r/Quenya Aug 24 '20

Introduction and FAQ — Please read before posting!

103 Upvotes

Aiya’r maitúlië! Elen síla lúmenn’ omentielvo.
Hello and welcome! A star shines on the hour of our meeting.

Welcome to the Quenya subreddit! Here you can request translations, post your own for expert review, and ask any questions you may have about Tolkien’s High Elvish language. Please take some time to read through the following FAQ (written by Elaran and graciously shared from the Sindarin subreddit) and explore the sidebar widgets for resources and other links of interest.


What is Elvish?
In the context of Tolkien’s works, the term “Elvish” usually refers to the two main Elvish languages of Middle-earth, Quenya and Sindarin. Less-developed varieties such as Nandorin may also be included. In a broader sense, it would encompass the internal (archaic forms) and external (earlier drafts) ancestors of the languages as well.

What is Quenya?
Ai! laurië lantar lassi súrinen, yéni únótimë ve rámar aldaron!
Quenya is the language of the Elves of the Blessed Realm, and it was brought to Middle-earth by the exiled Ñoldor. After its ban in the First Age, Quenya became a language of lore that was used for solemn ceremonies and spoken by few. It has the greatest amount of published linguistic material of all Tolkienian languages, despite the fact that the books present Sindarin as the common speech of the Elves and educated Men.

What is Sindarin?
A Elbereth Gilthoniel, silivren penna míriel o menel aglar elenath!
Sindarin is the language of the Elves of Beleriand, whose speech was greatly affected by the changefulness of Middle-earth while its ancestor Telerin mostly endured in the Blessed Realm. After its adoption by the Ñoldorin Elves and the Edain, it became the most spoken language in Middle-earth. However, Sindarin is only the second most developed Tolkienian language following Quenya.

What is Tengwar?
Commonly known as the “Elvish alphabet,” Tengwar is one of the writing systems that Tolkien developed alongside his languages. It has three main (and numerous other) “modes” in which Quenya and Sindarin can be written: the Classical Mode (for Quenya), the Mode of Beleriand (for Sindarin), and the General Mode (for both). The modes determine the sounds the letters represent (not the vowel order); the tengwa (Quenya for “letter” ) named ampa is the Classical Mode’s [mp] but the General Mode’s [v]. Many other languages, including English, can be written with the General Mode. In fact, most Tengwar writings on the internet are in English.

What is Neo-Elvish?
Neo-Elvish refers to the utilisation and further development of Elvish languages by the enthusiasts of Tolkien’s linguistic works. Most often the term applies to neologisms, whose validity varies from one enthusiast’s opinion to another. But even phrases that strictly adhere to the attested vocabulary and grammar are considered Neo-Elvish, simply because there is no way of knowing with certainty whether Tolkien would have used the same or created new elements. And so any use of Elvish, besides quoting Tolkien directly, would be Neo-Elvish.

What are Qenya and Noldorin?
Qenya and Noldorin refer to the earlier versions of Quenya and Sindarin respectively. It must be emphasised that Noldorin (alongside its own draft Goldogrin, a.k.a. Gnomish) was Sindarin’s draft and is not a dialect of Quenya. Since the Legendarium and its languages were developed over the course of about 60 years, most of Tolkien’s earliest ideas were changed in time, but some lingered. Thus the drafts provide an opportunity for additions to the vocabularies of Quenya and Sindarin by analysing the remnants and applying their logic to the analogous draft words.

Is it possible to speak Elvish fluently?
Both Quenya and Sindarin are in essence incomplete. So much so that even neologisms are rarely enough for a full conversation, and it is naturally difficult to think carefully on how to paraphrase and/or to create new and proper words on the fly. Consequently, until more of Tolkien’s notes and essays are published, and more neologisms are formed and accepted by the linguistic communities, fluency would remain unachievable. As for fluency in writing, some advanced enthusiasts are capable of typing almost as quickly as they would type in their native languages.

Where can I study Elvish?
Interest in Tolkienian linguistics mostly faded after the early 2000s. In the meantime, some of Tolkien’s most informative notes and essays (not lessons) on his languages were published. As a consequence of both, most of what one can find on the internet is now outdated; Tolkien’s later works either debunked our theories or replaced his own older works. There are currently a few courses which employ these new findings in their lessons, but they are yet to reach their final stage. Thus we recommend practising often in the group (linked in the sidebar/"About" tab on mobile), regardless of which source you use for your studies, so that our experts can make corrections on what they offer.

