Sundocarme

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Sundocarmë is the concept of an etymological root of the languages. All Elvish and Mannish words (and in a sense, also Khuzdul) derive from a base root.

Sundocarmi are not actual words, but bases that contain the general meanings, and from which, during the process of evolution and times, real words were derived through affixes, suffixes, or modifications.

In the very first phase of the Primitive Quendian, sundocarmi were probably used as actual words; in that period the Elves could speak only through uninflected words, without any differentiation between parts of the speech (Tradition says that the very first word ever said by an Elf was el-e!, a primitive exclamation "look!", referring to a star).

The consonants of the root was called sundo and the central radical vowel called sundóma.

Categories

Sundocarmi usually have the construction combinations:

  • VC or CV (examples: KWE "speak"; this category is called monoconsonantic)
  • (C)VCV (examples: DELE- "walk", ABA- "deny"; this category was preferred for meanings related to actions/verbs)
  • CVC(V) (examples: TATA- "two", TUR- "power, control")

Examples

These are some of the roots, with their derivatives in various languages

Some Mannish roots (which sometimes derived from Elvish words) have been: