Re: Tolkien language(s) question

Mark J. Reed sikyal:

> On Wed, Sep 03, 2003 at 05:27:51PM +0000, Robert B Wilson wrote:
> > actually it's more like Sindarin:Quenya :: French:Italian...
>
> Not really, because Q[u]enya was specifically envisioned by Tolkein as
> the "Elvish Latin".  The French/Italian comparison works if you
> consider Italy to be all of Middle-Earth and France to be
> another dimension.  That latter bit isn't too far off, actually . . .
> ;-)
>
> But among the Elves still dwelling in Middle-Earth, Sindarin is
> what they actually speak in their daily lives, while Quenya
> is the language of scholarship.
No good analogy can be made here. True, Quenya is the language of
scholarship, like Latin in the middle ages. However, Sindarin is not a
*descendant* of Latin (as the Spanish:Latin comparison implies), but a
sister of it, a sister that happens to be mostly dead within Middle Earth.

It might be a little better to say Sindarin : Quenya :: Old Russian :
Church Slavic.


--
Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/
http://students.washington.edu/jaspax/blog

Jesus asked them, "Who do you say that I am?"

And they answered, "You are the eschatological manifestation of the ground
of our being, the kerygma in which we find the ultimate meaning of our
interpersonal relationship."

And Jesus said, "What?"

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