Quenya
a aina neldië eru er órava (o)messë
Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us
Element in
Variations
- A Aina Neldie Eru {Erea >>} Er órava (o)messe ✧ VT44/12
a aina neldië eru er órava (o)messë
Holy Trinity, one God, have mercy on us
Element in
Variations
- A Aina Neldie Eru {Erea >>} Er órava (o)messe ✧ VT44/12
The ninth line of Tolkien’s Quenya translation of the Litany of Loreto prayer (VT44/12). The first word is the vocative a “O” followed by aina Neldië = “holy Trinity”. The fourth word Eru is Tolkien’s usual Quenya name for God. The fifth word is er “one”, emphasizing the one-ness of the Trinity. The phrase órava (o)messe “have mercy on us” was abbreviated o.o. in the original, but presumably was the same as in earlier lines of the prayer; see the entry for the first line for discussion.
Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:
> a Aina Neldië Eru Er órava (o)me-sse = “✱o Holy Trinity, God one have-mercy us-on”
Conceptual Development: Tolkien first wrote an adjectival form Erea before changing it to Er as a way of emphasizing the one-ness of the Trinity (VT44/17).