Merseburg Charm
translated into Sindarin by Lothenon
Lothenon, the author of this Sindarin translation and Tengwar calligraphy writes: "This is the second of the Old High German Merseburg Charms (see here). I transcribed it into Tolkien's Anglosaxon mode for Tengwar and hope I got the pronunciation correctly (since I didn't really study Old High German (so far)). There is no real breakaway, I just used the right-open-curl for O, since this is more frequent, and I used the extended-stem-tinko for affricate Z (= ts). The larger text is of course my translation of this spell into Sindarin." The story below is fictitious.
A few
days ago I was given the opportunity to study a spectacular ancient document,
that was just found in Gamenweiler, Germany. The
spectacular about it is that it is completely written in the rather puzzling
script used by Mr. Lowdham in his even more puzzling documents, so I believe
we just discovered another document of the same historical context.
It consists of two texts, which (by comparison of structure) seem to be the
very same in two different, yet perhaps related languages. The first and
larger one is the older; it is written in a beautiful angular black letter
type of mentioned script that seems to be written in three or more colours
originally.
The rules of writing seem similar, but the actual "mode" is different, and as far as we can say it reads more or less:
Fol a Wodan lennir nan eryn.
Ned lű hen rocheg i-chîr harnant dâl ín.
A Sinthgunt pent assan, ah Anor, muinthel dín,
a Frîa pent assan, a
Volla, muinthel dín,
a Wodan pent assan, an ho paul:
aes-nestad, sui iâr-nestad, sui
ranc-nestad:
aes nan aes, iâr nan iâr,
ranc nan ranc, sui raenannen aen!
and this seems to be the original text,
this and nothing else.
The lines in the lower right are of far newer origin, and written in a less
calligraphic style, clearly by a different author, supposedly not more than
private notes.
Undoubtfully this is a translation, and the style feels as if it was a
translation into ones mother-tongue (although I understand neither the one
nor the other used language). At least this is (especially by the methods of
using consonants and placing vowels) clearly related to Lowdham's documents.
It seems to say:
Phol ende Wodan
vuorun zi holza.
dú wart demo balderes volon sín vuoz birenkit.
thú biguol en Sinthgunt, Sunna era
suister,
thú biguol en Fríja, Volla era suister,
thú biguol en Wodan, só hé wola conda:
sóse bénrenkí, sóse bluotrenkí, sóse lidirenkí:
bén zi béna, bluot zi bluoda,
Maybe you understand a little more of this...
English translation of the Old High German and Sindarin texts:
Phol and Wodan fared
into the forest.
At that time the lord’s foal hurt its foot
and Sinthgunt spake to it, and Volla, her sister
and Fríja spake to it, and Sun, her sister,
and Wodan spake to it, for he could:
bone-healing, like blood-healing, like arm-healing
bone to bone, blood to blood,
arm to arm, like being enlaced!
Vocabulary:
lennir
- fared | 3.pa.t. of *ledh-, fare. Taken from ON
lende, fared.
rocheg - foal | lit. horselet,
roch-eg. Cf. nogoth-eg.
assan - to it | <an-san
(cf. hain, sg. *han < *san)
paul - could, was able to | pa.t.
of *pol- (< Q pul-), cf. pa.t. daul of doltha/doelio
aes˛ - bone | < *ais < *achs
< CE *aksō > Q axo
aes-nestad,… | I treat this neologisms
as modern compounds, transcribing them like tad-dail (no lenition of
n, of course)
raenannen - enlaced | < *raena-, enlace < *rajnâ- (cf. raen, enlaced; raeda-, catch in a net,…) I didn't use raen as it is because I wanted a direct counterpart of sóse gelímida sín (more or less: like they are being glued = as if they were glued).
By the way: There is no place called Gamenweiler in Germany. I made this up from Old High German *Gamanwîlâri, which consists of a word for fun plus a common old town-name-suffix (no specialist at all, please correct me if necessary). You see this is all just for fun ;)