Tolkien and the 'other' N-word ;)

[Angry Hill Troll]

A few years ago, near where I live, there was a rather amusing political flap. Someone, in a speech or interview, used the word "niggard". Apparently one of the people listening, not recognizing the word or knowing its meaning, assumed the speaker had used a different N-word (a racial epithet which I shall not repeat here ). Anyway, this made the local media and became a big flap before someone provided a definition of what the word meant (a miser).

Well, to my point, I had known what the word meant previous to this "incident", having learned it from Tolkien!

'No niggard are you, Éomer,' said Aragorn, 'to give thus to Gondor the fairest thing in your realm.'

ROTK VI, 6

(I do remember doing a bit of a double-take when I first read the book and read that line, then figuring out the meaning from the context, being too lazy to look it up in a dictionary )

Does anyone have any words they learned from Tolkien? It seems actually quite a good and fun way to build up one's vocabulary.

[Gothmog]

Me, being from Sweden, had a hard time reading LotR in english for the first time. I was maybe around 12 years or something. Luckily, my father had used the same books when studying english at the university many years ago, so the most uncommon words were underlined and translated. Though I wouldn't made it through if I hadn't read them in swedish first. I also tried Silm in english back then, but gave up. Now I try to read only in english.

I learned a lot of words from Tolkien. I was too lazy to look up some words too, so I guessed out of the context. This gave me an approximate translation but not always the correct. A lot of the words I learned adjectives because of the wonderful descriptions of places and people featured in LotR.

One word that I remember is Alas. I thought it sounded real cool...

I don't recommend LotR to first time english readers though. The language isn't that easy and some words used can hardly be find in my dictionary...

And I didn't know the word niggard until today Wish one could be better at english...

[Kath]

Oh wow probably hundreds! I read the books when I was about 8 and apparently I've had a pretty large vocabulary ever since so that's probably where all the new words came from. The writing and descriptions of people and places are just so beautiful, and its always easier to learn words that way, when you like them and want to know them.

I can't think of any particular words I learnt from reading the books though, I think it was more words in terms of context, if that makes any sense.

[Cailín]

Well, I learned a lot of Dutch words from the translation when my father read it to me as a little girl.

I'm currently reading the English version of Lord of the Rings for the very first time, but have not yet stumbled upon words I didn't know or could not figure out from the context. Had I read it before I was a full time Ye Olde English student, this would have been rather different - as Gothmog says, tis not easy reading Tolkien if you're not a native speaker.

When the movies first came out, I learned many words as well. I can remember wield (as in: 'we cannot wield it'), especially. I had no idea what it meant and for years have spelled it as wheeled, to the great amusement of all people more knowledgeable than me.

[Angry Hill Troll]

Those of you non-native speakers who have struggled through the books in English most definitely have my admiration! A lot of the vocabulary includes rather archaic words not commonly used or even understood today (as the 'niggard' example illustrates). I can imagine that it would be quite difficult for a non-native speaker to read, or for that matter, to do a good translation into another language.

[Celebuial]

Well I'm English and I read the books when I was about 12/13 and I still finished reading with a gargantuan list of new words...

Like 'bivouac'-I had never come across the word untill LotR.

I'm quite sure I had no idea what distance was represented by a furlong before either.

Hmmm... there's probably hundreds but I can't think of any more examples right now.

[Formendacil]

I can't say that I really learned a lot of new words from Tolkien- although I'm sure I picked up quite a few from context.

What I can say, though, is that Tolkien made a number of words a lot more prevalent in my everyday speech- and writing. I'm not even really sure which ones they are.

Certainly, a greater preponderance of more archaic words, and a fondness for older, British, spellings factored in a great deal.

*Query to the Mods: Should this perchance be in N&N?

[Angry Hill Troll]

Originally Posted by Formendacil

*Query to the Mods: Should this perchance be in N&N?

I wasn't completely sure where to post this myself, or what to title it... (I figured the title I chose would hopefully pique people's interest enough to look at the thread )

I chose The Books because I think that Tolkien's writing style, and particularly his rich vocabulary including many older words, is one of the things which makes reading him so enjoyable. To me, the writing style itself, because it is somewhat different than that commonly used today, gets me into the feeling of being in a different place and time, and the archaic words give his world a medieval feel.

Perhaps that's the larger point, aside from the anecdote in the original post and the idea of Enriching Your Word Power with Tolkien, of the importance of Tolkien's writing style and in particular his vocabulary, on the readability and success of his books.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

I dug up an aged thread on this topic which you might enjoy reading: Tolkien vocabulary. It too is located in the Books forum, so we'll leave this one here for now as well.

[Aiwendil]

I'm sure I learned a good many new words from TH and LotR, as I read them (well, had them read to me) when I was rather young - about 5 or 6, I think. But that's long enough ago that I can't remember it particularly well.

