adjective plu- rals in the earlier conception, then karnevalinar would be literally ‘russet ones, orange-red ones’. Thus kedlsvai ‘golden’ is an attributive plural modi- fying the preceding noun(s), while the substantival phrase ya karnevalinar ‘and (also) orange-red ones’ is a kind of afterthought. The usage here may be optional, and so chosen in part to provide a rhyme with Eldamar in the following line. But the substantive use of the adjective also serves to reem- phasize the things (birds or leaves) being described, and so aids the meta- phoric transition whereby kuluvai ya karnevalinar ‘gold and orange-red ones’ also refers to sinqi in the subsequent phrase. Line & V'ematte. This probably consists of ve ‘as, like’ + emratte, with contraction of ve before the initial of the following word. Presumably ematte sinqi Eida- mar is cither a noun-phrase subordinate tw ve in the sense ‘like’, or a clause subordinate to ve in the sense ‘as’, In either case the simile ought to supply the qualification for the emphatic statement in line 6, ‘the airs being so full of feathers’. There is nothing quite like enmatte in QL. So we have to consider how it might be divided into identifiable components. There is a demonstrative en-, ek- et- ‘that (by you)’, formed by various additions to a root E, with the unaugmented prefix form e- (given without gloss) apparently occurring as a variant, eg, in ef(farine = tantine ‘today’. Under the demonstrative root SA- the form sa- is equated with demonstra-Page 22 __Vinyar Tengwar - Number 4o April ig99 tives e-, en-, ta; but sa- is also said to be an intensive prefix like a-. Se perhaps we can infer that the prefix e- could be used as an intensive, If we are to divide the word as e-matte, then there is a suggestive resem- blance of the second component to mat (tt) ‘meal, meal time’ under the root MATA ‘eat’, An intensive af this might mean ‘great meal, feast, bounty’, and be used metaphorically to refer to a great number of gems. (See the discus- sion of singi, below.) The difficulty with this interpretation is that all of the other words under the root MATA refer to eating, kinds of food, ur parts of the mouth. So it is clear that such a metaphor 4s ‘a feast of gems’ would carry the implication that the gems would be eaten. This is not an impos- sible idea in Tolkien's emerging mythology. In the Lost Tales it is said how “Gloomweaver was ahungered of the brightness of that hoard of jewels” that Melko stole, though we only see her hide them in her caverns “wound in webs of darkness” (LT2:152), and it is only subsequently that the description emerges of her devouring them one by one. But the idea seems to have an inappropriate connotation in the context of the poem. In the Gnomish Grammar, at the end of the discussion of the origin of the case endings, in which it is stated that “-th is original and [the] same as Q-+’, Tolkien reports the following speculation: “The existence in G. of an -r plural sign in verbs has given rise to conjecture (coupled with [the] Q. form gen. pl. -ron) that G -th does not represent Q -r{,] but that -r is a true plural ending (ie. r liquid) and ~# = Q -t dual from -ital,| a dual ending = -nta. This is possible” (LNG:10). Perhaps Qenya has a related pronominal ending -te with dual meaning ‘they’ = ‘both of them’, Note that the dual ending would seem to allude to the two groups of things described in the previous line, Kuluvai ya karnevalinar ‘golden and orange-red ones’, (We normally think of a dual as referring to a pair of individuals, but it can also apply to a bipartite division of a larger group — in the later conception there is a distinction between omentie ‘meeting’ of two individuals or groups, and yomenie ‘mecting’ of three or more, WJ:367, 407.) If we are to divide the word as ema-tte, then there is a suggestive resem- blance of the first camponent to the stem of the verb enix, esil, emir ‘I (etc.) am called’. The irregular consonantism in the verb (if not illusory — Tol- kien wavered in his conception of these forms) may be connected with the variation in the rclated noun stem en (emb-) ‘a name’. We can only specu- late as to the precise meaning of the stern erna- that this would imply. If the subject of this verb is the ‘gold and orange-red? leaves and feathers of Au- tumn, and the object is ‘the gems of Elvenhume’ (singi Eldamur, see below), then the sense of the verb would be that (for the poet) these colors ‘call up” or ‘call to mind” these legendary Elvish creations. Note that this sense is echoed in the last line of the poem, in the word rzintya, meaning ‘to remind’ or ‘reminding’. For other verbs in QL which show a similar variation in sense due to the implicit presence or absence of the idea of completion orApril 1999 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 __ Page 23 finality (which is frequently expressed in English by the adverb ‘up’), cf. sulp- ‘tick, sup, lick up, sup up’, konta- (pret. kome) ‘roll up, roll, pack’, kupta- ‘to hump up, look lumpy’, goto ‘count up; reckon; account, call ups think, consider’. . sinqi. This appears tw be the plural of sink (q-} ‘mineral, metal, gem’, whcre the form of citation means that the stem is sitq-. The word was originally written as singe in the poem, apparently a variant singular form, and then changed to plural singi, (Carpenter gives *singi, mistaking Tolkien’s q for g, as he does also in line 6, reading *ganta for qarta.) ‘Ihe fact that