“Legolas was the first elf to learn khuzdul-"
-BREAKS DOWN THE FUCKING DOOR WITH EOL MORIQUENDI-
"Heard you were talkin’ shit"
i mean this makes zero sense considering that elrond could read thror’s map, right? c’mon…..
Actually, in the interest of being fair to Elrond (who, no, doesn’t speak khuzdul) the map was written in cirth.
Cirth runes, first invented by an elf named Daeron, were the earliest writing system in Beleriand. Once the Noldor arrived and the Sindar grew in might, tengwar became a thing- the typical ‘elvish letters’ you see. Dwarves kept cirth because its lines were easier to carve in stone, but it wasn’t a part of their secret tongue- anyone could learn cirth, the dwarves just use it on most official documents as opposed to tengwar or what passes for a westron alphabet.
It was the ‘moon rune’ part of the map they needed Elrond for. That kind of lore had been lost to the dwarves (they keep getting kicked out of mountains. Dragons, earth-shattering wars, balrogs…) so while Thror might have known the secret of it, Thorin didn’t.
That being said, in elvish history only three elves are presumed to have spoken khuzdul and one is definitely confirmed. It’s theorized that Pengolodh of Gondolin knew a little bit of dwarvish, and the fact that he invented the alphabet the dwarves use in public often means Daeron is thought to have spoken it, as well.
Eol is the only absolute we know of, and it’s possible that the dwarvish he knew was the Secret Tongue, while the dwarvish Daeron and Pengolodh might have known was a sort of slurred precursor that the dwarves used in company before converting to Westron and Sindarin.
It’s important to know that the dwarves do not speak their tongue from birth. They are taught it, as anyone is taught a second language. This means that a dwarf from the Orocarni might speak a Harad dialect as a top language, and a dwarf from Erebor might speak westron; but they could talk to one another, overcoming that language barrier, by using the secret tongue, which is universal with very few changes.
Khazad means ‘speaker’ because the dwarves had language first, and considering what else they’ve got going for them, they consider it pretty important. Frankly the amount of dwarvish used in the current hobbit films (around Bilbo and Gandalf specifically) is so far outside of the original canon that it’s almost appalling. I mean, I like it, but it sort of goes directly against dwarves as we know them.
…then again Tolkien thought dwarves didn’t keep animals, and that there were only twoeelf-human sexual interactions in the whole of his universe. So. Let’s not talk about authorial intent.
Anyhoo, the long and short of it is that the dwarves thought Eol was awesome enough to teach the super secret language they didn’t teach anyone else and I want everyone to know that all the time caus’ no one cares but me. >_>
Sorry for running off at the text post.
I should probably put this on my Eöl blog, but WHAT THE HECK IT’S COOL META
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