Let's learn Quenya on the Downs

[the guy who be short]

This thread has been created in Novices and Newcomers because, when we start learning Quenya, we'll be novices. ("Tenuous link," I know, but it doesn't really belong anywhere else.)

Whilst enjoying myself on the Barrow Downs, I noticed that a lot of us aspire to learn Quenya, you know, some day.

I'm suggesting we make that today. This thread has been created for anybody who wishes to learn Quenya in a group with fellow Downers.

This is how it will work: we will be using the Ardalambion Quenya Course. People should post here with a little information about themselves, and they will be paired off to be "Quenya Buddies" (for the lack of anything less cheesy-sounding).

The advantage of using a Buddy system is that people won't just give up half-way through; you will have somebody to support you. You also won't think "why am I learning Quenya?" (well, not too much anyway) because you'll have somebody to talk to in Quenya.

If you're interested, please post the following information:

Occupation: Student / Part Time Job / Full Time Job / Unemployed / Retired. People working similar hours will be paired together as they will have similar amounts of free time. Students should also post which type of school (Secondary / High / University...) they are in as this affects free time too.

Location: People from nearby countries (US citizens can post States) can be paired off as they live in similar time zones, which can be more convenient. Also, Students' lives differ in different countries; an American will have longer summer holidays and less mid-school breaks than a Briton.

Pace: The pace that you wish to learn at. Some people may be willing to learn quickly, perhaps a half hour every other day, whereas people with busier lives may only want to study for a shorter period of time each week.

Prior Knowledge: If you know any Quenya already, post how much.

Medium: How you would like to communicate with your Quenya buddy. The obvious way to do it would be through PMs, but if both parties are happy to do so, a more convenient Instant Messaging service could be used.

Once a pair has been formed, please delete the post with this information in it. This keeps the thread tidy and uncluttered, making it easier to sift through and find pairs for other people.


So, why learn Quenya? Seems a bit pointless doesn't it?
Well, we all love Tolkien, it's why we're here. Even knowing a little bit of Quenya can transform a reading of The Silmarillion or Lotr: you suddenly realise what "Isildur" means or the significance of "The Field of Cormallen."

Quenya can also help you to learn other languages, as it contains lots of linguistic techniques common to foreign languages.

Finally, by getting to know one another better, we can enhance that sense of community we all feel on the Downs.

TGWBS


Existing pairs:

Kath and TGWBS
dancing spawn of ungoliant and Lhunardawen
Encaitare and Feanor of the Peredhil
Kitanna and Orominuialwen
Arwen Imladris and Esgallhugwen
CaptainofDespair and durelin
Nilpaurion Felagund and vanwalossiel

[Esgallhugwen]

Occupation: Basically full time, usually 12 to 6pm, but that might change

Location: Alberta, Canada

Pace: I suppose shorter periods of time during the week would be best for me because my schedule can become very erratic sometimes.

Prior Knowledge: I havn't done any of the lessons, but I know a few words here and there.

Medium: pms are fine, but I prefer MSN Messenger.

[the guy who be short]

How exciting. Child pointed out that if enough of us are interested, we could potentially see a return of a Languages forum. How exciting.

[Child of the 7th Age]

The guy who be short -

Whoops! It's great to hear such enthusiasm but don't get too far ahead of where you are! The old Language forum died because there weren't enough posters to pose serious questions beyond simply asking someone else to do a translation for them. Whether or not there ever would be enough posters to carry on a whole Forum, I don't know. That would be for the B-W to decide.

However, I believe having people work with Quenyan is definitely a step in the right direction as far as taking a more in-depth look at the languages on this site, and many feel that the languages stand at the heart of Tolkien's Legendarium. I appluad your efforts.

Even some of us that won't actively be studying Elvish do have questions about languages. Right now, for example, there seems to be a huge disagreement going on within the Elvish community: linguists like Carl Hostetter who want to toe a "strict" line in terms of what Tolkien gave us and others, like David Salo (the grad student who worked with PJ), who are willing to see the language (especially Sindarin) evolve at least a little beyond what Tolkien gave us. This is a vexing question because Tolkien left so many issues of grammar unresolved. He gave one answer one time and another answer at a different time. Do we pick and choose, or just leave things unresolved? (Sounds just like the discussions in Books! ) And what about the apparently enormous volume of papers that have never been published? I don't think these questions have been discussed in depth on the BD.