I did learn a few words from HoMe. For instance:

ghyll = a deep, rocky ravine
shoon = old plural of "shoe"
clomb = old past tense of "climb"
champain = level, open country

[Estelyn Telcontar]

Most notable to me are the words Tolkien invented himself: eucatastrophe and dyscatastrophe.

[Kath]

eucatastrophe

Did he really invent that because I thought it was invented long before Tolkien was around, by a psychologist, though my teacher could be telling me lies.

[Estelyn Telcontar]

As far as I know, it was Tolkien's own word. I'm not a linguist though, so I checked it with several online sources. The Merriam-Webster dictionary tells me it's not in the dictionary, ergo not a known word. The Google references I got were all to Tolkien's usage. Wikipedia has this:

Eucatastrophe is a term coined by J.R.R. Tolkien which refers to the sudden turn of events at the end of a story which result in the protagonist's well-being.

As far as I can see, though there is certainly a linguistic background for the word, it was his own invention and has not been used by others except in reference to him. If someone knows more about it, though, I hope they'll tell us!

[Earendilyon]

Originally Posted by Angry Hill Troll

It seems actually quite a good and fun way to build up one's vocabulary.

If you want to learn new, archaic, obscure or obsolete words, you should read The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson!
You'll learn zillions of new words that way (Or forget them right away after looking in the dictionary, of course )

[Celebuial]

Originally Posted by Earendilyon

If you want to learn new, archaic, obscure or obsolete words, you should read The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever by Stephen R. Donaldson!

Yes that is a great way to learn new words but you have to be strong... I found it very hard to make it through the first half of the first book: it was just a re-shuffling of Tolkien. After a while though it did turn into his own story-which is very good.

I'm not sure that the words I learned where quite as interesting as the ones I learned from Tolkien though. I mean they were in my dictionary whereas quite a lot of the Tolkien ones where impossible(well really hard) to find.

[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Well, before Tolkien I didn't know what either a barrow or a downs was...

[Kath]

Well, before Tolkien I didn't know what either a barrow or a downs was...

Living where I do, only a few miles away from both a barrow and a downs I was aware of those words We visited them a few years back, after I'd read the books, and it was great fun imagining the Wights and Bombadil and the poor little Hobbits.

[Lalwendë]

The strange thing for me when reading Tolkien for the first time was how many of the odd words I was entirely familiar with. I had grandparents who spoke dialect, not mere accent, but a true dialect with its own vocabulary, and Tolkien makes extensive use of dialect in his work. He used the West Midlands dialect, but it's not that far removed from the dialect of where I grew up. I laughed when Tolkien used the word 'Attercop' because knew exactly what that meant, though I tended to pronounce it attercrop. I also knew exactly who a gaffer was and whereabouts yonder might be found.

[Earendilyon]

Originally Posted by Celebuial

Yes that is a great way to learn new words but you have to be strong... I found it very hard to make it through the first half of the first book: it was just a re-shuffling of Tolkien. After a while though it did turn into his own story-which is very good.

I'm not sure that the words I learned where quite as interesting as the ones I learned from Tolkien though. I mean they were in my dictionary whereas quite a lot of the Tolkien ones where impossible(well really hard) to find.

I never considered the Chronicles a reshuffling of Tolkien, not even the 1st half of the 1st book. Everyone his/her own opinion, of course

IMHO, the rare and weird words SRD strews around in his books are les 'usable' in everyday life, I think. In my impression, Tolkien uses archaic synonyms of more 'regular' words than does SRD.
Another impression I sometimes get when reading the Chronicles is, that SRD put in those words to just show he knows his OED, to show how erudite he is. Tolkiens rare and obsolete words fit better in the overall feel and style of the story.

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

The strange thing for me when reading Tolkien for the first time was how many of the odd words I was entirely familiar with. I had grandparents who spoke dialect, not mere accent, but a true dialect with its own vocabulary, and Tolkien makes extensive use of dialect in his work. He used the West Midlands dialect, but it's not that far removed from the dialect of where I grew up.

The impression I get from dialects (at least here in the Netherlands) is the fact that they tend to keep words that have become archaic or obsolete in the "official" language. Dialects seem to preserve older forms more likely than the standard language of a country. (Which may be the cause of dialects being considered backwards or even stupid.)

[Cailín]

It doesn't have much to do with words I am actually learning, but Elvish resembles Irish and Welsh so closely sometimes, I am becoming more and more frustrated I cannot read it.

I always thought Elvish mostly resembled Finnish and Tolkien did not appreciate Celtic languages, but I guess I was wrong.

[Alcarillo]

Originally Posted by Cailín

I always thought Elvish mostly resembled Finnish and Tolkien did not appreciate Celtic languages, but I guess I was wrong.

Not entirely wrong, Cailín. Sindarin is the language that sounds like Welsh, and Quenya is the language that sounds like Finnish. They're both beautiful languages.

