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Perians
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Author:  Caunion cyn Britannia [ January 19th, 2007, 8:55 pm ]
Post subject:  Perians

I was reading the Return of the King and they mention perians and I'm wondering, what are they? Is that what the Gondorian call the Hobbits because I read that when Pippin finds Merry in Minas Tirith he tells Bergil to hurry up and find someone because Merry was a perian.

Author:  Ninlor [ January 19th, 2007, 10:29 pm ]
Post subject: 

Perian is Sindarin and means hobbit, but I'm not quit sure, why Gondor people call them like this.. :blush:

Author:  Princess of Ithilien [ January 20th, 2007, 8:24 pm ]
Post subject: 

I thought Pheriannath was plural of Perian, but I'm not too sure...

I looked on The Encyclopedia of Arda. It just says the Dúnedain called them "Periannath" or "halflings". except in the book it says Ernil i Pheriannath for "Prince of the Halflings".

?

Author:  Eruhin [ January 23rd, 2007, 2:55 pm ]
Post subject: 

well i know for sure that per- is a sindarin prefix for "half". so i presume that
it just means "halfling"

Author:  Darrell [ January 30th, 2007, 1:42 pm ]
Post subject: 

Perian means halfling, as has been said. The plural is Periannath; 'halfings'. It is what the dunedain call them, though the word itself is elvish.

Author:  [ January 30th, 2007, 5:50 pm ]
Post subject: 

The Dunedain spoke (and I assume many still know the language in the Third Age) Sindarin and had close dealings with the elves, and many words in Gondorian might be similar or directly adopted from Sindarin. :angel:

Author:  Shadowcat [ February 24th, 2007, 12:04 am ]
Post subject: 

^ I was going to say that I didn't think Gondorians spoke Sindarin, but all the languages are pretty similar.

Author:  [ February 24th, 2007, 11:08 am ]
Post subject: 

The people of Gondor descend from the Dunedain, who spoke Sindarin, so the language was not strange to them. But you're right, many languages originate in Quenya or Sindarin because the elves were the first to speak and to name things.

Author:  Darrell [ February 25th, 2007, 6:14 am ]
Post subject: 

Right, most languages descended from one form of elvish or another (Though somehow I doubt Khuzdul was derived from elvish) but the languages of men would have been long sundered from the Elvish tongues, and so would be considerabley different.

Author:  Elthir [ December 26th, 2016, 8:44 pm ]
Post subject:  Re:

Princess of Ithilien wrote:
I thought Pheriannath was plural of Perian, but I'm not too sure... I looked on The Encyclopedia of Arda. It just says the Dúnedain called them "Periannath" or "halflings". except in the book it says Ernil i Pheriannath for "Prince of the Halflings".

?


Yep, one type of plural is Periannath, another type is Periain... but in a Sindarin context you can find mutations for various reasons, and so Ernil i-Pheriannath is also correct (note the mutations found in Welsh, for a Primary World example). You can also find Periannath in the books in an English context, in Appendix B, Tale of Years: Year 1050: "... The Periannath are first mentioned in records, with the coming of the Harfoots to Eriador."

Author:  Jax Nova [ December 27th, 2016, 8:38 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Perians

Interesting. :D Why so many plurals?

Kind of like Crowd, Gathering, Group etc... ?

Author:  Elthir [ December 31st, 2016, 7:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Perians

Interesting, I agree! Here we have two plurals with different meanings: Periannath refers collectively to the Hobbit folk, while periain is an "indefinite number of Halflings" [JRRT, footnote to letter 347, 1972]

And Pheriannath is just a mutated form of Periannath (sounds different at the beginning) in the Sindarin context for "Prince of the Halflings". Appendix F informs that in the time of the war of the ring, the elven-tongue was "... known to only a small part of the peoples of Gondor, and spoken daily by fewer. These dwelt mostly in Minas Tirith and the townlands adjacent, and in the land of the tributary princes of Dol Amroth." In The Road Goes Ever On Tolkien explains -ath as a group plural "embracing all things of the same name, or those associated in some special arrangement or organization..." which is why we can have not only elenath "all the visible stars of the firmament", but Argonath as well, meaning "pair of royal stones."

For those interested in some language bits anyway!

Author:  Korio_97 [ February 24th, 2023, 7:36 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Perians

Hello! It was very interesting to read. To be continued?

Author:  Cordero [ April 27th, 2023, 6:18 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Perians

thanks for the info

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