Ash Nazg
New Member
In the latter half of session #151 (and a little bit of session #152) we spent quite a bit of time breaking down the black speech ring inscription which Gandalf recites to the council:
Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.
Our analysis showed that the rhythm of the Black Speech appears to quite closely approximate the rhythm of the English translation, with the exception of the final part, which contained a problematic extra syllable in Black Speech:
Our hypothesis was: that the irregularity in the Black Speech version v.s. the English is a linguistic joke from Tolkien (and that we are just not getting the joke). This seems to me to be plausible; there are many other places where these kinds of wordnerd jokes and references do exist. However, in this instance, it strikes me as being more of a syntactical puzzle than a linguistic joke. Examples of obscure "philologist humour" from Tolkien, that I know of, usually relate to a specific piece of vocabulary rather than poetic irregularities. I think Tolkien simply wanted readers to do exactly what we were all doing in session #151 and try to work out, for ourselves, how to pronounce it properly, and make intimations about how the syntax breaks down.
Here's my reasoning on why we should see it as a puzzle:
This was the only piece of grammatically consistent Black Speech that we ever got from Tolkien. The other snippet of Black Speech, which we will read in the chapter The Uruk-Hai, is clearly a form of dialectal Orcish patois (as indicated by what Appendix E tells us about contemporary Orc speech). And Tolkien gave at least two wildly inconsistent translations for that line as well, so we should discount the later passage as a data point. However, the regularity of the ring inscription tells us quite a lot about Sauron's "pure" Black Speech grammar, by itself. Which is why I would characterise it more as puzzle than joke. I think it feels more like an exercise that Tolkien might have set for his students, than a meta-joke or Easter Egg that he might have included for his peers. One could very easily imagine him giving his students a workshop with a scrap of some dead language, and not much information to go on, and then asking them to draw up a list of conclusions about its content and rules based on exactly the types of clues that he gives us here.
Now, I don't agree at all with the conclusion made that the extra syllable is due to the '-ishi'. Here's why:
We can tell that 'burz' means dark, by isolating the elements of the Black Speech word for Barad-dûr, which we will learn later on. That is: 'Lugbúrz', which we know translates to 'dark tower'. The -um in 'burzum' is therefore presumably an abstract suffix: which turns an adjective into a noun, exactly like -ness in English. The -ishi, therefore, is a postpositional (locative) suffix which, in researching this passage, I have found more than one linguist suggesting might be connected to the Quenya suffix -ssë (e.g. 'Lóriendessë', which translates to 'in Lórien', found in the subtitle to Namárië). This makes sense, as there is evidence elsewhere that some of the vocabulary that we see in Orcish/Black Speech could have also been derived, or rather stolen, from Quenya (and also from Sauron's native Valarin, but that's besides the point). This also fits the backstory of the orcs that we see in The Silmarillion.
In any event, 'burzum-ishi' plainly matches the beats of 'in the darkness' -- so this isn't where our problem lies. We need to look more closely at the verbs instead.
As was noted in class, the Black Speech verb conjugations that we see in the inscription are suffixed: this seems clear. We have the -atul common in gimbatul and krimpatul which, judging by the translation, seems to modify the verb base x to mean "to x them". Then we have the -atulûk in durbatulûk and thrakatulûk, in which the -ûk extends the -atul suffix to, in turn, modify the verb base y to mean "to y them all". We can't assume the rhythm or pronunciation just from realising this, but it is certainly another clue.
The thing to note here -- which someone in class (I've forgotten who) did actually remark on -- is that the first three lines in the English all contain the to-infinitive: "to rule", "to find", "to bring". But, the final part is also in the infinitive: linked to the preceeding part by the conjunctive 'and' ('agh'), which then omits the final repetition of the 'to-' in Gandalf's English translation. This is our missing syllable in the English: it's not an "extra" syllable in the Black Speech at all. Our mistake, maybe, was forgetting which way this was being translated!
