From the world of
Middle-Earth, setting of
J R R Tolkien's
Lord of the Rings, Quenya is the ancient
Eldarin tongue, spoken by the
Vanyar,
Noldor, and
Teleri. King
Thingol, in
a fit of pique after hearing of the crimes of the Noldor against the Teleri, forbade the
Sindar to speak it, saying, "Never again in my ears shall be heard the
tongue of those who slew my
kin at
Alqualonde!" (Sil. pp. 154-5) The
High Speech of the West was thence spoken only as a language of
lore, and among
nobles. By this the language survived the
First Age, and most or all
linguistic change
ground to a halt.
Quenya is spelled similarly to
Latin, with all the
English vowels and
consonants except
th and soft
c. There are a limited number of
consonant clusters and
dipthongs which occur; the limited letter sounds give the language a distinct style.
Nouns
The language has nine or ten
cases (the
discrepancy results from
disputes over
Tolkien's intent over the
respective case) and four
numbers.
The cases are:
nominative,
accusative,
genitive,
possessive,
dative,
locative,
ablative,
allative,
instrumental, and sometimes
respective. The numbers are:
singular,
plural,
partative plural, and
dual.
The various cases and numbers are formed by
inflecting words; that is, adding
endings to a
stem, as in Latin. There seems to be no
gender characteristic.
Adjectives
Adjectives agree in number with the nouns they
describe, but not in case. There is a
superlative prefix, but no
comparative.
Verbs
Verbs come in four
tenses:
present,
past,
perfect, and
future, with an
imperative form and a disputed
subjunctive. They
agree in number with plural subjects. There also exists a form called the
aorist, but let this not be
confused with the same form in
classical Greek.
Participles occur, and are treated as adjectives, but the present participle seems to be
indeclinable.
Pronouns
Instead of
person being a characteristic integral to verbs, pronouns are attached to the end of them. This is a very muddled part of the
language as we know it now, but, at best, the system we know is roughly accurate.
Possessive pronouns are also used, and
affixed to the end of words they
modify.
There is a
definite article, but only an implied
indefinate article.
Sentence structure generally tend to be subject-verb-object, object-verb-subject, or object-subject-verb.
Questions have a verb at the end, and
initial verbs add
emotional tension.
For more
information, please look up
Ardalambion or
Mellonath Daeron. These
organizations have
reams of information online and some
hardcover publications. Tolkien's
appendices, especially the
etymologies in
The Lost Road and
Silmarillion, are also invaluable.