Neo Sindarin - A Stepwise Grammar

General background on Sindarin

There is a lot of information already available on the history and development of Sindarin, which will not be repeated on this page.

If you wish to know about its history, I suggest reading this page from Ardalambion first:
Sindarin - the Noble Tongue

For a grounded check on how Elvish languages were developed by Tolkien, I suggest this page from Eldamo:
Conceptual History of Elvish

It might be worth mentioning that the writings of Professor Tolkien are not published in their entirety.

This is why there are mentions of "latest paradigms" and "changes" in Sindarin's grammar and constructions. We had new information about Sindarin as recently as 2024, and more material will potentially come to light in the next years.

Having that in mind, please notice that the information on sources such as Ardalambion and Eldamo and books like David Salo's may differ, because they were written at different times, when different information was available. As far as I understand, Eldamo is the most up-to-date source of Elvish grammar at the moment (even though it focuses on Quenya.)

Notes on conventions used

Before starting, you might notice that some words are highlighted like this or this. This represents mutated words. Don't worry about it until you get to the mutations section. (If you forgot how some mutation works, try hovering the cursor over the mutated word.)

When an example is meant to highlight something, the keywords will be bold. If there are two concepts together, italic might also be used. (This is not 100% consistent, however.)

Words in [square brackets] are greyed out because these are not written in the Sindarin text, but they are implied. E.g. "something [implied] here."

Words between ‹single guillemets› mean a single Sindarin word includes the whole context in English, such as verbs with their respective pronouns.

Links in green/cyan and in pink are internal. They belong to this website and open in the same tab (or window). The green/cyan ones will typically take you to another page, in the same website, with more information and examples. The pink ones will scroll you elsewhere in the very same page you are at the moment. Blue anchors will open a new tab and take you to other websites.

1.1 Pronouns

Independent personal pronouns

In Sindarin, we don't use traditional personal pronouns. That's because pronouns are typically represented as suffixes to conjugated verbs.

There are, however, independent pronouns, which can be used on certain circumstances (such as when a subject has been mentioned and needs to be referred to again):

  Singular

  1st person I/me       ni
  2nd person thou       ci
  2nd person (polite)   le *
  3rd person he/she/it  te

  Plural

  1st person we (excl.) me
  1st person we (incl.) pe
  2nd person you        de
  3rd person they       ti

  Reflexive pronoun     im

* le is a loanword from Quenya

Reflexive pronoun

In Sindarin, there is a reflexive pronoun im attested in multiple places, confirmed by Tolkien in notes from 1969.

It is a general reflexive usable with all persons, equivalent to "self". It has a meaning of "I myself", "he himself", "you yourselves", and so on.

  i·chedhyd estanner im khazâd = "the dwarves called themselves khazâd"

Im can also be used as intensifier:

  Melian nî redhin an Ivann im = "Melian was related to Yavanna herself"

Pronominal endings

In Romance languages, among others, there is a concept known as "implied subject", or "understood subject". It might also be called "elliptical subject" or "zero subject".

An implied subject refers to a subject that is not explicitly stated but is understood from context, mostly because of how the verb is conjugated.

In English, one example is the "you" in imperative sentences, e.g. "go home!" → "[You] go home!".

In Sindarin, implied subjects are used at all times, except if absolutely required for the sentence to make sense. As in Romance languages, the verb is modified. In Sindarin, that means that a suffix is used.

The suffixes used with verbs are the following:

  Singular

  1st person I            -n
  2nd person thou         -g
  2nd person (polite)     -l
  2nd person (archaic)    -dh
  3rd person he/she/it    (nothing)
  
  Plural

  1st person we (not you) -f
  1st person we (and you) -b
  2nd person you          -gir
  2nd person (polite)     -dhir
  3rd person they         -r

Example for all personal pronouns

Verb gala- ("to grow"):

   I grow    - galon
Thou growest - galog
Thou growest - galol (polite)
Thou growest - galodh (archaic)
  He grows   - gala

  we grow    - galof
  we grow    - galab
 you grow    - galogir
 you grow    - galodhir (polite)
they grow    - galar

1.2 To be

Copular system

The verb na-, "to be", exists in published texts only as imperative no (and some sketchy notes.)

A proper conjugation can be reconstructed based on evidence, but all reconstructions are entirely hypothetical.

The "to be" is implied most of the time by the sequence of words, via the copular system.

A copula is often a verb or a verb-like word, though this is not universally the case.

Most languages have one main copula (in English, the verb "to be"), although some (such as Spanish, Portuguese and Thai) have more than one, while others have none.

In English, in "to be" statements as in "you are wise", "Elrond is an elf", the verb connecting the subject (you, Elrond) to its predicate (wise, an Elf) is the copula.

Sindarin does not use an evident copula word in such sentences: the subject and predicate are simply placed next to each other with no joining word. In linguistics this is referred to as a zero copula.

Neo-Sindarin writers use an independent pronoun together with its predicate for "to be" statements:

  me edhil   = "we [are] elves"
  le hael    = "you [are] wise"
  ti velig   = "they [are] mighty"
  te vaethor = "he [is] [a] warrior"

In this system, the predicate noun or adjective matches the subject in number.

Many Sindarin writers agree that a predicate adjective is not mutated (see mutations below.) However, there is no evidence that this would be the case. This is a common convention, but by no means universal.

For past and future copulas, the suggestion is to use nî and tho (or natho):

  Elrond nî sí    = "Elrond was there"
  Elrond tho sí   = "Elrond will be here" or...
  Elrond natho sí = "Elrond will be here"

Existential verb

There is a mysterious verb da- that should be used for existential statements.

There are two different theories of what da- really is. But despite uncertainty about its etymology, there is practical agreement.

  inn đa v'im = "I have a good mind (to do so)"
  (lit.) "a mind there is in me"

da- is Sindarin's only attested means of making existential statements ("there is/exists").

Its semantics should be limited to the attested construction: "there is X" and "there is X in/at/on/under/etc Y".

It functions as an existential verb, not a copula, and cannot take direct objects.

Some scholars were cautious about recommending it for Neo-Sindarin due to its speculative nature, yet PE23 made its status significantly more certain.

There is no attested past tense formation, although a few have been proposed: daun for singular, and possibly doner/dóner for plural.

We also don't know its plural inflection behaviour, nor whether it functions as a regular verb. It almost certainly functions as a clitic (uninflected.)

A proposed negative equivalent la (< LĀ) remains experimental.

Examples:

  Singular:
  rach dha vi ñelaidh        = "danger is ‹in the› trees"
  roch vorg da vi ñelaidh    = "a big horse is ‹in the› trees"

  Plural:
  lyth dhail dar vin hant    = "there are delicate flowers ‹in the› garden"
  rych dhar vin ñelaidh      = "horses are ‹in the› trees"

  Past singular:
  rach dhaun vi ñelaidh      = "danger was ‹in the› trees"
  lyth dhail daun vin hant   = "there were delicate flowers ‹in the› garden"

  Past plural:
  lyth dhail dóner vin hant  = "there were delicate flowers ‹in the› garden"
  rych vyrg doner vi ñelaidh = "big horses were ‹in the› trees"

Guidelines

The following guidelines may help elucidate how the copula is used:

• The verb na- is ommitted in "to be" phrases:

    Elrond ⏝ edhel = "Elrond [is] [an] elf"
      

• Some people think it's best if predicate adjectives are not mutated, and some reverse the position of the adjectives:

    en·edhel bain = "the elf [is] beautiful" (avoid)
    bain en·edhel = "beautiful [is] the elf" (prefer)
      

• The predicate matches the subject in number:

    in·edain velig = "the men [are] mighty" (ambiguous with "the mighty men")
    belig in·edain = "mighty [are] the men"
      

• "To be" phrases use independent pronouns as subjects:

    me edhil = "we [are] elves"
      

• Use past and future copulas nî and tho for "was" and "will be":

    Elrond nî ennas = "Elrond was there"
    Elrond tho sí   = "Elrond will be here" or...
    Elrond natho sí = "Elrond will be here"
      

• These past and future copulas are inflected with pronominal suffixes as appropriate:

    nîn ennas = "I was there"
    thof sí   = "we will be here" Questionable
    nathof sí = "we will be here" (alternate future copula)
      

• Use da- for existential statements, and inflect for number:

    lyth dhail dóner vin hant = "there were delicate flowers ‹in the› garden"
      

1.3 Nouns

Nouns can be definite or indefinite, singular or plural. There is no grammatical gender.

Proper names are considered definite nouns. Other nouns are made definite by use of a definite article. There is a singular article and a plural article.

In Old Sindarin, the noun originally had three numbers: singular, plural and dual.

The dual soon became obsolete, and only survives in a few fossilised words.

Sindarin plurals are mostly made with vowel-changes, through a phenomenon called ablaut.

Here is an example of a noun in its different states:

  parf = "book"

              Definite    Indefinite
  Singular    e·barf      parf
  Plural      i·pherf     perf

1.4 Plural formation

Umlaut

Umlaut is a type of sound change in a language where a vowel in a word shifts because of another vowel that originally followed it.

In early Germanic languages, speakers unconsciously adjusted the mouth position in anticipation of the next sound, and over time the spelling sometimes preserved this change with two dots (¨), as in German Mann → Männer.

English still shows the effect even though we no longer mark it with dots: foot → feet and mouse → mice come from the same historical process (often called i-umlaut). In short, umlaut is not decoration but evidence of how pronunciation evolved centuries ago.

Umlauts in plurals

Sindarin plural words go through umlaut. Sindarin has a term for it: prestanneth, meaning "disturbance". (It's exactly the same thing.) Tolkien also referred to this phenomenon as i-affection. That is because Sindarin plurals happen due to an ancient vowel i that ceased to exist, but left other vowels altered.

For example, the Sindarin word for "beard" is fang. In Old Eldarin, this word was spangā, plural spangāi. In Old Sindarin it became sphanga on singular and sphangi on plural. Eventually it evolved to Sindarin fang with plural feng, where the original vowel "a" drifted towards the same quality of the plural ending -i before it was lost.

                Old Eldarin  →  Old Sindarin  →  shift period* →  Sindarin
  Singular      spangā       →  sphanga       →  sfangi        →  fang
  Plural        spangāi      →  sphangi       →  sfängi        →  feng

  * This stage is only for illustration of an intermediate old Sindarin period.

These plural patterns are valid for both nouns and adjectives.

We will refer to this process as i-affection from now on.

There are 3 types of i-affection:

• internal i-affection
• final i-affection
• final i-intrusion

Internal i-affection

Occurs only in non-final syllables:

  Non-final a → e: adan  "man"    → edain "men"
  Non-final o → e: onod  "Ent"    → enyd  "Ents"
  Non-final u → y: tulus "poplar" → tylys "poplars"

  Archaically:
  Non-final o → œ: golodh "noldo" → gœlydh "noldor"

  Other vowels in non-final syllables (e, i, y) do not mutate.
  Long vowels in non-final syllables (í, ó, ú, ý) do not mutate.

Final i-affection

Occurs only in final syllables:

  Final a → e: narn  "tale"   → nern  "tales"
  Final e → i: edhel "elf"    → edhil "elves"
  Final ê → î: hên   "child"  → hîn   "children"
  Final o → y: orch  "orch"   → yrch  "orcs"
  Final u → y: tulus "poplar" → tylys "poplars"

  Other short vowels in final syllables (i, y) do not mutate.

Final i-intrusion

Happens when the last syllable ends in a single consonant:

  Intruded  a → ai: adan "man"   → edain "men"
  Intruded  â → ai: bâr  "home"  → bair  "homes"
  Intruded  ô → ui: thôn "pine"  → thuin "pines"         - monosyllables only
  Intruded  û → ui: dûr  "dark"  → duir  "dark (plural)" - monosyllables only
  Intruded au → oe: naug "dwarf" → noeg  "dwarves"

  The long vowels î, ŷ in final syllables do not mutate.
  The vowels e/ê, o, u undergo final i-affection instead (to i/î, y, y).

Rare diphthongs plurals

Plurals of rarer diphthongs are the result of other phonetic effects:

  Rare oe → ui: oew   "evil deed" → uiw  "evil deeds"
  Rare eu →  ŷ: teuch "chip"      → tŷch "chips"

The diphthongs ae, ei, ai, ui do not normally mutate in plurals, even in final syllables, but there are some unusual plurals where they do. (See below.)

Diphthongs never mutate in non-final syllables.

Unusual plurals

Sindarin has a number of plural patterns resulting from more obscure sound changes:

• Long or short ó/o derived from au resists mutations in non-final syllables, and might mutate to oe in final syllables of recognised compounds.

