Deep Water

Hi all.

For fun, I relexed Rinya with Quenya and Sindarin words to
see how it would come out. So the words are Q and S but the
morphology and syntax is plain old Rinya. The morphemes are
also new and derived from Q. and S. It was easier than I
thought it would be, because all the necessary words existed
and the cases of Quenya are pretty much the same as Rinya -
though used very differently. At the end of this mail is a
try in Swedish as well.

Here it is with Quenya words:

     Rinya quettanen sinyanen (rinya with new words)
     Rinya târa (high rinya)

     Lambe tarna er sîrenen lûmen.
     Emme têca sê er nôren eiterin.
     Nan îmen û tulyuvawa ero,
     ya caura linquello nurallo.

A version with umlaut and soft mutation:

     Lambe tarna er sîrenen lûmen.
     Emme tæ^ca sê er nôren eiterin.
     Nan îmen û dulyuvawa ero,
     ya gaura linquello nurallo.


lambe        tarna    er  sîre.nen  lûme.n
language:ABS ford:ABS DEF river.INS time.DAT

emme    têc.a    sê        er  nôre.n       eiter.in
1PL:ABS lead.PRS 3SG:N:ERG DEF dwelling.DAT father:PL.DAT

nan îmen  û   tuly.uva.wa ero
but there not come.FUT.AP 3SG:M:ABS

ya  caur.a   linquello nurallo
who fear.PRS water.ABL deep.ABL

ABS: -0       (< Q. Nominative)
ERG: -V^      (< Book Quenya Accusative, lengthening of last vowel)
INS: -nen
DAT: -n
ABL: -llo
PRS: -a
FUT: -uva
A-P: -wV      (where V is the stem vowel preceding {w})


And here it is with Sindarin words:

     Rinya peithana idinna (rinya with new words)
     Rinya mithren (grey rinya)

     Lam athrad i duinna lûman.
     Men tega ed i dôran eideran.
     Nan imen û tûlathawa e,
     i daedela nenel nûrel.

A version with umlaut and soft mutation:

     Lam athrad i dhoinna lôman.
     Men tæga ed i dhôran eideran.
     Nan imen û dûlathawa e,
     i ðaedela nenel nûrel.


lam          athrad   i   duin.na   lûm.an
language:ABS ford:ABS DEF river.INS time.DAT

men teg.a    e.d     i   dôr.an       eider.an
1PL lead.PRS 3SG.ERG DEF dwelling.DAT father:PL.DAT

nan imen  û   tûl.atha.wa e
but there not come.FUT.AP 3SG:ABS

i       daedel.a nen.el    nûr.el
REL:ABS fear.PRS water.ABL deep.ABL

For Sindarin, I have made up new suffixes based on the old
Sindarin prepositions and sometimes other words:

ABS: -0
ERG: -ed      (< '-dan' "maker")
INS: -(a)na   (< 'an-' "with, by")
DAT: -(a)n    (< 'na' "to")
ABL: -el      (< 'kelw' "source")
PRS: -a
FUT: -(a)tha
PST: -ant
IMP: -o
INF: -ad
A-P: -wV      (where V is the stem vowel preceding {w})

The worst thing that I discovered is that it looks much better
with Sindarin words than with Rinya ones. I guess you're bound
to lose if you try to compete with Tolkien himself.

I hope my dreams won't be haunted by Tolkien for this.

Comments are as always very much welcome.

Daniel

PS. I tried it with Swedish words too. It looked horrible!
Oh, what the heck. Here it is with Rinya/new orthography:

     Sprôk vâd flûdav tîtil.
     Vî lêder dêtør den hemvistil fø^rfæ^dertil.
     Men dæ^r inte komaska hanør,
     som ræd vatenon jwpon.

DS.