kay

root. lie, lie, [ᴹ√] lie down; [ᴱ√] rest, dwell

Tolkien used this root for “lie (down)” for most of his life. It appeared as ᴱ√KAYA “lie, rest; dwell” in the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s (QL/46), but in that document there was another root ᴱ√KAMA “lie down”, with the derivative ᴱQ. kama- “to lie down” (QL/44). There is no sign of ᴱ√KAMA¹ being used this way after the 1910s, and in the 1920s Early Qenya Grammar, the verb for “lie down” was kaita- (PE14/58), which in the Qenya Lexicon of the 1910s had the transitive sense “to place” (QL/44).

The root ᴹ√KAY “lie down” reappeared in The Etymologies of the 1930s (Ety/KAY), and it appeared again in the Quenya Verbal System of the 1940s as the basis for the verb ᴹQ. kaita- “to lie (down)” (PE22/126). The root and associated Quenya verb continued to appear in Tolkien’s later writings all the way up through the late 1960s, always with the sense “lie” (PE17/72; PE22/156).

Derivatives

• Ad. khay- “to lie (down)”
• ✶kainu- “to lie down” ✧ PE22/136
  • ᴺQ. cainu- “to lie down, *bend down; [with locative] to endure, suffer (from)”
• ✶kaita- “to lie, be on the ground” ✧ PE22/136
  • Q. caita- “to lie (down)”
• Aq. caia- “[unglossed]”
• Q. cairë “[unglossed]” ✧ PE17/101
• Q. caita- “to lie (down)” ✧ PE17/072; PE22/156
• Q. caita- “to lay (transitive), to lay (transitive); [ᴱQ.] to place, lie down”
• Q. cëa “*hedge” ✧ PE17/101
• ᴺS. caeda- “to lie; to lay (down)”
• S. caer “*flat isle on a river, [N.] flat isle on a river” ✧ PE17/101
• S. cai “hedge” ✧ PE17/101

Element in

• ᴺS. osgaef “surroundings, environs, milieu”

Variations

• KAYA ✧ PE17/101
• KAJ ✧ PE22/136

kait-a

verb. lie, be on the ground