Ancient Civilisations...Babaloynia?

[Iargwath]

Is there any proof that Tolkien has used ideas of older civilisation ie Babaloniya, Assyria and the Sumarians...in his books. The statues of Aragonath are a pretty good example of what was used in Assyria...The winged bull/king (guardians which dettered ppl) Much like the stance of the statues...hands stopping...And tengwar quenya looks similar to babaloynian script...
Here is a link to Babaloniyan or Assyrian script:
http://members.aol.com/assyrianme/aramaic/aramaic.html

There are only *some* letters which have a slight resemblance...but the sounds of elvish sound very much alike the Babaloniyan language...Iastr (as in the istari) and ishtar (babaloniyan goddess) the sounds are the same...
Hmmm so if anybody has a comment or has info on this fact...it will be great to read your posts smilies/smile.gif

[red]

réd, the Assyrian, will keep an eye on this thread...

[lathspell]

'Two eyes, as often as I can spare them' smilies/wink.gif

[Eol]

Hmmmm, do I smell a hunt? Heh, I am 100 percent sure he may have gotten some ideas from there, thought during his time, the information would be VERY limited except for what is covered with the bible. He was more into the northern european mythos and the classics.

[Joy]

If I remember right, the word Nazgul comes from the Arabic. I wish I could quote the source on that, but I will try to find it.

There is one old legend that is covered, I don't know if that is the right word or not, but anyway... Alantis.

Have you read the Silmarillion?? If so, not the silmarlities between Numenor and Atlantis.

[Iargwath]

Yes im currently reading the Sil...and i havent paid much attention to the similarities between the lost city of Atlantis and Numenor...But i'll be sure to look into it. My mother told me that Nahar (i think its a name of a horse) means sunlight in arabic smilies/smile.gif

[Tirned Tinnu]

How wonderful! TY on the translation of Nahar.
I'll say one thing - that I cannot see that Tolkien in his creation of The Tenguar might have failed to study The Codecs(sic?) or ancient forms of writing such as sanscrit.
If one looks at the scrolls and at the Rosetta Stone, one will see the forms of writing that were being studied during WW2.
Add in a bit of Egyptian, a bit if The Ogham, and you've got it. I seriously direct you to look these up on the web. I shall include a good site in this thread as soon as I have found one. smilies/wink.gif
Take a look at this, it's a simplified version of what was found on the rosetta stone. Top is English, middle, Egyptian, bottom, Greek.
little translator chart (http://www.childrensmuseumatl.org/images/internal/ancientdecodergraphic.gif)
Next I'll find a picture of the codex...
A chart of Uncial Codex (http://faculty.cua.edu/pennington/Paleography/Ancient%20Codex/UncialTypes.htm)
And here, a sample page of codex:
piece of ancient paper showing codex (http://faculty.cua.edu/pennington/Paleography/Ancient%20Codex/BeattyI-13r.jpg)
now, I see that this does not go far enough back to prove Assyrian or Babalonian origins, but I can tell you that Tolkien did study Persian poetry, and I will find you a copy of Rustam and Sohrab, so that you can see it for yourself.
Rustam and Sohrab (http://www.iranian.com/Arts/2002/January/Sohrab/)
That site is hard to read, I know there is another with just the text somewhere. If I find it again, I'll post it. Notice that there is a famous horse depicted in the story! (Sohrab also mean shining...strange parallel there.) Anyway, as soon as I've stumbled over proofs of Assyrian or Babalonian I will include them. For now, the above should keep you well occupied. smilies/smile.gif

[ September 16, 2002: Message edited by: Tirned Tinnu ]