Wednesday, August 02, 2006

Lend a dinen

by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, translated by me into Sindarin

Lend a dínen, lend a dínen,
Sûl aearon Dûn;
Dínen, dínen, thuio na-dhîn,
Sûl aearon Dûn;
Bado or aearon hiriol
Tolo uin Ithil firiel,
Den thuio ad na nin
Ir tithen nîn, bain nîn, losta.

Losto mae, losto mae,
Adar telitha na le;
Vi rainc Naneth losto mae,
Adar telitha na le;
Adar telitha na laes hîn,
Cîr gelebrin pain e Dûn,
Di-Ithil gelebren:
Losto, tithen nîn, losto, bain nîn, losto.

Sweet and quiet, sweet and quiet,
Wind of (the) Sea of (the) West;
Quiet, quiet, breathe with silence,
Wind of (the) Sea of (the) West
Go over the flowing Sea
Come from the dying Moon,
Him blow again to me
When my little (one), my pretty (one), sleeps.

Sleep well, sleep well,
Father will come to thee;
In Mother's arms sleep well,
Father will come to thee;
Father will come to his child,
Silver ships all out of (the) West,
Under (the) silver Moon:
Sleep, my little (one), sleep, my fair (one), sleep.

* * *

All right, there's my translation. It was done with a little help by people on Council of Elrond, and it's still not as good as it might be. My translation wasn't exact, both because I was limited by my knowledge and because I wanted it to sound nice. The grammar's iffy, because there's only so much we know about Sindarin grammar. Tolkien never gave us a grammar text, just examples, so many things are a little bit speculative.

That said, it was a lot of fun to do. I like translations.

1 comment:

Fidelio said...

This makes me sleepy, in either language.

Pretty.