History: Tengwar

Source of version: 12 (current)

A minority of Lojbanists think using the [http://www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca/u/relipper/tolkien/rootpage.html|Tolkien] script [http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/4948/tengwar/index.htm|Tengwar] (__lerfrtengua__) for Lojban is at the least cute, and at the most [http://www.raphael.poss.name/tengwar/lojteng2|instructive]. The kind of person interested in Lojban intersects with the kind of person interested in Tolkienian linguistics. Nonetheless, the majority of Lojbanists, it is fair to say, regard the enterprise as folly. This includes ((Ivan Derzhanski)), who is a Tolkienist of long standing. I doubt anyone is planning on switching the list over to Tengwar en masse once the Tengwar section of Unicode is established.... [[Here is the proposal: [http://std.dkuug.dk/jtc1/sc2/wg2/docs/n1641/n1641.htm]] However, as ((nitcion)) pointed out, it would be nice to use it on the covers of things like the lessons. I could see Tengwar being used in the way calligraphic English is used (or maybe hyper-intricate gothic fonts). Sort of the thing that classy Lojbanists would use on their wedding invitations. --((Jay Kominek|jay)) An example of a lojbanic text written in Tengwar is {file name="Berenstain_Fight_Tengwar.zip" showdesc=1} (The Berenstain Bears Get in a Fight). Actually, I already have converted the cmavo, gismu and lujvo lists to use Tengwar. -- ((xwaver)) / ficyr. __See also ((Why Tengwar?))__ and __((Tengwar Resources))__ that's the truth ---- There are two published mappings * [http://www.catb.org/~esr/tengwar/lojban-tengwar.html|Eric Raymond's proposed mapping] * [http://www.raphael.poss.name/tengwar/|Elrond's revised mapping] ** Mode 1: separate vowel carriers for each vowel ** Mode 2: full vowels (Beleriand mode) ** Mode 3: full vowel + ''tehta'' for diphthongs * [http://www.fa-kuan.muc.de/LOJBAN.RXML|aulun's mapping samples mainly following elrond's proposal (Mode 1)] ** {V'V}: short vowel carrier modified for this purpose (Sindarin), modified i.e. shortened about the size of apostrophe (Gandalf) ** {V,V}: use of comma (adapted to Tengwar) '' As in Raymond's proposal.'' ** (rejection of the Beleriand mode) *((cmeclax)) has [http://lexx.shinn.net/cmeclax/|also used Tengwar] (BTW, in order to achieving a good-looking script one ought to have __at least__ two kinds of different widths tehtar!) ''The single-byte fonts tend to; the Unicode fonts won't, because this is properly an issue for Smart Fonts. Thankfully, Smart Fonts are now on the market, though it'll be a year or two [[as of 2001] before they come into general use.'' The characteristics of Elrond's Mode 1 are: ** separate vowel carriers for each vowel ** CVV: tengwa+tehta, (short) carrier+ tehta ** VV: (short) carrier+ tehta for both vowels ** special case {uu}: long carrier as abbreviature ** special case {.i}: colon as abbreviature ** 'doubling' (underlining') the first tengwa for stress (Sindarin and Gandalf) ** various final-s (joined to different tengwar) The main technical issue with Tengwar seems to be what to do with VV and V'V. !!!VV ((Elrond)) in his [http://www.raphael.poss.name/tengwar/|published proposal] advocates a mode in which VV are handled with separate vowel carriers (a la Quenya), and a mode in which VV are handled with ''tehtar'' over full vowel letters (a la Sindarin; preferred). ((xwaver)) uses Beleriand full vowel tengwa for the primary vowel, tethar for the trailing '' I currently vote Quenya -- nitcion'' He has since come to believe that double ''tehtar'' are preferrable -- though this will prove typographically unwieldy. cmeclax concurs. However, if 'typographically unwieldy' refers to font design, xuinkrbin disagrees since any font designed for such use could employee a ligature. When typing ".ia.", a ligature could be used to display a combined 'i+a' tehta above the first full-stop. '' But since the VV are not just double vowels, I doubt it's very Tolkienesque -- ((nitcion)).'' !!!V'V Established usage (Raymond, Elrond, ((cmeclax)), ((xwaver))) is to use the ''halla''. nitcion would prefer to use the long vowel carrier, in order to deemphasise the distinction between VV and V'V. cmeclax makes the vowel following ' a ''tehta'' to the right of the ''halla''. There is no Tolkien precedent for this, presumably because the ''halla'' is taken in the Tolkien universe to be an archaic variant of the ''hyarmen'', so it wouldn't have been used much in extant Tengwar. ((xwaver)) eliminates the carrier altogether, using Beleriand mode for the first vowel (ie. the explicit vowel carriers), tetha for the second. aulun uses a shortened vowel carrier to render the aposrtrophe, and a normal short vowel carrier for the vowel after it. *((Originally misunderstood as:)) aulun shortens the second carrier to the size of an apostrophe. **''Do I read you correctly? Could you point me to a sample? --- the samples on your page seem to be straight Elrond mode 1 -- mi'e nitcion'' ***''What I did was designing a better looking apostrophe by shortening the (short) carrier - using Fontographer - i.e. I use the __apostrophe__ like in romanized Lojban for /h/. In the Gandalf font the modified carrier is almost the size of a normal apostrophe: will post a sample soon!'' ****OK, but be aware that Unicode won't be including non-Tolkien glyphs, and this will mean problems down the road. (Or am I ''still'' confused, and this is indeed a Tolkienian variant attributed to Gandalf in the mythos?) Still, the fact that aulun, cmeclax and nitcion independently arrive at a different 'carrier' for the vowel after an apostrophe than the short vowel carrier is surely significant. [[wrong, as it turns out] Here's a sample for .aulun's modified apostrophe in Gandalf (being aware of the problems pointed out above, it's just for personal use within graphic format): [http://www.fa-kuan.muc.de/apsampl.gif] !!!r *Raymond prescribes ''ore'' (untrilled r) rather than ''romen'' (trilled r) *Elrond makes this an optional choice *nitcion would prefer ''romen'', but ''ore'' looks less disruptive *aulun uses ''romen'' !!!Full vowels *Raymond picks ''hyarmen'' for full e *Elrond picks ''yanta'', which looks about the same but is less disruptive !!!Double vowels *Elrond treats uu and ii as double vowels (''tehta'' over long vowel carrier) *nitcion thinks this bogus. *Elrond starts to think about using yet different ''tehta'' for diphtongs !!!Stress *Raymond and ((xwaver)) double (underbar) the consonant/carrier of any capitalised letter *Elrond wants only the first such consonant/carrier to be doubled. This is far saner, but existing [http://user.tninet.se/~xof995c/tengscribe.htm|software] won't deal with it well, so this requires a separate script to be written. !!!Comma *Raymond and aulun incorporate the comma into Tengwar *Elrond and ((xwaver)) advocate a circumflex underneath, as a reused rare Tengwar *nitcion can't find such a thing in the standard repertoire, and awaits further instruction. There are various other ''tehta'' floating around. !!!Final S *xwaver uses the final s curls after consonants, considering that while they would be handy in CVS. and CVVS. circumstances, they are slightly more confusing. !!!Prenasalisation Noone seems to think introducing the prenasalisation ''tehta'' into Lojban Tengwar would be a good thing. !!!Non-Lojban letters To cope with cited non-Lojban text, nitcion proposes mappings for the non-Lojban letters: *q: nwalme *w: hwesta *h: hyarmen Comments from ((nitcion)): ''If anything in Lojban tengwar is sacred by now, it's that k = quesse. It's inefficient, but we are keeping coronals (palatoalveolars & palatals) distinct from velars. Even if we allowed series IV stops to be (also) written as series III, I'd still rather q keep out of the way; in nwalme, it's safe. Besides, it's not canonical Lojban; why should be anywhere near the usual tengwar in a Lojban mode?'' ''Right, but still, nwalme has a strong nasal connotation. Why not using the additional tengwar 34 (arda ?) instead ?'' If we pick a totally arbitrary tengwar, arda's as good as any ('course, arda kinda ''looks'' like q). But it'd be nice if the glyph for q was associated with either velar or labial. How about (16) unque? ''Seems nice indeed, and easy to write :-) I vote. -- Elrond'' So: *q: unque *w: hwesta *h: hyarmen To illustrate all the foregoing, here's one construal of all this: [http://www.opoudjis.net/dist/tengwar.gif] xwaver [http://www.xwaver.net/lojban/tlcursive.GIF] ---- a little bit more about the Tengwar, ''bau la lojban'', ((tenguar|here))