Re: Examples #5: Translate the One Ring poem

On Saturday 15 January 2005 03:29 am, Sai Emrys wrote:
> Pretty straightforward. You know this, I'm sure.
>
> Three Rings for Elven-kings under the sky.
> Seven for Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone.
> Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die.
> One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne.
> In the Land of Mordor were the Shadows lie.
> One Ring to rule them all.
> One Ring to find them all.
> One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.
> In the Land of Mordor were the Shadows lie.
This is in modern Veldan, in a fairly highbrow register that would be
used in speeches in the Senátus and official proclamations and
"Literature" and such.  It has some redundant case-marking that tends
to get dropped otherwise, particularly in casual speech.

Tríur cuartur Elda-Regaivos[0] fwi i menelû.
Efsur Naukes-taroivos in térasur ondéasur aicasur[1].
Novur Thánténanýntuivos Atánuivos cintyusswi[2] thánein.
Sénu i Moroio Taroio ár tésessu moressu cúressu.
In i Noresu Mordorû[3] caloc gráta lusteir.
Tarwoin[4] Sénusu Cuartusu sálumas.[5]
Túvein Sénusu Cuartusu sálumas.
Ilicépain Sénusu Cuartusu sálumas ce lígain in i morimenû túmas.
In Noresu Mordorû caloc gráta lusteir.


[0] This actually requires doing a disservice to the Elf-Kings because
of the negative connotations of "regas" in the modern language (the
Veldans not so many generations back having freed themselves from a
dynasty that had become very tyrannical).  I have tried to offset this
by using the Eldarin word for themselves for Elf or Elven.

[1] Lit. "house"...there is no separate notion of a hall as a dwelling
place in the sense of the Anglo-Saxon period in Veldan.

[2] There is no notion specifically of "doom" or "fate"; a person's
life is regarded as their own to make and shape as best they may.  The
adjective I have used means "certain."

[3] In general, "X of Y" patterns are not idiomatic in any Veldan
dialect.  The usual way is just to say (as close as can be rendered
literally) "the Land, Mordor."

[4] Another translation could be to use the verb "regauin," easily
formed from the noun "regas" (= "king").  This might actually carry
the punch of the original better because of the negative connotations
of "regas" in the modern language (the Veldans not so many generations
back having freed themselves of a dynasty that had become very
tyrannical).  To belabor the issue, one might even translate it using
"farregauin" (= "misrule"; "far-" = "perverse").

[5] Veldan speakers would find *sálumas túmas (= "all them") awkward:
sál- itself (although technically an adjective) is used in the idiom
equivalent to the superlative in which it almost achieves the status
of a pronoun.


BTW, I was pleased to note that I only had to add two or three words
to the language to translate the above...I wasn't sure the vocabulary
had gotten quite that far along.


CKR, insomniac :)
cian@cox-internet.com
http://crlh.tzo.org/~cian/CR/conlang/

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