singular singe could be changed to plural sinqi without any change to erate, is consistent with the suggestion that this noun is the object (rather than the subject) of this verb. Or to look at the matter in another way, of the two plausible interpretations of ematte singé as ‘gems are called to mind’ or ‘they call to mind the gems’, the second seems the more likely. If the subject is dual, then the meaning is ‘both of them call to mind the gems’, and (as suggested above) likely candidates for the dual subject to which the ending -tre refers are the ‘gold and orange-red ones’ of the previ- ous line. And of course karnevalin may describe such gems as topaz or garnet, while kuluva, derived from kulu ‘gold’, can refer to a metal. The term singi includes metals as well as gems. It is theoretically equivalent to English ‘minerals’, but does not necessarily have the same implication that the sub- stances described have been ‘mined’, since in fact the gems of Eldamar were first conceived of as having been fashioned by the Gnomes from the natural colors they saw around them. And even kulu has a more poetic sense than ‘metallic gold’ has in English, as explained in GL about its cognate cul, which was “used mystically as a class name of all red and ycllow metals”. The word sink (sing-) ‘gem’ was originally placed in QL under the root SNTYN ‘twinkle’, along with sinty- ‘sparkle’ and sindi ‘crystal’, and only later grouped (tentatively) with singele ‘mine’ Eldamar “the rocky beach in Western Inwinére (Faéry), whence the Solosimpeli have danced along the beaches of the world. Upon this rack was the white town built called Kor, whence the fairies came to teach men song and holiness.” It will be seen that what is described in this entry in QL, the dancing and singing of the fairies of Eldamar, is more or less the same 2s what is described in the following six lines of the poem. In GL Bglobar is equated with Eldamar and they are tendered as ‘Elfinesse” and ‘Elthome’. There is no inflection on this word in the poem, so that it would appear to be nominative singular. As the Gnomish Grammar explains in discussing the three cases of Goldogrin and Qenya, the nominative case is also inessive or locative. It is used as such with locative prepositions, but can be used by itself in some constructions to indicate location. The example given is Goldogrin bar ‘at home’, ‘This is the same word that forms the second com- ponent of Fldamar-Egiobar,Page2g Vinyar Tengwar - Number 40 April 1999 It seems possible then that Vematte singi Eldamar means ‘as they call to mind the gems in Eldamar’. Perhaps compare the passage Tolkien subse- quently composed in The Book of Lost Tales, describing how “the Noldoli with great labour invent and fashion the first gems. Crystals did they make of the waters of the springs shot with the lights of Silpion; amber and chrysoprase and topaz glowed beneath their hands, and garnets and rubies they wrought, making their glassy substance as Aulé had taught them but dyeing them with the juices of roses and red flowers, and to each they gave a heart of fire” (LT1:127). The Gnomes made a great number of gems, which they shared with the other inhabitants of Valinar, and scattered about the shores of Eldamar. This abundance is the focus on which the comparison is drawn by use of nalla ganta ‘being so full’ in line 6 and v'ematte ‘as they call up’ in line &. The Qenya idiom is not exactly parallel to anything in English. But it is similar to a construction like the air is so fulf of feathers as to remind me of the gems of Elvenhome, insofar as the relative adverb ‘as’ is used te introduce a clause expressing manner or degree. On the other hand it is similar to the air is indeed full of feathers, as if they might recall the gems of Elvenhome, insofar as the comparable subjunctive construction can take for its subject a pronoun that refers back to an object of the main clause. Lines 5 through 8 of the poem taken together mean something like: ‘Oh! Autumn with its many swallows, the airs so full of golden and orange-red feathers, that they call to mind the gems of Elvenhome’, It is to that legend- ary time when all the Gnomes and Fairies dwelt in Eldamar that the poem now turns. Line 9 San ‘then, at that time’. The use of sart to introduce an historical description is also seen at the beginning of the poem Farendel (MC:216). rotser. This is the plural of rotse ‘pipe (tube)’, presumably here referring to the device made of tubes of different lengths used to make music, as shown by the following ward. sitmpetalla. The word that this most closely resembles in QL is simpetar ‘a piper’. Apparently both words are derived from a stem *simpeta-. For the formation of the agent noun from an active verb, compare maksar ‘a cook” from maksa- ‘to cook’, nagar ‘thief from naga- ‘steal’, ot tektar ‘writer’ from tekia- ‘to write’. As a verb-stem ‘simpeta- would be parallel to certain denominatives like koleta- ‘endure, last’ derived from Kole ‘passivity, endur- ance, patience; passive individual’, makseta-‘enmesh’ from makse ‘net’, or vaimata-‘[to] robe’ from vaima ‘wrap, robe’. The underlying noun simpe does not occur as such in QL, although what appears to be the plural form Simpi is equated with Solosimpe, and clearly simpe is the second component in Solosimpe, pl. Solosimpi ‘Shoreland-April i999 ___Vinyar Tengwar > Number 40 Page 25 pipers’. In the entry for the compound QI gives the following quotation (as though cited from an external source): “The fairies ... lived among [the] rocks and shingles of Eldamar, who danced along the beaches of the world — and now they dance and pipe to the waves or make melody in the weedy caverns of the shores of Tol Eressea.” The verb *simpeta- would mean ‘to do what a Solosimpe does’ (hence ‘to play the pipe’) and simpetar is ‘one who does what a Solosimpe does’ (hence ‘piper’). Like nalla “being” and sirilla ‘flowing’, simpetalla may then mean ‘piping’ or ‘playing’, a participle modifying rotser. pinge ‘slender, thin’. This adjective when applied to sounds refers to the higher pitch and more tremulous fluidity of the whistles or hoots produced by pipes, as compared with the lower and fuller sounds of horns or drums, for example. So rotser simpetalla pinge would mean ‘pipes piping thin’ = ‘pipes making their high and tremulous sounds’. Line 10 Stlimarya sildai. If the word suilimarya were divided stiima-rya, then the first component would resemble sust#lima ‘full of wind’ without the redupli- cative syllable, which we saw above serves as an intensifier. Thus silima- might mean something like ‘containing wind, containing air’. The root is given as SUHYU, SUHU, SUTU ‘air, breathe, exhale, puff, and some of the words related to sustilima, like sit ‘noise of wind’, suiva ‘soughing, moaning’ or stima ‘nostril’, show that the air referred to here can be the air breathed by a person, and also that the sounds made by the air as it moves are part of the basic idea of this group of words. Note that in English an “air” can refer to a melody or tune. In later examples of Quenya poetry there is a suffix -rya used as a 3td person possessive, e.g. in ve fanyar maryat Elentéri artane ‘like clouds her two hands the Star-queen has uplifted’, The essay Quendi and Eldar notes that -rya can also be used followed immediately by the name of the person to which it refers instead of a genitive construction, as in kéarya Olwe “Olwe’s house’ (literally ‘the house of him, Olwe’), and explains that posses- sive suifixes could also be attached to adjectives when these were attributed to proper names (or personal functions like ‘king’) as in Varda Aratarya “varda the Lofty, Varda in her sublimity’ (WJ:369). So if silima is here attributed to rotser ‘pipes’ in the previous line, or by metonymy to the ‘piper(s)’ playing the pipes, then silirnarya could mean ‘his having airs’ (or ‘their having airs’), and stifimarya sildai ‘slender his (or their) airs’, perhaps in the sense that the melodies being played are delicate, subtle, or eery. There are two difficulties with this interpretation. First, there is no evi- dence ta corroborate the use of -rya as a ard person possessive suffix at this carly stage in the conception of Qenya. There are no parallel possessive suffixes, and although the verb-forms erin, emil, emir ‘] (etc.) am called’ seem to be 1st, 2nd, and 3rd persun, respectively, formal parallels like mokirPage 26 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 April 1999 ‘L hate’ render the identification of this suffix -r problematic. Secondly, the use of pinge ‘slender, thin’ in the previous phrase and sildai ‘slender’ here seems somewhat redundant, if both refer metaphorically to the character of the music being played on the pipes. Neither objection is very strong by itself, but together they seem to recommend seeking another possible inter- pretation. If the word stilintarya were divided suli-marya, then the first component could be stile ‘pillar, column’, perhaps the plural form, or else a variant stem. The former possibility would make sense with sildai as the plural of adjective silda ‘slender’, ice. ‘slender columns’. This leaves the second element -marya to be explained. The following forms in QL beginning with mar- exemplify the various connections that are possible: mar- ‘get ripe’, marin ‘fruit’, marilla ‘pearl’, mar ‘dwelling of men’, marqa ‘oozy’, mard- ‘grind’, arma ‘sand’, mart ‘a piece of luck’. Of these marilla is the only one with a meaning that is suggestive in context. QL lists marifla ‘pearl’ without any related words, but with a hesitant connection to the group including mard- ‘grind’ and marma ‘sand’, If we take the word at face value, it seems to be derived from a stem *mari- with a noun-forming suffix -lIla, which occasionally has diminutive force, as in lotella ‘a floret’ (beside léte ‘a flower, bloom’), or mirilla ‘faint smile’ (beside mire, mirin ‘a smile’), Perhaps derived from this implicit stem *mari- there is an a-stem adjective *marya ‘of pearl’ or ‘pearl-like’ in substance, compa- rable in formation to such adjectives as inya ‘tiny’ (from root INI- ‘small’) or varya ‘different’ (beside the stem *vari- in varimo ‘foreigner’ ). So the compound siili-marya might mean ‘having columns of pearl’, re- ferring to the construction of the rotser ‘pipes’ in line 9. And the phrase stlimarya sildai may actually consist of two adjectives in apposition, ‘pearl- columned (and) slender’, both modifying rotser, with the plural inflection applied only to the second adjective. (Cf. the discussion of ofkta rémavoite malinai in line 4.) hiswa ‘dim, fading’, timpe ‘fine rain’. Thus hiswa timpe ‘a dim, misty rain; a fading drizzle’. Line 1 San ‘then, at that time’, As suggested above sirilla probably means ‘flowing’, derived from the verb siri- ‘flow’. The subject of the verbal notion, i.e. the noun which the participle sirilla