anno ammen sír i mbas ilaurui vín

give us this day our daily bread

The sixth line of Ae Adar Nín, Tolkien’s Sindarin translation of the Lord’s Prayer (VT44/21). The first word anno is the imperative form of anna- “to give”, followed by ammen “to us”, a combination of an “to” and men “us”. The third word sír “this day” seems to be the equivalent of Q. síra.

The fourth word is the definite article i “the”, followed by the lenited form mbas of bas(t) “bread”, the adjective ilaurui “daily” and the lenited form vín of the possessive pronoun mín “ours”. The adjectival elements follow the noun as is usual in Sindarin. See the entry for the second line of this prayer for a discussion of the use of the definite article i “the” before the possessed noun in this phrase.

Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:

> ann-o am-men sír i mbas [← bas] ilaurui vín [← mín] = “✱give-(imperative) to-us this-day the bread daily ours”

Conceptual Development: Tolkien first wrote the unlenited form mín of the pronoun “our” before replacing it with the lenited form vín.

Element in

• S. Ae Adar Nín

Variations

• Anno ammen sír i mbas ilaurui {mín >>} vín ✧ VT44/21