Elvish presentation Quenya

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Elvish presentation Quenya
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Tongues of Arda

• Quenya - the Ancient Tongue (see also
  Course)Sindarin - the Noble Tongue (sorry, I
  have no Sindarin course to go with the Quenya
  course above!)Adûnaic - the Vernacular of
  NúmenorWestron - the Common SpeechTelerin - the
  Language of the Sea-ElvesDoriathrin - the
  Mothertongue of LúthienVarious Mannish Tongues -
  the Sadness of Mortal Men?Nandorin - the
  Green-elven TongueOld Sindarin - between
  Primitive Elvish and Grey-elvenIlkorin - a "Lost
  Tongue"?Avarin - All Six WordsKhuzdul - the
  Secret Tongue of the DwarvesEntish - Say Nothing
  That Isn't Worth SayingOrkish and the Black
  Speech - Base Language for Base PurposesValarin
  - Like the Glitter of SwordsPrimitive Elvish -
  Where It All Began

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Can you just CREATE a language?
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J.R.R Tolkien

• 1892-1973
• From English origins
• Created languages as a hobby
• Made up languages already in young age
• Started writing the Quenta Silmarillion during WW1

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The Legendarium

• Hobbit
• The Lord Of The Rings
• Silmarillion
• Book of Unfinished Tales
• Children of Hûrin

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Mythology

• Iluvatar creates Eä (Universe) and Arda(The
  Earth)
• Ainur(Gods) divided into 2 categories
• Valar (Greater Ainur)
• Maiar (Lesser Ainur, Sauron, Gandalf etc.)

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Origins of Elves

• Iluvatar wakes them up during The First Age
• Elves start to make up their own language
  (Quenya)
• First thing they saw was stars and thus their
  first word was el meaning star
• Later on they started to call themselves Eldar
  people of the stars

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Non-fictional development

• Tolkien wanted to create a language comparable to
  Latin
• He wanted to create a beautiful language and a
  people who spoke it
• Took influence from Finnish(!), Latin, Greek,
  Spanish and Italian

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The Language

• Quenya is agglutinative language (lots of
  affixes), like Finnish(!)
• Has its own vocabulary and grammar, but they are
  quite flexible, because Tolkien was creating it
  alone
• Contains loan words from Finnish(!) and Latin

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Language

• Phonology is similar to Finnish(!), and to lesser
  extent Latin, Spanish and Italian
• Rule of thumb You read it as you write it
• Example Tolkien reading poem "Namárië"
  http//www.youtube.com/watch?v6de_SbVUVfA

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Quenyas status in fiction

• Oldest known language in Arda during The Third
  Age (LoTR took place here...Aragorn and that
  freaking ring)
• Tolkien used to refer to it as Elven-Latin
• Example Elves reaction to Frodos greeting elen
  síla lúmenn' omentielvo ("A star shines on the
  hour of our meeting")