In fact, technically, the "in the darkness" here makes this line a type of split infinitive (which is extremely rare and conspicuous for Tolkien, in itself). The Black Speech version lacks this, because of the regularity of the verb forms that we see. Presumably, if the suffix -atul in krimpatul was changed, it would completely alter the conjugation/meaning of the word. Conversely, if it had served the rhythm better to translate the English as "One ring to bring them all and in the darkness to bind them", then Gandalf could have rendered his translation this way, and it would still be perfectly legible. But Gandalf doesn't do that, because English (and, presumably, its Westron analogue) allows him the flexibility to translate the line either way.
I think this answers the question of how the discrepancy between the two versions came to exist. I can see two possible explanations for why it exists:
Perhaps the point is that it's the oppressive strictness of the Black Speech syntax which destroys the rhythm of the lines, assuming that those line endings are, in fact, supposed to be pronounced gimbatul and krimpatul, rather than gimbatul and krimpatul. That would seem to fit with the idea of Sauron as a tyrant and Black Speech as an oppressive language. But it could also be an indication that the latter pronunciations are the correct ones, which flow better, and that the black speech does not actually parallel the English quite as exactly as we had assumed.
Personally, I quite strongly favour the latter explanation, since:
a) We can see that the Black Speech syntax, with its peculiar verb suffix clusters, is quite different than English in its construction and we shouldn't expect parity.
b) It is an incantation and, in my opinion, it shouldn't stumble. Burzum-ishi krimpatul stumbles, as we have repeatedly pointed out. This is the guy who strove with Finrod Felagund in songs of power, and won. Sauron wouldn't screw that up, any more than Tolkien himself would!
and c) part of the fun of this passage is in figuring out the correct pronunciation from the clues that we get (see also: the circumflexes, and the other snatches of Black Speech vocab, with identical roots, that we can use to cross-reference). This feels like another clue!
Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.
Our analysis showed that the rhythm of the Black Speech appears to quite closely approximate the rhythm of the English translation, with the exception of the final part, which contained a problematic extra syllable in Black Speech:
Ash nazg durbatulûk, (6) | ash nazg gimbatul, (5) | ash nazg thrakatulûk (6) | agh burzum-ishi krimpatul. (8) |
One ring to rule them all, (6) | One Ring to find them, (5) | One ring to bring them all (6) | and in the darkness bind them. (7) |
Our hypothesis was: that the irregularity in the Black Speech version v.s. the English is a linguistic joke from Tolkien (and that we are just not getting the joke). This seems to me to be plausible; there are many other places where these kinds of wordnerd jokes and references do exist. However, in this instance, it strikes me as being more of a syntactical puzzle than a linguistic joke. Examples of obscure "philologist humour" from Tolkien, that I know of, usually relate to a specific piece of vocabulary rather than poetic irregularities. I think Tolkien simply wanted readers to do exactly what we were all doing in session #151 and try to work out, for ourselves, how to pronounce it properly, and make intimations about how the syntax breaks down.
Here's my reasoning on why we should see it as a puzzle:
This was the only piece of grammatically consistent Black Speech that we ever got from Tolkien. The other snippet of Black Speech, which we will read in the chapter The Uruk-Hai, is clearly a form of dialectal Orcish patois (as indicated by what Appendix E tells us about contemporary Orc speech). And Tolkien gave at least two wildly inconsistent translations for that line as well, so we should discount the later passage as a data point. However, the regularity of the ring inscription tells us quite a lot about Sauron's "pure" Black Speech grammar, by itself. Which is why I would characterise it more as puzzle than joke. I think it feels more like an exercise that Tolkien might have set for his students, than a meta-joke or Easter Egg that he might have included for his peers. One could very easily imagine him giving his students a workshop with a scrap of some dead language, and not much information to go on, and then asking them to draw up a list of conclusions about its content and rules based on exactly the types of clues that he gives us here.