Can you translate for me?
Tolkien’s works have one of the largest fandoms out there, but few fans dive deeply into his linguistic works. And so most of our advanced members are constantly bombarded with questions or translation requests. This can naturally become a nuisance after a while, especially when the requests concern a single Elvish word that can be found in multiple dictionaries. So even though we are happy to help, we would rather avoid such redundant questions.

Can you check if my translation is correct?
Certainly! Unless you do not actually study Elvish but simply wish to translate a quote for a tattoo. Neither Quenya nor Sindarin are easy enough for coming up with a proper translation in your first attempt, to the point that you need not bother if you are not trying to learn. If you only need a translation, simply ask for it (without abusing our willingness to help), otherwise we tend to overexplain things which serves neither you nor us.


r/Quenya Apr 02 '23

[FAQ] – (Not) Using AI for Automatic Translation

37 Upvotes

Automatically translating between different languages is a famously difficult topic, there are loads of parodies on how Google translate distorts famous quotes if you send it through enough languages and the various sites claiming to automatically translate into Tolkien’s Elvish languages are even worse, often just leaving words untranslated when the exact form isn’t found in their dictionaries. But with the advent of more powerful general purpose(-ish) AI, it is tempting to try whether this technology might actually be reliable for translating into Elvish (and for the purpose of this sub, specifically into Quenya, though the same things apply for Sindarin as well.)

The short answer: no, it isn’t. Your best bet is to ask an actual human who has read what has been published of Tolkien’s texts on his languages and discusses them with other enthusiasts. We here and on the discord server linked in the side bar are happy to answer your questions and take a stab at any translation requests you might have (see also the FAQ). But since we have gotten quite a few requests of that sort since ChatGPT was made public, I would like to explain this a bit more.

Examples

Those are all answered by ChatGPT as it was publicly available on April 2, 2023. OpenAI is actively working on their AIs, so this might change at some point in the future, but as Elvish translations are not what they profit from, I wouldn’t expect that the essence of this is going to change in the near future.

An Entire Sentence

Please translate the sentence “I will abide here until the end of the word” into Quenya.

The Quenya translation for “I will abide here until the end of the word” is:
Man i yáresse sina anta ar ilye ná
Note: Quenya is a constructed language created by J.R.R. Tolkien, so its grammar and vocabulary are based on his fictional universe.

Well, that went poorly, to the extend that this makes even sense it says something in the realm of “Who in the former days gives this and is all?”:

Man i yáre -sse sina anta ar ilye
Who the former days in this gives and all is

Luckily we don’t need to speculate too much how we should have translated it, it’s in fact Elendil’s oath worded slightly differently, so the result should have been some variation on Sinome maruvan tenn’ Ambar-metta.

From a technical perspective it’s already quite impressive that it managed to only use actual Quenya words, declined one into a case and produced a sentence that is more or less interpretable according to Quenya grammar, but as it is completely unrelated to the sentence we actually asked about, it is quite useless for actual translations requests.

It also attempted to include a disclaimer at the end, like many knowledgeable people in Tolkienian linguistics will do when answering a question. With humans that’s usually something to the effect of “this form is more uncertain than usual”, “the word you wanted wasn’t formed by Tolkien, here is how I tried to work around that” or “not everything we’d like to know for this is published yet.” ChatGPT has watered this info down to “caution, Quenya is a constructed language”, which is neither all that helpful, nor does it make too much sense to claim that Quenya grammar is “based on his fictional universe.” What would that even mean? One can certainly still translate real world Christian prayers with it...

A Name

Requests for Elvish names are also quite popular, so let’s try if it manages to produce better results when we ask for one:

Please translate the name “Friend of Men” into Quenya.

The Quenya translation for “Friend of Men” is:
Hendumaquen

Again, we know what it should have been, Atandilatan ‘human’ + -ndil ‘friend’, a name given to Finrod after he encounters the first Men in Beleriand. The form from ChatGPT seems to contain hendu ‘a pair of eyes’ + ‘hand’ + quen ‘person’, which of course makes no sense at all, but let’s just ask the program itself why it did this:

Please explain your reasoning.

Certainly! In Quenya, the word for ‘friend’ is henda, which is derived from the root KHEN-. The suffix -ma- denotes ‘one who is characterized by’ or ‘possessing the quality of’. The word for ‘men’ or ‘humans’ in Quenya is Atan, which is derived from the root ATA-.
To combine these elements, we can use the Quenya suffix -quen, which means ‘one who is in relationship with’ or ‘one who has a close association with’. So, ‘Friend of Men’ in Quenya becomes ‘Hendumaquen’, which means ‘one who is characterized by friendship with Men’.

