The Lord of the Rings

The Cirth were devised first in Beleriand by the Sindar, and were long used only for inscribing names and brief memorials upon wood or stone. To that origin they owe their angular shapes, very similar to the runes of our times, though they differed from these in details and were wholly different in arrangement. The Cirth in their older and simpler form spread eastward in the Second Age, and became known to many peoples, to Men and Dwarves, and even to Orcs, all of whom altered them to suit their purposes and according to their skill or lack of it. One such simple form was still used by the Men of Dale, and a similar one by the Rohirrim.

But in Beleriand, before the end of the First Age, the Cirth, partly under the influence of the Tengwar of the Noldor, were rearranged and further developed. Their richest and most ordered form was known as the Alphabet of Daeron, since in Elvish tradition it was said to have been devised by Daeron, the minstrel and loremaster of King Thingol of Doriath. Among the Eldar the Alphabet of Daeron did not develop true cursive forms, since for writing the Elves adopted the Fëanorian letters. The Elves of the West indeed for the most part gave up the use of runes altogether. In the country of Eregion, however, the Alphabet of Daeron was maintained in use and passed thence to Moria, where it became the alphabet most favoured by the Dwarves. It remained ever after in use among them and passed with them to the North. Hence in later times it was often called Angerthas Moria or the Long Rune-rows of Moria. As with their speech the Dwarves made use of such scripts as were current and many wrote the Fëanorian letters skilfully; but for their own tongue they adhered to the Cirth, and developed written pen-forms from them.

(i) THE FÉANORIAN LETTERS

The table shows, in formal book-hand shape, all the letters that were commonly used in the West-lands in the Third Age. The arrangement is the one most usual at the time, and the one in which the letters were then usually recited by name.

This script was not in origin an ‘alphabet’: that is, a haphazard series of letters, each with an independent value of its own, recited in a traditional order that has no reference either to their shapes or to their functions.[87] It was, rather, a system of consonantal signs, of similar shapes and style, which could be adapted at choice or convenience to represent the consonants of languages observed (or devised) by the Eldar. None of the letters had in itself a fixed value; but certain relations between them were gradually recognized.

The system contained twenty-four primary letters, 1-24, arranged in four témar (series), each of which had six tyeller (grades). There were also ‘additional letters’, of which 25–36 are examples. Of these 27 and 29 are the only strictly independent letters; the remainder are modifications of other letters. There was also a number of tehtar (signs) of varied uses. These do not appear in the table.[88]

The primary letters were each formed of a telco (stem) and a lúva (bow).

THE TENGWAR

The forms seen in 1–4 were regarded as normal. The stem could be raised, as in 9-16; or reduced, as in 17–24. The bow could be open, as in Series I and III; or closed, as in II and IV; and in either case it could be doubled, as e.g. in 5–8.

The theoretic freedom of application had in the Third Age been modified by custom to this extent that Series I was generally applied to the dental or t-series (tincotéma), and II to the labials or p-series (parmatéma). The application of Series III and IV varied according to the requirements of different languages.

In languages like the Westron, which made much use of consonants[89] such as our ch, j, sh, Series III was usually applied to these; in which case Series IV was applied to the normal k-series (calmatéma). In Quenya, which possessed besides the calmatéma both a palatal series (tyelpetéma) and a labialized series (quessetéma), the palatals were represented by a Fëanorian diacritic denoting ‘following y’ (usually two underposed dots), while Series IV was a kw-series.

Within these general applications the following relations were also commonly observed. The normal letters, Grade 1, were applied to the ‘voiceless stops’: t, p, k, etc. The doubling of the bow indicated the addition of’ voice’: thus if 1, 2, 3, 4=t, p, ch, k (or t, p, k, kw) then 5, 6, 7, S=d, b, j, g (or d, b, g, gw). The raising of the stem indicated the opening of the consonant to a ‘spirant’: thus assuming the above values for Grade 1, Grade 3 (9-12)=th, f, sh, ch (or th, f, kh, khw/hw), and Grade 4 (13–16)=dh, v, zh, gh (or dh, v, gh, ghw/w).