Now, I don't agree at all with the conclusion made that the extra syllable is due to the '-ishi'. Here's why:
We can tell that 'burz' means dark, by isolating the elements of the Black Speech word for Barad-dûr, which we will learn later on. That is: 'Lugbúrz', which we know translates to 'dark tower'. The -um in 'burzum' is therefore presumably an abstract suffix: which turns an adjective into a noun, exactly like -ness in English. The -ishi, therefore, is a postpositional (locative) suffix which, in researching this passage, I have found more than one linguist suggesting might be connected to the Quenya suffix -ssë (e.g. 'Lóriendessë', which translates to 'in Lórien', found in the subtitle to Namárië). This makes sense, as there is evidence elsewhere that some of the vocabulary that we see in Orcish/Black Speech could have also been derived, or rather stolen, from Quenya (and also from Sauron's native Valarin, but that's besides the point). This also fits the backstory of the orcs that we see in The Silmarillion.
In any event, 'burzum-ishi' plainly matches the beats of 'in the darkness' -- so this isn't where our problem lies. We need to look more closely at the verbs instead.
As was noted in class, the Black Speech verb conjugations that we see in the inscription are suffixed: this seems clear. We have the -atul common in gimbatul and krimpatul which, judging by the translation, seems to modify the verb base x to mean "to x them". Then we have the -atulûk in durbatulûk and thrakatulûk, in which the -ûk extends the -atul suffix to, in turn, modify the verb base y to mean "to y them all". We can't assume the rhythm or pronunciation just from realising this, but it is certainly another clue.
The thing to note here -- which someone in class (I've forgotten who) did actually remark on -- is that the first three lines in the English all contain the to-infinitive: "to rule", "to find", "to bring". But, the final part is also in the infinitive: linked to the preceeding part by the conjunctive 'and' ('agh'), which then omits the final repetition of the 'to-' in Gandalf's English translation. This is our missing syllable in the English: it's not an "extra" syllable in the Black Speech at all. Our mistake, maybe, was forgetting which way this was being translated!
In fact, technically, the "in the darkness" here makes this line a type of split infinitive (which is extremely rare and conspicuous for Tolkien, in itself). The Black Speech version lacks this, because of the regularity of the verb forms that we see. Presumably, if the suffix -atul in krimpatul was changed, it would completely alter the conjugation/meaning of the word. Conversely, if it had served the rhythm better to translate the English as "One ring to bring them all and in the darkness to bind them", then Gandalf could have rendered his translation this way, and it would still be perfectly legible. But Gandalf doesn't do that, because English (and, presumably, its Westron analogue) allows him the flexibility to translate the line either way.
I think this answers the question of how the discrepancy between the two versions came to exist. I can see two possible explanations for why it exists:
Perhaps the point is that it's the oppressive strictness of the Black Speech syntax which destroys the rhythm of the lines, assuming that those line endings are, in fact, supposed to be pronounced gimbatul and krimpatul, rather than gimbatul and krimpatul. That would seem to fit with the idea of Sauron as a tyrant and Black Speech as an oppressive language. But it could also be an indication that the latter pronunciations are the correct ones, which flow better, and that the black speech does not actually parallel the English quite as exactly as we had assumed.
Personally, I quite strongly favour the latter explanation, since:
a) We can see that the Black Speech syntax, with its peculiar verb suffix clusters, is quite different than English in its construction and we shouldn't expect parity.
b) It is an incantation and, in my opinion, it shouldn't stumble. Burzum-ishi krimpatul stumbles, as we have repeatedly pointed out. This is the guy who strove with Finrod Felagund in songs of power, and won. Sauron wouldn't screw that up, any more than Tolkien himself would!
and c) part of the fun of this passage is in figuring out the correct pronunciation from the clues that we get (see also: the circumflexes, and the other snatches of Black Speech vocab, with identical roots, that we can use to cross-reference). This feels like another clue!
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