    Ódhel → Ódhil (< ✶aw(a)delo) "Elf [who left for Aman]"
    Rodon → Rodyn (= raud + -on) "Vala"

• The diphthong ai in final syllables might mutated to î (monosyllable) or i (polysyllable) depending on the ancient form of the word.

    cair → cîr "ship" (✶kiryā)
    gail → gîl "star" (✶gilyā)

• When a vowel mutates to i or y in its plural, it absorbs any preceding i, as in:

    Miniel → Mínil, thalion → thelyn.

• When a polysyllable ends in a short vowel, it generally follows the same mutations as in polysyllables ending in a single consonant:

    -a → -ai:   nadha "fetter"     → nedhai "fetters"
    -e → -i:     tele "end"        → tili   "ends" 
    -o → -y:   duirro "river bank" → duirry "river banks"
    -u → -y:    hadhu "seat"       → hedhy  "seats"

• One exception is when a final -a is derived from an ancient g > ɣ > -a, in which case in plurals:

    -a → -i:     fela "mine"       → fili   "mines"
  
    Singular: fela < felɣ  < phelgā
    Plural:   fili < felɣi < phelgāi < √PHELEG

• When a monosyllable ends in a long vowel, it generally follows the same mutations as in monosyllables ending in a single consonant:

    -â → -ai:      iâ "pit"    → iai  "pits"
    -ê → -î:       tê "line"   → tî   "lines"
    -ô → -ui:     drô "rut"    → drui "ruts"
    -û → -ui:      tû "muscle" → tui  "muscles"

• Diphthongs are immune to mutation except when in some monosyllables:

    -êw → -îw:    têw "letter" → tîw  "letters"
    -aw → -oe(w): raw "wing"   → roew "wings"

• Some Sindarin plurals are formed with the plural suffix -in, either a remnant of an ancient n preserved in the plural, or a generalisation of this suffix applied to other situations.

    ael "lake" → aelin "lakes"

• Sometimes the Sindarin plural becomes the base form, and a singular is derived from it using the suffixes -eg, -ig, -og or -od. These also seem to work as diminutives for regular words. Find more details in the diminutives section.

    glam   "orcs"          → glamog   "orc"
    gwanūn "twins"         → gwanunig "twin"
    lhaw   "ears"          → lheweg   "ear"
    loth   "small flowers" → lotheg   "small flower"
    lhoth  "flowers"       → lhothod  "flower"
    filig  "small birds"   → filigod  "small bird"

More info: Eldamo: S. unusual plurals.

Class plural

Sindarin has a second plural form for classes of things, using suffixes like -ath, -hoth or -rim.

  êl     "star"    , elin   "stars"     , elenath   "all stars".
  gaur   "werewolf", goer   "werewolves", gaurhoth  "wolf-horde".
  Nogoth "Dwarf"   , Negyth "Dwarves"   , Nogothrim "all Dwarves".

-ath is by far the most common class plural suffix, which seems to be the "default" suffix. It is the only one used with inanimate items like elenath "all stars" and sammath "(all of the) chambers".

-hoth is mostly used for "bad" groups given its connotation of "horde".

Some class plural suffixes -rim, -hoth and -waith are used for groups of people: orchoth, Rohirrim, Forodwaith.

The suffix -ath may preserve (or restore) ancient final endings to words that were lost in the singular form.

   êl     "star"        → elenath    "all stars".
   Ennor  "Middle land" → Ennorath   "(all) the Middle-lands"
   gail   "star"        → giliath    "host of stars".
   Perian "Halfling"    → Periannath "Hobbits (as a race)".
   cair   "ship"        → círiath    "(all) ships".
   lhîn   "pool"        → lhiniath   "(all of the) pools".
   sîr    "river"       → siriath    "(all of the) rivers".

Dual remnants

Sindarin once had a dual inflection, used for pairs of objects, but in Sindarin this dual has fallen out of use because final vowels vanished in Sindarin.

However, there are remnants of a dual in fossilized forms.

  lhaw       "ears" (two ears of one person) (*slasū > lhahu > lhau)
  Orgaladhad "day of [the] Two Trees [of Valinor]" (galadh)
  samarad    "two neighbours" (sammar)
  nobad      "thumb and index finger (as a pair)" (lit.) "pickers"
  hent       "two eyes" (hen)

1.5 Consonant mutations

Tolkien attempted to make languages that sound beautiful. Sindarin has mechanisms in place to prevent harsh consonantal encounters. That's why many of the words in Sindarin change sounds when spoken in a certain sequence.

Consonant mutations are where the ends and beginings of words interact. Mutations are closely related to Sindarin's phonetic history. These mutations are so frequent, in fact, that it is probably the most pertinent property of Sindarin for any enthusiasts.

Sindarin has about six types of consonant mutations. The three most important ones are: soft mutation, nasal mutation, and mixed mutation. They are more common and widely used.

The other three are limited in scope, normally dealing with a few prepositions each. They are the stop mutation, the liquid mutation, and the sibilant mutation.

These consonant mutations apply to the initial consonant of a word (either when closely following another word or in compounds,) and can apply to the end of the triggering word (when there is one.)

Overview table

This is a summary of all the consonant mutations used in Neo-Sindarin:

  Category                   Base         Soft mutation      Nasal Mutation      Mixed Mutation     
  Voiceless Stops            p, t, c      b, d, g            ph, th, ch          m·b, n·d, ñ·g      
  Voiced Stops               b, d, g      v, dh, '           m, n, ñ (or ng)     m·b, n·d, ñ·g      
  Nasalised Stops            mb, nd, ng   m, n, ñ (or ng)    m, n, ñ (or ng)     m·b, n·d, ñ·g      
  Sibilants and Spirants     s, h, wh     h, ch, chw         s, ch, chw          h, ch, chw         
  Voiceless Liquids †        lh, rh       thl, thr           thl, thr            thl, thr           
  Nasals                     m            v                  m                   m                  

  Category                   Base         Stop mutation      Liquid Mutation     Sibilant Mutation     
  Voiceless Stops            p, t, c      ph, th, ch         ph, th, ch          ph, th, ch            
  Voiced Stops               b, d, g      b, d, g            v, dh, '            b, d, g               
  Nasalised Stops            mb, nd, ng   mb, nd, n-g        b, d, g             mb, nd, ng            
  Sibilants and Spirants     s, h, wh     s, ch, wh          s, ch, 'w           s, ch, wh             
  Voiceless Liquids †        lh, rh       l, r               'l, 'r              lh, rh                
  Nasals                     m            m                  v                   m                     

Detailed table

A detailed table with examples, phonetics and filtering can be found in the Mutations table page.

Soft mutation

Soft mutation - aka lenition - aka vocalic mutation

Soft mutation is a systematic lenition (sound-softening process) of initial consonants triggered by certain grammatical environments, such as following the definite article or appearing in compounds.

It "softens" the consonant's articulation without changing its place of articulation, producing predictable alternations used to mark grammatical relationships.

  - bain (adj.) "beautiful; good, wholesome, favourable
  ↔ main (adj.) "prime, chief, pre-eminent"

  - balt (n.) "force, [ᴱN.] might"
  ↔ malt (n.) "gold (as metal)"

  - bang (n.) "staff"
  ↔ mang (n.) "butter"

  - both (n.) "fen, marsh; [N.] puddle, small pool"
  ↔ moth (n.) "dusk"

  - bâd (n.) "road, [N.] beaten track, pathway"
  ↔ mâd (n.) "meal"

  - bân (adj.) "fair, good, wholesome, favourable" (see bain)
  ↔ mân (n.) "departed spirit"

  - bíleb (adj.) "equal"
  ↔ míleb (adj.) "romantic"

  - bîl (n.) "likeness, similarity"
  ↔ mîl (n.) "love, affection"

  - bôr (n.) "heat"
  ↔ môr (n.) "dark(ness)"

  - baul (n.) "torment" → [mb-]
  ↔ maul (n.) "flour"

  - baur (n.) "need" → [mb-]
  ↔ maur (n.) "gloom"

  - bund (n.) "snout, nose; cape [of land]" → [mb-]
  ↔ mund (n.) "bull"

  bain  ~ dail
  bíleb ~ ain
  môr   ~ fuin
  moth  ~ uial

Nasal mutation

The nasal mutation is triggered by a preceding n (most often from the plural article in or prepositions like na(n)). It "nasalises" the initial consonant, producing these core effects:

The preceding nasal itself often drops before the mutated consonant, except before vowels, resistant clusters, and before other nasals (especially with an).

Mixed mutation

There are actually two versions of the mixed mutation. The original one was proposed by David Salo as a special pattern — mainly used after a genitive preposition en "of" — that begins like soft mutation but then applies nasal effects once the lost historical vowel disappears, producing a more conservative outcome for b/d/g/m and fully restoring ancient mb/nd/ng.

Ellanto from the Vinyë Lambengolmor server has noted that this version of the mutation has been supplanted by PE23/141, in which Tolkien describes what seems to be a "lenition with nasal assimilation":

"(...) but this before consonants would have produced S en followed by vocalic mutation and assimilation of n. So en(a) parth, the garden, > em-barth. The nasal would probably have been lost before spirants, so inā þoronō, the eagle, > en(a) þóron > e-þoron."

The original Salo mutation is unlikely to be used in modern Neo-Sindarin en because the paradigm of the genitive has changed due to PE23 and the CEA (meaning that en is not a preposition, only an article.)

The newer form of this mutation is used for a few prepositions, mainly an, the definite form of mi, and a few others.

This is the version described here.

Stop mutation

Stop mutation - aka hard mutation

The stop mutation is a rare Sindarin mutation triggered by prepositions that historically ended in -t or -d (notably ed "out of" and o "from"). The ancient stop vanishes before the following consonant, producing these effects:

The preposition's final t/d usually disappears, except before liquids (l, r, 'l, 'r, 'w) where it may survive. Stop mutation is attested only in theoretical notes and is considered optional in Neo-Sindarin.

Liquid mutation

The liquid mutation is a speculative and probably archaic Sindarin mutation triggered by a preceding l or r. It is attested only in a couple of "Túrin Wrapper" sentences and seems not to operate in later Sindarin.

Because most evidence elsewhere shows no such mutation after liquids, it is treated as an optional/archaic system in Neo-Sindarin.

Sibilant mutation

The sibilant mutation results from an ancient preceding s that caused various mutation effects before being lost.

The two best examples of sibilant mutation are the preposition o "about" and the conjunction a "and".

This mutation has two effects: First, the h which is the normal medial development of s reappears before vowels:

  ah annon or a hannon = "and a gate"
  Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth = "The Debate of Finrod and Andreth"

The other effect is that the voiceless stops become voiceless spirants (p, t, c → ph, th, ch) and voiced liquids l, r become voiceless lh, rh, where these are the normal phonetic effect of a historical s preceding p, t, c; l, r.

Though not mentioned by Tolkien, it is likely that older initial ch would be preserved rather than becoming h as it does initially, so that initial h would "mutate" to ch.

It is an obscure but plausible mutation for a(h).

1.6 Verbs and present tense

Sindarin verbs are inflected for tense, number and person.

In PE23, there is an explicit statement saying that verbs should be lenited after the subject, which seems at odds with many attested forms. The current working hypothesis is that the lenition does not apply after complex subjects. So if the subject is complex (e.g. Celebrimbor o Eregion) the following verb is not lenited. Otherwise, it is.

A complex subject has adjuncts (adjectives, prepositional phrases.) But if it has an article, a possessor, a quantifier, or it happens to be a genitive construct, it is still considered simple.

There are two major classes of verbs: Basic and derived.

Basic (i-stem)

They are based on an unadorned primitive verbal root. They are also known as i-stem (because in the infinitive they have an -i added to them.)

Basic verbs are usually represented by stems ending in a consonant as in: ped- "to say, speak".

Monosyllabic basic verbs are lengthened: câr "do, make" (car-).

When pronominal suffixes are added, the ancient aorist suffix i is preserved, which causes internal i-affection of the base vowel: cerin "I do" (car-). For many basic verbs, the vowel becomes e in an inflected present tense.

  car-: present tense cerin "I do".
  heb-: present tense hebin "I keep".
  tol-: present tense telin "I come".

Because of the large number of collisions in the present tense, basic verbs are less likely to survive, and that's why we see derived verbs or prefixed verbs in Sindarin where their Quenya equivalents are basic verbs. (The reverse can also happen, e.g. Quenya pata- vs Sindarin pad-.)