The "nuts and bolts" of grammar and vocabulary are the obvious place to start, just as you've suggested. In addition to this announcement thread in the B-D, you might want to have a thread for sharing information and questions about the language itself, perhaps in one of the forums moderated by Esty. ( I'm sure you could pm her to check if you're uncertain.) In any case, great and good luck!

[the guy who be short]

Thanks for that post Child - and now that I think about it, I was getting a little ahead of myself, and I'm not sure exactly what a forum would entail. There's only so much we can say about Quenya - it is doubtful whether this would be enough to fill a sub-forum.

Tolkien himself is quoted as saying that the languages lie at the heart of his writing - that the stories have infact been built up around the language and not vice versa. The debates we could have on the languages also sound interesting.

I'm not sure where these fora moderated by Estelyn are - are they sub-forums here or full fora elsewhere?

As Child said, it is indeed great to see such enthusiasm, especially in so short a time. However, there is the question of maintaining this enthusiasm. I have a proposal to put forward.

To keep enthusiasm going, and also to make learning Quenya more of a group activity on the Downs, I propose some friendly competitions. Quenya is used in RL primarily to write short stories or poetry. I suggest a bi-monthly or quarterly poetry competition with interested parties contributing in their "Buddy pairs." This is reasonably frequent, but also leaves plenty of time to actually learn more Quenya inbetween.

The judge(s) would have to be impartial. It would really just be a bit of fun and competition to keep everybody interested. Please PM me with opinions on this idea (particularly if you have already posted).

Lastly - when a Quenya pair is formed, please go back and delete your "stats posts" as they will no longer be needed. This means the only stats posts remaining will be those belonging to people still searching for buddies, making it easier to sift through them. PM me and I'll edit the first post, adding in the Quenya Buddy pairs.

TGWBS

[the guy who be short]

While I do want to post here minimally so that people can browse through looking for Buddies, let's sort out the Competitions. I sacrificied my sleep thinking about it.

Frequency:

Once every two months. Each one shall begin on the first day of an odd month; the first will begin on the 1st of September.

Entries:

I've realised it's a little silly telling people to contribute in Buddy pairs - poems are meant to be individual. So, each person should post their own poem(s), though feel free to get your Buddy to help you out, proof-read, edit, etc.
Entrees should be received on the first 10 days of the competition, with English translations underneath. There should be a maximum of two poems per person (though perhaps we could increase that to start off with if there aren't many of us).

Discussion:

After the initial ten-day phase is over, the Judge should announce a period of discuss. This is where we basically say "Ooh, I like your poem!" and voice our opinions, consider the feelings behind the poems and look at the techniques used. In short, flatter one another.

Winner:

The winner is chosen by the Judge. Yay! End of competition. Remember it's not about the winning - the main thing here is to discuss the poems. But congrats if you do win, anyway.

Judge:

The Judge should be allowed to enter work which can be debated, but cannot choose their own poem to win. The Judge rotates - the Winner of the last competition is given the title of Judge for the next one. I'll probably be the first Judge, unless a Mod wants the job.

Differences in Skill:

We'll be working at different paces, so there will obviously be differences in skill. To be honest, to start off with most of our poems will follow a pattern similar to this:

The birds are singing
The sun is shining
Oh, happiness
I am happy.

So don't feel embarassed to contribute. Eventually, though, the differences in pace will be marked, and people who have studies more lessons will be more likely to win. There could be a split into two levels of competition when this stage is reached.


Please feel completely free to PM me about anything above. Any ideas or opinions are welcome.

[Arwen Imladris]

Occupation: Student (University)

Location: Canada (Ontario)

Pace: Fairly slow. No more than an hour or two a week I would think. Although I could be persuaded to do more or less.

Prior Knowledge: Just a few phrases and such. A few words.

Medium: PMs or Email.

[Elentari_Elbereth]

Occupation: Student. High school (11th grade) possibly home-schooled next year

Location: North Carolina, US.

Pace: Steady pace. Not too quickly, but consistent. I'm already teaching myself Geometry.

Prior Knowledge: I made it to lesson 9 or 8. My vocabulary may be a little rusty.

Medium: PMs, AIM, MSN, or Email do just fine

[empress_han]

Occupation: Secondary school (A levels)

Location: Kent, UK

Pace: Slowish please. No more than an hour or two a week!

Prior Knowledge: Knowledge?None

Medium: PMs or Email or MSN!

much love

Han X

[Lúmen Rómello]

Occupation: Full-time college student (junior); currently full-time bank employee till the end of August (when I head back to school).

Location: USA - Ohio/PA

Pace: Slowish, at least until the end of summer. What with having to sneak the 'Net at work and not having it at home, I won't have all that much time to relearn.

Prior Knowledge: I finished Helge's course about three years ago, but I've since forgotten most of what I learned. I was planning on starting back up, though.

Medium: PMs. Definitely. Though I suppose I could work through email. No IMs until I get back to school in fall, though.


I'm an oldster from around here - or at least my other username was (I was Eruhen in a past death) - and anything that we can do to reanimate the Language forum will be a Very Good Thing.

Later.
-LR.

[Child of the 7th Age]

When will you be starting? You don't want to let the momentum slip away....

[the guy who be short]

Well, the pairs that have already been formed have already started - it's meant to be more of a pair activity than a group activity. Kath and I have got through 4 lessons, spawn and Lhuna are learning, and Enca is back today so she can start with Fea soon. I've also sent out four PMs to potential pairs, so we may soon see 5 pairs of us.

I was waiting for the return of Enca to start a "Learning Quenya Discussion Thread" though, and that will be up within the week if not the day.

[Encaitare]

Originally Posted by Fea

Random thought: Encai, care to pair up, since we're in the same time zone, are about the same age, both hate standardized tests, and already know each other's screen names?

Funny, I was going to ask you the same thing. Sounds dandy to me!

I was waiting for the return of Enca to start a "Learning Quenya Discussion Thread" though, and that will be up within the week if not the day.

This makes me feel special for some reason.

[Child of the 7th Age]

the guy who be short -

Sounds like you've been very busy! Maybe the pairs could post their progress every now and then to let others know how they're doing? I'm not studying myself but I'd like to hear how others are faring.

Good luck everyone!

[Orominuialwen]

Kitanna and I will be working together. We haven't started yet, but I figured I should let people know.

[vanwalossien]

Occupation: student (last year of upper secondary school), with part-time job
Location: Norway
Pace: a few hours weekly
Prior Knowledge: finished lesson 10 some time ago, need to repeat
Medium: email, PMs, MSN

[Nilpaurion Felagund]

guy millionaire . . . I mean guy, can I, an Eruhin of the male race, join?

Occupation: Slave to Higher Academic Institution (College Student)

Location: The Philippines.

Pace: Quite Slow. Few hours a week, perhaps.

Prior Knowledge: I once took the lesson up to the Dative case, but I am willing to re-learn. I've forgotten most of it, anyway.

Medium: PM, e-mail, YM, MSN on odd instances--I rarely use the same computer twice.

Ulterior Motive: I want my soon-to-be-born baby cousin to be trilingual (Filipino, English, Quenya). Just had to say that.

[solarisa]

right...wait...is quenya the high speech?

[Alcarillo]

Originally Posted by solarisa

right...wait...is quenya the high speech?

Yes, Quenya is spoken by the Noldor, who brought it back to Middle-earth when they rebelled. Sindarin is spoken by the Sindar, who didn't make it to Valinor and whose language remained in Middle-earth.

[Encaitare]

I've been working with Fea, but RL problems have made it virtually impossible for us to continue. I'm going to carry on by myself; I think it will go faster for me that way. I've always worked better alone, actually -- I just hope that Fea will find some time to look at the lessons every now and then!

[Elrowen Tinúviel]

Occupation currently unemployed and in the process of moving. Will (hopefully) have a full time job in a few weeks

Location New Hampshire, USA

Pace at the moment, I can do it pretty quick... but when we are all moved in, it'll have to be cut down to once or twice a week.

Prior Knowledge only a very little bit... I don't know much Elvish, but most of what little I do know is Sindarin, not Quenya.

Medium PMs or AOL Instant Messenger

~Elrowen

[Salacia Deloresista]

Occupation: student, with classes from 7am-1 or 2pm

Location: Currently Germany, but as of August I'll be back in Pittsburg, PA

Pace: I can only do a couple of hours a week because of other activities...