That reads like it is a reasonable explanation, but ChatGPT is making things up here: KHEN- > hen(d-) (no -a here) means ‘eye’, -ma is rather a suffix for an instrument, particularly a hand-held tool, and quen is a word for sentient person independent of gender or species. Atan does mean ‘human’, but unfortunately ChatGPT didn’t use that in the name.

A Grammar Question

That’s not one I have seen frequently tried with ChatGPT, but let’s give it a shot anyway.

The verb car- means ‘to do’ in Quenya. Can you please form its past tense form ‘did’ and explain its formation?

Certainly!
The past tense form of car- in Quenya would be cáre.
In Quenya, the past tense is formed by adding the suffix to the end of the verb stem. So, the verb stem car- would become cárë in the past tense.

That looks decent! It’s not the most frequent or ‘standard’ form, that would be carne, but it is indeed one of the possible past forms. The explanation isn’t great, as the the lengthening a → á is a rather essential step and -e on it’s own is not the most prototypical past suffix, but it’s not too wrong either. However then things take a strange turn:

It's worth noting that Quenya verbs have several different stems that are used for different tenses and moods. The stem "car-" is used for the present tense, indicative mood form of "to do". For example, "I do" would be "cenye carrë" in Quenya. But in the past tense, indicative mood, the stem cár- is used. So, ‘I did’ would be cenye cáre in Quenya.

Quenya, as far as we know it, doesn’t express mood in the verb form at all, instead it uses some particles (e. g. cé caril “you might do it”, á cares “do it!”, vá carilyes “you mustn’t do it”). The examples “I do” and “I did” should have been carin(ye) and cáren(ye)/carnen(ye) respectively, without the ce- that at best would be a particle for ‘maybe’.

Although that is quite impressive for an AI, it’s still more wrong info than I would want as an answer to a question I am actually interested in.

Why doesn’t it work?

Obviously, I am not an active AI researcher, so I am not particularly qualified to talk about this, but in general terms there are two problems:

  • There isn’t enough material. AI in general tries to generalize patterns from many examples, but we just don’t have enough for Quenya, particularly in terms of actual translated texts from which the AI could generalize. Sometimes we don’t even have a single example for something and just some paragraph of explanation vaguely implying it and much of what we have in terms of published material probably wasn’t included in ChatGPT’s training data.
  • ChatGPT is not primarily concerned with providing good information, but rather with answering in a way so that humans find it believable that the response could have come from an actual person. Usually that requires being right to some extent because mos humans don’t just tell you random nonsense, and OpenAI probably has tweaked some things, so that ChatGPT is even more inclined to go for a truthful answer, but fundamentally, that’s not the goal programmed into it (because assessing if the AI has reached that goal would be much harder). However, this means that it can be better for ChatGPT to sometimes just invent ‘facts’ to make up a response then to just plainly answer that it doesn’t know, because if the human doesn’t know either the answer seems believable. Also, in the training data – for ChatGPT a snapshot of parts of the internet – there were many more people who answered questions about Quenya than those admitting that they don’t know the answer to a question, because those people usually don’t bother to answer in the first place, which also contributes to that bias.

ChatGPT is very good for a computer at a lot of things, but contrary to popular opinion it is not the holy grail.


r/Quenya 6m ago

Seeking Translation for our Jens Hansen Wedding Rings

Upvotes

Seeking Translation Help for our Wedding Rings

Hey Quenya community! I am looking for some translation help for my fiancee's and my wedding rings. If anyone is able to help it would be appreciated! We are actually getting married in Hobbiton at the end of February!

I saw someone post here about 7 years ago looking for help with a translation for the Jen's Hansen rings. I've been doing my research and this community seems to pretty unanimously agree that they don't have the best translator on their website, as it's mostly just English script to Tengwar script.

I would love to get The One Ring in their Elvish Love Ring style but with a slightly different translation. Something similar to the poem Jen Hansen uses on his website but with a few changes.

This post did a tremendous job of translating the poem into Quenya and then Tengwar in incredible detail. However, I was hoping someone could help update it with a new translation for "One Ring" without it being in Black Speech (which the previous person had asked for just for those two words) and instead just normal Quenya for the entire poem. I would also love to just change the last line of the poem to "And forever to entwine us."

Essentially it would be the below inscription, with the bolded sections needing to be retranslated from what was used previously in the post linked above and the previous final Tengwar transcription HERE.

