Tolkien's Languages: Sources of Information

Tolkien's Languages: Sources of Information

Here is a short list of some things to help people learn Tolkien's languages, mainly Quenya and Sindarin, since so many people ask. They are all hopefully still available, mostly on the net, and either inexpensive or free. If you notice any broken links or other mistakes, I would appreciate very much if you'd let me know at LisaStar@earthling.net.

There is a new Elvish Linguistics email list, called, amazingly enough, the Elvish Linguistics list. All good people are welcome to join, and you can subscribe by sending a message to ElvishLinguistics-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. It is moderated to remove netkooks and spammers, in accordance with the FAQ.

If you are trying to figure out how to say your name in Elvish, please look it up on these two sites first: Lapseparma webpage or try Helge Fauskangers's article "Now We Have All Got Elvish Names". I have been completely overwhelmed by people asking me questions like this, and I can't answer them all.

Elvish Languages in the Movie

Ryszard Derdzinski has provided a list of words and phrases here.

General Sources

Quenya Wordlist

There is also a supplemental wordlist you may wish to see.

Quenya Grammar

Conversational Quenya

I have just been working on a series of lessons which present the sort of phrases and expressions which people study when they are learning a modern foreign language. It is called Quettie or Conversational Quenya.

Sindarin Wordlists

There is not a single decent Sindarin - English wordlist on the net right now. I regret this very much and will work on it immediately!

Sindarin Grammar

Dwarvish Language or Khuzdul

I have provided an updated Khuzdul-English wordlist but unfortunately, it still has only about 30 words.

Alphabets

The best information about Tolkien's Invented Alphabets, such as the Tengwar and Cirth, is in the third book of the Lord of the Rings. However, some explanations are available here, for some of the alphabets.

I have moved the Font links to another page, Fonts and completely updated them.

More General Sources

If English is not your first language, there are many publications in other languages. Write to your country's Tolkien Society for more information. Nancy Martsch's Basic Quenya Language Lessons have been translated into a number of languages, including Polish and Spanish. There are also groups, net sites and publications devoted entirely to Tolkien's languages in various countries, e.g. Poland, Russia, Spain, France, Czech Republic, Slovenia, etc. Helge Fauskanger's webpage has a list of the sites, by language.

You can order almost any book or publication (and some miniatures and collectibles) from the Tolkien Shop in the Netherlands, called Tolkienwinkel or write to:

     Rene van Rossenberg 
     Hoge Rijndijk 195
     2314 AD Leiden
     The Netherlands
Rene's email is info@tolkien_shop.com. He wraps things up well so that they don't get beaten up in the mail, and he is fast, in my experience. Americans can pay in US dollars.

*Not* recommended are Ruth Noel's book, The Languages of Middle-earth and Jim Allan's book, An Introduction to Elvish, because they are both about 25 years out of date.

Please feel free to share this information with others.

My email address is LisaStar@earthling.net If you send me a message, please put Elvish in the subject line so I don't mistake it for spam and delete it.

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Tyalie Tyelellieva / LisaStar@earthling.net / This page was first uploaded in 1994, and revised July 2004.
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