Posted: January 18, 2000 at 22:56:05: by Tar-Elenion
: I believe that "roquen" would almost certainly exclude someone who was not somehow associated with horses (it is translated as "horseman" rather than "horseperson"). However, the class of knights in Third Age Gondor may have been hereditary (rather than dependent upon appointments and ceremonial qualifications). Occasionally exceptions would be reasonably made, as in Pippin's case.Roquen is indeed given a translation of 'horseman' but more (not completely just more) literally it means "horseperson" that is 'quen' : "person, individual, man or woman." : Isildur's knights may have been "arqueni" (nobles, noblemen) or "arpeni". Words for "warrior" from "The Etymologies" include "mahtar" and "maethor". There is also "ehtar" => "ehtyar", "spearman". "Ohtakaro" is another word for warrior, and it eventually became "Ohtar" (as in "The Disaster of the Gladden Fields"), and Boldog's name contains an element which means "warrior" (Boldog was an Orc captain of the First Age). "herth" is the household of a "hir" (lord), or a troop (of soldiers) led by a "hir". Also 'Ohtatyaro'='warrior', 'ndako'= 'warrior,soldier', 'turma'='shield', 'hathel'= 'axeblade', 'syando'='cleaver,sword'
'lango= broad sword,also prow of ship (for the weapon I take this to be a falchion type), 'lhang'='cutlass', 'qinga'='bow' :Other words from "The Etymologies" I should probably throw out for future reference include "haran (pl. harni)" for "king, chieftain", "garon" for "lord", and "aryon" for heir. People should keep in mind that I'm not a linguist, and the languages documented in "The Etymologies" are not exactly the Quenyan and Sindarin of the later books, although there are many carryovers. : One of the dangers of doing too much research into etymologies, however, is that one can easily assume that a given word is the only representation of an overused English word. For instance, "noble" can mean several things to us: 1) someone born of "high" blood or raised to an elevated social status; 2) something exalted, of greatly admired or desired status or completion; a lofty or noble idea. Tolkien used "arpen" for a nobleperson and "khalle" for "noble, exalted". "weg" gave rise to "gweth", said to mean "man-power", "troop of able-bodied men", "host", "regiment" and an example provided is "forodweith" (Christopher notes this became "forodwaith"). I have done a good amount of research into the words JRRT used relating to weapons, warfare and nobilty, and if people are interested will give a more in depth post at some point.
|