modifies, is timpe ‘fine rain’. ter i-aldar. It was also mentioned above that i-aldar = ‘the trees’. The word ter is presumably related to tereva ‘piercing, acute, shrill, sharp’ given under the root TERE in QL. The preposition tere, ter ‘through’ is given later in The Etymologies, together with tereva ‘fine, acute’ under the base TER-, TERE! ‘pierce’. So hiswa timpe san sirilla ter i-aldar seems to mean ‘a fading mist then flowing through the trees’. The descriptions of the ‘pipes playing’ andApril 1999 Vinyar Tengwar « the ‘mists flowing’ are followed in the text by a colon, and they appear to be appositive participial phrases serving to convey the circumstances accompa- nying the action described in the following lines. Line 12 Lilta. QL has the verb /ilt- ‘to dance’, so the form /ilta is either ‘dances’ or ‘dancing’, with subject lie ‘people, folk’. In QL noldorinwa is glossed ‘goblin (adj.)’, but it is clear that this refers to Elves (as it does in the poem “Goblin Feet”) rather than to Orks, Other QL entries in the same group as noldorinwa were revised, such as noldomar ‘goblin-land’ with the gloss changed to ‘gnome-land’. So lie noldorinwa means ‘the gnomish people, the gnome-folk’. Line 13 Omalingwe. QL has dma ‘voice’, which is certainly the first component of this word, and lingwe or lingo ‘snake’, which might account for the second part. There is a derivative lingwilla ‘spire, coil’ which shows the abstract quality of lingwe that may be alluded to here, the voice of the people spiral- ing and coiling like the movement of a snake, as they dance among the trees, to the sound of pipes emerging from the fading mists. An alternative possibility was suggested above, that we have the multipli- cative suffix -li here, ie, dmali- ‘many voices’ and an ending -ngwe, with émia-li-ngwe comparable to pilini-ngwe in line 6, assuming that this contains the plural pilini ‘feathers’. If so there would be a parallel between pilini-ngwe and dmali-ngwe in structure. The context suggests that pilini-ngwe stiyer nalla ganta means something like ‘the breezes being filled with feathers’, and a parallel meaning for dmali-ngwe would be ‘with many voices’. lir’ amaldar. QL has a verb Jiri- ‘to sing’, and we apparently have “lire or “lira (‘sings’ or ‘singing’) with the final vowel contracted due to the initial vowel of the following word. QL also lists amalda ‘soft, gentle, kind’ and maida (amalda) ‘tender’, presumably the same word, of which amaldar ap- pears to be the plural form, comparable to karnevalinar in line 7, the plural of karnevalin(a). If amaldar is a substantive plural ‘tender ones, gentle ones’, it probably represents the object of the verb lir’, referring to the songs being sung by the lie noldorinwa as they dance to the music of the pipes. Line 14. Singitalla. This is the form written in the text of the poem at this point. In the left margin there is an annotation: “< dlar.” This has been taken to represent a revision of the text, supposing that the (hastily written) arrow is in the wrong direction, whence the reading Singitdlar. But for other changes to the text Tolkien lined through the older version, or wrote over it. Perhaps he was here considering the two variants as both possible, without rejecting either one, and the arrow may actually indicate that the marginal form isPage 28 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 April 1999 older, from the perspective of the internal history of the language (or of the poem). Both forms seem to derive from a verb-stem sirgita- not found in QL, but probably derived from sing- ‘mincral, metal, gem’, in an alternative form “singi- similar to that which underlies singin ‘metallic’. Comparing the derivation of maksela- ‘enmesh’ from makse ‘net’ or vaimata- ‘to robe’ from vaima ‘wrap, robe’, singita~ might possibly mean something like ‘to cover or decorate with metals or gems’. At the time that the entry sink (sing-) ‘gem’ was originally placed in QL under the root SNTYN ‘twinkle’ (see the discussion of singi, above}, this was immediately followed by an entry singe[??] ‘sparkle as with gems This was later erased and is only faintly legible in the manuscript. Perhaps the farm should be read as singe[ta]- or singfita]- and represents the verb underlying the form Singitalla in the poem. If so this would mean ‘sparkling as with gems’. The following word laiganinwa is composed of laiga ‘green’ and ninwa *blue’. So singitalla laiqaninwa could mean ‘sparkling with gems of green and blue, bejewelled in emeralds and sapphires’. The alternative form singitdlar may represent the inflected form of a derived verbal adjective *singitdla, as opposed to a generic participle, which singitalla seems to be, judging by is close similarity to nalla, simpetalla, sirilla, and tukalla. The derivation of singitdla from singita- is roughly equivalent to the derivation of (a)antila {com lant-, although not identical. The use of the adjective here as a plural substantive singitdlar ‘sparkling ones’ (or even ‘ones who cause sparkling’) may again anticipate the conception of the Gnomes in the Lost Tales as the makers of gems, which they used to decorate Kér and also liberally strewed along the shores of Eldamar. The passage cited above, in the discussion of Wematte singi Efdamar, continues: “Emeralds some made of the water of the creek of Kér and glints among the grassy glades of Valinor, and sapphires did they fashion in great profusion, (?tingeing] them with the airs of Manwé; amethysts there were and moonstones, beryls and onyx, agates of blended marbles and many lesser stones, and their hearts were very glad, nor were they content with a few, but made them jewels in immeasurable number till all the fair sub- stances were well nigh exhausted and the great piles of those gens might not be concealed but blazed in the light like beds of brilliant flowers” (17112728). Lines 9 through 14 of the poem taken together mean something like: “At that time when pipes were whistling, slender columns of pearl, when fading mists were flowing through the trees: the dancing Gnome-folk with many yoices sang tenderly, sparkling green and blue.’ It should be noted that the past-time reference assumed here is only conveyed by the two uses of the adverb san ‘then, at that time’, which is actually demonstrative, and here describes the past by virtue of its reference to the time of the description ofApril 1999 _Vittyar Tengwar - Number 40 ___ Page 29 the singi Eldamar in the previous line. The poem turns from this image of the past back to the present. Line 15 Nealalmino ‘from the elm-tree’, hya ‘here by us’, lanta ‘drops, falls’, lasse ‘a Jeaf’. See above for a fuller discussion of Nalaimino, tanta, and lasse. The Jine means ‘from the elm-tree here a leaf falls’, and echoes lines 1 and 2 of the poem. Line 16 Torwa ‘baked; dark (rich) brown’, the color is probably the primary mean- ing in this contest, But metaphorically the color of the skin of a fruit is the result of its ‘baking’ in the warmth of the sunlight. pior. This is the plutal of péo ‘phat, (berry,) cherry’. The form of the gloss in QL seems to suggest that the primary use of the word is to refer to fruits of the type of plum and cherry. Some berries ate of this sort, but not all; and this seems to be the reason ‘berry’ is placed in parentheses. Here the word is used to refer to one such berry, named explicitly in QL by the related com- pound piopia ‘the fruit of hawthorns, haws’. Hawthorn-berries are shaped somewhat like small cherries, and grow on clustered. stems. (Note that an indirect allusion to the berries being food for the birds might echo V'ematte singi in line 8, under the alternative suggestion that this means ‘ike a feast of gems’.) mé. QL has the noun md ‘hand’, said to “= maha”, This is also the form in which the root is given as MAHA ‘grasp’, so perhaps md could be used (at least poetically) as a verb ‘grasps’. The subject is tarasse ‘hawthorn’, i.e. the hawthorn holds onto its berries (while the leaves ate falling). Alternatively we may have the noun md ‘hand’ with the nominative case used in its inessive function in these two nouns, with the meanings ‘in hand’ and ‘on hawthorn’, (Cf. the use of Eldumar in line 8.) Thus torwa pior md tarasse ‘brown berries in hand on the hawthorn’ would again convey a contrast with the falling leaf described in the preceding line. Each cluster of stems that bears the haws does (Joosely) resemble a hand with long fingers. Line 17 Tukalla. This has been read as Tukalia, but what was taken to be i appears more likely to be a second /, written somewhat shorter than the first. QL has the verb tuku ‘po in search af, look for, fetch’, so tukulla could be ‘going in search of, looking for, fetching’, The last seems most appropriate here if we take it to mean that the berries of the hawthorn are attractive to sangar tiumeai ‘large throngs’ of birds. Line 18 Oikta ‘of birds’, ramavoite ‘having wings’, a repetition of the same words used in line 4Page30 = SS«CVinyar Tengwar - Number 40 ___ April aggs karneambarai. QL has adjective karneambara ‘redbreast’, derived trom the noun karneambar ‘redbreast, robin’. As originally written this line was Qikta rdmavoite malinai, exactly repeating line 4, and probably intended to de- scribe the same throngs of yellow birds in flight. The syntax is parallel here, and the new adjective karneambarai ‘redbreast’ suggests that throngs of red- breasted robins are being described. Unlike the swallow that flies south in the Autumn, the robin stays for the ‘Winter. The throngs of robins on the wing are to be understood as arriving rather than departing, It is presumably these birds which the hawthorn ‘fetches’ with its berries, There may also be the hint of a similarity in color and shape between the fruit of the hawthorn and the breast of the robin, at least to an extent parallel to the similarity in culuralion between the elm- leaves and the swallows in flight, which is hinted at in the beginning of the poem. Lines 15 through 18 of the poem taken together mean something like: ‘From the elm-tree here a leaf is falling, brown fruit in hand on the haw- thorn: fetching throngs of red-breasted birds on the wing.’ Following this the poem ends with a couplet addressed to Autumn, in a “refrain” of lines 5 through 8 Line 19 Ai ‘ob! hal’, lindérea ‘singing at dawn (esp. of birds)’, Lasselanta ‘the Fall, ‘Autumn’, Here the adjective lindérea, usually applied to birds, is used meta- phorically to describe the season itself, The implication is that birds are singing in the autumn morning, so that this line closely echoes line 5, Line 20 Wierme. QL has nier (nies-) ‘honey bee’ and also nie ‘tear’, (The similarity is accidental: one word is from the root NEHE, the other from NYEHE.) On the whole it seems more likely that the second of these is relevant here. GL has a related word nir ‘grief, sorrow’ and under this entry mentions Q nyére, presumably of similar meaning, Perhaps nierme is an adverbial derived from this, with an ultimately locative meaning like ‘in gricf, in sorrow’, used to describe an emotional state. This would be parallel to the derivation of sime suggested above, on the basis of an analogy with the apparent derivation of such locational nouns as kaime ‘dwelling, home’, kirme ‘gully’, and mize “west”, smintya. QL has a verb minty- ‘to remind’, with impersonal sense ‘it reminds me’ = ‘T remember’, and an adjective mintya ‘reminding, memoryful’. No person is explicitly mentioned in the poem as being the one reminded, so probably we have the impersonal verb here, in which ‘me’ is the implied person whose memory is affected. Presumably the thing that reminds (me) is Lasselanta, so the meaning is ‘Autumn reminds (me)’, with the rest of this line expressing the remembrance.April igs __Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 Page 31 nace. In QL rare is given as the preterite form of the verb nara- ‘snap, quarrel’, with related words such as narka ‘snappy, ill-tempered’ and narte ‘bitter’. These are derived from a root NARA, which is said to mean “prop- erly ‘bite at, So ndre ‘snapped, quarteled’ may also mean ‘bit, has bitten’. The sense could be that Autumn is full of the reminders which have ‘bitten’ the poet and produced his sorrow. But this is a rather harsh metaphor to choose for expressing this idea. With Autumn described as Hindérea ‘singing at dawn’ it is birds who are actually singing, and using the verb nara- would suggest that the birds were ill-tempered and quarrelsome, snapping at each other. The parallel with line 6 suggests another (perhaps more likely) interpretation, when we consider that that line ends with the same word that ends the poem: qanta ‘full’. The phrasing in line 6 is Piliningwe stiyer nalla qanta ‘the airs being full of feathers’. The first word piliningwe describes those things with which the object stiyer is filled. If the syntax is comparable here, then the first word nierme may describe the substance (in this case an emotion) with which the object is filled. Thus nierme and ganta together would mean ‘filled with grief, full of grie?. This probably refers back (as 2 predicate adjective} to Lasselanta, For the syntactical combination of am adjective with a verb other than the copula, we might compare lassi lantar laurié ‘the leaves fall golden’ in Galadriel’s Lament. But if Lasselanta mintya means ‘Fall reminds me’, even though the object is only implicit, we might well expect an explicit clarification of who or what the adjective qanta modifies. So a plausible conclusion would be that ndre is an inflected form of the verb nd ‘it is’. No verbal ending -re occurs elsewhere in the earliest material, but in the first version of the “Secret Vice” poem Oilirna Markirya it is used in the 3rd person singular verb in the phrase kirya kalliére kulukalmalinen ‘the ship shone with golden lights’ (MC:220-21). The 3rd person pronoun subject ending -re is used in ndre to convey that the subject, Autumn itself, is also modified by the predicate adjective qanta. The two lines together mean: ‘Oh! with singing at dawn Autumn reminds me that it is filled with grief. The sense of the reftain is naturally metaphoric, and the attribution of grief to the season of Autumn is a personification. The implication is that the experience of Fall fills the poet’s memory with sorrow for the past, not only the immediate past with the swallows that are leaving for the Winter, but the distant past as well, when the Elves used to pipe and dance among the trees, who now are gone, save in memories that the changing colors, the leaves and berries, the fine rain and the singing birds, all summon so vividly in bis imagination. But like the dissolving mists the Fairies and Gnomes were once present among the trees long ago, and though they have faded from view the effects (at least) of their presence are still to be seen by those who know where to look. ‘The sparkding colors of the morning dew on leafPage 32 Vinyar Tengwar + Number 40 Aprilig99 and berry, and the shimmer of sparrow and robin in flight, are the very same colors of the gems and Is that the Elves scattered through their realm. Thus Autumn is indeed still full of the reminders of that mythical past that moved the poet to exclaim his sorrow at its passing away. To sum up I give a more or less literal translation of the Qenya poem into English prose, followed by my own somewhat more approximate rendering in verse of the same metrical pattern as the original: ‘From the elm-tree falling one by one small leaves were in the wind, like throngs ever large of yellow birds on the wing. Oh! Fall with its many swal- lows, the airs are so full of golden feathers, and orange-red ones too, that they call to mind the gems of Elven-home. ‘Then pipes playing their thin music, slender columns of pearl, a dim rain at that time flowing through the trees: the dancing Gnome-folk sang a gentle tune with many voices, sparkling green and blue. From the elm-tree here a leaf falls, the dark-brown fruit in the hand of the hawthorn: attracting large throngs of red-breasted birds on the wing. Oh! with singing at dawn Fall reminds me that it is filled with grief.’ Autumn ‘The elm-tree one by one lets fall Upon the wind its leaves each small That ever large as throngs are grown Whose yellow birds upon their wings have flown. Oh! Fall, its swallows spring-like trilling All the airs indeed with feathers filling, Golden-hued and orange-red, recalls The gems bestrewn near Elven-halls. Then pipes sustained their slender whistle, Columns pearly thin, a fading drizzle Then meandered through the forest: Dancing folk of Gnomish-seeming Raised their voices tender-chorused, Emeralds and sapphires gleaming. Here from the elm a leaf is drifted, Rich-brown haws are still uplifted: Fetching the throngs that large are grown Whose red-breast birds upon their wings have hither flown. Oh! the Autumn that sings each morrow Reminds me it is full of sorrow. 6April 999 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 Page 33 Publications Received Due to limitations of space and time, the editor cannot fully review all publications received. The following notices highlight those publications and items that the editor feels vill be of special interest to members of the Elvish Linguistic Fellows Angerthas. Tidsskrift for Arthedain — Norges Tolkienforening (‘Journal of Arthedain, the Tolkien Society of Norway’). Norwegian with English issue synopsis. Published thrice annually. ISSN 0382-4931. http://www.ii.tib.no/~bjorts/arthedain/angerthas.html Editor: Magne Bergland, Sjoveien 6B, 5084 Tertnes, Norway. E:mail: magne.bergland@hedb.uib.no. Subscriptions to: Arthedain, Norges Tol- kienforening, Postboks 37 Blindern, 0313 Oslo, Norway. Annual sub- scription: Norway and rest of Scandinavia Kr. 90; rest of Europe Kr, 100; elsewhere surface Kr. 110, airmail Kr. 140. No. 43, May 1997: “Skriftsystemer fra Midgard, del 2: Quenya med Tengwar” (‘Writing-systems of Middle-earth, part 2: Quenya in Tengwar’) by Helge Fauskanger. “Om a oversette Tolkien, del 1” (‘On Translating Tolkien, part 1’) by Johannes H. Berg, Norwegian translator of Tree and Leaf and Smith of Wootton Major. No. 44, July 1997: Angerthas in English 3. Collects and translates into En- glish a number of articles from past issues, including “Tolkien’s Not- So-Secret Vice” (from issue 41, see VT 38, p. 33) and “The Poem *” (Quenya, ‘In Starlight’, from issue 34), both by Helge Silmessé Fauskanger; also a survey of “Norwegian Tolkien Translations” by Magne Bergland. No. 45, December 1997: “Skriftsystemer fra Midgard, del 3: Sindarin med Tengwar: eller «Vokalene kommer og gir»” (‘Writing-systems of Middle-earth, part 3: Sindarin in Tengwar: or, “Vowels Coming and Going”) by Helge Fauskanger. English article “On Translating Tol- kien”, part 1 of an interview by Magne Bergland with Nils Ivar Agoy, Norwegian translator of The Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, and The Hobbit. No. 46, April 1998: “Skriftsystemer fra Midgard, del 4: Daerons og dvergenes runer” (‘Writing-systems of Middle-earth, part 4: Daeron’s and the Dwarves’ Runes’) by Helge Fauskanger. English article “On Translating Tolkien”, part 2 of an interview by Magne Bergland with Nils Ivar Agoy. Extensive reviews of Agoy’s Norwegian translations of Unfinished Tales and The Hobbit. No. 47, October 1998: “Skriftsystemer fra Midgard, del 5: Rtimils skrift” (‘Writing-systems of Middle-earth, part 5: Rtimil’s Script’) by Helge Fauskanger. (See Arden Smith’s presentation, transliteration, and analy- sis of the Rimilian “Turin Prose Fragment” in VT 37). “Om a oversette Tolkien, del 2” (‘On Translating Tolkien, part 2’) by Johannes H. Berg.Page 34 Vinyar ‘Tengwar - Number 40 _ April 1999 Estel. Bulletin of the Sociedad Tolkien Espafiola. Spanish with English sum- mary. Published thrice annually. E-mail: nacpb@lix.intercom.es. http:/f usuarios.intercom.cs/nacpb/ Editor: Luis Gofti Navarro. Subscriptions to; Sociedad ‘Tolkien Espanol, Apartado de Correos 35081, o8o¥o Barcelona, Spain. Annual subscrip- tion: 2000 ptas. No. 19, October 1997: “Quenya Elemental — Leccién 15; Adverbios, compatacién de adjectivos y mimeros” (‘Basic Quenya — Lesson 15: Adverbs, Comparison of Adjectives, and Numbers’), continues Luis G. Baixauli’s Spanish translation of Nancy Martsch’s Basic Quenya. No. 20, January 1998: “Quenya Elemental — Leccién 16: FI tiempo de pasado” (‘Basic Quenya — Lesson 16: The Past Tense’), continues Luis G, Baixauli’s Spanish translation of Nancy Martsch’s Basic Quenya. Other Hands, The International Journal for Middle-earth Gaming. Pub- lished quarterly. ISSN 1081-8359. http://pweb.netcom.com/—oh/ Editor: Chris Seeman. Subscriptions to: the Editor at P.O. Box 1213, Novato, CA 94048. B-mail: chrisi224@aol.com. Anrual subscription: Write for details or see: http:/pweb.netcom.com/~oh/Subsc.html, Noa. #8, July 1997: Quenya letter, in tengwar, on the One Ring, from “Isildur Elendilion, Aran Arnanéreo ar Ondonéresse”. Simbelmyné. Magazyn Sekcji Tolkienowskiej Slaskiego Klubu Fantastyki (‘Magazine of the Talkien Section of the Silesian Fantasy Club’). Polish with English summary. Published quarterly. Editor: Ryszard Derdziriski. Subscriptions to; the Editor at Ordonéwny gf29, 41-200 Sosnowiec, Poland. E-mail: maggot@saba.wns.us.eda.pl. Subscription: Write for details. No. 34, Autumn/Winter 1997: “Sindarin, Jezyk Elféw Szaryeh: cz. IZ — sindaritiska ortografia” (Sindarin, the Grey-clven Tongue: Part [11 — Sindarin Orthography’) continues Ryszard Derdzifiski’s series of lin~ guistic workshops. No. 6, Spring 1998: “Sindarin, Jezyk Elfow Szarych: Warszlatow jezykoznawezych cz. V — Preedimki i zaimki” (‘Sindarin, the Grey- elven Tongue: Linguistic Workshops Part V — Articles and Pronouns’} continues Ryszard