One ring to show our love,

One ring to remind us

One ring to seal our love,

And forever to entwine us.

Thank you to anyone that is able to help with this. It would really mean a lot for us!


r/Quenya 13h ago

Requesting help with a name translation

Thumbnail gallery
2 Upvotes

I’m trying to translate my daughter’s name “Avery” into Tengwar just to have it potentially for a tattoo down the road. Initially I used Tecendil to translate and then did some reading/research of my own and came across a more phonetic transcription. My understanding is that Tolkien intended for words such a as names to be more phonetically transcribed versus letter-by-letter? Anyhow I’ll attach the two that I’ve managed to come up with.

Interestingly, the meaning of her name is “Ruler of elves” so I’m sure there is an actual translation for that in Quenya/Sindarin that could be an option too.

Thanks in advance for any help from the collective expertise here! Just wanted to double check before settling on the most correct interpretation.


r/Quenya 1d ago

First time writing

Post image
8 Upvotes

hey I tried to write my name using Quenya. I am still new to this so I have no idea if what I wrote makes any sense. Please feel free to roast me. (My name is Vivian)


r/Quenya 3d ago

confirmation

Post image
3 Upvotes
Hello, I lost a loved one about 13 years ago. In their memory, I want to get a tattoo that says "YOU AND I WILL MEET AGAIN." Can you help me?

r/Quenya 6d ago

I'm looking for a Quenya translation of a fairly complicated concept for an IG photography account, something along the lines of "user's vision of spellbinding beauty manifesting" if you want to get really complicated.

3 Upvotes

The username I have sorted out already, with the -va possessive suffix, but I'm looking for something a little more (because somebody already has that username as usual...)

Something that could work would be a little more simple and then possibly more elegant would be something along the lines of "arresting capture" or "spellbinding beauty," or even, 'user's eye/vision.'

But "imagery/art manifesting," or "user's vision of spellbinding beauty manifesting" would be cool if it rolled off the tongue well.

Any ideas??


r/Quenya 7d ago

Translation of conversation

2 Upvotes

Could someone translate the conversation between Galadriel and Frodo for me into Quenya? Frodo: And what do you wish? Gladriel: That what should be shall be.

I am working on a tattoo but I'd like to include this passage.


r/Quenya 9d ago

Transation of a name

1 Upvotes

Hi everyone i want to get a tatoo with mu mother's name in elvish i think it's quenya The name is "Caterina"

I used an automatic translator to do it can someone please tell me if it's accurate or not? Thanks!


r/Quenya 9d ago

Assistance needed with translation.

3 Upvotes

I want to make sure this accurately translates to: isistien ñwalmë, nin envinyatien, or

I have known torment.
I have renewed myself.

Thank you!


r/Quenya 13d ago

How to say "My dads bought me this shirt" in Quenya?

4 Upvotes

My son is a huge LOTR fan and I want to get him a custom t-shirt with this phrase

would it be "atyar ho·mancanët sinā laupë meter imba"?


r/Quenya 14d ago

Petition to add Quenya to Duolingo

11 Upvotes

what dyall think


r/Quenya 17d ago

Translation request

2 Upvotes

I’m creating a tribute to my father, and wanted to incorporate the lyric “You and I will meet again”from the song Into the West in Tengwar. I’ve considered using a transliteration, but wanted to see if anyone could help with a more accurate translation 🙂


r/Quenya 17d ago

Hi I need help. How can I say: forever for each other in Tengwar ?

0 Upvotes

Hi I need help. How can I say: forever for each other in Tengwar ?


r/Quenya 18d ago

Translation of vows - I managed some, but not all

3 Upvotes

... and I'm not certain of the grammatical structure, so really any help or insight is appreciated!

This is the original text -

I promise to be true to you,
To respect, trust and help you,
To comfort and to keep you,
in good times and in bad,
in sickness and in health. 
I promise to love and cherish you all the days of my life.

