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Nerdmeister
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Post Ablative case in inquisitive sentences
on: May 27, 2016 05:22
I was fooling around the other day with some quenya sentences. I usually try to just come up with some different exersises to (hopefully) hone those grammatical skills. Anyway I ended up writing the sentence:
Calimanaron maquentë Tauriello: "Ma meruval matë as nye?"

Now because ´Tauriel´ ends in an ´l´ I accidentally added the ablative case when I meant to use the allative. But when I got to look at the sentence and ponder the meaning of it, the ablative is kinda making sense to me in this context, precisely because it is a question. I would thus translate it:
"Calimanaron asked from Tauriel: ´Will you want to eat with me?´"

Is this something which has been discussed previously? Has a consensus already been reached and I just haven´t heard of it? If not then what are your thoughts on this approach?

Any and all comments are appreciated.

[Edited on 05/27/2016 by Nerdmeister]
Tamas Ferencz
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on: May 28, 2016 02:07
I don't know of a consensus (not that it means anything). Since the publication of PE22 we know a bit more about questions in Quenya in general, and have some valuable attested sentences, but I don't recall seeing an example which shows what case the verb 'ask' governs. What you suggest makes sense semantically (and occurs in real-life languages), so if you use it that way, people will understand, in my opinion.
The good thing is that in PE22 we have kesta- attested in the meaning of 'ask someone [to do sg]', e.g. kestallen, tuluvanye "[if] you ask me, I will come" [1]; so at least we can now use maquet- for 'ask [a question]', and kesta- for 'ask [for something]', if we want, which makes differentiation easier.

[1] this also suggests that after [i]kesta-[i] an accusative is used

[Edited on 05/28/2016 by Tamas Ferencz]
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Nerdmeister
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on: May 28, 2016 05:57
Thank you for your input on this. The word ´kesta-´ is interesting; the closest I have is ´cesta-´ -> seek, search for; though spelt with a ´k´ it adopts a whole new meaning? I bit puzzling to me since in Tengwar both ´c´ and ´k´ would be spelt using caima. Also I noticed you use ´kesta-´ in the form ´kestallen´ but from your translation should it not be ´kestalyen´ ("you ask me" )? The ending ´-llen´ I do not recognize. Is it that over time ´-lyen´ has become ´-llen´? The two appear to be closely related in any event.
I feel obligated to ad that I am not by any stretch a linguist myself; just a very quenya-interested individual, who has studied Helge Fauskanger´s quenya course a couple of times and used that as a base to learn more from Tolkien´s publications (Children of Húrin, Silmarillion, HoME etc). Anyway if you can please bear with me, I am very much interested in learning more
I´m afraid I haven´t dedicated any time in my studies thus far to the PE-series, though more from lack of time than lack of dedication.

[Edited on 05/28/2016 by Nerdmeister]

[Edited on 05/28/2016 by Nerdmeister]
Tamas Ferencz
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on: May 28, 2016 07:52

  • c and k represent the same sound and are interchangeable in spelling; in his linguistic writings and notes Tolkien usually used k in Quenya and c in Sindarin texts; he substituted c for k in his published texts to make it easier for his English audience. I prefer k in Quenya as my mother tongue uses the same (Hungarian)
  • kesta- in the sense of "ask" appears in essays written in the 1940's. cesta- and its pair ces- in the sense "search for" appears in notes written after the first publication of the Lord of the Rings. Whether they are one and the same verb, and Tolkien revised the meaning, or he simply forgot about the earlier one when he glossed cesta-, or whether these are homonyms, I cannot tell. But if you think of it, "ask for sg" and "seek for sg" are not that far from each other semantically. I don't think one necessarily obsoletes the other.
  • the same is true for the pronominal ending: Tolkien revised his system of endings several times during his lifetime; when he wrote those sample sentences in the forties with kesta-, the 2nd person ending happened to be -lle. You can happily substitute it with -lye to 'modernize' it





    • [Edited on 05/29/2016 by Tamas Ferencz]
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    Tamas Ferencz
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    on: May 28, 2016 07:53
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    [Edited on 05/29/2016 by Tamas Ferencz]
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    Nerdmeister
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    on: May 30, 2016 12:35
    Thank you for you insights, Tamas.
    I can see the connection you make for cesta- (sorry, I just find ´c´ to be more pleasing to the eye ) and that they might co-exist. What I will do with that I´m not too sure about right now. Would be nice to get around to PE22 at some point to put it in the same perspective as you have.
    While I am aware that Tolkien did alot of revising on quenya, I only know of a few outside the standards that I use. I was under the impression that students strive for a as-close-to-LotR-quenya as possible and since -lye is used in the sentence ´Nai hiruvalyë Valimar´ that is the one I got under my skin.
    Perhaps my next goal should be to read the Council of Elrond quenya course and see how it compares to Helge Fauskanger´s course; which, though very good imo, is more than 10 years old.
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