Black language of Mordor
Öjevind Lång
news:1178b6d1.03071...@posting.google.com...
[snip]
> As others have noted, the Elves developed speech on their own.
> Valarin pre-dated any other language in Middle-Earth, but overall it
> had minimal influence on the others because it was an extremely
> difficult and even 'unpleasant' language for any but the Ainur to
> speak. The exceptions would be Khuzdul, and possibly Black Speech
> and/or Iglishmek. From the texts I believe that Iglishmek was most
> likely developed by the Dwarves largely independant of any Valarin (or
> even Elven) influence, but it is possible that it was partly inspired
> by elven hand signs or even originally developed by Aule.
What is Iglishmek?
Öjevind
Graham Lockwood
{snip}
> What is Iglishmek?
Iglishmêk was a type of sign-language used by the Dwarves. It's talked about
in _The War of the Jewels_ which I haven't read so I can't really tell you
any more than that.
||// // "The narrative ends here. || //
|// // There is no reason to think ||//
(/ // that any more was ever written. |//
||// The manuscript, which becomes //
|// increasingly rapid towards the end, //|
(/ peters out in a scrawl." //||
|| -Christopher Tolkien, _The Lost Road_ // ||
Matthew Bladen
"Graham Lockwood" <GondhirAtC*H*O*K*L*I*TDo...@IgnoreThis.AndThis> wrote in
message
news:BB3AA25F.9E91%GondhirAtC*H*O*K*L*I*TDo...@IgnoreThis.AndThis...
> Öjevind Lång said:
> {snip}
> > What is Iglishmek?
>
> Iglishmêk was a type of sign-language used by the Dwarves. It's talked
about
> in _The War of the Jewels_ which I haven't read so I can't really tell you
> any more than that.
The most distinguishing feature of Iglishmêk was that Dwarves would use it
to
communicate with each other while talking out loud, so as to modify what
they
were saying in the presence of other races, or to confer silently with each
other.
It also varied widely between Dwarf communities, unlike their spoken
language.
--
Matthew
"What was that, Gimli?"
"Just cracking my knuckles, Legolas!" F-O-A-D U L-V-S-H P-O-N-S
Conrad Dunkerson
> Iglishmęk was a type of sign-language used by the Dwarves. It's talked about
> in _The War of the Jewels_ which I haven't read so I can't really tell you
> any more than that.
There isn't much more than that about it or sign language in general;
"They knew of such systems of gestures. The Eldar possessed a fairly
elaborate system, (Note 34, p. 416) containing a large number of
conventional gesture-signs, some of which were as 'arbitrary' as those
of phonetic systems. That is, they had no more obvious connexion with
self-explanatory gestures (such as pointing in a desired direction)
than had the majority of vocal elements or combinations with 'echoic'
or imitative words (such as *mama. Q mama 'sheep', or *k(a)wak, Q
quako 'crow').
The Dwarves indeed, as later became known, had a far more elaborate
and organized system. They possessed in fact a secondary tengwesta
['system or code of signs', 'language'] of gestures, concurrent with
their spoken language..."
Quendi and Eldar, Appendix D
The note referenced in the above passage states;
"Note 34 (p. 394)
In genuine independent use mainly employed between persons out of
earshot: the Elves had astonishingly acute eyesight at a distance.
These 'signals' were really distinct from the gestures (especially
those of the hands) made as concomitants to speech and additions to
tone-changes for the conveyance of feeling, though some of the
gestures in both systems were similar. The Elves made considerable
use of the concomitant gestures, especially in oration or
recitation."