  S. cova-   "assemble"    vs.  Q. ócom-
  S. díhena- "forgive"     vs.  Q. apsen-
  S. echad-  "shape out"   vs.  Q. cat-
  S. groga-  "feel terror" vs.  Q. ruc-
  N. nara-   "tell"        vs. ᴹQ. nyar-
  N. teitha- "write"       vs. ᴹQ. tek-
  N. telia-  "play"        vs. ᴹQ. tyal-
  N. toba-   "cover"       vs. ᴹQ. top-

Example:

  car- (to do)

  1st person - cerin    - I do
  2nd person - cerig    - thou dost
  2nd person - ceril    - thou dost (polite)
  2nd person - ceridh   - thou dost (archaic polite)
  3rd person - câr      - he/she does

  1st person - cerif    - we (not you) do
  1st person - cerib    - we (and you) do
  2nd person - cerigir  - you do
  2nd person - ceridhir - you do
  3rd person - cerir    - they do

Derived (a-stem)

They are produced with some kind of verbal suffix. They are also known as a-stem.

Derived verbs always appear with stems ending in a as in: teitha- "to write".

The infinitive is formed with the ending -d:

  brenia- "endure" > breniad "to endure"

The 3rd person singular present tense is identical to the unadorned verb stem itself:

  brenia- "endure" > brenia "endures, is enduring"

Pronominal suffixes make the final -a- of the verb change to -o- as in galon "I grow" (gala-). (This mostly happens on first and second person conjugations.)

  brenion = "I endure",
  dagrof  = "we make war"

Example

  gala- (to grow)

  1st person - galon    - I grow
  2nd person - galog    - thou growest
  2nd person - galol    - thou growest (polite)
  2nd person - galodh   - thou growest (archaic polite)
  3rd person - gala     - he/she grows

  1st person - galof    - we (not you) grow
  1st person - galab    - we (and you) grow
  2nd person - galogir  - you grow
  2nd person - galodhir - you grow
  3rd person - galar    - they grow

Verbal nouns (gerund)

Verbal nouns function as both gerunds and infinitives. When used as gerund, they behave in all respects like nouns except:

1. they cannot be inflected in the plural and
2. are not mutated when functioning as the infinitival object of another verb (since they are not nouns.)

Basic verbs: add -ed

  car- (to do) = cared (doing)

Derived verbs ending in -a: add -d

  saeda- (to teach) = saedad (teaching)

It works as an object to another verb, like English infinitive. E.g.

  nidhin mened = "I intend ‹to go›"
  melin saedad = "I love ‹to teach›"

A verbal noun may follow a verb, but an adverb may be in the middle as well. E.g.

  te aníra ennas suilannad = "he desires there ‹to greet›" (ennas = there)

The gerund/infinitive itself can take a direct object, which does undergo the usual soft mutation. E.g.

  aníra maded gordof = "‹he desires› ‹to eat› [an] apple" (gordof is mutated from "cordof")

2.1 Articles

Sindarin has no indefinite article like English "a, an"; the absence of a definite article indicates that the noun is indefinite:

  Edhel = "Elf" or "an Elf"

The definite article recommended is the one from the Common Eldarin Article (CEA), from 1969, first published in 2024 on PE23/135.

In notes on the CEA, Tolkien decided that the singular article was (mostly) e rather than i, taking the form en before vowels.

In CEA, the singular definite article was derived from an ancient emphatic article ✶inā, with a-affection resulting in e(n).

The singular form e(n) induces soft mutation on a following consonant, while the plural i(n) induces nasal mutation.

When preceding r-, the nasal -n becomes -dh.

When preceding gw-, the plural article drops the -n.

  Noun starting on a vowel:
  en  for singular
  in  for plural

  Noun starting on a consonant:
  e   + soft mutation for singular
  i   + nasal mutation for plural
  idh + r- for plural nouns starting in r-
  i   + ñgw- for plural nouns starting in gw-
  i   + ñg- for plural nouns starting in ancient ngw-

Archaically, if the gw- happened to be an ngw- word, the plural article retains the -n:

  gwend        = "maiden"
  golodh [ng-] = "sage"

  Archaic S.   Late S.
  in·wind      i·ñgwind
  i·ñgelydh    i·ñgelydh

These two styles (late Sindarin style, and archaic Sindarin style,) shouldn't coexist in a single moment in time (except maybe a transitioning stage.) When writing texts in Sindarin, it's recommended to choose one style and use it consistently.

It's a Neo-Sindarin convention to use a dash (-) or a dot (·) after the definite article. This started with Tolkien sometimes (but not always) doing it as a marker of its proclitic nature. (That marking is not used in tengwar alphabet.)

Examples:

  e·cherdir = "the master"  (herdir)
  en·arben  = "the knight"
  i·thiw    = "the signs"   (tiw < têw)
  in·emyn   = "the hills"   (emyn < amon)
  idh·Rodyn = "the Valar"
  i·ñgelydh = "the sages"   [ng-]
  i·ñgwaidh = "the shadows" (late)
  in·wind   = "the maidens" (archaic)

2.2 Adjectives

Adjectives generally appear after the nouns they modify. Then they undergo soft mutation.

Adjectives are inflected into the plural the same way that nouns are. They need to agree with their noun.

Neo-Sindarin should distinguish functions via word order. Positioning an attributive adjective before a noun to avoid ambiguity is permissible but not standard in normal colloquial speech.

  tathar dond   = "a tall willow"
  tond dathar   = "tall [is] [a] willow" (permissible but not standard)
  e·dathar dond = "the willow [is] tall" or ~ "the tall willow"
  tond e·dathar = "tall [is] the willow"
  
  e·dond dathar = "the tall [is] willow" (ungrammatical, avoid)

Predicative statements such as "an elf is tall" and "elves are tall" are ambiguous with attributive sentences.

  edhel dond      = "[an] elf [is] tall" or "[a] tall elf"
  edhil dynd      = "elves [are] tall"   or "tall elves"

The only way we can disambiguate is by reversing the position, so the copula is implied, as such:

  tond edhel      = "tall [is] [an] elf"
  tynd edhil      = "tall [are] elves"

Multiple adjectives

When a noun is described by multiple adjectives, there is no consensus on whether they should mutate.

The hypothesis I subscribe to and recommend is that
No, the mutation the adjective goes through is purely phonological and thus only the first adjective should be mutated. That aligns somewhat with Welsh, which mutates the first adjective.

This structure also works well when using multiple adjectives with a genitive chain. To look into that case, please head to the genitive section below.

English has a conventional (though not strict) adjective order. It's usually something like: adjectives of opinion, size, age, shape, etc.

Romance and Celtic languages lack a memorised stacking template like English, but they typically order adjectives according to semantic scope. I suggest using the same structure in Sindarin:

• inherent / classifying properties closest to the noun
• physical/descriptive properties next
• evaluative/subjective properties further out

Use pre-nominal position mainly for emphasis, evaluation, or lexicalised meanings.

Finally, don't end a list of adjectives with the word "and" between the last two items. (That's the same for any lists in Sindarin.)

For example, "a beautiful proud black horse":

• beautiful: evaluative
• proud: descriptive/character
• black: inherent/classifying

  roch vorn tarlang bain  = "[a] horse black proud beautiful" (lit.)

If different adjectives concern the same semantic group, the order doesn't matter:

  roch vorg guir morn = "[a] horse big slow black"
  roch 'uir borg morn = "[a] horse slow big black"
  roch vorn guir borg = "[a] horse black slow big"

2.3 Numerals

Elves count to 12 instead of 10.* That means the reader has to rewire the way s/he thinks about numbers in Elvish languages. The base-12 system is called the "duodecimal" system.

* There is some debate about that. Elves certainly had both systems.

(Imagine that converting from the decimal system to duodecimal works like converting from kilometres to miles. A certain distance is the same, but it's represented by different numbers.)

However, even though Tolkien mentioned multiple times the duodecimal system, the words for the numbers in Sindarin clearly follow the decimal system.

It is implied that the decimal system predates the duodecimal, and it is also implied that Numenóreans prefer the decimal system, so my suggestion is to use the regular decimal designations of numbers for anything that doesn't suggest Elvish origin, and a reconstructed duodecimal designation for other content.

Cardinal numbers

The decimal system

The decimal system is the same we use on our daily lives. These are the names of the numbers in decimal:

  0 lad      10 pae
  1 min      11 minib
  2 tâd      12 ýneg        20 taphaen
  3 neledh   13 paenel      30 nelphaen
  4 canad    14 paegan      40 caphaen
  5 leben    15 paeleben    50 lephaen
  6 eneg     16 paeneg      60 enephaen
  7 odog     17 paenodog    70 odophaen
  8 tolodh   18 paedolodh   80 tolophaen     100 toch
  9 neder    19 paeneder    90 nederphaen   1000 meneg

Note that toch, the word for a hundred, is pluralised for higher numbers, so 200 is written "tych dâd". The same goes for a thousand: 2000 is pluralised to "menig dâd".

The duodecimal system

The system of base 12 is called the duodecimal system. In that system, instead of using 10 digits, we use 12. After the algarism nine (9), we use, in English, dek and el.

In a duodecimal place system, based on the standards laid out by the Dozenal Societies of America and Great Britain (organisations promoting the use of duodecimal), ten (or dek) is written as A (or ᘔ), eleven (or el) is written as B (or Ɛ), twelve is written as 10, meaning "1 dozen and 0 units", instead of "1 ten and 0 units", whereas 12 means "1 dozen and 2 units" (i.e. the same number that in decimal is written as "14"). According to this notation, 50 means sixty (= five times twelve), 60 means seventy two or "half a gross" (= six times twelve), 100 means one hundred forty-four (= twelve times twelve) or "1 gross", 1000 means one thousand seven hundred twenty eight or "1 great gross", and 0.1 means "1 twelfth" instead of "1 tenth".

These are reconstructed names of the numbers in duodecimal:

  0 lad      10 rast
  1 min      11 rasnel
  2 tâd      12 rastad      20 tadrast
  3 neledh   13 rastnel     30 nelrast
  4 canad    14 rastan      40 cadhrast
  5 leben    15 rasthleben  50 lebedhrast
  6 eneg     16 rasteneg    60 enegrast
  7 odog     17 rasnodog*   70 odograst
  8 tolodh   18 rasdolodh*  80 tolodhrast
  9 neder    19 rasneder*   90 nederrast
  A pae      1A rastpae     A0 paerast       100 host
  B minib    1B rastmin     B0 minibrast    1000 hû

These are not widely used and very hypothetical.

Some think that the compounds past B are too far-fetched and prefer to describe duodecimal numbers using the known terms, like for example 13 as "neledh rast."

The same way it works with decimals, the words for gross and great gross are pluralised. So 200 is "hyst dâd" and 2000 is "hui dâd".

Writing cardinal numbers

In English, to say the name of a larger number, we break it into thousands, hundreds, tens, and ones. In Sindarin, this is done backwards.

Instead of saying "twenty one", one should say "one and twenty". Instead of "six hundred thirty two", one says "two thirty six hundred".

In decimal system, reversing the order is enough. In duodecimal system, things get different even in English.

Examples:

It's important to stress here the equivalences:
70012 in duodecimal is exactly the same amount of a thing as 100810 in decimal.
"70012" means 7 gross, and a gross is 14410. 14410 × 7 = 100810.
The number is named differently, it has different algarisms, but it's the same amount.

Ordinal numbers

Ordinal numbers use the suffix -ui. We don't have any evidence of ordinal numbers above 10, but we can make an educated guess.

  Decimal:

  0 --       10 paenui
  1 minui    11 minibui
  2 tadui    12 ýnegui      20 taphaenui
  3 nelui    13 paenelui    30 nelphaenui
  4 canthui  14 paeganthui  40 caphaenui
  5 levnui   15 paelevnui   50 lephaenui
  6 enchui   16 paenchui    60 enephaenui
  7 othui    17 paenothui   70 odophaenui
  8 tollui   18 paedollui   80 tolophaenui     100 tochui
  9 nedrui   19 paenedrui   90 nederphaenui   1000 mengui

  Duodecimal:

  0 --       10 rastui
  1 minui    11 rasnelui
  2 tadui    12 rastadui     20 tadrastui
  3 nelui    13 rastnelui    30 nelrastui
  4 canthui  14 rastanthui   40 cadhrastui
  5 levnui   15 rasthlevnui  50 lebedhrastui
  6 enchui   16 rastenchui   60 enegrastui
  7 othui    17 rasnothui    70 odograstui
  8 tollui   18 rasdollui    80 tolodhrastui
  9 nedrui   19 rasnedrui    90 nederrastui
  A paenui   1A rastpaenui   A0 paerastui      100 hostui
  B minibui  1B rastminui    B0 minibrastui   1000 hûthui ?

