Quenya is a constructed language devised by J. R. R. Tolkien, and used in his fictional universe, Middle-earth. Here is presented a resume of the grammar of late Quenya as established from Tolkien's writings c. 1951–1973. It is almost impossible to extrapolate the morphological rules of the Quenya tongue from published data because Quenya is a fictional and irregular language that was heavily influenced by natural languages, such as Finnish and Latin, not an international auxiliary language with a regular morphology.
Tolkien wrote several synchronic grammars of Quenya, describing its state at specific moments during its development, but only one has been published in full: The Early Qenya Grammar.J.R.R. Tolkien, Carl F. Hostetter, and Bill Welden. 23 December 2003. The Early Qenya Grammar, Parma Eldalamberon 14, pp. 37-88 Apart from that, he wrote several diachronic studies of Quenya and its proto-language Common Eldarin, three of which have been published: The Qenyaqetsa (dealing with early Qenya or Eldarissa), the Outline of Phonetic Development, and the Outline of Phonology.
Late Quenya is a highly inflected language, in which nouns have ten cases and there is a rather regular inflection of verbs. Although the word order is highly flexible, the usual structure is subject–verb–object.
Evolution
The Tolkien scholars Christopher Gilson and Patrick Wynne explore the evolution of Elvish grammar, stating that the Elvish languages including Quenya "form an expanding canvas" that grew during Tolkien's career. In the last stages of this external development, Tolkien imagined a diglossic Elven society with a vernacular language for daily use, "the 'colloquial' form of the language",J.R.R. Tolkien, annotated by Christopher Gilson. "Words, Phrases and Passages", Parma Eldalamberon 17, p. 76. called Tarquesta High-tongue, and a more formal and conservative language for use in ceremonies and lore, Parmaquesta or Book-language, "which was originally the spoken language of the Noldor of Túna as it was at approximately period V.Y. 1300".J.R.R. Tolkien, "Outline of Phonology", Parma Eldalamberon 19, p. 68. Tolkien envisaged that Quenya evolved, internally within Middle-earth, following regular laws or linguistic principles, and that languages, even if different, could interrelate.
Nouns
Numbers
Contrary to many auxiliary languages that have fairly simple systems of grammatical number, in late Quenya nouns can have up to four numbers: singular, general plural (or plural 1), particular/partitive plural (or plural 2), and dual.
In late Quenya Tarquesta, the plural is formed by a suffix to the subjective form of the noun. For plural 1, the suffix is or (depending on the type of the noun). In Parmaquesta the is (not always) long (the precise rules have not yet been published). For plural 2, the suffix is ( in Parmaquesta).
"Thus in Quenya (not with article!) = Elves, The Elves, All Elves; = (all) the Elves previously named (and in some cases distinguished from other creatures); but , Elves, some Elves. With the definite article is seldom used,"J.R.R. Tolkien, "Common Eldarin: Noun Structure", Parma Eldalamberon 21, p. 73.
Not all nouns can have all four numbers since some of them are pluralia tantum having no singular variant for referring to a single object, such as ; some other nouns, especially monosyllabic ones, use only one of the two plurals judged the most aesthetic by Elves (i.e., Tolkien); with the word "the only plural in use (at any recorded period) was ".J.R.R. Tolkien, "The words for 'hand", Vinyar Tengwar 47, p. 6. The word has no dual or plural, according to Tolkien.J.R.R. Tolkien, "Declension of Nouns", Parma Eldalamberon 21, p. 40.
+TarquestaSingular Pl. 1 Pl. 2 J.R.R. Tolkien, annotated by Christopher Gilson. "Words, Phrases and Passages", Parma Eldalamberon 17, p. 63. J.R.R. Tolkien, "Words, Phrases and Passages", Parma Eldalamberon 17, p. 135.
Noun declension
Quenya nouns are declined, having cases that often resemble those of Finnish. Declining is the process of inflecting nouns; a set of declined forms of the same word is called a declension. Parmaquesta has ten cases (including short variants). These include the four primary cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, and instrumental; three adverbial cases: allative (of which the dative is a shortened form), locative (also with a shortened form), and ablative; and an adjectival case.
Primary cases:
The nominative is the subject of a verb. It is also used with most prepositions. The accusative is the direct object of a verb. It has the same form as the nominative in Tarquesta, but is distinct in Ancient Quenya and in Parmaquesta. The genitive is mainly used to mark origin (e.g. the best painters of France). Its usage sometimes overlaps the ablative, sometimes the adjectival. The instrumental marks a noun as a means or instrument.
Adverbial cases:
The allative expresses motion towards: elenna, 'toward a star, starward(s)'. The dative is the indirect object of a verb. The locative expresses location or position: Lóriendesse, 'in Lórien'. The ablative expresses motion away from: earello, 'from the sea'.
Adjectival case:
The adjectival case describes qualities, and turns almost any noun into an adjective. It is also used to indicate possession or ownership. In Tarquesta, this usage sometimes overlaps with the genitive.
The declension of the noun in Parmaquesta has been published in the so-called "Plotz Declension" that Tolkien provided in a letter to Dick Plotz in 1967.J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter to Dick Plotz, 1967. First published in the fanzine Beyond Bree in March 1989. This provides the "classical" declension of two vocalic-stem nouns cirya "ship" and lassë "leaf", in four numbers: singular, pl. 1, pl. 2, and dual. The declension has eight chief cases in three groups that Tolkien labelled a, b, and c. Of these cases, Tolkien named only
The allative and locative in turn have (unnamed) short forms (except in the loc. dual), of which the short allative form appears to correspond to the dative case. The third group, c, has only one member (and only in singular and in plural 2), which appears to correspond to the adjectival case as described in the essay "Quendi and Eldar – Essekenta Eldarinwa" written in c. 1960.
