Adûnaic (or Adunaic) ("language of the West") is one of the fictional languages devised by

J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ...

for his fantasy works. One of the

languages of Arda Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...

in Tolkien's

Middle-earth Middle-earth is the fictional setting of much of the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy. The term is equivalent to the ''Miðgarðr'' of Norse mythology and ''Middangeard'' in Old English works, including ''Beowulf''. Middle-earth is t ...

legendarium Tolkien's legendarium is the body of J. R. R. Tolkien's mythopoeic writing, unpublished in his lifetime, that forms the background to his ''The Lord of the Rings'', and which his son Christopher summarized in his compilation of ''The Silmarill ...

, Adûnaic was spoken by the

Men A man is an adult male human. Prior to adulthood, a male human is referred to as a boy (a male child or adolescent). Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chro ...

Númenor Númenor, also called Elenna-nórë or Westernesse, is a fictional place in J. R. R. Tolkien's writings. It was the kingdom occupying a large island to the west of Middle-earth, the main setting of Tolkien's writings, and was the greatest civil ...

during the

Second Age In J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, the history of Arda, also called the history of Middle-earth, began when the Ainur entered Arda, following the creation events in the Ainulindalë and long ages of labour throughout Eä, the fictional unive ...

Fictional history

Adûnaic was the language of

, and after its destruction in the

Akallabêth ''The Silmarillion'' () is a collection of myths and stories in varying styles by the English writer J. R. R. Tolkien. It was edited and published posthumously by his son Christopher Tolkien in 1977, assisted by the fantasy author Guy Gavriel ...

, the "native speech" of the people of

Elendil Elendil is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium. He is mentioned in ''The Lord of the Rings'', ''The Silmarillion'' and ''Unfinished Tales''. He was the father of Isildur and Anárion, last lord of Andúnië on the island of ...

in the kingdoms of Arnor and

Gondor Gondor is a fictional kingdom in J. R. R. Tolkien's writings, described as the greatest realm of Man (Middle-earth), Men in the west of Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age. The third volume of ''The Lord of the Rings'', ''The Return of the ...

in the west of Middle-earth, though they usually spoke

Sindarin Sindarin is one of the fictional languages devised by J. R. R. Tolkien for use in his fantasy stories set in Arda, primarily in Middle-earth. Sindarin is one of the many languages spoken by the Elves. The word is a Quenya word. Called in Eng ...

. By the time of the

War of the Ring ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...

, it had developed into the common speech or

Westron The English philologist and author J. R. R. Tolkien created a number of constructed languages, including languages devised for fictional settings. Inventing languages, something that he called ''glossopoeia'' (paralleling his idea of ''mythopoe ...

. Tolkien called Adûnaic "the language of the culturally and politically influential Númenóreans."

Concept and creation

Although Tolkien created very few original words in Adûnaic, mostly names, the language serves his concept as the ancestor of a

lingua franca A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, vehicular language, or link language, is a language systematically used to make communication possible between groups ...

for

, Westron, a shared language for many different peoples. Tolkien devised Adûnaic (or Númenórean), the language spoken in

, shortly after World War II, and thus at about the time he completed ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...

'', but before he wrote the linguistic background information of the Appendices. Adûnaic is intended as the language from which

(also called ''Adûni'') is derived. This added a depth of historical development to the Mannish languages. Adûnaic was intended to have a "faintly Semitic flavour". Its development began with his 1945 work ''

The Notion Club Papers ''The Notion Club Papers'' is an abandoned novel by J. R. R. Tolkien, written during 1945 and published posthumously in '' Sauron Defeated'', the 9th volume of ''The History of Middle-earth''. It is a time travel story, written while ''The Lord of ...

''. It is there that the most extensive sample of the language is found, revealed to one of the (modern-day) protagonists, Lowdham, in a visionary dream of

Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas (mythology), Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works ''Timaeus (dialogue), Timaeus'' and ''Critias (dialogue), Critias'' ...

. Its grammar is sketched in the unfinished "Lowdham's Report on the Adunaic Language", included in ''

Sauron Defeated Sauron (pronounced ) is the title character and the primary antagonist, through the forging of the One Ring, of J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings'', where he rules the land of Mordor and has the ambition of ruling the whole of Midd ...

''. Tolkien remained undecided whether the language of the Men of Númenor should be derived from the original Mannish language (as in Adûnaic), or if it should be derived from "the Elvish Noldorin" (i.e.

Quenya Quenya ()Tolkien wrote in his "Outline of Phonology" (in ''Parma Eldalamberon'' 19, p. 74) dedicated to the phonology of Quenya: is "a sound as in English ''new''". In Quenya is a combination of consonants, ibidem., p. 81. is a constructed la ...

) instead. In ''

The Lost Road and Other Writings ''The Lost Road and Other Writings – Language and Legend before 'The Lord of the Rings is the fifth volume of ''The History of Middle-earth'', a series of compilations of drafts and essays written by J. R. R. Tolkien in around 1936–1937. ...

'' it is implied that the Númenóreans spoke Quenya, and that

Sauron Sauron (pronounced ) is the title character and the primary antagonist, through the forging of the One Ring, of J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings'', where he rules the land of Mordor and has the ambition of ruling the whole of Middl ...

, hating all things Elvish, taught the Númenóreans the old Mannish tongue they themselves had forgotten.

Phonology

The phonology is as follows: : : ¹Adûnaic is fundamentally a three-vowel language, with a length distinction; the long and are derived from diphthongs and , as is the case in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

and in most

Arabic dialects The varieties (or dialects or vernacular languages) of Arabic, a Semitic language within the Afroasiatic family originating in the Arabian Peninsula, are the linguistic systems that Arabic speakers speak natively. There are considerable varia ...

, in line with the Semitic flavour that Tolkien intended for both Adûnaic and Khuzdul, which influenced it.

Grammar

Most information about Adûnaic grammar comes from an incomplete typescript ''Lowdham's Report on the Adûnaic Language'', written by Tolkien to accompany ''The Notion Club Papers''. The report discusses phonology and morphological processes in some detail, and starts to discuss nouns, but breaks off before saying much about verbs, other parts of speech or the grammar as a whole. It appears that Tolkien abandoned work on the language after writing this portion of the Report, and never returned to it.

Nouns

Most nouns are triconsonantal, but there are a number of biconsonantal nouns as well. Nouns can be divided into three declensions, called Strong I, Strong II and Weak. The two strong declensions form their various cases by modifying the last vowel, similarly to English ''man/men''. The weak declension forms its cases by appending a suffix. There are three numbers, singular, plural and dual. Dual is used mainly for "natural pairs", like eyes and shoes. There are three cases, Normal, Subjective and Objective. The Subjective case is used as the subject of a verb. The Objective case is used only in compound expressions and appears only in the singular. The Normal case is used in all other circumstances, such as the object of a verb. Example declensions:

Sample Text

This Adûnaic text, part of the tale of the Fall of Numenor, appears in ''The Notion Club Papers''. It is fragmentary because it appeared in a dream to the character Lowdham, and is only partially translated by him because he did not know the language. Words in bold are not translated at the point in the text where the translation is first given, but their translation is given later in the story.

References

External links

*
Andreas Moehn – Lalaith's Guide to Adûnaic Grammar

Thorsten Renk's Ni-bitha Adûnâyê

Adûnaic from Almavarno in Italian
{{DEFAULTSORT:Adunaic Middle-earth languages Constructed languages