Literature on the subject of Sindarin ordinal numbers is patchy at best. I'll add more information here when I have any.

Word order of numerals

Numerals always come after the nouns, in an adjectival position. Both cardinal and ordinal numbers. Examples:

  beraid dâd           = "two towers"
  andrann dadui        = "second age"
  cyrf nedir nan edain = "nine rings of men"
  cerenyr chost        = "gross years" (144 years)

When adjectives are used along with numerals, it's recommended to keep the numeral between the noun and adjectives and not mutate the adjective chain. (Don't pluralise the numeral.)

  Eight beautiful proud and black horses:
  rych dolodh myrn terleng bain  = "horses eight black proud beautiful" (lit.)

2.4 Sentence Structure

Direct objects

Direct objects are a word or phrase in a sentence referring to the person or thing receiving the action of a transitive verb.

For example, in English, in "mail the letter and call him", "the letter" and "him" are direct objects.

In Sindarin, direct objects undergo soft mutation. Examples:

  lasto beth lammen = "listen [to the] word (peth) [of] ‹my tongue›"
  cenin 'aladh      = "I see a tree (galadh)"
  annon higil adan  = "I give a man (adan) a knife (sigil)" 

Word order

Sindarin normally places the subject first, the verb second, and the direct object third. The indirect object follows the direct object. This gives the basic pattern:

  Subject – Verb – Direct object – Indirect object

Example:

  e·vaethor ón e·ledil eni chothron = "the warrior gave the key ‹to the› captain"

• Subject: the warrior
• Verb: gave
• Direct object: the key
• Indirect object: to the captain

This pattern can be called S-V-DO-IO or SVO for short (DO and IO are merged into O "object".)

SVO is the standard and only basic word order explicitly described for Sindarin. Yet there are exceptions.

Behaviour and exceptions

The indirect object may be moved

The indirect object is often marked by a preposition, giving it flexible placement.

  an Edain ónen estel               = "to the Edain ‹I gave› hope"
  eni chothron e·vaethor ón e·ledil = "‹to the› captain the warrior gave the key"

The direct object is marked by lenition

The direct object undergoes soft mutation whether it appears after the verb or is fronted for emphasis. Because of this mutation marking, the direct object also has limited freedom to move.

  im Narvi hain echant

  san  → "that", singular
  sain → "those", plural of san
  hain → "those", mutated form of sain

  Literal translation:
  
  myself Narvi those made

The imperative has its own word order

The Sindarin imperative is used for commands and for the expression of a wish (cuio i·Pheriain anann = "live the Halflings long"). It follows VOS.

In the imperative, the subject follows the verb, and the verb always appears at the beginning of the phrase.

See more details at the imperative section of the page. Example:

  pedo mellon            = "speak, friend"
  edro en·annon, Aragorn = "open the gate, Aragorn"

Examples

Other word order patterns

Adjective After Noun

Unlike English, adjectives follow the nouns they modify rather than preceding them. This is one of the major differences from English word order.

  bas ilaurui = "daily bread" (lit.) "bread daily"

Genitive (Possessive) After Noun

Genitive expressions place the possessing/qualifying noun after the primary noun, in the same position as adjectives.

  aran Moria = "king [of] Moria"

Compound Words: Modified + Modifier

In compounds, the modifying element typically appears after the element being modified, following the adjective-after-noun pattern.

  aeluin = "blue lake" → ael "lake" + luin "blue"

Preposition Before Noun

Like English, prepositions precede the noun phrase they qualify.

  n'orod = "to the mountain"

Relative Pronoun Before Subordinate Clause

Relative pronouns precede their subordinate clauses, similar to English structure.

  en·adan i padrast = "the man who walked"

2.5 Adverbs

An adverb is a word that modifies a verb, an adjective, or another adverb, usually by describing how, when, where, or to what extent something happens. For example, in "she spoke softly," "softly" tells us how she spoke.

Adjectives as adverbs

Sindarin possesses a handful of "true adverbs" (e.g. mae "well", palan "far", sí "here", hí "now"); however, it also employs adjectives adverbially, but only when the adjective can plausibly describe the subject of the verb.

So for example, when Glorfindel says noro lim "run swift", in The Lord of the Rings, he is using an adjective, "swift", which can only be used if the subject (in this case Asfaloth, a horse) can be swift.

When the adjective can't apply to the subject, Sindarin instead uses prepositional formations, as for example in anann "for long."

General rules of adverbs

The adverb's position is flexible for emphasis.

Where an adverb precedes a verb, the verb goes through soft mutation.

  Maglor eno badra vi Ennor = "Maglor still walks in Middle-earth"
  padra- > padra > badra

Adverbs following verbs are not lenited:

  Maglor reniast palan vi Ennor = "Maglor wandered far in Middle-earth"

Adverbs modifying adjectives precede and lenit these adjectives:

  o menel palan-diriel = "from heaven far-gazing"
  tiriel > diriel

Adverbs modifying a noun probably undergo soft mutation, so:

  en·ost vae-garnen = "the well-made city"

  "well" = mae
  "made" = carnen > garnen

Adjectives acting as adverbs are not lenited either:

  lhûth bennas bregol or then = "[a] spell fell suddenly over him"

Known adverbs

2.6 Negation

Negation is a controversial topic because Tolkien kept changing his mind on how it worked.

There are two chief forms of negation in Sindarin: u-negation and la-negation.

There's also an interjection baw and a verb pen- to express lack of something.

Brief explanation

Basically, u-negation began in early Sindarin as the negative prefix ú- with a "bad/unpleasant" sense.

Later on, Tolkien came up with the la-negation from primitive syllabic [ḷ], which appeared as prefixes like il- or al- meaning "no/not" or "opposite". Then it largely disappeared and then re-emerged in the 1930s as al- "no, not", which survived in alfirin "immortal".

After The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien briefly rejected u-negation, restored la-negation for Quenya, then reinterpreted ú- as "bad/difficult/impossible", then reversed to traditional u-negation again, leaving la-negation without any Sindarin examples and its function mainly as a negative prefix of variable strength.

In the end, although not his latest idea of a negation paradigm, the la-negation is solid enough to be acceptable to be used along with u-negation. So the recommendation is to use both.

U-negation

U-negation is the most complete system known in Sindarin, originally the ú- served as the general verbal negator, inducing soft mutation, forming quasi-participles, creating adjectives of impossibility (with -ui), and underlying an archaic negative verb (ui / ûn) that could act as a negative copula.

This is the recommended paradigm for Neo-Sindarin when negating verbs.

The u-negation produces several distinct negative morphemes with different use cases. For example:

• A verbal negator ú- which (probably) works as a clitic.
  E.g. ú-chebin "I do not keep".
• A negative prefix ú-, which when attached to adjectives/participles simply negates or reverses their meaning.
  E.g. nodui "countable" × únodui "countless, uncountable".
• When attached to a noun it creates a noun or an adjective with a related negative meaning.
  E.g. carth "deed" × úgarth "trespass, misdeed"; talraph n. "stirrup" × udalraph adj. "stirrupless".
• There might also be a negative particle ú to negate the existence of a noun.

How to use u-negation

I recommend using u-negation with verbs. It is also possible to use with adjectives, but I prefer to reserve la-negation for those.

Simply prefix the word with ú-, and then apply soft mutation to it.

If the word starts on a vowel, we don't have any attested evidence, but the assumption is that úa-, úo- and úe- are preserved as is, and ú- + -i would render into ui- and ú- + -u would yield long ú-.

Verbs should simply become negative, and adjectives should have their meaning reversed.

  Verbs:

  beria- = "to protect"
  úveriant loss e·nîr = "‹s/he didn't protect› [the] snow man"

  ephola- = "to remember"
  úepholant e·beth = "‹s/he didn't remember› the word"

  ialla- = "to call"
  uiallannen gin = "‹I didn't call› you"

  Adjectives:

  bregol  = "quick", "sudden"
  úvregol = "delayed"

  aeg     = "sharp"
  úaeg    = "dull"

La-negation

Similarly to u-negation, the la-negation also produces distinct negative morphemes.

The la-negation mostly operates via the al- prefix, but it also manifests itself as a negative particle law.

Like u-negation, it can be used as a clitic verbal negator ló before consonants (ló-chebin) and law before vowels (law-aphon).

How to use la-negation

While it's still possible to use la-negation with verbs, there is not much evidence of it. It is best to limit its use to adjectives and as a particle for discourse.

Just like u-negation, simply prefix a word, particularly an adjective, with al-, and then apply soft mutation to the word.

    baradh = "steep"
  alvaradh = "not steep"

       nûr = "deep"
     alnûr = "shallow"

    bregol = "quick", "sudden"
  alvregol = "delayed"

       aeg = "sharp"
     alaeg = "dull"

The negative particle law can be used before the negated discourse, causing soft mutation:

  avant yrf, law dâd, ach neledh    = "‹he ate› apples, not two, but three"
  law ill hain idh·reniar líthennin = "not all those who wander [are] lost"

Negation of volition

While the u-negation and la-negation both are concerned with negation of facts, there is a different way to express negation of volition, known as "baw-negation," due to its origin from the root √BĀ/ABA.

This root actually yields two forms of negation.

The first form is baw, derived from the verb boda-, meaning "to ban, prohibit". It is an interjection used to emphatically express refusal, used as "don't!" or "no!"

The second form is avo, which comes from avad, meaning "refusal, reluctance". Avo is simply used to express a negative command. Its prefixed form is av-, but it can also be suffixed with pronominal endings: avon "I won't", avof "we won't".

Commands addressed to others use avo, followed by the regular imperative verb to express command: avo vado! "don't eat!"

How to use baw-negation

For refusing things, use baw as interjection. For prohibiting someone, use avo plus imperative:

  Lindir:  Gliro e·'laer ad!         = "Recite the poem again!"
  Legolas: Baw! Si mboe annin lored. = "No! I must sleep now."

  Elendil: Iuithathon e·'wachaedir ad... = "I will use the palantír again..."
  Elrond:  Baw! Avo apho e·'wachaedir!   = "Don't! Do not touch the palantír!"

Note that avo can be inflected as a regular verb:

  avon mened = "I won't go"
  avo saedad = "he won't teach"
  avof       = "we won't"

Expressing lack of something

To express the lack of a thing, Sindarin has a word pen. It's a versatile term, it can behave as a prefix, as a preposition, and as a verb.

Again, similarly to u-negation and la-negation, one may use the prefix pen- and mutate the following word to achieve a sense similar to English suffix "-less". Examples:

  penbed     = pen + ped    = "unpronounceable"
  pennod     = pen + nod    = "countless"
  pennoediad = pen + nœdiad = "innumerable"

To use as a verb, the stem is pen-:

  penif vast = "‹we lack› bread"
  penin inc  = "‹I lack› [an] idea"
  pên vlaud  = "‹he lacks› pride"

Negative concord

Negative concord describes systems where multiple negative elements in a clause express a single semantic negation rather than cancelling each other out.

For example, in French ils n'ont compris aucun mot "they didn't understand any word", both ne and aucun contribute to one negation.

Sindarin seem to provide this mechanic in quantificational negation (see below.)

  úhenianner ú-beth o lam i·Naugrim = "‹they didn't understand› no word from [the] language [of] the Naugrim"

Linguistics of negation

Negation comes in different types. In real-world languages, some types may be natural, possible but unproductive, ungrammatical or semantically odd. We don't have much context to understand how the different types of negation hold in Sindarin, so we might assume all of them work. Yet we can draw from the main inspirations of Sindarin to guess which would be more productive if we had the means to measure it.

Romance languages, English, Welsh and Hebrew, for example, seem to all favour clausal negation and reject nominal negation. So for example, negating a verb is quite common, but negating a noun sounds odd ("not dog", "not water").

The following classification is based on how these languages handle negation:

Clausal (sentential) negation

Negates an entire proposition. Clausal negation is verb-centred: the negative marker scopes over the finite verb, not over individual nouns or adjectives. This way, negation attaches to predication:

  úagammen = "‹I didn't jump›"
  Aragorn úlastant e·rom = "Aragorn ‹didn't hear› the trumpet"
  Gondor úmbaura aran    = "Gondor ‹doesn't need› [a] king"

This type of negation is documented in Sindarin, I think it should be encouraged and I suggest using u-negation to achieve it.

Quantificational negation

This is a negation expressed via negative quantifiers. It causes negative concords (see above.)