Prior Knowledge: None. I read the Elvish in the books and went "hey, look at the pretty words!" I do have lots of experience with learning foreign languages, however, and tend to pick them up very quickly.

Medium: PMs, e-mail, or ICQ

I'd like to start as soon as possible, and will try to do some stuff on my own, but it's harder alone...

[stowni]

Occupation: In employment, monday tuesday, 9-5.30, friday 6pm - 11, sunday 8am - 4.30. Student at college, wed-fri 9-6... pretty busy...

Location: Kent, england...

Pace: dont really mind, im a fast learner generally, but could only do a few hours a week... 2 evenings?

Prior Knowledge: none really...

Medium: any way really MSN im preferably

Thanks really looking forward to it!! hannah x

[Eryn_Lasgalen]

Occupation: Student; High School

Location: California, US

Pace: Fairly slow, as I don't have a lot of time to work with, plus I'm a slow learner. Maybe two to three hours a week.

Prior Knowledge: Er... none in Quenya, a little vocabulary in Sindarin, though.

Medium: PMing, but I'd be willing to try something else if it would be easier.

I tried to learn Sindarin a few months ago but I just couldn't keep myself motivated to continue and sort of died out once I encountered confusing grammar! Buddying up for encouragement and help sounds just right for me, though I'm not sure if this thread is still active; the last post was about three months ago... but if anyone else would like to buddy up with me I'd be happy!

[Alassë Estel]

Is there anyone still here who wants to learn? I have been using the Quenya workbook on CoE (The Council of Elrond; it is a sort of library/forum similar to The Downs) https://www.councilofelrond.com/read...enya-workbook/, but whoever is in charge of grading the lessons is gone, and I have no way of knowing if I am accurately translating to and from Quenya. Also elfdict.com is very useful. I am getting along rather slowly, but steadily I think. So far, I cannot really make sentences off the top of my head. But I know many words. I could try pairing up with someone, but I am not sure I can properly commit to that on a daily basis. Perhaps a weekly, or even monthly schedule. But mostly, I am just inquiring to know whether or not anyone here knows, or is interested in learning Quenya.

[Galadriel55]

I could try to decipher some words if you throw them at me. That's probably the extent to which I intend to learn Quenya in the next while, I am not feeling up to actual studying of it. If you want company, maybe you could try to make some sentences, and I could guess what you're trying to say?

[Huinesoron]

I actually worked through the Ardalambion course years... um, decades back (yikes). Istan quete i vanya lambë, sorta.

These days I mostly use Eldamo for reference; it neatly identifies which period a word comes from, provides referenced examples from Tolkien of how it was used (often every example), and the grammar section and semantic dictionary are a lot easier to search usefully than the Ardalambion page.

If you take G55 up on her offer to translate your sentences, I'll happily join in; and I could probably put some together if you want to have a go translating back yourself.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

Thank you both for replying. I wasn't sure if anyone would. I started with Helge Fauskanger's course. I made it through many lessons, but the farther I went, the less I was understanding. The CoE course is a lttle easier for me to understand. I think that after I finish it, I will give Ardalambion another try. And as to translating sentences, we could just keep it simple to star with and go back and forth for a bit. Whoever gives the right answer first gives the next sentence.

I'll start: Mo lalertë aspata minna Mordor

Hopefully that is grammatically correct. I think it is not too hard, even if there are any mistakes.

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Alassë Estel

I'll start: Mo lalertë aspata minna Mordor.

Well, Mo = one, someone, so with that and Mordor I have a guess straight off.

Let's see... la-lerte is not+to be free to, though I can't pin down the tense on lerta-. As-pata a very nice "easily to walk", I think it's an infinitive. Minna is "into" in an older version of the language, but should hold up as mi-nna, in-towards. And Mordor is Mordor. So yes, one cannot simply walk into Mordor; Sauron has insomnia.

I wasn't sure if Mo was used like that, but Tolkien's uses say yes. I'm not sure I'd use lerta- here; "not free to" suggests it's forbidden, whereas *lapole "not able to" makes it clear that it's impossible. That said, an elf would like the sound of lalerta a lot more, so yours might be more historically accurate.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

Yes! That's right!

Your turn.

[Huinesoron]

Out of curiousity, what was the form lerte? Aorist/infinitive?