Derdzisiski’s series. No. 8 Spring 1998: “Sindarin, Jez; fow Szaryeh: cz. VI — czasowniki i odezasownikowe creéci mowy” (‘Sindarin, the Grey-elven Tongue: Part VI — Verb, Gerund, and Participle’) continues Ryszard Der- dzitiski’s series. “Lennath i Dur-Gyrf”, a Sindarin translation of the Ring Poem by Ryszard Derdziiiski.April 1999 Vinyar Tengwar » Number 40 _ rage 0 Resources The following are just some of the resources available tor the study of Tolkien's invented languages. For a more complete list, visit the Resources for Tolkienian Linguistics web page al the URL listed below. Primers An Introduction to Elvish, edited by Jim Allan. (Somerset: Bran’s Head Books, 1978. ISBN 0-905220-10-2). A venerable but still indispensable primer of Tolkienian linguistics. [dE is available for £14.50 ($22.50 for US orders; prices include postage) from the bookseller Thornton’s of Oxford, 11 Broad Street, Oxford OX13AR, England. Tel. 01865-242939, Fax 01865- 204021, E-mail ‘Thorntons@booknews.demon,co.uk Basic Quenya, by Nancy Mautsch, Second edition. Quenya lr beginners! Twenty-two lessons, plus Quenya-English / English~Quenya vocabulary. Sto plus postage: USA ist class $3, book rate $1.25; Canada airmail $3, surface $2.25; Europe airmail $5, surface $2.75. Make checks payable to Nancy Martsch, P.O. Box 55372, Sherman Oaks, CA 91413, USA. Dictionaries and Concordances A Working Concordance, A Working English Lexicon, A Working Reverse Dic~ tionary (with or without meanings), A Working Reverse Index, A Working Reverse Glossary, A Working Tolkien Glossary (in 7 volumes), A Compre- hensive Index of Proper Names and Places, available in printed form and on disk (DOS format) from Paul Nolan Hyde, 8520 Jean Parrish Ct. NE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87122, USA. Journals Parma Eldalamberon. A journal of linguistic studies of fantasy literature, especially of the Elvish languages and names in the works of JR.R, Tol- kien, Editor; Christopher Gilson, 10200 Miller Avenue #426, Cupertino, CA 95014, USA; E-mail harpwire@ifnnet, Parma is an occasional journal, sold on a per-issue basis. Write for current information. Quettar. The Bulletin of the Linguistic Fellowship of The Tolkien Society. Edvtor: Julian Bradfield. Subscriptions to; the Editor at Univ. of Edinburgh, Dept. of Computer Science, King’s Buildings, Edinburgh EH3 9JZ, UK; E- mail jcb@des.ed.ac.uk. Four-issue subscription: £3.75 for UK, £4.50 surface elsewhere, £6 airmail. Resources for Tolkienian Linguistics Web Page For more resources, including links to Internet mailing lists and and to web sites devoted to Tolkienian linguistics, visit: http://www.crols.com/aelfwine/Tolkien/linguistics/ sesources.htmlVinyar Tengwar The journal of the Elvish Linguistic Fellowship, a Special Interest Group of the Mythopoeic Society. http://www erols.cozw‘aeliwine/'tolkien/linguistics/BLE/VT/VT. html Vinyar Tengwar isa refereed journal indexed by the Modern Language Association. Paitor: Carl 8, Hostetter, 2509 Ambling Circle, Crofton, MD 21114, USA, E-mail: Aelfwinet@erols.com Review panel: Ivan Derzhanski, Christopher Gilson, Arden Smith, & Patrick Wynne. Cover design: by Patrick Wynne. Subscriptions: A six-issue subscription casts: gia USA. $15 Canada, South America, and averseas sutface mail $18 Overseas airmail. . Subscription stavus paye: hitp:/ {www crols.com faclfwine/Tolkéen/ELB/members. tral Back issues: All back issues are perpetually available at the current pet-issuc subscrip- tiva price: $2 USA, $2.50 Canada, South America, and. overseas surface mail, $3 overseas airmail. Deduct 25% if ordering 8 ar more back issues. For a comelete list of the contents of ¥/'te date, visit: hitps//www.erols.com/aelfwineTolkien/ELF/YT/VT_cositents. html Payments; All payments must be isi US dollars. Make checks payable to Carl Hostetter: Sulrmissions: All material should in some manner deal with Tolkien's invented lan guages. All submissions must be typed, or must be exyuisitely legible: the editor will not decipher lower-glyphics. The editor reserves the tight to edit any materiah (except artwork) for purposes of clarity, brevity, and relevance. Iluvatar smiles upon submissions by ¢-tail or on Macintosh or MS DOS disks (3.5”) in Microsoft Word or plain text (ASCIT) formats. Copyright of all material submitted is retained hy the author or artist, although VT reserves the right te reprint the material at any time. Acknowledgement shat origin! material subsequently reprinted elsewhere first appeared in VT would be a welcome courtesy. All quotations froma the works of | RR. ar Christopher Tolkien are copyright of their Publishers andjor the Tolkien Estate. All other material is ©1999 Vinyar Tengwar. Bibliographical Abbrevialions Ho The Ltobbit LB the Lays of Heleriand 1 The Fellowship of the Ring SM the Shaping of Middle-earth UW The Two Towers LR The Lost Road WL The Return of the King RS The Rerum of the Shadaw Ro The Road Gues Hver On Tl The Treason of Isengard TC A Tolkien Compass WR The War of the Ring 5 the Silmariltion SD Sauron Defeated UY Unfinished Tales MR Margoti’s Ring L the Letters of [R.R. Tolkien = WJ The War of the Jewels MC The Munsters ard the Critics PM = The Peoples of Middle-eartit LI. The Book of Lost Tales, Part One LNG é-Lam na-Ngoldathon, in Parma u Lf2 The Book of Lost Takes, Part fwon Qo Qenyagetsa. in Parmar Page references are ta the sineuiarad keardeoverd trade paperback edition an tess nsherwisy noted.