Just like Russian, German and many other languages, Quenya uses ‘cases’ and ‘case endings’ to show the function of a noun in the sentence, but also often instead of prepositions like to, from, on etc. An example from English is the ‘-s’ used to show ownership: “the woman’s house”.

The ending for the Quenya genitive case singular is “-o”.
Example: vessë > vessëo).
If the word ends in “-a”, this is removed before the ending is added.
Example: quetta > quetto.
If the word ends in an “-o” already, then it has the same form in the genitive.
Example: cáno > cáno
Nouns with special stem forms add the genitive ending to this form.
Example: car (card-) > cardo.

For plural, the ending “-on” is added to whichever form the word has in plural.
Examples: vessi (plural of vessë) > vession (genitive plural), quettar > quettaron, cardi > cardion.

Genitives can either precede or follow their nouns; the important thing to remember is that the ending is added to the ‘main’ word.
Example: “i ataro hína” and “hína i ataro” both mean “the father’s child”, but “i híno atar” would mean “the child’s father”.

Only one article is necessary in a genitival phrase. Both “hína i ataro” and “i hína i ataro” mean “the child of the father” (“the father’s child”).

The genitive case is used for several things and situations in Quenya:
– for family relationships between people
– for relationships between a ruler and the thing that is ruled
– for relationships between places and things located there
– to show that x is a physical part of something else
– to show that x is one of a group of something
– to show origin, source or former ownership
– to mean “of” in the sense “about”, “concerning”
– after the preposition “ú” (without)
– after the adjective “arwa” (possessing, in control of)

Notice that the genitive case is *not* used for denoting current ownership of things. For that, the possessive case, which will be introduced in the next lesson, is used.

Another verb for “having”

We are already familiar with the verb “harya-“ (“possess”), which is used for ownership of things. There is also another verb, “sam-“ (“have”), which is used in connection with genitival relationships.
Example: I atar samë yeldë. (The father has (rather than “possesses”) a daughter).

***

Lesson 11 Vocabulary List

nertë “nine”
cainen “ten”
ú “without, destitute of” [followed by genitive]
lauca “warm” (adjective)
parca “dry” (adjective)
lusta “empty, void” (adjective)
nén (nen-) “water”
cuilë “life” (noun)
lossë “snow” (noun)
mistë “rain” (noun)
anta “face” (noun)
tál (tal-) “foot” (noun)
quén (quen-) “one, somebody, a person” (noun)
sam– “have” (verb) Note: The past tense is sámë.

***

Tengwar Lesson 11

The next three tengwar denote ‘f’, ‘v’ and ‘w’:

11-1

There are no special remarks about formen and vala.

A word initial wilya is pronounced as ‘v’ in some words: in the word list you’ll recognize them as follows: vendë < wendë “maiden”. This means that the word is pronounced as vendë but is written with wilya and not with vala. It is however not wrong to write wendë in Latin letters.

Words with initial v and written with wilya: vaia < waia “envelope”, vailë < wailë “wind”, vaiya < waiya “envelope”, vaina < waina “blonde”, vaita- < waita- “to enfold”, vaiwa < waiwa “wind”, ván < wán “goose”, vanwa < wanwa “lost (participle of auta-)”, vanwië < wanwië “past (noun)”, vára < wára “soiled, dirty”, vasar < wasar “veil” (written with súlë), vasarya- < wasarya- “to veil” (written with súlë), ve < we (personal pronoun inclusive “we”), vëaner < wëaner “adult man”, vembë < wembë “worm”, vendë < wendë “maiden”, vénë < wénë “virginity”, véra < wéra “personal, private, own”, vilwa < wilwa “lower air”, vindë < windë “pale blue”, vinya < winya “young, new”, vinimo < winimo “baby”, vinyamo < winyamo “youngster”, vista < wista “air (as substance)”.