  úavannen allad         = "‹I didn't eat› nothing"
  alphen avant allad     = "nobody ate nothing"
  Aragorn úlastant allad = "Aragorn ‹didn't hear› nothing"

I would suggest using u-negation with the verbs, and la-negation with quantifiers.

Pragmatic / corrective negation

Discourse-level negation, often corrective. This is a negation used to reject or revise an assumption in discourse, rather than to deny the truth of a proposition.

  sunc law miruvor, ach nen    = "‹s/he drank› not mead, but water"
  te law e·gallon i mbaurasseb = "he [is] not the hero we need"

I suggest using law as the negative particle.

Lexical / morphological negation

This kind of negation is built into the word via morphology (not syntax.)

It's very productive in English and Hebrew, a bit limited in Romance languages, and not very productive in Welsh. We can probably extend into Sindarin.

  alhael   = "unwise"
  alnadren = "unreal"
  alfar    = "insufficient"
  pennod   = "without count"
  penestel = "hopeless"

Sindarin seem to be mechanically ready for this kind of negation, I prefer to use la-negation with it, but I think the prefix pen- can also create lexical negation. Still, I think it should be limited in scope and used carefully.

Constituent negation

This is a negation that targets a specific phrase inside a clause, rather than negating the whole proposition. Only one element is excluded or corrected.

While productive in English, it's limited in Romance, Welsh and Hebrew.

  te ú farthannen  = "he [is] not satisfied"
  i·maethyr ú fair = "the warriors [were] not ready"

Don't confuse this with lexical negation. In the sentence, the words ú and farthannen are separate on purpose. Merging them into úfarthannen "unsatisfied", or alfarthannen, causes it to morph into a lexical negation.

I think constituent negation sounds odd and should be avoided in favour of lexical negation.

Nominal negation

Nominal negation negates reference, the thing itself. It's not very productive in any of the languages analysed. An example in English could be: "not dog". Yet English may use prefixes that achieve a similar result via lexical negation: "non-sense", "non-issue". English also uses quantificational negation: "no dog", "no water".

It is possible, but its uses are limited.

  da estel bîn [...] athen, ach law alestel = "there is little hope [...] for him, yet not ‹no hope›"
    - The Fellowship of the Ring, chapter 2

Negative correlative coordination

A negative correlative coordination is a construction where two or more constituents are linked by paired or repeated elements that jointly express negation.
In English that looks like "neither ... nor."

Sindarin seem to lack any kind of negative coordinating conjunction that allows this kind of construction.

Hebrew also lacks a single paired morpheme equivalent to the ones in Romance languages. Coordination in Hebrew is achieved by repeating the negator and linking with the conjunction "and."

We can easily emulate Hebrew and create a similar construction in Sindarin:

  s/he neither eats nor drinks:
  úvâd ah úhôg              = "‹s/he doesn't eat› and ‹s/he doesn't drink›"

  neither the father nor the mother:
  law en·adar a lhaw en·emel = "not the father and not the mother"

2.7 Yes and No

There are no examples of "yes" and "no" in the Sindarin corpus.

The general recommendation is to use the u-negation as a standalone word û for "no", and a neologism naw for "yes".

Naw is based on Quenya ná.

There is a case for using lá as a word for "no", but based on empirical experimentation (made in the Omentielva Conference) speaking Neo-Sindarin, people reportedly mistook yes for no too often to be considered a realistic choice.

2.8 Conjunctions

A conjunction is a part of speech that connects words, phrases, or clauses. It shows the relationship between the connected elements, such as addition, contrast, or cause.

It might overlap with other parts of speech.

There are only a handful of conjunctions attested in Sindarin, and a few neologisms:

Dealing with lists of things

Tolkien has stated that the placing the word "and" before the final item of a list represents a discontinuity in Quenya. (PE17/70–1)

The same concept applies to Sindarin, as can be observed in a version of the King's Letter from the early 1950s:

  Iorhael, Gelir, Cordof, Baravorn ionnath dîn = "Frodo, Merry, Pippin, Hamfast ‹his own› sons"

3.1 Overview

In Sindarin, when a preposition is used adverbially and follows immediately after a verb or the zero copula, it undergoes soft mutation.

Prepositions are generally proclitic, so e.g. mîn and trî and mîg can be shortened.

In both the singular and the plural, the definite article may appear as a suffix appended to prepositions in the forms -n and -in.

3.2 Prepositions of space

3.3 Prepositions of time

3.4 Prepositions of association, means, and possession

3.5 Prepositions of comparison

3.6 Prepositions of exclusion and opposition

4.1 Participle

Sindarin divides its participles into active participles and passive participles.

For intransitives or natural processes ("to grow", "to fall"), in a sentence like "the grown maiden", active participles are more adequate, because using the passive would wrongly imply an external agent (something "grew" the maiden).

The active participle is split into past and present participles. The passive participle has merged both functions into the past passive participle, so there's only one type.

Active participles

Sindarin has two active participles that behave like adjectives: a present/continuous participle in -ol and a past/perfective participle in -iel.

The present participle (-ol) historically comes from an ancient continuative marker combined with an active participial ending, giving the sense "currently doing."

The past participle (-iel) is derived from the old Common Eldarin perfect plus the same participial suffix, producing the sense "having done."

Tolkien originally used forms like tíriel as present participles, but later reinterpreted them as perfective ("having gazed"), and created new present forms (e.g., tiriel) to contrast with them. The result is a system where -ol marks ongoing action and -iel marks completed action, both ultimately descending from ancient participial formations.

Present Active Participle

Use present active participles as adjectives describing someone who is currently doing the action. Example:

  en·adan anu na vâr dín norol = "the man went to his house running"
  Aragorn, hennol barf, egin Voromir anglennol = "Aragorn, reading a book, saw Boromir approaching"

The mechanics of how to form it are simple:

Basic verbs

Add -ol to the verb stem.

  cen- → cenol = "seeing"
  car- → carol = "doing"
  nor- → norol = "running"

Derived verbs (ending in -a)

Replace -a with -ol:

   gala- → galol  = "growing"
  lasta- → lastol = "listening"
  tiria- → tiriol = "gazing"

Mutation

Participles behave like adjectives: they soft-mutate after a prefix (garol from carol after ú- → úgarol, rhugarol, etc.)

Past / Perfective Active Participle

Use past active participles as describing someone/something that has completed an action. Example:

  e·'wend 'óliel = "the maiden ‹has grown›"
  Aragorn, henniel e·dain, evin chestad Voromir - Aragorn, ‹having read› the letter, went to seek Boromir"

Basic verbs

Add -iel, with vowel-lengthening of the base vowel:

  car- → córiel = "having done"
  cen- → cíniel = "having seen"
  nor- → núriel = "having run"

Derived verbs (ending in -a/-ia)

Replace -a / -ia with -iel.

If the verb stem does not end in a consonant cluster, lengthen the base vowel.

If the stem does end in a cluster, no vowel lengthening - instead apply i-affection if expected:

   gala- → góliel
  tiria- → tíriel
  lasta- → lestiel
  ortha- → erthiel

Plural Forms

Most Neo-Sindarin practice do not pluralise active participles. Thus:

  adan norol  = "running man"
  edain norol = "running men"

Special Note: Short-vowel tiriel

  tíriel = past participle "having gazed"
  tiriel = present participle "gazing" (a special form created for poetic and phonological reasons).

This does not affect the general rules above.

Passive participles

Passive participles describe a state resulting from an action ("slain", "broken", "closed").

They are used as adjectives:

  en·adan nangen  = "the slain man" (from dag- [nd-])
  in·edain nengin = "the slain men"

Basic verbs

Passive participles do not use the (modern) past tense. They are always built from the ancient nasal-infixed past stem, which survives only in the passive.

The mechanic is rather phonetic: insert /n/ after the stem consonant and add -en; the exact result depends on the final consonant. Examples:

  Final consonant  Passive participle pattern  Example
  b                mm + en                     heb-   →  hemmen "kept"
  d                nn + en                     mad-   →  mannen "eaten"
  dh               nn + en                     badh-  →  bannen "judged"
  f/ph             mm + en                     raph-  →  rammen "seized"
  g                ng + en                     dag-   →  dangen "slain"
  l                ll + en                     hol-   →  hollen "closed"
  n                nn + en                     cen-   →  cennen "seen"
  r                rn + en                     tir-   →  tirnen "guarded"
  th               nn + en                     path-  →  pannen "smoothed"
  v                mm + en                     lav-   →  lammen "licked"
  w                usually nw → -nwen          gwae-  →  gwanwen "departed"

Derived verbs (ending in -nna)

These often collapse instead of forming -nnannen:

   onna- → onnen  "born"
  danna- → dannen "fallen"

Plural Forms

Passive participles agree in number with their noun. Attested examples:

  gwanwen → gwenwin
  onnen   → oennin (later ennin, Ebennin)

4.2 Personal pronoun paradigm

Sindarin has five basic sets of pronouns: independent, subject, object, dative and possessive:

                     Independent     Subject          Object         Dative             Possessive
  
    1st sg.          ni  I/me        -(o)n    I       nin  me        annin  to me       nín  my/mine
    2nd sg.          ci  thou        -(o)g    thou    cin  thou      angin  to thee     cín  thy/thine
    2nd sg. (polite) le  you         -(o)l    you     len  you       allen  to you      lín  your(s)
    3rd sg.          te  he/she      -        he/she  ten  him/her   anden  to him/her  tín  its/his/her(s)

    1st pl. excl.    me  we/us       -(o)f    we      men  us        ammen  to us       mín  our(s)
    1st pl. incl.    pe  we/us       -(o)b    we      pen  us        amben  to us       pín  our(s)
    2nd pl.          de  you         -(o)dhir you     den  you       anden  to you      dín  your(s)
    3rd pl.          ti  they/them   -r       they    tin  them      andin  to them     tín  their(s)

    Reflexive        im  self        -                -              anim   to self     în   * own

Independent and subject pronouns were already explained earlier in this page.

Handling ambiguity with independent pronouns

Independent pronouns do what it says on the tin: they are independent words that precede the verb. They are not used in Sindarin unless strictly necessary.

There is no grammatical gender in Sindarin, so the third person singular can be ambiguous. The problem has to be solved the same way a language like Finnish handles it. Example:

  Thingol looked at her. She spoke no word.

That would be translated to:

  Thingol egin na den. Te úagarfant û beth.

In this example, te can mean both Thingol or the woman he looked at. In the story we know by context the woman is Melian, but the second sentence is still ambiguous. To fix it the subject needs to be explicit:

  Thingol egin na den. Melian úagarfant û beth. = "Thingol looked at her. Melian spoke no word."

Subject pronouns

The subject form is a suffix used with verbs that do not have an explicit noun as a subject.

The (o) in the pronoun list above indicates that derived verbs change their final a to o as in:

  en·adan anna = "the man gives"
               vs
         annon = "I give"

Object pronouns

The object forms are most often used for direct objects of verbs. That means it goes through the usual soft mutation.

Object pronouns are also known as oblique pronouns.

They are also used as the object of prepositions and imperatives.

  Lúthien mabent din  = "Lúthien asked them" (tin)
  Thingol egin na den = "Thingol looked at him/her/it" (ten)
  dambedo nin!        = "Answer me"

Dative pronouns

Sindarin has a few attested words that play the role of dative pronouns. They are the preposition an + the object pronoun, which goes through mixed mutation. The reflexive pronoun is also used.

  ón annin                      "‹he gave› to me"
  guren bêd annin               "‹my heart› tells [to] me"
  annon edhellen, edro hi ammen "elvish gate, open now for us"
  ú-chebin estel anim           "I have kept no hope for myself"

You may notice that the dative pronouns have collisions. For example, anden can mean "to him/her/it" and "to you" (plural). That is acceptable and disambiguated by context. It's common for languages to have collisions in pronouns. Check, for example, English you, German sie/Sie and Italian lei.

Possessive pronouns

See 5.2 Possessive below.

4.3 Demonstratives

Demonstrative pronouns are words like "this," "that," "these," and "those" that point to specific things or people, replacing nouns in a sentence. Demonstrative adjectives use the same words but modify nouns instead. In English they appear directly before the nouns ("this book", "those men"), and in Sindarin they appear after the nouns.

In English the demonstrative object pronouns and demonstrative adjectives are the same, and most Neo-Sindarin writers assume this is also true of Sindarin.

We have very little evidence of demonstrative pronouns in Sindarin, but the Moria inscription has two of them. A somewhat complete paradigm can be guessed based on those.

Similarly to the paradigm used for dative personal pronouns, Fiona Jallings suggests using the preposition an as prefix for demonstrative datives. For more information on how these pronouns came to be, check Eldamo.