Before I read Tolkien I didn't know what argent, or sable, or chalcedony meant, and some words I hadn't even heard of before. Bilbo's song in Many Meetings had some wonderful words, like habergeon and carcanet and flammifer, great vocabulary-filling words that sound old and noble. I always thought that Tolkien's poetry included some of his loveliest language.

[littlemanpoet]

From Farmer Giles of Ham: blunderbuss

[Glirdan]

No new words on this end, besides all the Elven words that is. I'm normally a very good English student. I started reading at a young age and learned a lot of words then. I continued to read throughout the years and learned new words in those books. Now a days, I don't really don't know a word, and if I don't know a word, I try and match the definition to the context in which it is used. Or I ask my parents.

Originally posted by that crazy Balrog Gotmog
One word that I remember is Alas. I thought it sounded real cool...

Oh yes. One of my favorite words, along with retribution. Love them. I think alas would probably have been the only word I didn't know, but that was still a few years ago.

[Gothmog]

"That crazy balrog Gothmog"? So i'm not only villanious these days, I'm crazy too

About the finnish-elven tounge. I've lived close to Finland all my life and never really liked the way the language sounds. Sindarin and Quenya seems so much...Beautiful! No offence people of my neighbour in east, but your language sounds funny, but not beautiful.

One thing I've noticed: many of the pronouncation (sp?) that's supposed to be in elven tuonge, it comes natural to us swedes. Maybe to others too? Point is: it doesn't sound like in English which must have been hard for you anglo-speaking boys and girls in the beginning.

[Thinlómien]

Originally posted by that super-crazy balrog:
About the finnish-elven tounge. I've lived close to Finland all my life and never really liked the way the language sounds. Sindarin and Quenya seems so much...Beautiful! No offence people of my neighbour in east, but your language sounds funny, but not beautiful.

You should know how much we love swedish in Finland... As a Finn, I can say that quenya doesn't sound that familiar to me - there are many different things and written quenya doesn't resemble even that much because it has fg. 'c' instead of 'k'. Still, some words have clearly Finnish roots, tië is quenya and means 'path'. In finnish 'tie' (pronounced exactly the same way as the previous) means 'road'. I don't think this is a coincidence.

And back to the topic. The beautiful world 'alas' has always amused me since it means 'down' in Finnish...

[Aiwendil]

Thinlomien wrote:

As a Finn, I can say that quenya doesn't sound that familiar to me - there are many different things and written quenya doesn't resemble even that much because it has fg. 'c' instead of 'k'.

Actually, for a long time Tolkien did use "k" instead of "c" in Quenya (and Sindarin). Only around the time of the completion of LotR (or perhaps around its publication; I can't recall) did he switch to the Latinized orthography.

I must say that to me (whose native tongue is neither Finnish nor Quenya) the two languages do seem quite similar in phonology.

To keep this post from being wholly off-topic - it occurs to me that I didn't know the word "shibboleth" before reading HoMe XII.

[Earendilyon]

Originally Posted by Aiwendil

To keep this post from being wholly off-topic - it occurs to me that I didn't know the word "shibboleth" before reading HoMe XII.

You should read you Bible a bit better and you'd known it already

[Lalaith]

bivouac

Celebuial, I'm completely amazed that Tolkien used that word, but I've just checked in my Adobe edition, and by jove, you're right.

Dwimmerlaik is my favorite Tolkien word. If I had a full edition of the OED to hand, I'd check to see if had ever been used before....

[bilbo_baggins]

Well, I did not learn any 'new' words in LoTR, but I got a good handle for how big a league and fathom was.

Part of Tolkien's archaic terminology is because he wrote these stories nearly 70 years ago, and because as a studier of languagest, I believe he suffered from lingual nostalgia.

And Early Celtic is much, much harsher with gutturals and dentals, rather than the breathy and labial Elvish I read in the books.

[Fallenstar]

my first major English reading task (I gave myself four years ago when I first arrived to Canada) was the Fellowship...I understood parts of it...more like just one fourth of it if I was lucky..I learned just about tons of words, I mean I never knew that "cry" can also mean speak out loud or shout, and I started wondering when I reached chapter three that why is everybody crying when they are not sad..

I learned a lot of new words thanks to LOTR, and after tons of re-reading I think I understood more every time.

Still trying to increase my vocabulary.

[Holbytlass]

Originally Posted by Gothmog

Point is: it doesn't sound like in English which must have been hard for you anglo-speaking boys and girls in the beginning.

Hee-hee, how true, except for me it was second time 'round. First read, I just read through, in fact didn't know about the appendices till I got to the end of RotK, then I saw how wrong I was pronouncing many words and names.

Second read was when I took my time and looked up pronunciations and words in a dictionary.

P.S.-I remember that political incident, looked up the word at the time and got angry because the idiots who were mad never took the time to! So when I read it in RotK, already knew what it meant!