Writing using Tengwar characters

[Rían]

Shadowfax, you might want to try memorizing them in small groups, like I recommended to Sminty a few posts ago. The groups I did were: the "p" looking group - t, p, d, b; the 'b'-looking group - th, f, dh, v, then the 'q' looking group and the 'd'-looking group. Then the miscellaneous ones. Good luck!
Does anyone else have recommendations? Maybe my way is only good for the way my brain works....

("oh, wheeeerrree is my hairbrush???" - classic Larry song - I love it! Do you know that one?)

[Rían]

updates, anyone??

[katya]

no! no updates! (oh my gosh i just reminded myself of the old woman on monty python and the holy grail when she says "no! no shrubberies!) i wrote some of my recent notes for school in the tengwar. it was fun. i am surprised i could write quickly enough.

[Sminty_Smeagol]

I have all of the un-vowell letters memorized pretty well, and some of the vowells (a, aa, i, ai, e, ee) and I have to peak at the sheet occassionally for vowells I don't know, but I have been writing in Tengwar/Tehtar in my agenda last few days! woopee!

-~*Smintz

[Rían]

congrats!!

[Snowdog]

Hail RÃ*an! I haven't bee into the Tengwar for a week, but it does seem to come back to me easy. I am going to start working with a calligraphy pen and write it out.

Yes, if I had known they were going to trash the curb later, I would have sat there all night and chisiled it out and took it home when I was there last winter. Oh, it was early 1976 when we inscribed that. I had just recently saw the girl's name on Classmates.com and I emailed her about it. She remembered and was saddened about its demise as well.

A month or so ago I met a couple who speak Sindarin, and I had to say I was impressed!

[Rían]

Snowdog - I graduated from high school in '76 - did you? Hope the Tengwar is coming along - I sure enjoy it. I don't have the time to learn Sindarin, though it would be interesting to hear someone speak it. They must have either made up a lot of their own, or just talk on limited subjects, though, because it wasn't fully completed, if I remember correctly.
Any updates, anyone else? Katya, did you make up your own symbol for "H"? That's the one letter that I really don't like. I can't seem to make it very pretty. And it always reminds me of the Greek lambda, which I used in math and physics - definitely not pretty associations!

[katya]

no, sorry i have not. h is not that bad, but i have seen prettier characters. how do you make yours by the way? i once made my own writing completely. tengwar i think is better however. i make a lot actyally but htis one was particularly close to the tengwar. um...no updates. by the way, i am stupid, help me; i can't find the s curls.

[Snowdog]

Yes RÃ*an, I graduated in June 1976. I will have to get in touch with them and get the sites they used to learn it.

My Tengwar is coming along, but its been difficult to actually devote time to it with so much needing to be done. I figure when I'm snowed in for the three months of Winter i can study and practice it then.

[Mornië Tulkieldë]

hi i am new here and was wondering if there was a way to learn to read, write, and speak elvish. i think it would be really cool to be able to strike up a conversation like that.

[katya]

welcome, Mornië Tulkieldë. i am not an expert but maybe this will help: you can learn a couple different elvish languages. quenya (as far as i know) is the most complete. i am learning it myself actually. you can also read and write in the tengwar. that is the topic of this lovely thread. any of this stuff can be found on the internet and the tengwar is in the appendix, although many internet sights are easier to understand, in my opinion. nice to meet you Mornië Tulkieldë. elen sila lumenn' omentielvo. (too lazy to find accents)

[TinuvielChild]

Replying to RÃ*an's post awhile ago: I can't do the bloody accents, etc either, it's not just you. Copy and paste, copy and paste. The 'h' symbol always makes me think of the chinese word for "big" (I had to take 4 years of Mandarin in elementary school. I hated it then, mostly because I couldn't get the knack of it.)

Just printed out both pages to which you posted links; plus the calligraphy page from the "Amanye Tenceli" page. Shall begin learning it tomorrow in my study, once I finish my Latin homework!


