Tengwar
II by Fíriel
The Mode of Beleriand
As you might remember from Lesson One, the Mode of Beleriand was a
full mode used to write Sindarin. It’s likely that the exiled Noldor of Middle
Earth were the creators of this mode, and we know that this mode was in
widespread use among the Elves of Middle Earth in the Second Age, as well as
the Third.
a. Reading & Writing the Mode
If you remember from the last lesson, this mode uses letters to represent
both consonants and vowels, and as such, is easy enough to read. All you
need to do is memorise the sound that each tengwa (letter) represents.
There are also a few symbols where the function must be known (which will be
explained below).
Consonants and Vowels:
· quesse, ungwe, hwesta, unque: some people have guessed that the sound
values for these tengwar in this mode would be KW, GW, KHW/HW and GHW/W
respectively. However, it was most likely for a W following a consonant to be
written with the W-tilde instead.
.vilya was most likely used between vowels or at the end of a word; e.g.
1]n]7 'tawar; wood', 1lRn 'têw;
letter'. To write a W sound following a consonant, the over-twist was
used. (see 'Miscellaneous Symbols')
. long carrier: since this tengwa has no obvious use in this mode, many
people have used it to represent the initial I that is pronounced with a
consonantal Y sound (when the I is followed by a vowel); e.g. ~]ln 'iaew; scorn', ~]R3 'iâth;
fence', ~.Õ3]T3h6 'iuithathon; I will use/employ'
· lúva usually doesn’t appear by itself in other modes except this one,
where it represents the vowel sound A.
Diphthongs:
The diphthongs AE and OE were written out with two tengwar (letters)
instead of a tengwa and a tehta (vowel-mark). Other diphthongs
could be written out with two letters also, but the usual method was to use the
tengwa-tehtar combination whenever possible; e.g. `B e]Õ7 jlÕ3]T5l6 6]T `B 7]é 'i fair
leithannen na i raw; the mortal was set free by the lion'.
Miscellaneous Symbols:
NOTE: The nasal bar isn't used in loose-compound words (often words
linked by a hyphen);
e.g. q]Tj]T62`V7`Blj
'palan-díriel; having gazed afar'.
NOTE: this symbol ... U is an
alternative symbol that can be used in writing the "following W".
Punctuation:
· The question mark, the exclamation mark, and the parenthesis have not been
found in any attested samples for this mode, but have been used based on their
existence in other Sindarin modes.
RULES:
1.) A bar is placed over the following letter to represent a nasal consonant
cluster (a letter combination starting with N or M, like ND, NG, or MB);
e.g. 2]Tw{l3 'dambeth; answer'.
2.) The consonant cluster NG is represented by a nasal bar over angwa
tengwa (s{) when it
occurs in the middle of words, and by noldo tengwa (g) when it occurs at the start and end of words; e.g. `B g.7.3h8 'i
nguruthos; the death-shadow', or another,
e.g. 6`Bs{jh7 'ninglor; golden water-flower'.
3.) In Roman orthography (i.e. the way we write Sindarin), a final V sound
is represented with the letter F. However, Tengwar is more forward in that we
always use ampa tengwa (r) to write
the V sound, and formen tengwa (e) to write the F/PH sound (PH is pronounced the same as F);
e.g. shjr 'golf; branch', e`B7`Bl3 'firieth; mortal woman', ]Tje 'alph;
swan'.
4.) By the Third Age, the spirant M sound (written as MH) was pronounced as an
ordinary V, but it seems that óre tengwa with a curl (y+), which represented the spirant M sound, was
used, even if it was pronounced V. Our one attested example of this is
in the King’s Letter, where, even though “M” is a slightly different tengwa
than in the Moria inscription, it is definitely M, not V, being used to show
the sound ..... šljji6 'mhellyn; friends'.
5.) The long carrier (~) is often
used by some to represent the initial consonantal Y sound that occurs in
Sindarin
e.g. ~]ln 'iaew; scorn', ~]r]8 'iavas; autumn', ~.Õ3]T3h6
'iuithathon; I will use/employ'. (If you can't remember this particular sound
occuring in Sindarin, refer back to Gildor's Sindarin Course, Lesson One.)
6.) Double consonants were usually written twice as required; the
exceptions to this rule were MM, NN and SS, which were written with malta
tengwa (t), númen
tengwa (5), and esse
tengwa (k)respectively;
e.g. wljj]T8 'bellas; bodily strength', w]Tk 'bass;
bread'.
7.) Long vowels (written by us with an acute accent or circumflex) are
represented with an andatehta ('long-mark') over the appropriate vowel.
e.g. u.R6l6 'rhúnen; eastern', 2.R7 'dûr; dark'.
TIPS:
1.) A dot is usually placed over the A-tengwa and I-tengwa
to keep people from confusing them with other letters, but using the dot isn't
always necessary;
e.g. 27`Bs{]T5l6 'dringannen; I beat'. The dot almost
never appears when writing diphthongs.
2.) Be carefeul to write Sindarin exactly as it's pronounced; e.g.
Edhelharn 'elf-stone' is not written l4lm]76 (i.e. it's not written with the alda
tengwa, which represents the sound LH), but rather l4lj9]76 with the
L and H sounds represented separately. Why? Because edhelharn is a
compound word which is made up of edhel 'elf' and lenited sarn
'stone', and in any case, the sound LH never occurs in the middle of a word -
it's hard enough to pronounce naturally at the start!
3.) When transcribing hyphenated words, always leave the hyphen out!
However, it's your choice whether you'd like to write the two words (separated
by the former hyphen) together or separately, depending on how important they
are to each other.
4.) About lenited G in Sindarin; as you know, when a word starting with
G is lenited, the G disappears and we mark the disappeared G with an apostrophe
( ' ). Evidence suggests that Tolkien came up with such a symbol for Tengwar,
called a gasdil, but if it did exist, we won't know what it looks like
or its function until there are more papers published by the Tolkien Estate.
Until then, treat the lenited G as if it doesn't exist in Tengwar.
As you can see, writing in this mode is fairly easy, and isn't too taxing on
the brain. Writing a word simply requires you to use the right tengwar
and put them in the right order.....
]T + 5 + .R + 6 + ]Õ + 2 = ]T5.R6]Õ2
a + nn + ú + n + ai + d = annúnaid
q + l + 7 + `B + ]T + 5 + ]T + 3 = ql7`B]T5]T3
p + e + r + i + a + nn + a + th = periannath
And it's as easy as that!
(One parting note; don't try to memorise everything on your first read!
It can be a lot to take in, and you should be constantly referring to the
lessons when writing Tengwar (although eventually there'll be a time when you
can easily write your own Tengwar by memory). However, people will still think
you're mad };))
** For a chart to help you match up your computer keyboard keys with
the Tengwar letters at a glance, click here: chart. This chart is for Dan Smith's
Tengwar Sindarin Font mode.