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Select Elvish Words 9.17-9.18: Bond, Chain

9.17 Bond

Q. naxa n. “bond, fetter”

A word for “bond, fetter” in green-ink revisions from around 1970 to the Outline of Phonology (OP2), based on the root √NASAG and related to Black Speech nazg “ring” (PE19/101).

ᴹQ. núte n. “bond, knot”

A noun in The Etymologies of the 1930s glossed “bond, knot” under the root ᴹ√NUT “tie, bind” (Ety/NUT).

N. gwedh n. “bond”

A noun in The Etymologies of the 1930s glossed “bond” derived from ON. weda under the root ᴹ√WED “bind” (Ety/WED). It might be an element of the later word danwedh “ransom” in the name Bar-en-Danwedh “House of Ransom” from The Silmarillion (S/203).

N. nûd n. “bond”

A noun in The Etymologies of the 1930s derived from the root ᴹ√NUT “tie, bind” (Ety/NUT).

9.18 Chain

ᴱQ. limil n. “chain”

A word appearing as ᴱQ. limil “a chain” in the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s under the early root ᴱ√LIMI (QL/54).

Neo-Quenya: In Tolkien’s later writings √LIM means “link, join”, so I think it can continue to serve as the basis for a (Neo-Quenya) word ᴺQ. limil “chain”.

N. angwedh n. “chain, fetter, (lit.) iron-bond”

A word in The Etymologies of the 1930s glossed “chain, (lit.) iron-bond”, a combination of N. ang “iron” and N. gwedh “bond” (Ety/WED). The same words appeared in notes on the The Feanorian Alphabet from the 1930s, but with the gloss “fetter” instead of “bond”.

Conceptual Development: A similar word ᴱN. angath “fetters” appeared in the Early Noldorin Dictionary from the 1920s, but there it was simply the plural of ᴱN. ang “iron”, so literally “*irons”.

S. nadha n. “fetter”

A word for “fetter” in green-ink revisions from around 1970 to the Outline of Phonology (OP2), from primitive ✶nazgā based on the root √NASAG that was related to Black Speech nazg “ring” (PE19/101). Here the [zg] spirantalized to [ðɣ], and later the final [ɣ] became [a] after the loss the more ancient final vowel .

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