I think that's a good idea, but while Fiona and Paul Strack use nasal mutation when deriving these words, I think we should stick to mixed mutation instead. (This is why it looks different here.)

                   Independent   Object/Adjective  Dative

  near   singular  se  "this"    sen  "this"       anhen  "to this"
  remote singular  sa  "that"    san  "that"       anhan  "to that"
  near   plural    si  "these"   sin  "these"      anhin  "to these"
  remote plural    sai "those"   sain "those"      anhain "to those"

Examples:

4.4 Interrogative

Questions in Sindarin simply look like regular indicative statements with a questioning intonation, the same way many Romance languages deal with it.

  e·vrôg vorg  = "the bear [is] big"
  e·vrôg vorg? = "[is] the bear big?"

Interrogative pronouns

There are no attested forms of interrogative pronouns, except for ma/man in the mysterious Túrin Wrapper:

  man agorech? = "what have we done?"

Most Neo-Sindarin writers assume ma/man can mean both "what" and "who".

A paradigm for Neo-Sindarin interrogative pronouns has been proposed by Fiona Jallings and improved by Paul Strack.

The words are formed by using the question word ma/man, prefixed with prepositions. The result is thus:

  an  + man = amman "for what, why"
  mi  + man = mivan "in/at what, where"
  na  + man = navan "at/to what, where, whither"
  o   + man = oman  "from what, whence" (use stop mutation)
  mo  + man = movan "by means of what, how"
  man + lû  = mallú "what time, when"

Eldarin languages have wh-movement. Wh-movement is a syntactic process in which a wh-word (e.g. who, what, which, where, why) is displaced from its original position to the front of a clause, typically to form a question or a relative clause. Examples:

• Declarative: You saw what.
• With wh-movement: What did you see?

Therefore, the reconstructed pronouns are typically positioned at the start of the sentences.

Object mutation shouldn't apply to these pronouns. There are a couple of reasons for that, but the most important one is because mutations are triggered by syntactic relations, and wh-words don't fit the expected relation that triggers mutations.

If the question with the pronoun happens to be a subordinate question, just use commas. (The meaning changes slightly.) Example:

  man cenig min feleg?     = "what ‹you see› ‹in the› cave?"
  cenig, man da min feleg? = "‹you see›, what is ‹in the› cave?"

Examples of other pronouns:

4.5 Relative Pronouns

Attested forms of relative pronouns are scant: we have i, ai, and ir.

Of these, the only one that seem consistent enough for use on Neo-Sindarin is i, which has the meaning of "that", "who(m)", "which."

The other two are questionable. For example, ir had a Quenya equivalent íre that was replaced by yá. Everything else are, naturally, Neo-Sindarin reconstructions.

Restrictiveness

The relative clause in Sindarin sometimes causes soft mutation or nasal mutation, depending on plurality, and sometimes it doesn't. While the reason why that happens is unknown, the best hypothesis is because of restrictiveness.

A restrictive relative clause gives essential information about the noun. Without it, the meaning changes. Example:

The book that recounts the tale is thick. (We need the clause to know which book.)

In the other hand, a non-restrictive relative clause adds extra, non-essential information. The sentence still makes sense without it. These clauses are usually set off with commas.

The king, who lives in Armenelos, went to Lindon. (The clause just adds extra detail; we already know which king.)

So, the mutation only occurs when the clause is a restrictive relative clause.

And it should cause no mutation when it's a non-restrictive relative clause.

Examples:

  Restrictive singular (mutates):

  en·barf i drenar e·bent dûg = "the book that recounts the tale [is] thick"
  
  Restrictive plural (mutates):

  in·pherf i threnerir e·bent duig = "the books that recount the tale [are] thick"

  Non-restrictive (no mutation):

  en·aran, i bâr vi Armenelos, evin an Lindon = "the king, who lives in Armenelos, went to Lindon"

Recommendation

To fill the gap in relative pronouns, it's suggested one use relative pronouns derived from CE ✶ya with case endings, largely paralleling Quenya.

Note that the primitive y yields an i in Sindarin. But that i doesn't behave as a vowel. In this case we parallel it to a j instead, and there's a class of pronouns known as "j-pronouns".

"The j-pronouns developed naturally into relatives. In this use the bare vocalic form i was most used in Eldarin; or else the bare vowels: e personal, a impersonal." - PE23/114

Based on Quenya, the following pronouns can be deduced:

  Subject/object relative: i

  When ...:  io ⪤ Q. yá
  Where ..: ias ⪤ Q. yasse
  Whence .: ias
  Whither : ias or...
  Whither : ian ~ Q. yanna
  How ....: ial ~ Q. yalle
  To whom : ian (dative)

Examples:

  Which:
  sad i aen nî belt = "[a] place which should be strong"

  When:
  io Ardhon bân aw îdh = "when [the] World all had peace"

  Where:
  Sarn Athrad, ias oeth chídas ab = "Sarn Athrad, where battle after happened"

  Whence:
  in·Edhil istasser ias te odul = "The elves knew whence he came"

  Whither:
  in·Edhil istasser ias te evin = "The elves knew whither he went"
  in·Edhil istasser ian te evin = "The elves knew whither he went"

  How:
  Thingol 'erias o ial adabatha anim mbâr = "Thingol pondered about how ‹he will build› [him]self [a] dwelling"

  To whom:
  Thingol, ian i·Naugrim agórer Venegroth = "Thingol, ‹to whom› the Dwarves made Menegroth"

4.6 Comparative

Comparative grammar is not well attested nor described in Sindarin, but a methodology has been developed to achieve such an effect.

The way to compare things in Neo-Sindarin involves using intensive and superlative prefixes. This system has been first proposed by Thorsten Renk, and it has been polished by Fiona Jallings and Paul Strack.

Intensive

To build an intensive adjective, we use the prefix an-. This prefix modifies the word in the following ways:

• If the original word starts on a consonantal i-, the prefix changes to ein- and the rest goes through i-affection
• If the original word has a regular -i-, the prefix goes through i-affection
• Otherwise, use nasal mutation
• Then add medial development

Here is it in action:

Superlative

To build a superlative adjective, we use the prefix ro-. The process is similar to intensive, yet much simpler:

• Use soft mutation
• Add medial development

Examples:

Comparisons

These intensive and superlative words work just like regular adjectives.

To make a comparison, use the preposition athar (beyond):

  Aragorn veleg athar Boromir    = "Aragorn [is] strong beyond Boromir"    = "stronger"
  Aragorn ammeleg athar Boromir  = "Aragorn [is] stronger beyond Boromir"  = "much stronger"
  Aragorn roveleg athar Boromir  = "Aragorn [is] strongest beyond Boromir" = "way stronger"

  Galadriel hael athar Elrond    = "Galadriel [is] wise beyond Elrond"   = "wiser"
  Galadriel anhael athar Legolas = "Galadriel [is] wiser beyond Legolas" = "much wiser"
  Melian rohael athar Galadriel  = "Melian [is] wisest beyond Galadriel" = "way wiser"

5.1 Genitive

In grammar, a genitive construction or genitival construction is used to express a relation between two nouns such as the possession of one by another, or an attributive relationship. A genitive construction involves two nouns, the head (or modified noun) and the dependent (or modifier noun).

Sindarin's most used style of genitive constructions is by juxtaposition, similar to Hebrew.

Juxtapositional genitives

These function adjectivally and hence the modifying noun is always indefinite.

Juxtapositional genitives are always used for nouns in apposition, that is, two nouns referencing the same thing:

  "ost Minas Tirith" = "city [of] Minas Tirith"

Definiteness (final noun rules)

Unlike in English, where each noun may independently bear definiteness, in Sindarin only the final noun in a construct chain determines the definiteness of the entire phrase.

  bâr aran    - "a king's house" (indefinite)
  bâr en·aran – "the king's house" (definite)
  bâr erain   - "a house of kings" (plural genitive)

Multi-noun construct chains

Sindarin allows extended construct chains, where multiple nouns are stacked to create complex phrases.

  parf inias ionnath Elros — "[the] book [of] [the] annals [of] [the] sons [of] Elros"

Notice that, because "Elros" is a proper noun, it's considered definite. Because it's the last item in the chain, all other nouns are also definite.

Here, the construct has an internal hierarchical structure:

  parf ─────────────────┐
  │ inias ────────────┐ │
  │ │  ionnath Elros  │ │
  │ └─────────────────┘ │
  └─────────────────────┘

The first element of the chain is called the head noun. It means the primary thing in the chain, the thing we are actually talking about. The other nouns are qualifiers or possessors. They add more information about the preceding noun.

In this example, the head noun is the book. The construct sequence spans three levels:

  parf    ‹...› – the book   of ‹something› - head noun: we are talking about a book
  inias   ‹...› – the annals of ‹something› - qualifier of the book
  ionnath Elros – the sons   of Elros       - qualifier of the annals

"Elros" is also a qualifier or possessor. It's the "possessor" of "the sons", in this case.

Adjectives with a construct chain

Such constructions are semantically rich but syntactically rigid. Any adjective modifying the chain must follow the entire construct and agree in number with the element it refers to.

If there is any ambiguity, adjectives by default are interpreted as referring to the head noun. For example:

  brûn = "old"

  parf inias ionnath Elros vrûn = "[the] old book [of] [the] annals [of] [the] sons [of] Elros"
  
  brûn refers to parf - the head noun

However, if syntactic agreement can indicate that the adjective actually refers to another element, that removes the ambiguity:

  beren = "brave" (singular) - plural berin

  aglar maethyr en·aran verin = "[the] glory [of] [the] brave warriors [of] the king"

Because berin is plural, so it could only refer to maethyr (warriors), which is also plural.

Semantics can also disambiguate the chain. Example:

  bar en·aran luin  = "[the] blue house of the king"
  bar en·aran istui = "[the] house of the learned king"

If ambiguity persists and the adjective seems to wrongly refer to the head noun, it needs rephrasing.

Multiple adjectives

Multiple adjectives are also possible, and they should show up after the chain and in reverse order. As always, they should agree with their modified nouns.

  bar en·aran istui luin = "the blue house of the learned king"

Order matters:

  bar en·aran luin istui = "the learned house of the blue king"

To illustrate the reverse order of adjectives, let's re-use the first chain example and add adjectives:

  "the great book of the old annals of the valiant sons of noble Elros"

         parf veleg  = "great book"
       innias iaur   = "old annals"
      ionnath thelai = "valiant sons"
        Elros raud   = "noble Elros"

     parf inias ionnath Elros raud thelai iaur beleg

       parf ──────────────────────────────────┐
       │   inias ─────────────────────────┐   │
       │   │   ionnath ───────────────┐   │   │
       │   │   │      Elros raud      │   │   │
       │   │   └──────────────── thelai   │   │
       │   └────────────────────────── iaur   │
       └───────────────────────────────── beleg

While that's possible, it's clear it becomes more and more confusing the more noun-adjective pairs are added, therefore this kind of complex construction should be discouraged.

Interruption rules (prohibition), ambiguity and stylistic workarounds

One of the strict features of the construct chain is that it must be uninterrupted. Unlike in English, where modifiers may separate the head noun from its genitive, Sindarin discourages such insertions. An adjective or demonstrative must follow the entire chain.

  Preferred:
  roch aran vaer = "a good horse of a king"

  Highly stylised/poetic:
  roch vaer aran = "a good horse of a king"

This syntactic rigidity causes ambiguity if the adjective or demonstrative is applicable to multiple nouns. Sindarin normally relies on context or emphasis rather than rearrangement to solve that. A few workarounds may serve as reference:

  If the horse is good

  Standard:
  roch aran vaer = "[a] good horse [of] [a] king"

  Ungrammatical:
  maer roch aran = "good [is] [a] horse [of] [a] king"

  Prepositional genitives can prevent ambiguity:
  roch vaer nan aran = "[a] good horse ‹of a› king"

  If the King is good

  Prepositional genitives:
  roch nan aran vaer = "[a] horse ‹of a› good king"

  Relative pronouns:
  roch aran, i vaer = "[a] horse [of] [a] king, who [is] good"

Prepositional genitives

Prepositional genitives were very common before PE23's CEA was introduced in 2024. Among the prepositions were en and in, which are now considered simply definite articles in juxtapositional genitive chains. The last prepositions to be used as a genitive marker are the partitive na(n) preposition and the origin preposition o, both described above.

Partitive na(n)

Partitive is when a thing is part of something, e.g. "three of my friends".

