Plastikdol@... wrote:

> I was just watching Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring...
> ... it appears to me that the book was written in the Elder Futhark.
> Reanna

The book in question (both in the novel and the movie) were written in a
couple of scripts that Tolkien invented; the best place for detailed
information is in the Appendices of _Return_of_the_King_, though there's
plenty on-line. Try http://www.uib.no/People/hnohf/

The script that looks runic Tolkien called the Cirth; it is indeed
inspired by the futhark scripts, but it's a featural system targeted
toward the languages he'd invented.

'featural' here means that the shapes of the letters indicate the sounds. A
right-pointing rune is usually a basic point of articulation:

|\ |\ | /
|/ | \ |/ are 'p' 't' 'k'
| | |
| | |

Adding a stroke to these adds voicing:

|\ |\ | /
|/ |\\ |// are 'b' 'd' 'g'
|\ | \ |/
| \ | |

Turning them to point left made spirants ( 'f' 'th' 'kh' / 'v' 'dh' 'gh' )
and so forth.

The 'Feanorian' script (the swooping letters in the movie) used a
similar featural system. I actually find them a little difficult
for fast reading. Words with similar sounds end up looking similar,
and easy to get confused when reading quickly. Perhaps they are
intended to be used by people who don't read very much or very fast;
perhaps Tolkien's Elves and Dwarves preferred to reserve writing
for monuments and inscriptions and didn't write down stories and
histories. Or perhaps they wer just largely illiterate.

Erich