The declension of cirya and lasse given below is taken from the Plotz Declension and reflects the forms of Classical Quenya. The declensions of ondo "stone", nér "man", and cas "head" are taken from an earlier conceptual period of Quenya (c. 1935).J.R.R. Tolkien. Parma Eldalamberon 16, p. 113–115
Singular cirya lassë ondo nér cas Nominative cirya lassë ondo nér cas Accusative ciryá lassé ondo cara Genitive ciryo lassëo ondo nero caro Instrumental ciryanen lassenen ondoinen nerinen carinen Allative ciryanna lassenna ondonta nerta casta Dative ciryan lassen ondor neren caren Locative ciryassë lassessë ondosse nerissë casse Short Locative ciryas lasses ondos neris cas Ablative ciryallo lassello ondollo nerullo callo, carullo Adjectival ciryava lasseva ondova nerwa carwa
Plural 1 cirya lassë Nominative ciryar lassí Accusative ciryai lassí Genitive ciryaron lassion Instrumental ciryainen lassínen Allative ciryannar lassennar Dative ciryain lassin Locative ciryassen lassessen Short Locative ciryais lassis Ablative ciryallon lassellon
Plural 2 cirya lassë ondo nér cas Nominative ciryalí lasselí ondoli ? cari Accusative ciryalí lasselí ondoli ? ? Genitive ciryalion lasselion ondolion ? ? Instrumental ciryalínen lasselínen ondolínen ? ? Allative ciryalinna(r) lasselinna(r) ondolinta(n) ? ? Dative ciryalin lasselin ondolir ? ? Locative ciryalisse(n) lasselisse(n) ondolissen ? ? Short Locative ciryalis lasselis ? ? ? Ablative ciryalillo(n) lasselillo(n) ondolillon ? ? Adjectival ciryalíva lasselíva ? ? ?
Dual cirya lassë ondo nér cas Nominative ciryat lasset ondos nerut carut Accusative ciryat lasset ondos nerut carut Genitive ciryato lasseto ondu neru caru Instrumental ciryanten lassenten ondoinent ? ? Allative ciryanta lassenta ondontas ? ? Dative ciryant lassent ondur nerur carur Locative ciryatsë lassetsë ondoset ? ? Ablative ciryalto lasselto ondollut ? ?
Adjectives
According to Tolkien, adjectives appear only in -a, -e, -o (rare), and -n (stem nearly always -nd); melin "dear", pl. melindi.
Quenya adjectives may be freely used as nouns.J.R.R. Tolkien, "early Qenya Grammar", Parma Eldalamberon, 14, p. 77.
Comparison
The comparative forms of adjectives are in late Quenya normally expressed by the use of the preposition lá, much as in French plus:J.R.R. Tolkien, annotated by Christopher Gilson. "Comparative in Eldarin", Parma Eldalamberon, 17, pp. 90–91.
A (ná) calima lá B. "A is brighter than B." .
Note that the use of the copula ná, when in the present tense, is optional.
Some adjectives are irregular. The following table provides the comparative and superlative forms of the adjective mára "good":
Positive Comparative Superlative (good) (better) (best) mára arya i arya + gen. case
A (ná) arya B. "A is better than B."
Agreement
An adjective in Quenya agrees with the noun it describes as regards number, but in general not with respect to case. In other words, the adjectives have specific plural forms, which are used if the corresponding noun is in (ordinary) plural. On the other hand, the case of the noun in general does not influence the form of the adjective.
The historical plural ending for adjectives is -i. However, in late Quenya, adjectives ending in -a instead have this -a replaced by -ë. Moreover, the adjective laurëa ("golden") there has the plural form laurië (in laurië lantar lassi, literary "golden fall (the) leaves", which in singular would have been *'laurëa lanta lassë', "golden falls (the) leaf").
In general, just the noun or pronoun, but not any accompanying adjectives, take case endings. However, sometimes, a case ending on a group consisting of a noun followed by an adjective attribute may be put on the adjective instead of on the noun, as in Elendil vorondo voronwe, "Elendil the faithful's fidelity"; compare this with the noun phrase possessive construction in modern English. The nominative of "Elendil the faithful" would be Elendil voronda.
Verbs
According to Tolkien's own terminology, Quenya verbs are either in a personal form or an impersonal form. Usually in linguistics, an impersonal verb is a verb that cannot take a true subject, because it does not represent an action, occurrence, or state-of-being of any specific person, place, or thing. This is not how Tolkien used the term "impersonal". An impersonal verb form is a verb to which no pronoun is attached, as care or carir; carin "I do" is a personal form (-n).
The impersonal conjugations provided below were written by J.R.R. Tolkien in the late 1960s,J.R.R. Tolkien, annotated by Christopher Gilson. Parma Eldalamberon, 17, p. 77 for henta- and p. 144 for car- but only in singular forms. There are apparently two main types of verbs in late Quenya: weak transitive verbs, which are usually 'root' verbs, such as car- "make; do" from the Elvish base or root KAR-, and derivative intransitive verbs with a strong conjugation, whose stems end mainly in -ta, -na, -ya, formed by putting a verbal suffix to a base or root, like henta- "to eye", from the Elvish base KHEN- "eye".
Derivative verb (strong) Root verb (weak) Singular Plural Singular Plural Stem henta- car- Aorist henta hentar carë (cari-) carir Present hentëa hentëar cára cárar Past hentanë hentaner carnë carner Future hentuva hentuvar caruva caruvar Perfect ehentië ehentier acárië acárier Gerund hentië hentier cárië cárier
Irregular verbs