The na(n) preposition can mark a genitive as long as the relationship of the nouns matches its description. Tolkien himself described na(n) as such:

na, before vowels nan (nasal mutation), means "with" in sense of possessing, provided with, especially of characteristic feature. Orod na Thôn "Mount of the Pine Tree(s)".

Tolkien contrasted a juxtapositional genitive aran cîr lim (no mutation) with a prepositional genitive aran na chîr lim "king of swift ships". He also compared the genitival preposition na "with, of", causing nasal mutation, with the allative preposition na "to, toward", causing soft mutation. So na thaur means "of a forest" while na daur meand "to a forest".

The na(n) preposition should always be indefinite and limited to partitive and compositional relationships. (It can precede an article, however.)

While the sense could be mostly the same, one advantage of using prepositions is that it can break genitive chains and allow more readability, for example, when using adjectives:

  Juxtapositional genitive:
  mellon en·aran vaer hael      = "the wise friend of the good king"
  (lit.) "friend the king good wise"

  Prepositional genitive:
  mellon hael nan en·aran vaer  = "the wise friend of the good king"
  (lit.) "friend wise of the king good"

Genitive chains, prepositions, and zero copula

When using prepositions to form complex sentences, genitive chains may force the prepositions into an indefinite state because the chain itself holds definiteness. For example, the sentence:

  "made by the friends of the elves"

Would be formed like this:

  carnen vo vellyn in·edhil

Note how there is no article between mo and mellyn. That's because mellyn in·edhil functions as a single structure: in·edhil is definite, so the whole chain is definite. This means it doesn't require an article.

Adding an article to the sentence triggers the zero copula (which doesn't make sense):

  carnen voen mellyn in·edhil = "made ‹by the› friends [are] the elves"

Another example:

  Faramir choen aran      = "Faramir [is] ‹before the› king"
  Faramir cho aran Gondor = "Faramir [is] before [the] king [of] Gondor"

Gondor is definite, and so is aran. This is why we use ho and not hoen.

5.2 Possessive

The possessive construction in Sindarin follows the same standard to the genitive, and the possessor needs to be at the end of the chain. Example:

  dring Celebrimbor = "[the] hammer [of] Celebrimbor"

When there is no proper noun for the possessor, the possessive pronouns come into play.

  e·dhring dín      = "his hammer"

Possessive pronouns

Sindarin has a set of possessive pronouns that seem to be very similar to, and possibly based on, the forms of independent pronouns.

Most examples are from a single source, Tolkien's translation of Lord's Prayer into Sindarin, Ae Adar Nín, from the 1950s.

Based on these, it seems the possessive pronoun is formed by: a) adding n to the independent pronoun; and b) lengthening the base vowel, with the caveat that the long ē became ī as was usual in Sindarin’s phonetic history.

Thus the following paradigm can be constructed:

                        Singular                   Plural
  1st person            nín  "my/mine"             mín "our/ours"
  2nd person familiar   cín  "thy/thine"                 
  2nd person polite     lín  "thy/thine (polite)"  dín "your/yours"
  3rd person            tín  "his/her(s)/its"      tín "their/theirs"

In all attested uses of the Sindarin possessive pronouns, they follow the possessed noun and undergo soft mutation like adjectives do, which means they almost always appear in mutated form.

Unlike English, the possessed noun is also preceded by the definite article.

  e·higil nín = "my (nín) knife (sigil)" = (lit.) "the knife my"
  e·degil dín = "his (tín) pen (tegil)"

There doesn't seem to be any difference using a "to be" statement and an attribution statement. This is a debated topic among Neo-Sindarin enthusiasts, but one hypothesis is that a statement of attribution should not be different from a statement of predication in this particular case, since both translate more or less the same idea. To disambiguate, perhaps the same can be done to the pronoun as if it were an adjective, and be positioned before the thing possessed for emphasis.

  e·gorf nín  = "my ring"
  e·gorf nín  = "the ring is mine"
  nín e·gorf! = "the ring is mine!" (emphatic)

More adventurous enthusiasts might want to check David Salo's "to be" verb reconstruction for another way of disambiguating. Most Neo-Sindarin writers would not encourage a standalone "to be" verb, however, as it's not attested and thus considered a fan invention.

Using adjectives in possessive constructions

To use adjectives, simply put the adjective after the noun as usual, and before the possessive pronoun:

  mellon rovaer nín = "my best friend" = "friend best mine" (lit.)

5.3 Imperative

The Sindarin imperative always ends with -o. The suffix -o comes from an ancient imperative particle ā, which became ō > o and fused with the verb.

The imperative is used for:

• Commands — noro! "run!"
• Requests or exhortations — pedo! "speak!"
• Wishes/benedictions — cuio i Pheriain anann "may the Halflings live long"
• Negative commands — avo garo! "don't do it"

The imperative always appears at the beginning of the clause, even for wish-style constructions.

Basic verbs

To form the imperative on basic verbs, simply add -o to the verb stem:

  ped- → pedo = "speak!"
  nor- → noro = "run!"
  tir- → tiro = "look/watch!"

Derived verbs

To form the imperative on derived verbs, simply change the final -a to -o:

  minna- → minno "enter!"
  lasta- → lasto "listen!"
  linna- → linno "sing!"

Negative Imperative

The standard negative command is avo, which comes from avad, meaning "refusal, reluctance".

Read more about it in the "baw negation" section of this page.

Simply use avo + imperative verb to make it negative. The negative can also fuse into a prefixed form:

  avo vado! — "don't eat!"
  avo garo! — "don't do [it]!"
  avgaro!   — "don't do [it]!"

The word avo is an adverb, and verbs that follow adverbs are lenited.

5.4 Passive voice

Sindarin does not have a dedicated passive verb form, unlike Quenya. Instead, two strategies appear in Tolkien's writings:

• Using 3rd person plural
• Using passive participle predicatively

3rd person plural

The 3rd person is used for impersonal verbs the same way it's used for passive voice.

This impersonal verbs mechanic is used in Romance languages because of "implied subject". For example, in Portuguese the word chove means "it's raining", and it's simply the verb chover "to rain" in the third person, with no subject.

The same logic applies in Sindarin: uil = "[it] rains".

Sindarin goes one step further and makes use of the third person to create a passive voice:

  te sennui Panthael estathar aen = "he should be called Fullwise"
                             (lit.) "he rather Fullwise ‹they will call› should"

This can be a rather confusing example, but here's another:

  golthathar den aen = "he should be taught"  = (lit.) "‹they will teach› him should"

Passive participle

Read more about the participle in the section above.

This has been sparsely attested, but Tolkien did analyse mae govannen as meaning "well met" with govannen functioning as a passive participle. From this, many Neo-Sindarin writers assume the structure:

  en·adan dhangen = "the man (is) slain"

Applying Paul Strack's past and future copula, this can be used for past and future passive voice:

  en·adan nî dhangen    = "the man was slain"
  en·adan tho dhangen   = "the man will be slain"
  en·adan natho dhangen = "the man will be slain" (alt.)

5.5 Modal constructions

In English, modal verbs are auxiliary verbs that express possibility, ability, obligation, permission, or likelihood. The core set in modern English is: can, could, may, might, shall, should, will, would and must.

Sindarin has no direct equivalents to these English verbs. There are no one-word translations most of the time, and many constructions for modal equivalents don't even use verbs.

Instead, different strategies are used to translate from English into equivalents in Sindarin.

Ability and possibility

Sindarin has two verbs that can translate to English can:

pol- means to be able to do something as a literal truth, to have the possibility.

ista- means to have the knowledge or skill to do something, to understand it.

Advice & possibility

There is no distinction between could and should in Sindarin. There is an adverb that can point to a possibility: aen, used in the King's Letter.

This adverb uses the future tense.

Possibility & permission

Again, an adverb can probably fill in. ce should work the same way as aen, using the future tense.

Likelihood and intention

In English, the verb "will" is used as auxiliary to denote periphrastic future tense. The verb "shall" often plays the same role.

Of course, in a more classic English, "will" and "shall" had different meanings. "Will" denoting desire and "shall" denoting obligation. "I will" would mean something close to "I want to" and "I shall" something akin to "I have to".

In Sindarin, there is a real, morphological future tense. And there is a verb for "to will", nidh-. There is nothing strictly equivalent to "shall", but the declaring of the intention to do something can be expressed with this verb by using a verbal noun with it. This verb should not, however, be used for periphrastic future tense. Its meaning should be limited to intention as it would in Middle English.

(Remembering that "would" is the past tense of "will".)

Agreement and ellipses

There is another verb in Sindarin, highly defective, to express agreement: atha-.

It is translated to "[I/we] will": athon, athof, athab.

In a sentence like "he can play the piano, she can too", we don't describe what "she" can do. This omission in the sentence is called ellipsis of the verb. atha- is used for ellipses. Example:

  Legolas: Madathog e·mbast hen? = "Will you eat this bread?"
  Elrond:  Athon!                = "I will!"

Notice that the replier doesn't need the full description of the action.

Obligation

There is an impersonal verb that describes a need for something to happen, which is the best translation for "must": boe. It uses verbal noun and if it needs a pronoun, use a generic "it" or "they". The agent who is object of the need becomes an object of the verb. Use dative pronouns.

boe is probably defective and can't be conjugated. It's assumed to be always in the third person. We don't know whether it should inflect for plural, probably not.

6.1 Additional verb classes

Half-strong verbs

Sindarin has a minor class of verbs called half-strong verbs.

Half-strong verbs are a subclass of derived verbs whose past-tense formation preserves patterns inherited from Common Eldarin and Quenya half-strong verbs. The evidence is limited but consistent.

These verbs were originally derived causative verbs formed with the suffix -ta (Common Eldarin -tā). Their past tense was created not with a regular dental suffix, but by strengthening or infixing the root, producing forms with -nt-.

One of the best evidences is the verb tangad(a)-, meaning "to make firm, confirm" (< ✶tankāta-), from Noldorin (1930s). It's present tense is tangod and its past tense is tangant. Sindarin still have traces of this system in several ways.

A more recent verb in the Sindarin development that serve as example of a causative half-strong verb is the verb covad(a)-, meaning "to make meet". Present covad and past covant. This mirrors the Noldorin pattern and demonstrates that the class survived into Sindarin.

Some general properties of half-strong verbs are:

• They are derived verbs
• They are typically causative
• They are formed historically with -tā (S. ending –da/-tha/-a in later forms)
• Their past tense formed by strengthening the root, giving -nt

Example of a half-strong verb:

  tangad(a)- (to make firm, to confirm)

  1st person - tangadan    - I confirm
  2nd person - tangadag    - thou confirmest
  2nd person - tangadal    - thou confirmest
  2nd person - tangadadh   - thou confirmest
  3rd person - tangod      - he/she confirms

  1st person - tangadaf    - we confirm
  2nd person - tangadagir  - you confirm
  2nd person - tangadadhir - you confirm
  3rd person - tangadar    - they confirm

6.2 Past tense

Past tense in Sindarin is highly irregular, because it can derive from Common Eldarin and other morphological changes depending on the verb.

Basic verbs

Basic verbs form their past in two main ways, depending on the verb:

• Via vocalic augment + vowel mutation; or
• Nasal-infixion

Past with vocalic augment + vowel mutation

This is used for many basic verbs (especially those not ending in b/d/g). The basic mechanism is this:

• Add a vocalic augment (usually a-, sometimes e- depending on the base vowel).
• The base vowel is lengthened and undergoes its usual Sindarin change:
  • a → o
  • e → i
  • o → u
  • a → aw if the result becomes monosyllabic
• The consonant after the augment soft-mutates.

If the verb has a prefix, the augment may be omitted (e.g. echad- → echant instead of edachant).

If the uninflected past becomes monosyllabic, long ā → au, as in aul “grew” (though this one is technically a strong past of a derived verb).

Examples:

  car-  agor    "did/made"
  dew-  edíw    "failed"
  nor-  onur    "ran"
  sav-  aw      "had"
  bal-  aval    "had power"
  nidh- enidhen "I intended" (inflected)

Nasal-infixed pasts

This is used mainly for basic verbs whose roots originally ended in p, t, k, which become b, d, g in Sindarin. This is the mechanism:

• Insert a nasal (n/m) before the final consonant.
• Restore the ancient voiceless stop:
  • b → mp
  • d → nt
  • g → nc

Sometimes there are both nasal and augmented alternatives (e.g., dag- → aðag and aðanc).

Prefixes block augmentation (as above with echad- → echant).

Inflected forms may use joining vowels -e- or -i-, but the evidence is inconsistent (e.g., echannen, echanthel).

