We have gotten quite a few requests concerning Tauriel’s healing spell so I decided to sha
We have gotten quite a few requests concerning Tauriel’s healing spell so I decided to share with you, what I understood in the cinema and what I am still understanding when I re-watch that scene.Menno o nin na hon i eliad annen annin. Hon leitho o ngurth. – (Send from me to him the blessing/help [that was] gifted to me. Release him from death.)In a less literal and prettier way, I would translate it as followed:A: “Bestow upon him the blessing that was given to me. Release him from death.”B: “May the grace that is given me pass onto him. Release him from death.”Depending on wether it was meant to be a prayer or an an actual spell/blessing I would go with eihter the first or the second option. The Grammar would suggest something like A, but I still wanted to list a version phrased like B so that you may see the similarity to Arwen’s “healing spell” in FotR: “What grace is given me, let it pass to him, let him be spared — save him.”Two (rather long) Grammar-annotations for those who are interested below the cut; an explanation why the translator indeed made no mistake, although it may appear so at the first glance.Menna-, the verb that “does not exist” in Sindarin.“Menno” (imperative of menna-) is a “sindarinized” verb. Like most languages of our world, the phenomenon of sound shifting exists between Quenya and Sindarin – which means that once you understood the pattern, you can more or less convert vocabulary from one language into the other. More or less, because not everyone shares the opinion that this is something that should be encouraged.By studying both Quenya and Sindarin verbs for a while, I realized that the Quenya “nt” often becomes “nn” when being translated [compare: “anta” (Q; to give) becomes “anna-” (S; to give)] Apparently the translator of the movies had figured the same, otherwise he would not have used this techinique to create a “new” word. I think this particular verb was made to avoid a repetition of the “anna-” root as seen in the second part of the sentence.The anna- “dilemma”And speaking of “anna-“, I had quite a hard time finding a suitable translation for this! Its form suggested that it was of the past tense, but it simply wouldn’t fit the grammar-rules, since anna- is an irregular verb and becomes ón- in the past tense. Ònen (I gave) does not fit either. *“The blessing that I give to myself”? I highly doubt that any Elf would be mighty enough to bestow a blessing upon themselves… [*annen (I give) annin (to me/myself)]There is however something called passive perfect participle, which I came across thanks to mellonen Elaran who immediately joined my researches when we discussed the matter. It is used for a situation/state that has been affected by the past. Very fitting for this case, isn’t it?Another example could be the infamous “Mae govannen”. According to the standard past tense grammar, it would actually mean “I met well”. If, however, you apply the same rules as seen here, it makes sense again:Basicslly –en or –nnen is added, depending on the type of verb. This operation often causes a nasalisation:govad-* (to meet) >> govannen (met)dag- (slay) >> dangen (slayed) [source: the “Parma Eldalamberon”, by the Linguistic Fellowship (realelvish.net)]The source however suggests, that anna- should change to ónen as well, but they are not sure of it either. I think, the translator did that “mistake” on purpose to define between the two grammars and avoid confusion.Those who study Sindarin know the pain of words having multiple meanings depending on the tense and other circumstances, which sometimes causes misunderstandings. In my opinion this was not a bad idea; others will surely beg to differ, but this little alteration makes the language a lot more speakable. And besides, can you really call it alteration, when there are no original sources on this particular matter and all knowledge we have is interpretation anyways?*Keep in mind that there are different opinions about the root for “govannen”, covad-, cova- or govan- is also often assumed. -- source link
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