Beleriand Numismatics – MisbehavingMaiar: Tumblr Archive

i’m dying the closest thing to “ingot” i can find in the quenya dictionary is “loaf”

Since there’s apparently an elvish word for huckster I can finally complete my “Honest Caranthir’s Used Swords Dealership and Emporium” fic

:LSDKFj;lKSDfjklj
THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS

misbehavingmaiar:

“…Similarly farthing has been used for the
four divisions of the Shire, because the Hobbit word tharni was
an old word for ‘quarter’ seldom used in ordinary language,
where the word for ‘quarter’ was tharantin ‘fourth part’. In
Gondor tharni was used for a silver coin, the fourth part of the
castar (in Noldorin the canath or fourth part of the mirian).(20)”

The Peoples of Middle Earth, II. The Appendix on Languages, JRRT, ed. C.T.

This, aside from mentions of gold pieces and “silver pennies”, is the only passage I can find concerning currency in Middle Earth. Not much to work with, but suggestive of a long-reaching history nonetheless– like so many things Tolkien.

A few more tidbits (confirming the silver and gold currency as well as other stuff), relating to Elvish culture (possibly). From the erstwhile Darth Fingon’s excellent Linguistic Foolery series on the Silmarillion Writers’ Guild (Everyday Elves and What They Do):

Now that we have people to make all the things the Elves need in
their daily lives, we need to find somebody to sell the goods. Luckily,
the Qenya Lexicon provides words for pedlar (sic) and huckster. Just in case
you thought all Elves were honest traders. Other attested words
include barter, bargain, and words for silver and gold coins.

Cf. the Qenya Lexicon, Parma Eldalamberon 12:

kulusta (n.) – gold coin

telpilin (n.) – silver coin

vaktelear (n.) – merchant

qapa- (v.) to swap or barter; to bargain

qapta (n.) good deal

Granted, these are derived from the earlier Qenya, but the evolution of the conlang gives us a modicum of insight into Tolkien’s thoughts on Elvish culture. IMO, for fannish purposes, one can run with it (and I have).

*clappity* MORE TIDBITS! TIDBITS FOR THE TIDBIT THRONE!

Every time I think I’ve successfully stripped the legendarium for parts, it turns out some giant swath of material has escaped my grasp! (…the existence of the Parma Eldalamberon confronts me with the terrifying question: how much money would I be willing to spend to have a table-top dictionary of obscure Quenya words? hmmmm…)

The coin words are particularly useful because it gives me a pattern to follow. I’d kludged together my own words for “gold coin”, “silver coin”, etc by just making the noun for the metals plural (i.e. “silvers”, “coppers”, etc.), and I was using “malta” for gold rather than “kulu”, the earlier form.

Excellent! TO THE REVISIONING!

Thank you ever and again Prof Pandë, for pulling magical gifts out of your eldritch hat.

Dear DS, might I beg your assistance? I am designing a set of coins for Beleriand with inscriptions in the appropriate languages. I’ve done my best with using your Neo Khuzdul tools, and if you are willing to red-pencil me, I’d be very grateful! Especially as I can’t find a working Cirth transcriber. The phrases are essentially “Coin from Tumunzahar/Gabigathol, property of the Firebeards/Broadbeams” or “Izizaz Tumunzahar/Gabigathol Urstarâgu/Fantnuhûb”, and “Mahal Maharuma”, “Mahal be praised”.

thedwarrowscholar:

Hello there! Well met! No need to beg for assistance, happy to aid when I can.

I would translate these lines as:

“Iziz Tumunzaharul ra Gabilgatholul.”

“Gunrû ‘Urstarâg ra Fantnuhûb.”

“Mahal maharuma.”

“Iziz” – I’m using the nominative form here as I’ve added “-ul” to both place names. The -ul form is used here because we want to indicate descriptive origins (like: “from the iron” (“Zirnul”) – indicating origins of an element. There are other options, using the constructive for instance, but I believe this would fit best.

Incidentally, the “-az”-form I no longer included in the current Neo-Khuzdul grammar, what I referred to in the documentation as “Classical Khuzdul” (CK). It however would still be present in the “Blue Mountains Khuzdul” (BMK). And seeing that we are talking about just these halls, it is indeed still a valid option for your translation (if you want to give it that local touch). In that case, this part of your translation would be perfectly fine.

Usage of “ra” instead of “/”: I used “ra” (meaning “and”), as I do not believe the “/”-sign would be present in Khuzdul runic writing. Note though that “ra” does have its own rune, which you could use (if you are writing this in runes of course). More on that HERE.

I also translated “property of” literally to “Gunrû” (using the construct form), which means the clan names would not need to be modified to include a possessive genitive marker.

The last line “Mahal be praised”, is translated perfectly. One could be tempted to use the passive imperative (”maihrim” here, but seeing we are not “commanding” Mahal to be praised, but merely suggesting others should praise him, your choice of the passive subjunctive is absolutely spot on! “Mahal Maharuma”, literally meaning “Mahal, let him be praised” fits perfectly.

Please do show me those coins when you are done, I would love to see them.

Ever at your service,

The Dwarrow Scholar

I am swooning. You’ve swooned me. I am disproportionately gleeful to have conjugated a verb correctly. This is an excellent night.

The “/” sign I blame on tumblr’s character limit and my own hubris… I’d meant to have two separate sentences whose only differences were the proper nouns; “Coin from Tumunzahar property of the Firebeards” and “Coin from Gabilgathol property of the Broadbeams”. My theory is that each hall has their own mint, and would wish to differentiate their own coins from their neighbor’s, even if the value was the same.

Would the same construction apply? Making it “Izizaz Tumuzaharul gunrû ‘Urstârag” and “Izizaz Gabilgatholul gunrû Fantnuhûb”, respectively?

…And if I can sneak in a separate topic: I’ve done my best to coin (hah) some words for “electrum” and “nickel”, but I’m at a loss as to how to shorten them into the terms for coinage such as “Kibil” –> “Kabl” or “Mikil” –> “Makl”.
For electrum, I compounded words for “containing gold and silver” with the same ending as the other coins, and got “Barkadzurl”, (or “Zurl” but I am less confident that would be recognizable on its own). For nickel I tried “yellow-tin” or “tahfazimil”, and shortened it to “tahfl”. Again, I am not confident that holds together.

Thank you so much for lending me your expertise and time, and for the truly epic undertaking that is your Neo Khuzdul lexicon. 🙂 Hobnobbing with you linguists is the coolest part of being a Tolkien fan.
It will be my pleasure to show off the coin designs when they’re done! I’ll be sure to tag you in it and give all due credit for the translation assist.

Mukhuh turgizu turug usgin. ❤