Examples:

  echad- echant "made"
  ped-   pent   "said"
  tag-   tanc   "fixed"
  cab-   agamp  "leapt" (implied)
  dag-   aðanc  "slew" (alternating with augmented aðag)
  caw-   cawn   "tasted"

Recommendation

Use nasal infixion if the stem ends in b, d, g (from ancient p, t, k).

E.g. ped-, tag-, echad-, cab-.

Use augment + vowel mutation for most other stems.

E.g. car-, dew-, nor-, nidh-, sav-, bal-.

Derived verbs are more complicated because the past tense varies whether the verb is transitive or intransitive, has a strong past tense or half-strong.

Strong past tense

Strong pasts are rare, and only two Sindarin cases are attested: anna- and gala-.

They are irregular, mirroring similar irregularities in Quenya and earlier stages of Elvish.

These verbs form their past tense not with the regular weak suffix -ant, but instead with an old strong past built directly from the verbal root. They both end in -a formed from an old root-based past that is inherited (e.g., ✶ānē → ōn).

No general pattern for these verbs can be provided.

• ōn "gave" violates expected Sindarin sound laws.
• aul "grew" is phonologically regular but treated as a special inherited form.

Besides the two verbs mentioned, we don't know which derived verbs have strong pasts. They are assumed to be irregular exceptions, not a productive pattern.

Transitive Verbs

Derived transitive verbs form their regular ("weak") past tense with the suffix -ant. This is the default and normal past-tense formation for this verb class.

It likely originated from half-strong causatives, but functionally it is simply the normal past ending.

If a derived verb takes a direct object → use -ant.

Some -ant forms show a vocalic augment (a-, e-, o-), but this is not required and is not shown in most examples. Example:

  carfa- "speak" → agarfant (augmented)
  
  but also expected:

  carfant (unaugmented — Tolkien deleted this form, but it shows the base pattern)

To form the past of a derived transitive verb:

• Take the verb stem (teitha-, r[a]itha-, carfa-, etc.)
• Add the suffix -ant
  Optionally:
  • add a vocalic augment (a-, e-, o-) before the stem (rare, not required)
• For pronoun endings:
  insert -e- before the pronoun
• Optionally: Add medial development

  Verb: tiria- (to watch)

  Add the suffix          = tiria-    → tiriant
  Inflecting for person
  Join with -e-           = tiriant   → tiriantel
  Add medial development  = tiriantel → tiriannel

  Verb: carfa- (to speak)

  Add the suffix          = carfa-   → carfant
  Add a vocalic augment   = carfant  → acarfant
  And mutate consonant    = acarfant → agarfant

Intransitive Verbs

Derived intransitive verbs form their regular past tense with the suffix -as.

A verb can take -as when it is used intransitively, even if it otherwise forms -ant when transitive. Thus, the classification depends on use, not the inherent nature of the verb.

To form intransitive past, the mechanism is:

• Take the verb stem (e.g., rhitha-, egledhia-, ista-)
• Add the suffix -as (optional spelling variation: -ast)
  
• For pronoun endings:
  insert -e- before the pronoun
• Optionally: Add medial development

  Verb: tiria- (to watch)

  Add the suffix          = tiria-   → tirias
  Inflecting for person
  Join with -e-           = tirias   → tiriasel
  Add medial development  = tiriasel → tiriassel

  Verb: muda- (to toil)

  Add the suffix          = muda-    → mudas
  Inflecting for person
  Join with -e-           = mudas    → mudasel
  Add medial development  = mudasel  → mudassel

There is a single example with an augment, which could, perhaps, be treated as irregular, for practical purposes:

  Verb: carfa- (to speak)

  Add the suffix          = carfa-    → carfas
  Add a vocalic augment   = carfas    → acarfas
  And mutate consonant    = acarfas   → agarfas
  Inflecting for person
  Join with -e-           = agarfas   → agarfasel
  Add medial development  = agarfasel → agarfassel

There is a mysterious category of half-strong past verbs that use the suffix -d(a) in their present stem (because they come from ancient -tā causatives), and form their past tense with nasal infixion (-nt).

These are the origin of the common transitive past suffix -ant, but half-strong verbs themselves don't use -ant — they use -nt directly. There is only one verb of this category attested in Sindarin, and 3 others attested in Noldorin.

The verbs are these:

  covad(a)- = "make meet" → past covant   "[made] met"
  lhimmid   = "moisten"   → past lhimmint "moistened, made moist"
  nimmid    = "whiten"    → past nimmint  "whitened, made white"

  and:
  eria-     = "rise"      → archaic half-strong past †oronte "arose"

  But eria- later became a regular intransitive past erias.

6.3 Future tense

There are two patterns for future tense: one for basic verbs and one for derived verbs. And they behave almost identically.

Basic verbs

If the verb ends on a consonant, simply use the stem with the suffix -atha. Then add the pronoun endings.

When you add pronominal endings, the final "a" mutates into "o", just like in other verb inflections, except on the third person. Example:

  car- (to do)

  1st person - carathon    - I will do
  2nd person - carathog    - thou wilt do
  2nd person - carathol    - thou wilt do
  2nd person - carathodh   - thou wilt do
  3rd person - caratha     - he/she will do

  1st person - carathof    - we will do
  2nd person - carathogir  - you will do
  2nd person - carathodhir - you will do
  3rd person - carathar    - they will do

Derived verbs

If the verb ends on "a", simply add the suffix -tha. Then add the pronoun endings.

Likewise, the final "a" mutates into "o" except on third person. Example:

  linna- (to sing)

  1st person - linnathon    - I will do
  2nd person - linnathog    - thou wilt do
  2nd person - linnathol    - thou wilt do
  2nd person - linnathodh   - thou wilt do
  3rd person - linnatha     - he/she will do

  1st person - linnathof    - we will do
  2nd person - linnathogir  - you will do
  2nd person - linnathodhir - you will do
  3rd person - linnathar    - they will do

6.4 Other tenses

In English, there are only two morphological tenses: present (non-past) and past tense. All the rest is formed with auxiliaries, and are not, strictly speaking, tense inflections. That dependency on auxiliaries is what is called a "periphrastic tense."

Similarly, Sindarin only has three indicative tenses: past, present and future. Any other tenses in Sindarin have to be periphrastic, like English.

Continuous tenses

It's debatable whether continuous tenses can be achieved in Sindarin, because we don't have any evidence of it.

Certain constructions can be made that emulate the behaviour of a number of European languages, like using past tense copula with present active participle, for example, to achieve what might be considered "past continuous." Example:

  nîn hennol barf     ≈ "‹I was› reading [a] book"
  ni hennol barf      ≈ "I [am] reading [a] book"
  nathon hennol barf  ≈ "‹I will be› reading [a] book"

The argument here is that it translates almost seamlessly into languages that support a verbal periphrasis style of past tense continuous, like English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, some dialects of German, and others. That means they can achieve a sense of past continuous by using a past tense "to be" (or other auxiliaries) and a participle/gerund. From Sindarin, the translation looks a lot like past continuous in these languages, but we don't know whether this is a reliable way of expressing continuity or progression on its own, as there are also many languages that wouldn't support this kind of construction.

The recommendation is to avoid that kind of construction.

The chief intention of a continuous tense is to define or emphasise a temporal relationship between the main action taking place and another discrete event that happened during this action. This relationship can be expressed without grammatically bending the verbs into an unproven standard. For example:

  lo hennen barf, lhassannen e·'lim lín = "while I read a book, I heard your voice"
  
  Literally:
  
  "while ‹I read› [a] book, ‹I heard› the·voice yours"

This is the preferred approach in Neo-Sindarin for past continuous. A future continuous can be expressed similarly:

  lo hennathon barf, no dhínen! = "while ‹I read› [a] book, be silent!"

The present continuous is not a concern, because Sindarin is aspectually underspecified. That is, the present tense is used to express both ongoing and habitual actions, so it can describe continuity on its own.

  hennon barf = "‹I read› [a] book" (habitual or general truth — imperfective aspect), or
  hennon barf = "‹I am reading› [a] book" (action occurring now — progressive aspect).

These can be disambiguated with prepositions, conjunctions and others.

  hennon barf hí = "‹I am reading› [a] book now"

Sindarin has no mechanisms for describing a continuative perfective, i.e. if an action has been completed or not. Once again, context should describe it. A preposition, conjunction or other mechanism can help elucidate the message meant.

  hennon barf hí     = "‹I am reading› [a] book now"
  edílen hennad barf = "‹I've finished› reading [a] book"

7.1 Making compound words

Making compound words in Sindarin is a complicated business and out of scope of this page. The reason why it's complicated is because Sindarin words derive from Common Eldarin and to make convincing words one must first revert the elements of the composition back to CE and then revise all the phonetic changes from CE to Ancient Telerin, then from that language into Old Sindarin, and then into Sindarin itself.

Take the following illustration shared by Elaran from the Vinyë Lambengolmor server as an example:

Creating a compound for "Fire Lord"

Let's combine naur & hîr which are "fire" & "lord", for what should be a simple example:

Would Naurhîr work?

No. With certain exceptions like annûn & amrûn, no polysyllabic word can have a circumflexed (i.e. over-long) vowel, the circumflex always becomes acute (i.e. î > í, shortening the over-long vowel to a long vowel).

Then, would Naurhír work?

No. With exceptions, no polysyllabic word can have a long vowel in the final syllable.

Then, would Naurhir work?

No. In compounds the second element is often lenited (h > ch), unless the preceding consonant requires another mutation.

Then, would Naurchir work?

No. With exceptions, AU in polysyllabic words become Ó/O as with glaur + findel = Glorfindel.

Then, would Norchir work?

No. Unlike glaur (<- (g)law-rē), the AU in naur (<- nār) comes from ancient long A, which in the Common Eldarin stage should get shortened before a consonant cluster like "rch", so it should become plain/short A, as we see with Narwain = naur + gwain.

Then, would Narchir work?

Yes!

Shouldn't it be Nerchir due to I-affection (which turns O and A into E if there is an I in the following syllable)?

No, because the I-affection rules take place before the "ē>i" rule (i.e. hēr>hīr) and "e" does not cause "i" affection, hence not "Rendir" but Randir = raun(<rān) + (n)dîr(<ndēr).

How many rules do I have to learn if I want to form names properly?

At least 75.

References

The phonetic rules to be used for word compounding can be seen here:

• Ancient Telerin
• Old Sindarin
• Sindarin

A summarised explanation of the rules has been published by Rínor from the Vinyë Lambengolmor server on this page:

Sindarin Crash Course: Compounds

There you can also find examples for the rules and some compounds with their equivalent primitive forms.

There are efforts into automating some of these rules to minimise manual checks for this kind of work, but at the date of this text, these efforts have not been successfully implemented yet.

7.2 Diminutive

Diminutive is Sindarin is not very well documented, so this is rather speculative.

Diminutives are probably caused with the suffix -eg (from < ✶-ikā, attested in PE23.)

That works along with the distribution of -ig (< ✶iki, comparable to Q. -ince). There's another suffix -og of unknown etymology, which may represent a single unit of something. This one is unclear, but it is highly unlikely to be random.

Examples:

  atheg    = "little father; thumb"
  emig     = "little mother, mum"
  gwinig   = "little-one, baby"
  honeg    = "little brother"
  lebig    = "little finger"
  nethig   = "little sister, little girl"
  Nogotheg = "Dwarflet"
  toleg    = "sticker-up (middle finger)"
  lotheg   = "single (little) flower"

7.3 Augmentative

Augmentatives can be formed with -on and -oth.

Examples:

  Ardhon     = "great region; The World"
  gaearon    = "great sea; ocean"
  gardhon    = "large region; province"
  Rodon      = "most noble; Vala"

  Carcharoth = "Great Red Fang"
  deloth     = "great horror; abhorrence"
  faloth     = "large foamy wave"
  goroth     = "great horror, dread"
  Lammoth    = "Great Echo"
  Nogoth     = "Greater Dwarf"
  daedelos   = "[big] dreadful horror"

Detailed topics

There are many more topics that either don't strictly concern grammar, or grow in complexity too fast to keep this guide focused. So I've put some of the relevant discussions and detailed guides and examples into these separate pages:

Copula - More details about the zero copula and common problems people run into

Prepositions - A more exhaustive list of prepositions in Neo-Sindarin, with examples

Word lists - Some of the most common words in Sindarin

Time words and expressions - How to express time in Sindarin

Mutations table - Detailed mutations table with examples, phonetics and filtering

Tengwar - A basic guide for using tengwar in Sindarin

Example of a full translation - An example of a translation being made, step by step, into a Neo-Sindarin text