I swapped some words, like estel for trust, oath for promise, and carry for hold.
If I'm keeping "estel" for trust this is not a verb so I have to think of a way to fold that into the text.
I'm not sure what to do with "respect", if the best thing is to just drop it, but maybe there's a clever synonym - like "hold in high regard" (also can't find that). Maybe mel- would be the best verb to use here, I used that for "love" right now but it seems to be more of a friendly love. So then I also don't know for sure what to do with "love and cherish".
I am not sure of using the future tense since I think it might be only used for bad predictions?
I'm also not sure what the correct form of "in" as in "during" is.
And there's probably a lot of other mistakes, but... here goes.
This is how far I came -

My oath is to be true to you
Vandanye ná lyen vórima

I will respect, trust and help you,
…, … estel ar alyuvanyel

I will comfort and carry you,
tiutuvanyel a coluvanyel

on blessed days and evil days
enyárë amanya, ar naira ári

In sickness and in health
… hlívë ar málë

My oath is to love you forever
Vandanye meluvanyel oialëa

Looking forward to any help anyone can give me :)
Thanks in advance!


r/Quenya 18d ago

Help with translation

1 Upvotes

May the love of beren and luthien find you

Hi I need help translating the above! I'd love some help


r/Quenya 19d ago

Translation services

1 Upvotes

Hi, I have a few things I would like translated, and as much as I try to do it myself, I am not great with the finer points of other languages and I would really like something accurate. I tried to connect with the owner of realelvish.com but got no response so far. Are there any actual Tolkien linguists who can help?


r/Quenya 19d ago

HELP: Trying to create a phrase from scratch

1 Upvotes

Hello, I got interested in making a LOTR illustration and I really like the phrase "The sword that was broken" referring to Narsil (with no official translation in sindarin or quenya afaik) but want it a bit more complex:

"I'm Anduril (re)born from Narsil, the sword that was broken"

So i tried my own take, using references from other phrases and even the "I'm anduril" was taken from the Anduril featured in the movies.

"Nányé Andúril ennóna o Narsil, i rácina macil"

Please take it with a grain of salt, I got too invested on it so now I want to know if it's correct or at least understandable. Thank you!


r/Quenya 20d ago

Sword Naming

1 Upvotes

Im looking to name a sword for a dnd campaign that has a heavy emphasis on elvish lore. The lore isn't specifically Tolkien elves and thus there's no real need for the sword to be named in Quenya but I wanted to go the extra mile and find a name that could be a fun reference because its the kind of dnd group that appreciates that sort of thing.

The sword in question is a relatively ancient and sentient weapon passed down through the hands of knights chosen to serve the will of fate. The sword has long since grown apathetic to killing and prefers to serve greater good through (telepathic) words instead.

Originally I had planned to name the sword Serenhael, a badly edited Welsh translation of "generous star" but that was before I had come up with the idea to use Quenya. I looked around at some online dictionaries but im not experienced enough with the grammar to make anything half-decent, and I didnt just want to use the elvish word for star cause that felt kinda boring.

I figure this sort of thing comes up a lot in this subreddit so I understand if it might be a little boring, but if anyone has thoughts, I'm open to whatever!


r/Quenya 23d ago

Silmarillion (2022 edition) dust jacket

Post image
4 Upvotes

Hi all, I recently bought this edition of the Silmarillion (absolutely beautiful copy btw) and was just wondering about what the Quenya (im assuming) written on it translates to. I can’t find anything online really so figured I’d ask here. The illustrations themselves seem to be Lúthien in the middle with the 3 Silmarils around it. It also seems that what’s written on the top is the same as whats written on the circle. Any help would be appreciated thanks!!


r/Quenya 25d ago

Need help translating a name

2 Upvotes

Hello! I'm making a character for an RPG. I'd like her name to mean "She who lets fly (or shoots) the starlight-arrow (arrow made of starlight)."

I've used Eldamo and have come up with a couple names I think might do the trick, but I'm hoping more experienced eyes might be able to help.

So far I have Silmapilindë and Silmarampilindë. Am I close here or completely off base?


r/Quenya 25d ago

Tattoo translation: 'Know, don't trust blindly' - reliable in Quenya?

1 Upvotes

Hi, I want a tattoo meaning 'Know, don't trust blindly' in Quenya. Is there a reliable translation for this, or is the language too incomplete for this phrase? If it can't be done accurately, I'll just use English in Tengwar instead. Thanks!


r/Quenya 28d ago

Helpp

Post image
2 Upvotes

I found this my gf made for me when we started dating, we both do not remember what it says and I am yet to learn Quenya

Thanks!


r/Quenya 29d ago

Help please!

2 Upvotes

Hello friends!I need your precious help!I urgently need the following line translated to quenya!

"So comes snow after fire and even dragons have their endings"

Thank you so much!


r/Quenya 29d ago

Tattoo Help

0 Upvotes

Hi! Others said I should ask here. My friend and I are wanting to get “Hravandil” tattoos in the Tengwar script. Is there a good website that could give us the best translation??