The dative case is used for the following:
– the indirect (dative) object of a sentence (I gave the book *to the smith*)
– to express “for” in the sense “for someone” (The boy works *for the smith*)
– with gerunds to express purpose (I came *in order to meet* the king)
– with impersonal verbs (It seems *to me*)

The ending for dative case singular is”-n”.
Example: “i tanon” (to/for the smith).
If this ending is to be added to a word that ends in a consonant, an “e” is slipped in to avoid impossible consonant combinations.
Example: “i aranen” (to/for the king).

The plural ending is “-in” for words with plurals in “-r” (this “r” is dropped before the dative ending is added), but if the word has a plural in “-i”, only “-n” is added.
Example: “i tanoin” (to/for the smiths), i vessin (to/for the wives)

The gerund

A gerund is a form of the verb that works like a noun. Quenya gerunds can be formed by adding -ië to the verbal stem (A-stems lose their final -a, and verbs ending in -ya drop this entire ending).
Example: turië (controlling, from tur-), mótië (toiling, from móta-), hilië (following, from “hilya-“).

The gerund in the dative case is used to express the idea of “in order to” / “with the purpose of”.
Example: I aran túlë turien i nórë. The king came (in order) to rule the land.
Literal translation: The king came for ruling the land.

Pronominal endings for “we”
Confusingly enough for mortals, Quenya has several pronominal endings for “we”:
– lvë (“inclusive we”, including the person(s) addressed)
– lmë (“exclusive we”, excluding the person(s) addressed)
– mmë (“dual we” – whether inclusive, exclusive or both is unknown)

Examples:
1. “Turuvalvë i nórë, quentë i aran ar i aranel”. Inclusive “we” – the king and princess expect to rule with the persons addressed, so perhaps they’re addressing their council.
2. “Turuvalmë i nórë, quente i aran ar i aranel.” Exclusive “we” – the king and princess don’t expect to rule with the persons addressed, so this is what they might say to the people.
3. “Turuvammë i nórë, quente i aran.” Dual “we” (“the two of us”) – the king might be addressing the princess he’ll rule with (inclusive dual), or talking to the people, but with “we” meaning himself and the princess (exclusive dual).

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Lesson 13 Vocabulary List

mal “but”
var “or”
or “over”
laire “poem”
alassë “joy”
aran “king”
minya “first”
métima “last, final”
melda “dear, beloved”
voronda “faithful”
valin “happy”
laita- “to bless, to praise”
mahta- “to fight”

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Tengwar lesson 13

The consonant ‘y’ is a little bit special in Quenya as it in most words is not denoted by a separate tengwa but by two dots under another consonant. The four most frequent combinations are:

13-1

Note that as ‘ry’ is always followed by a vowel (a short vowel, long vowel or diphthong) we always use rómen and never órë.