Since we're doing Mordor:

I tengwar Eldarin, yára lé, apa i lambë i Mordoro ita sinomë váquetuvan quetë.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

Lertë was in the aorist form.

I found the translation rather difficult, hopefully it is at least close.

"The letters of the Eldar, belonging to a former manner, against the tongue of Mordor that which in this place will forbid me to speak".

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Alassë Estel

Lertë was in the aorist form.

I think the aorist of an a-stem still ends in -a.

Originally Posted by Alassë Estel

I found the translation rather difficult, hopefully it is at least close.

"The letters of the Eldar, belonging to a former manner, against the tongue of Mordor that which in this place will forbid me to speak".

It's close, in that you've got all the nouns right; now it's just a matter of making sense out of it.

One thing Tolkien frequently did (especially in Sindarin, but also Quenya) was to leave out forms of "to be" unless they were emphasised. So a sentence like "the apples are red" would be written as "the apples red" - the word order would create an implicit verb in the middle (standard order would be "the red apples"). I think I do this twice, though one is debatable.

There are three possible meanings of "apa"; you need a different one. There are also two meanings of "i", though to be honest they're pretty close.

"Váquet-" is an interesting compound used by Tolkien; "va" is a form of "ava", a negative prefix like la-. "Váquet-" is literally "to not say", but I think the meaning is more "I say I will not". I'm not positive I've used it right, but I couldnt' figure out how to directly negate my verb. (Also, there's a pronoun in "váquetuvan".)

... and the whole thing is a quote.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

A- stem Aorists do keep their a endings. I will pay more attention.

So "I tengwar Eldarin": "The laguage/letters are Elvish"

"Yára lé": an ancient manner/method/way

"Apa": but

"i lambë i Mordoro": The tongue is of Mordor

"Ita": that which, which

"Sinomë": here, this place

"váquetuvan": I will not speak

And if I put all that together: The language is Elvish, an ancient method, but the tongue is that of Mordor which I will not speak in this place.


And if you like memes, this one is relevant:

[Huinesoron]

That's the one! Turned out to be a much harder sentence to write than I expected. Back to you.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

Alright. Here is the next one.

Cardi úva ea mis astalda pan tai nar úlaitanë.

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Alassë Estel

Cardi úva ea mis astalda pan tai nar úlaitanë.

"Deeds will not be less valiant because they go unpraised".

And when the men have died in battle and honour, you have leave to be burned in the house, for the men will need it no more.

Carda should form the plural cardar (cardi would be a Telerin plural).

"will not be" is a complex one; it looks like the prefix lá- is actually a weird verb "not to be", attested in the form lanye, "I am not". The future form is lauva, "will not be".

I actually have no idea how I'd write "less"; I can't seem to find a useful adjective. What is mis? If forced, I'd do something like "not completely", alaqua.

Astalda is good for "valiant".

Pan may be the best word for "because". It looks like Tolkien actually discarded it, but the best alternative is something like cenai, "if it be that".

"they are unpraised" is another complex one. úlaita is good, but I think you want it as a passive participle (ie, an adjective like "named", "sung", "built". A built house, an unpraised deed). That means it can just sit after the pronoun and get the "are" in by implication. So it would be úlaitaina, and tai appears to be a decent pronoun.

So I would have said: Cardar lauva alaqua astalda pan tai úlaitaina.

hS

[Alassë Estel]

Thank you for explaining that, I do appreciate it. I am sorry for those mistakes, I hope it isn't too bothersome for you translating like that.

Also, here is a link to "mis", https://www.elfdict.com/wt/110751 .

And, as long as you want to keep going, I am ready for the next one.

[Galadriel55]

I have been following along about as nimbly as Gimli on a horse. But I had a question, on reading on of the translations, because I thought I knew the word but I didn't:

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

I tengwar Eldarin, yára lé, apa i lambë i Mordoro ita sinomë váquetuvan quetë.

I saw "ita" and brain matched it to the Quenya form of Idril, IIRC meaning something like "sparkling" or "shining". Here it means "which". Is there a similar sounding root that is used for Idril, or did I make that up?

[Alassë Estel]

Yes there is: íta (notice the accent, versus "ita" with no accent). Here's a link https://www.elfdict.com/wt/501686 , if you like.