The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum - View Single Post

Alfirin · 09-10-2014, 06:41 PM

Greetings,

I'm wondering if anyone here could answer a little question that's been bothering me

In LOTR when Gandalf reads the account of the death of Balin and the rest of the Moria reclamation party. He makes mention that is in written in "a bold hand, using an Elvish script", by which Gimli identifies that the writer must be Ori. My question is as follows

1. by "an Elvish script, does Tolkien mean Ori was actually writing in Elvish (presumably Sindarin) or simply using Elvish letters to write in some other language, presumably Westron, since I'm not sure it is POSSIBLE to write Kuzdul using Elvish characters. I'm not sure you can write Westron in them either, but maybe you can (like how many Eastern European languages can be written using either the Roman or Cyrillic alphabet)

2. If the former, why would he write a message like that in Elvish? Ori is old enough to predate the Dwarf/Elf reconciliation, so while he might know Sindarin or Quenya (for trade reasons, or as part of a classical education) I doubt it's his first language (though the fact that Gimli can identify him from this means he must have done it fairly regular. Any friendly party coming in who might read it would presumably be more dwarves so one would assume you would want to make the message as easy to read as possible, which would presumably mean Kuzdul would be the tongue of choice. Even Weston would be a better choice than Sindarin since it seems to be sort of the lingua franca of interspecies trade and hence, the most readable by any party.
Quenya seems even less likely than Sindarin, I might be the language of scholars and the learned, but few common people of ME still seem fluent in it. If part of the reason for writing the message was to warn any future interlopers into Moria of the danger, writing it in Quenya would be a bit like a castaway on an island sending a message in a bottle written in Classical Latin.

NOTE: if my mind is playing tricks on me, and the whole "Elvish" script thing is found only in the BBC radio version (where I know I heard it) please ignore this question.

09-10-2014, 06:41 PM	#1
Alfirin Shade of Carn Dûm Join Date: Jun 2007 Posts: 435	Ori's writing Greetings, I'm wondering if anyone here could answer a little question that's been bothering me In LOTR when Gandalf reads the account of the death of Balin and the rest of the Moria reclamation party. He makes mention that is in written in "a bold hand, using an Elvish script", by which Gimli identifies that the writer must be Ori. My question is as follows 1. by "an Elvish script, does Tolkien mean Ori was actually writing in Elvish (presumably Sindarin) or simply using Elvish letters to write in some other language, presumably Westron, since I'm not sure it is POSSIBLE to write Kuzdul using Elvish characters. I'm not sure you can write Westron in them either, but maybe you can (like how many Eastern European languages can be written using either the Roman or Cyrillic alphabet) 2. If the former, why would he write a message like that in Elvish? Ori is old enough to predate the Dwarf/Elf reconciliation, so while he might know Sindarin or Quenya (for trade reasons, or as part of a classical education) I doubt it's his first language (though the fact that Gimli can identify him from this means he must have done it fairly regular. Any friendly party coming in who might read it would presumably be more dwarves so one would assume you would want to make the message as easy to read as possible, which would presumably mean Kuzdul would be the tongue of choice. Even Weston would be a better choice than Sindarin since it seems to be sort of the lingua franca of interspecies trade and hence, the most readable by any party. Quenya seems even less likely than Sindarin, I might be the language of scholars and the learned, but few common people of ME still seem fluent in it. If part of the reason for writing the message was to warn any future interlopers into Moria of the danger, writing it in Quenya would be a bit like a castaway on an island sending a message in a bottle written in Classical Latin. NOTE: if my mind is playing tricks on me, and the whole "Elvish" script thing is found only in the BBC radio version (where I know I heard it) please ignore this question.