ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA)

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Subject: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Wed Apr 05 2006, 13:22

:lol!: As my name shows elfie I thought I would teach some elvish. There are loads of different types of elvish but i will be teaching quenya here!
(lol)
Of all the languages invented by British author and philologist J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973), the most popular has always been Quenya. It also seems to be the most highly developed of all the languages

If you would like to read the background and introduction follow the following link:

http://www.uib.no/People/hnohf/intro.rtf

I wont go into the pronounciations as they can be translated many different ways, but i will give the basic words and sentances.

See next post for basic greetings. This will be updated as soon as i can

From your elendil (elf-friend)

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Wed Apr 05 2006, 13:34

For the first part i will give you some simple words to start you off:

evening sinye
hail! áye
morning arinya

good-bye/Farewell namárie

A few in between words to keep you going:

I Ni
is ná-
it sa
no lau
me lá
The i
you le

Next will come: Family, Months, numbers and Days

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Thu Apr 06 2006, 05:09

Ok Here is the days of the week in Quenyan!

Monday Isilya
Tuesday Aldea
Wednesday Menelya
Thursday Earenya
Friday Tárion
Saturday Elenya
Sunday Anarya

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Thu Apr 06 2006, 12:44

Miscellaneous
Hîr i-Chorvath -Lord of the Rings
Noro i roch lín!- Ride your hourse!
Sí na i veth, i veth naid bain-Here at the end, the end of all things.
Am man harthach? -Why do you still hope?
Caro i echad sí. -Make the camp here.
Ú-aníron den. -I don’t want it.

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Thu Apr 06 2006, 21:02

Sinye Everyone!!!

Ni Love Hîr i-Chorvath!!! Ni have loved it since forever!

Anyway, Namárie

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Tue Apr 11 2006, 06:40

Ok - time to move onto months of the year:

January - Narvinye

February - Nénime

March - Súlime

April - Víresse

May - Lótesse

June - Nárie

July - Cermie

August - rime

September - Yavannie

October - Narquelie

November - Hísime

December - Ringáre

namárie elendil :D

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Wed Apr 12 2006, 12:08

I have found our old sheets of when me and elfie learnt quenyan so I thought I would help out a bit here to take some of the pressure of her!

I know elfie was going to do family next so I will leave that for her and I will cover numbers (1-10)

ok here goes:

1 - quen
2 - atta
3 - nelde
4 - canta
5 - lempe
6 - enque
7 - otso
8 - tolto
9 - nerte
10 - cainen

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Thu Apr 03 2008, 08:50

It's really interesting. I've read the trilogy, the Hobbit and the Silmarillion. They were quite interesting. I don't remember much words, but I know, that Tar means "king". Númenor's kings were named in Quenya (like Tar-Elendil, Tar-Telperien etc.). I hope that it was useful ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) 436937

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Thu Jul 15 2010, 21:39

I've just taken an interest in learning this. Well I always had an interest but now I'm actually gonna try to learn. I guess here will be a good start ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) 436937

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Sun Oct 03 2010, 17:20

Hello HE’ers! I’m going to attempt to teach you all Quenya or at least the ones who are interested. Here’s your first lesson!

Words to know:

Numbers
(These are a little different than the ones that Mick gave. These were the numbers that I learned)
minë- one
atta- two
neldë- three
canta- four
lempë- five
enquë- six
otso- seven
tolto- eight
nertë- nine
cainen- ten
minquë- eleven
rasta- twelve
And that’s where the number list ends for me. If there is more than I don’t know of them XD
Order:
minya- first
tatya- second
nelya- third
cantëa- fourth
lempëa- fifth
enquëa- sixth
otsëa- sixth
nertëa- ninth
quainëa- tenth
And that’s all of the order numbers that I know of. If there’s more I don’t know of them XD

Some Nouns to know:
Elda- Elf
Nauco- Dwarf
Atan- Mortal man. Like the human race and not Elves or Dwarves. There’s a different word for man so try not to get them confused.
lië- people
rocco- horse
aiwë- bird
alda- tree
parma- book
elen- star.

Now onto the first lesson you’ll have to Quenya so it’ll give you something to do other than memorizing these words. We’re going to focus on making Nouns plural as to why I gave you a short list of nouns.
Making nouns plural:
To make a noun that ends in a, i, o, u or ië plural all you have to do is add the letter r at the end. It’s just like English and adding an s at the end to make duck into ducks. Now you should be wondering, what about those nouns ending in just ë or a consonant. Well for these you just add the letter i at the end except for those ending in ë. With nouns ending in ë you must drop the ë and then put an i there.

Now you might be wondering what is the difference between ië and ë? Well here’s the thing. Try adding the letter i to the end of ië word. The ending would then become ii and you would get some pretty strange words. XD

Now that we know how to make nouns plural I leave you with one more thing. The word the. XD In Quenya the word the is simply i. Another fun fact about Quenya is that there is no words for a or an. They are just understood instead. A horse in Quenya would be written as rocco.

