Early Quenya
ma kaire laiqen ondolissen kirya maita?
*does a ship lie maimed on green rocks?
Element in
Variations
- ma kaire laikven ondolissen kirya maita? ✧ PE16/077
Beware, older languages below! The languages below were invented during Tolkien's earlier period and should be used with caution. Remember to never, ever mix words from different languages!
The tenth phrase (lines 19-20) of the intermediate version of the Oilima Markirya poem (PE16/77). The first word is the interrogative particle ma followed by the present 3rd-singular feminine form of the verb kaya- “to lie”. The subject of the phrase is kirya “ship”, followed by the modifying adjective maita “maimed” and preceded by the clause laiqen ondolissen, the locative plural of the adjective laiqa “green” and the noun ondo “rock”.
This phrase corresponds to the lines of the English translations of the poem LA2a-LA2b (PE16/68-9): “who shall heed a dead ship/drowned boat lying on the green rocks”. It also resembles the seventeenth line in the first English translation LA1a (PE16/67): “a ship lay upon the green rocks”.
Alternate Interpretations: In their original article, Gilson, Welden and Hostetter suggested this phrase might be “What maimed ship lies upon the green rocks?” where the initial element ma was “what”. In a Discord conversation from 2023-04-23, Christopher Gilson also suggested the possibility “what lies on green rocks, a maimed ship?”, pointing out that since kirya maita falls on the next line, there could be an omitted comma.
Decomposition: Broken into its constituent elements, this phrase would be:
> ma kai-re laikve-n ondo-li-ssen kirya maita = “✱does lie-she green-(plural) rock-(plural)-on ship maimed”
Alternate Interpretations: In their original article, Gilson, Welden and Hostetter suggested this phrase might be “What maimed ship lies upon the green rocks?” where the initial element ma is “what”. In a Discord conversation from 2023-04-23, Christopher Gilson also suggested the possible interpretation “what lies on green rocks, a maimed ship?”. Since kirya maita falls on the next line, there could be an omitted comma: ma kaire laikven ondolissen, kirya maita? I find Gilson’s 2023 suggestion to be quite plausible.