Q. man pron. “who” (Category: What)
The most common Quenya word for “who”, most notably appearing in the Namárië poem in the phrase sí man i yulma nin enquantuva? “who now shall refill the cup for me?” (LotR/377). It is based on the interrogative element ma (PE17/68). Man might be a general interrogative element “who, what, which”; at one point Tolkien said man was a reduction of mana before vowels (PE23/135). However, in the Markirya, man was used for “who” before consonants, such as man tiruva fána cirya “Who shall heed a white ship?” (MC/222).
In writings from the 1930s and 40s, man was used for “what” (LR/59, 72) or as a general interrogative marker (PE23/99). However, it was used for “who” in the versions of the Oilima Markirya from around 1930 (MC/213-214).
Neo-Quenya: For purposes of Neo-Quenya, I would mostly use man in the sense “who”, before both consonants and vowels. For “what” I would use mana, and as a general interrogative marker I’d use ma. In cases where you want an unambiguous word for “who = what person”, I would use mamo.
References ✧ LotR/377; MC/221-222; Minor-Doc/2013-05-13; PE17/67-68; PE22/161; PM/357; RGEO/58-59; VT21/6
Glosses
Variations
Related
Elements
| ma² | “interrogative particle” | ✧ PE17/68; PM/357 |
Element In
ᴹQ. man pron. “what” (Category: What)
References ✧ LR/59, 63, 72; PE23/99
Glosses
Variations
Inflections
| Man-ie | stative | “What is it?” | ✧ LR/59 |
Elements
| ma | “interrogative particle” |
Element In
ᴱQ. man pron. “who” (Category: What)
References ✧ MC/213-214; PE16/77
Glosses
Variations
Element In
Derivations