Now that you know how to make some words plural why don’t you try making the list of nouns I gave you plural? You can reply in this thread or send me a PM of your answers and I’ll let you know if you’re right. Maybe in a few days I’ll give you more nouns to make plural. Oh joyous fun! Also if you have any questions about this lesson feel free to send me a PM. ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) 436937

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Wed Oct 20 2010, 16:14

Moving on... kinda. I'm going to give you guys some more nouns so that you have more nouns to practice with. I think with the next lesson I'll give you a lesson on how to make nouns possessive. Like the King's son or The Queen's stone.

More Nouns to know

Anar- Sun(Anar is always capitalized)
Isil- Moon( Isil is always capitalized)
vendë- maiden
aran- king
tári- queen
tasar- willow
ando- gate
cirya- ship
ohtar- warrior
harma- treasure

Now some of the nouns have stem words. So when you go to add an ending it's not what you think it will be right away. One example of a stem noun would be the word for stone, sar. It's stem is sard so when you go to make the word stone (sar) into stones (sardi). It's not that hard to figure out but it does give you some stems to remember.

Nouns with stems
hen (hend)- eye
talan (talam)- floor
nér (ner)- man (gender unlike Mortal Man Atan)
nís (niss)- woman
oron (oront)- mountain

Now try making the words with stems have a plural ending. Send me a PM of just post them here. I'll check over them for you ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) 436937

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Mon Nov 08 2010, 13:13

doesn't "Isildur" mean "moon-servant"? and if it does, would "Anardur" mean "sun-servant"?

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Mon Nov 08 2010, 13:45

Yes Ian Isildur does mean moon-servant or servant of the moon and Anardur does mean sun-servant or servant of the sun. For others who are wondering why that is I'll explain.

As we know the words Isil and Anar is moon and sun. Well -dur is a suffix that means servant of which you can add to just about any noun. In this case Ian added this suffix to the words moon(Isil) and sun(Anar) to make it into Isildur(moon-servant) and Anardur(sun-servant).

Let's take some of the previous nouns I gave before and make more servants! lol

arandur- servant of the king or king-servant
táridur- servant of the queen or queen-servant

We can even have something as ridiculous as roccodur servant of the horse or horse-servant. XD However with some words you must be careful when adding dur to the ending and not produce some impossible letter combinations not allowed in Quenya. In a later lesson I will discuss why this is. For now you can try and make some new words with the suffix -dur. If I seen anything that needs fixed I'll tell you what's wrong and how to fix it.

Thank you Ian for bringing this up ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) 436937

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Sun Dec 05 2010, 18:01

Alright, I'm gonna give this a try...I'm not positive I'm doing it right but here I go! xD

Elda --> Eldar
Nauco --> Naucor
Atan --> Atani
lië --> lii (This is the one I'm confused on...do I drop the ë? Or is it liëi?

)
rocco --> roccor
aiwë --> aiwi
alda --> aldar
parma --> parmar
elen --> eleni

I hope those are okay. Thanks for the lesson stephy! I'll try some other nouns later! ^_^

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Sun Dec 26 2010, 02:08

sorry I didn't get back sooner kate!

Good news they are all right except the lie. (I have no accents on the e mostly because I'm on my phone and done know how to add accents XD). Don't worry though lie is a tricky one. Now when it comes it's like a special one and you would probably want to go about dropping the e and replacing it with i or any of those things. However, instead you do what you do for any other noun ending in a vowel. You just add r. It has to do with how short the word is and how it would sound if done the other way. When you make lie plural you add r making it lier. Confusing?

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Sat Jan 01 2011, 23:10

I know it's been awhile but I'm finally able to post the next lesson XD I hope I'm not moving too fast on your guys! However if you have questions feel free to send me an Owl or just post in here. I can't wait until everyone on the site is fluent in Quenya XD Oh also if you want during these lessons I could also try to include small neat facts about Quenya.

More Nouns
Since we're still working with nouns I'll just be giving you more nouns to work with. Don't worry we'll learn other words than nouns soon XD
perian (periand)- hobbit
ranco- arm
rá (rav)- lion
Ambar- the world
hrávë- flesh
macil- sword
seldo- boy
wen (wend)- girl
mól- thrall, slave
coa- house

I know I said we would move onto possessive words but there's something I need to cover quick before we move onto that. I need to go over the dual numbers. Now when it comes to English we don't really use dual numbers, at least not that I know of so many of you might not know what on earth I'm talking about. There are other languages that do use it, for example the one you're learning right now, Quenya. So if you're first and only language is English or you simply have no clue what I'm talking about I'll explain.

Quote taken from Quenya Course from the link Elfie gave above

Quote :: Like quite a few "real" languages, Quenya also possesses a dual form, that has no direct counterpart in English. Dual number refers to two things, a couple of things.

It's basically like a pair, two of something. Examples would include a pair of lips, a couple, a pair of two like knifes, a pair of twins, sister ships, anything that there is a pair of.

Now when making a word a dual word it's pretty simple. When you want to make a word a dual number word it is just like making it plural, you add a letter at the end. However depending on the word will depend on the ending it will receive. If the word does not end in a t or a d than you simply add t at the end. However if the word happens to end in a t or a d you will instead have to add a u. Very simple concept. Try using the words you have learned already to make some dual number words. Next lesson for certain will be the possessive words.

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Mon Feb 28 2011, 12:46

For this lesson we will now be moving onto adjectives. I know I said I would do possessive Nouns but I want to let you guys be able to make some sentences.

Here’s some words to know:
vanya- beautiful
alta- great, big
calima- bright
taura- mighty
saila- wise
úmea- evil
firin-dead
tiaca- thick, fat

Here’s some colors:
carnë- red
ninque- white
morë- black
luinë- blue
varnë- brown
laica- green
malina- yellow
culuina- orange

Other:
ná- is
nar- are

Now first off I will also introduce the words ná meaning is and nar meaning are. This way we can form some sentences using the nouns and the adjectives that we know.

First thing you need to know about adjectives is that when you use them in a sentence they must agree in numbers with the noun that is in the sentence. So if you say the Elf is beautiful both Elf and beautiful must be in the non-plural form. This sentence in Quenya will look like this:

I Elda ná vanya. (The Elf is beautiful)

Now when you are talking about many Elves you must change beautiful into its plural form. I know in English we wouldn’t say the Elves are beautifuls but in Quenya and I’m certain other languages you do. So when it comes to making an adjective plural all you need to know is these three rules I’ll call them.
1) If the adjective ends with a you must drop the a and add ë.
2) If the adjective ends with ëa you must drop the ëa and add ië
3) If the adjective ends with ë or in (very few end in in) you drop the ë or in and add i.

So taking the sentence from before and changing Elf into Elves we have the new sentence the Elves are beautiful or written in Quenya:

I Eldar nar vanyë. (The Elves are beautiful)

Now you must also remember that ná changes into nar. It’s just like English. You would say the Elves is beautiful but instead the Elves are beautiful. Using the words that you already know try to make some sentences and I’ll correct any mistakes for you.

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Mon Apr 04 2011, 12:08

For this lesson we will be now moving onto present verbs. You’ll be able to construct some simple sentences now.

Some words to know
ar- and
mapa- to grasp, to seize
tir- to watch, to guard
lala- to laugh
caita- to lie
tulta- to summon
lind- to sing
mat- to eat
cend- to read
sil- to shine
hir- to find
cap- to jump
tec- to write
quet- to speak, to say
mel- to love
cen- to see
orta- to rise
harya- to possess, to have

Now when it comes to present verbs in Quenya they are fairly simple to use in a sentence and doesn’t require too much thinking. Later I will introduce past, future and those other verbs which will be a little more challenging. However don’t fret; present verbs are fairly easy to learn. Now if you’re like me and not very good at English and are wondering what a present tense verb is I remember it simply by the fact that they seem to be the verbs that end in –ing.

Now when it comes to using verbs in a sentence and having them be in present tense all you have to do is add the letter a at the end. However if the word already ends in a like the word for rise (orta) then you will have to change the a into ëa so orta would become ortëa.

For example the sentence “The elf is laughing.” Would be written like this in Quenya:

I Elda lalëa.

Now like the adjectives, verbs must also agree in numbers with the noun. So if there are many elves laughing you would have to make the adjective plural. Making verbs plural however is very simple. All that is needed is the letter r at the end of the verb. So the sentence The Elves are laughing would be written like this:

I Eldar lalëar.

Subject: Re: ELVISH : The basics (QUENYA) Mon Apr 04 2011, 12:08

For this lesson we will be learning about superlative adjexctives.

A few Words to know
nu- under
fir- to die, to expire
tur- to govern, to control, to wield
or- over, above
an- for
núra- deep
sere- peace
vanya- beautiful, fair
alta- great, big
taura- mighty
úmea- evil
lauca- warm
ringa- cold
sarda- hard
moina- dear

This will be a fairly short lesson. For this lesson we will be learning about superlative adjectives. However if you’re like me and not very good at English then you might not even know what a superlative adjective is (I know I didn’t). However it’s pretty simple. Basically I remember what a superlative adjectives is simply by the fact that it is words that are most (insert adjective) or end in the suffix –est. Some examples would be the most evil or biggest. In Quenya they would be written as anúmea (most evil) or analta (biggest).

However there are some special words like lauca, ringa, sarda and moina. If we were to follow the rule above and add an in front of these words we would get anlauca, anringa, ansarda and anmoina however this cannot be for there are impossible consonant cluster nl, nr, ns and nm. In order to fix this there is other rules that must be remembered for these special cases.
nl becomes ll making anlauca to allauca (warmest)
nr becomes rr making anringa to arringa (coldest)
ns becomes ss making ansarda to assarda (hardest)
nm becomes mm making anmoina to ammonia (dearest)

When it comes to these special cases all you have to remember is that the adjectives starting with l, r, s and m when an is added at the beginning of the word the n is then changed to the letter of what the word started with. In lauca since the word started with l so the n was changed to l making it allauca instead of anlauca.

This can be a little confusing and I hope that I made myself clear. However if you have any questions feel free to ask.

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