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Tolkien's Runes, an actual rune of earth?

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Tolkien's Runes, an actual rune of earth?

Postby Solomons Song » September 26th, 2009, 3:19 pm

My friend just uncovered something very interesting, He found . Interestingly enough, it isn't about a Tolkien rune, but a Germanic rune. But when my friend downloaded the font necessary to view the website correctly, the font was called "The One Ring". Did Tolkien use an actual earthly rune for the language of Morder? Was it this Germanic rune? If you do not have the font, and want to view the site without installing the font, for a screenshot.

I am amazed that Tolkien would not create his own rune for this. I know that both Sindarin and Quenya, along with their respective runes, are derivatives of earthly languages and runes, but not exact to any earthly languages runes. I find it unusual that he would use an actual earthly rune, unmodified, for any of his middle-earth languages.

Can anyone enlighten me about this?
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Re: Tolkien's Runes, an actual rune of earth?

Postby galion » October 1st, 2009, 6:12 pm

In The Hobbit Tolkien uses Anglo-Saxon runes ('futhorc'). Elsewhere, as far as I'm aware, he uses his own. As for languages: Quenya has a lot in common with Finnish, Sindarin (also Goldogrin, Nandorin etc.) rather less with Welsh. However, his main consideration in devising these languages seems to have been phonaesthetics.
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Re: Tolkien's Runes, an actual rune of earth?

Postby deadwhitemale » October 12th, 2009, 5:12 am

I stand to be corrected about this, but I think his Dwarf runes rather resembled earthly Norse/Teutonic/Anglo-Saxon runes.

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"It is when we try to grapple with another man's intimate need that we perceive how incomprehensible, wavering, and misty are the beings that share with us the sight of the stars and the warmth of the sun." -- Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim(1899?)
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Re: Tolkien's Runes, an actual rune of earth?

Postby galion » October 12th, 2009, 11:19 am

There were several styles of Germanic runes, the commonest being the Scandinavian rune series called "futhark", from the names of its first six letters. The version of this used for representing Old English had slightly different values, as indicated by the fact that it is known as "futhorc"; and the dwarf runes used in The Hobbit are a variant of this. However, the runes used in The Lord of the Rings have completely different values, and are, I believe, Tolkien's own invention. Clearer? :smile:
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