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Authors: J. R. R. Tolkien
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detailed).
F2. was substantially corrected and added to (more especially in the earlier part of the essay), and some pages were rewritten. These alterations are not all of a kind, some being made with care and others more roughly, and I have found it extremely difficult to determine, in relative terms, when certain of them were made: the more especially since the development after F 2 was not a steady progression, my father evidently feeling that a different treatment of the subject was required. Some corrections undoubtedly belong to a time when the text as a whole had been supplanted. I have therefore included in the text that follows all alterations made to the manuscript, and in most cases I have shown them as such, though in order to reduce the clutter I have in some cases introduced them silently, when they do no more than improve the text (largely to increase its clarity) without in any way altering its purport.
In general I treat F 2 as the representative text of the original version, and only distinguish F 1 when necessary. The paragraph-numbers are of course added editorially. A commentary follows the notes on pp. 61 ff.
The Languages
at the end of the
Third Age.
$1. I have written this note on the languages concerned in this book not only because this part of the lore of those days is of special interest to myself, but because I find that many would welcome some information of this kind. I have had many enquiries concerning such matters from readers of the earlier selections from the Red Book.*
$2. We have in these histories to deal with both Elvish and Mannish (2) tongues. The long history of Elvish speech I will not treat; but since three [> two] varieties of it are glimpsed in this book a little may be said about it.
$3. According to Elvish historians the Elven-folk, by themselves called the Quendi, and Elven-speech were originally one.
The primary division was into Eldar and Avari. The Avari were those Elves who remained content with Middle-earth [struck out:] and refused the summons of the powers; but they and their (* The Hobbit, drawn from the earlier chapters of the Red Book, those mainly composed by Bilbo and dealing only with the discovery of the Ring.)
many secret tongues do not concern this book. The Eldar were those who set out and marched to the western shores of the Old World. Most of them then passed over the Sea and came to that land in the Ancient West which they called Valinor, a name that means the Land of the Powers or Rulers of the World. But some of the Eldar [added: of the kindred of the Teleri] remained behind in the north-west of Middle-earth, and these were called the Lembi or 'Lingerers'. It is with Eldarin tongues, Valinorean or Lemberin [> Telerian] that these tales are concerned.
$4. In Valinor, from the language of that Elvish kindred known as the Lindar, was made a High-Elven speech that, after the Elves had devised letters, was used not only for lore and formal writing, but also for high converse and for intercourse among Elves of different kindreds. This, which is indeed an
'Elven-latin' as it were, unchanging in time and place, the Elves themselves called Quenya: that is simply 'Elvish'.
$5. Now after long ages of peace it came to pass, as is related in the Quenta Noldorion, that the Noldor, who were of all the kindreds of the Eldar' the most skilled in crafts and lore, departed as exiles from Valinor and returned to Middle-earth, seeking the Great Jewels, the Silmarilli, which Feanor chief of all their craftsmen had made. Their language, Noldorin, that at first differed little from the Lindarin or Quenya, became on their return to Middle-earth subject to the change which even things devised by the Elves here suffer, and in the passing of time it grew wholly unlike to the Quenya of Valinor, which tongue the exiles nonetheless retained always in memory as a language of lore and song and courtesy.*
$6 According to the Elves Men shared, though in a lesser degree,
F2. was substantially corrected and added to (more especially in the earlier part of the essay), and some pages were rewritten. These alterations are not all of a kind, some being made with care and others more roughly, and I have found it extremely difficult to determine, in relative terms, when certain of them were made: the more especially since the development after F 2 was not a steady progression, my father evidently feeling that a different treatment of the subject was required. Some corrections undoubtedly belong to a time when the text as a whole had been supplanted. I have therefore included in the text that follows all alterations made to the manuscript, and in most cases I have shown them as such, though in order to reduce the clutter I have in some cases introduced them silently, when they do no more than improve the text (largely to increase its clarity) without in any way altering its purport.
In general I treat F 2 as the representative text of the original version, and only distinguish F 1 when necessary. The paragraph-numbers are of course added editorially. A commentary follows the notes on pp. 61 ff.
The Languages
at the end of the
Third Age.
$1. I have written this note on the languages concerned in this book not only because this part of the lore of those days is of special interest to myself, but because I find that many would welcome some information of this kind. I have had many enquiries concerning such matters from readers of the earlier selections from the Red Book.*
$2. We have in these histories to deal with both Elvish and Mannish (2) tongues. The long history of Elvish speech I will not treat; but since three [> two] varieties of it are glimpsed in this book a little may be said about it.
$3. According to Elvish historians the Elven-folk, by themselves called the Quendi, and Elven-speech were originally one.
The primary division was into Eldar and Avari. The Avari were those Elves who remained content with Middle-earth [struck out:] and refused the summons of the powers; but they and their (* The Hobbit, drawn from the earlier chapters of the Red Book, those mainly composed by Bilbo and dealing only with the discovery of the Ring.)
many secret tongues do not concern this book. The Eldar were those who set out and marched to the western shores of the Old World. Most of them then passed over the Sea and came to that land in the Ancient West which they called Valinor, a name that means the Land of the Powers or Rulers of the World. But some of the Eldar [added: of the kindred of the Teleri] remained behind in the north-west of Middle-earth, and these were called the Lembi or 'Lingerers'. It is with Eldarin tongues, Valinorean or Lemberin [> Telerian] that these tales are concerned.
$4. In Valinor, from the language of that Elvish kindred known as the Lindar, was made a High-Elven speech that, after the Elves had devised letters, was used not only for lore and formal writing, but also for high converse and for intercourse among Elves of different kindreds. This, which is indeed an
'Elven-latin' as it were, unchanging in time and place, the Elves themselves called Quenya: that is simply 'Elvish'.
$5. Now after long ages of peace it came to pass, as is related in the Quenta Noldorion, that the Noldor, who were of all the kindreds of the Eldar' the most skilled in crafts and lore, departed as exiles from Valinor and returned to Middle-earth, seeking the Great Jewels, the Silmarilli, which Feanor chief of all their craftsmen had made. Their language, Noldorin, that at first differed little from the Lindarin or Quenya, became on their return to Middle-earth subject to the change which even things devised by the Elves here suffer, and in the passing of time it grew wholly unlike to the Quenya of Valinor, which tongue the exiles nonetheless retained always in memory as a language of lore and song and courtesy.*
$6 According to the Elves Men shared, though in a lesser degree,
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