"Oh wheeeere is my hairbrush?" I loved that song! Go Larry and Bob! VeggieTales = Awesome. It's been forever since I last watched VeggieTales....maybe 5 years? Wow... Memories...

[Sminty_Smeagol]

what;s the s curl? also, how do you do plural and posessive?

-~*Smintz*~-

[Rían]

Hello, Mornië Tulkieldë, and welcome!
As katya said, this is about writing English (or whatever your native language is) using the elvish Tengwar character set, which can be adapted to fit any language. IMO, it's much more do-able than learning Quenya or Sindarin, but still gives you a lovely Middle Earth feeling. Check out the two links that I listed early in the thread, and check back if you have more questions - I'll try to help you out.

[Rían]

TC - isn't that infuriating??!! I get tired of copy and paste, so I haven't been doing it lately. *sigh*
4 years of Mandarin - wow! and in elementary school - that's a great place to take a language, when you're young and the new-language-part of your brain works better. Have you retained much of it?
*runs to print out calligraphy page* ooh, I forgot about that page! Glad you mentioned it. And I like what they say - it's "unusually well suited for calligraphic freedom" - since you just have to have the stem and the bow recognizable. It's fun to try different looks!
Good luck learning - keep us posted here

[Rían]

Sminty (or do you prefer Smintz, as in your sig?) - look on the first link I gave, just under the big chart. The paragraph starting "The sound values of the tengwar can be modified by diacritics called tehtar." , then it shows examples of doubling a consonant (the first two), adding a nasal in the same column (the second 2 examples, nt and ng), then the last 2 examples are letters with a s-curl - ts and gs. But those curls are pretty boring - the better example is from "Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien" - letter number 118, the second writing example - the word "Christmas" is nice, he wrote the 'm', then a big s-curl, then the vowel mark for 'a' above the s-curl, so it reads 'mas'. My favorite one is at the end of the word 'explanations' (which he spells phonetically) - a 'n' with a big s-curl doubling back on itself, with a 'o' vowel mark over it, giving 'ons'. (This is so hard to type out - try to get to the bookstore and take a look at letter 118 )

I just put an 's' at the end to show possessive or plural, it's pretty evident by the context. Sometimes I write out words I would otherwise use contractions for, like "I am" instead of "I'm", but sometimes I just write "Im" - again, the context makes it pretty clear, and there is no word "Im", so it must mean "I'm".

I wonder if other languages have contractions? Oh, yes, of course they do - I know Spanish does, at least, but they don't use the apostrophe mark.

[Mornië Tulkieldë]

thanks, RÃ*an and katya, for the help. i downloaded a file that contained characters in Quenya Tengwar. but i can't figure out how to get it into wordpad or any programs like that so that i can use the file. any suggestions there?
thanks again. i will definately check out the site you posted, RÃ*an. maybe there will be something i can download there.
if i think of other questions i will let you know.

[Rían]

You might want to check out both links, Mornië Tulkieldë - I found that by putting info from the two sites together I was able to get really good English-mode Tengwar notes.
I think I'll try to scan my "crib sheet" and the Letter #118 and attach it as a .bmp file for anyone to look at, if they want to.

[Rían]

OK, here's my "cheat sheet" - the paper I carried around and studied while in line at the grocery store, etc., if anyone is interested. At least we can stare at the same thing while talking about English-mode Tengwar. I added the numbers above the characters, as in RoTK appendix, so we can also say Character #5, or something like that, instead of "the double p-looking thingie". Now let me see if I can figure out attachments....
p.s. - The stuff at the bottom is just a note for you guys to read. I'll post a translation tomorrow, "spoiler-ed" out, if you want to check it out. Remember, it is very phonetic, and JRR wrote the same words different ways - it's very individual, but other Tengwar readers should be able to make it out. Good luck!

[Rían]

Darn file was too big - well, I don't quite know how to keep it readable and shrink it down. Any suggestions? Or just forget it, and we'll refer to character numbers?