10.73 Street
- ᴹQ. malle n. “street, (made or stone) road”
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A word for “street” appearing in Tolkien’s writings of the 1910s-40s. ᴱQ. malle “street” first appeared [albiet marked with “?”] in the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s under the early root ᴱ√MALA¹ “crush, squeeze, pulp” (QL/58), and in early names from this period such as ᴱQ. Olóre Malle “Path of Dreams” (LT1/18) and ᴱQ. Kúne Malle “Road of Arches” (PE13/105). ᴱQ. malle “street” reappeared in several charts of Qenya Declensions from the 1920s (PE16/112-115) and in contemporaneous Early Qenya Word-lists (PE16/143).
ᴹQ. malle was more fully defined as “made road, stone-road, street” in Declension of Nouns from the early 1930s (PE21/24) and also appeared in some contemporaneous declension charts (PE21/44-45). In The Etymologies from around 1397, ᴹQ. malle “street” was derived from the root ᴹ√MBAL (Ety/MBAL). This word also appeared with the gloss “road” in various iterations of the ᴹQ. Lament of Atalante from the 1930s and 40s, in the phrases ᴹQ. malle téna lende númenna “a road [once] went straight westward” and ᴹQ. ilya sí maller raikar “now all roads (are) bent” (LR/47, 56; SD/310). There is no sign of this word in the 1950s and 60s, but that could be a coincidence.
Neo-Quenya: For purposes of Neo-Quenya, I would use this word for constructed roads, particularly those that are paved or are city streets.
- N. ostrad n. “street”
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A word appearing in The Etymologies of the 1930s as N. ostrad “street”, a combination of N. ost “city” and N. râd “path, track” (Ety/RAT).
Neo-Sindarin: Some Neo-Sindarin writers update this word to ᴺS. othrad “street” as suggested in Hiswelókë’s Sindarin Dictionary (HSD), based on words like othrond “stronghold” = ost + rond. I think either is fine if we assume othrad is an ancient compound and ostrad was a late (or reformed) compound; compare N. mistrad “error” which also shows medial str.
- S. rath n. “street, track; ⚠️[N.] course, river-bed”
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A word used in street-names in Minis Tirith, most notably Rath Celerdain “Lampwrights’ Street” (LotR/768) and Rath Dínen “Silent Street” (LotR/826). It was also an element in the (rejected) name Raith ’Ngorthrim “Paths of the Dead” (RC/526) and the river-name Rathlóriel “Golden-bed” (S/235), but the last of these may be a remnant of its 1930s meaning (see below). In the “Unfinished Index” of The Lord of the Rings Tolkien indicated that rath meant “street (in a city)” (RC/523, 551).
The most extensive description of this word appears in a 1968 discussion of the (possibly related) name Amroth which Tolkien said “is connected with a stem RATH meaning ‘climb’ — with hands and feet, as in a tree or up a rocky slope”. Regarding S. rath Tolkien said:
Both Quenya and Lindarin also possessed a word ratta, which might be a derivative (by lengthening the medial consonant, a frequent device in Primitive Eldarin) from either *rattha or *ratta from the stem RAT … It meant ‘a track’; though often applied to ways known to mountaineers, to passes in the mountains and the climbing ways to them, it was not confined to ascents … This is evidently the origin also of S. rath … [which] had the same senses as Q., L. ratta, though in mountainous country it was most used of climbing ways … In Minas Tirith, in the Númenórean Sindarin that was used in Gondor for the nomenclature of places, rath had become virtually equivalent to ‘street’, being applied to nearly all the paved ways within the city. Most of these were on an incline, often steep (NM/364).
Thus Sindarin rath was a blending of √RATH “climb” and ✶ratta “track” < √RAT “find a way”, and in the context of Minas Tirith was generalized to “(city) street” since most of that city’s streets were sloped.
Rath seems to have been used in the sense “climb” or “climbing track” in the name Andrath [= “*Long Climb”] for the high-climbing pass from Rivendell over the Misty Mountains that Bilbo and the Dwarves took in The Hobbit, as suggested by Christopher Tolkien (UT/271, 278 note #4). However, the name Andrath was also used for the road running from Fornost down to Tharbad (TI/305; UT/348) which was unlikely to climb much, so in that case may have been used in the sense “street”, “track”, or “course”.
Conceptual Development: In The Etymologies of the 1930s, N. rath was also derived from ON. rattha < ᴹ✶rattā̆ under the root ᴹ√RAT “walk”, but in that document it was glossed “course, river-bed” (Ety/RAT). In this sense it was the basis for the river-name N. Rathloriel, translated “Bed of Gold” in narratives from this period (LR/141). This translation of Rathlóriel survived in The Silmarillion as published (S/235), but may have been a remnant of the 1930s meaning of rath.
Neo-Sindarin: Tolkien’s 1968 note implies that original sense of S. rath was a “(climbing) track”, and may have meant “street” only in Númenórean Sindarin, or possibly just for street names in Minas Tirith. For city streets in other contexts I would use [N.] ostrad or [ᴺS.] othrad. I would furthermore ignore the 1930s translation N. rath “course, river-bed”, and would assume that Rathlóriel had a more metaphorical meaning: “*Golden Street/Track”. For “(river) course” I was instead use the better-attested S. rant; see that entry for details.
10.74 Bridge
- Q. yanta n. “bridge”
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The Quenya word for “bridge” from The Lord of the Rings appendices, also the name of tengwa #35 used in i-diphthongs (LotR/1123). ᴹQ. yanta “bridge” also appeared as the name of this tengwa in notes The Feanorian Alphabet from the 1930s and 40s (PE22/22, 51).
Conceptual Development: Earlier words for “bridge” include ᴱQ. penda “bridge” under the early root ᴱ√PENE (QL/73) and ᴱQ. ranta “arch, bridge” under the early root ᴱ√RAÞA (QL/79). See the entry for √YAN² “join” for a discussion of the possible later development of yanta’s root.
- S. iant n. “bridge”
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A Sindarin word for “bridge” appearing in a number of names such as Iant Iaur “Old Bridge” (SA/iant; WJ/333), Esgaliant “Bridge of Esgalduin” (WJ/333), and Varanduiniant “Bridge of Baranduin” (SD/129).
Conceptual Development: In The Etymologies of the 1930s, N. iant was glossed “yoke” and N. ianw was “bridge”, both derived from the root ᴹ√YAT “join” (Ety/YAT). Another possible precursor is G. rantha “arch, bridge” from the Gnomish Lexicon of the 1910s (GL/65), which is reduced to -rant in compounds (GL/31, 50) and is probably derived from the early root ᴱ√RAÞA that was the basis for ᴱQ. ranta “arch, bridge” (QL/79).