Mannish

Mannish was a term used to refer to the languages spoken by Men in Middle-earth in J.R.R. Tolkien's legendarium.

History

With the first raising of the Sun in the West, Men awoke in Hildórien. However, is not known how the ancestors of the Edain sundered from the ancestors of Easterlings and Haradrim and if their languages were indeed related. When Morgoth acted in order to corrupt Men, the ancestors of the Edain were still in the east of Middle-earth, thus they chose to move westward seeking the rumored Great Sea and the Light found there. During the migration they separated in two hosts: one moved north and reached the Sea of Rhûn, while the other moved southwest.

Taliska was the language spoken by the first host, while the second host spoke a different language. However, Tolkien never explained if the two language were completely different or if they had a distant common ancestor. While the etymologic origin of Taliska is unknown, contact between the Atanatári, the Elves and the Dwarves before the former's arrival in Beleriand left strong influences on Taliska. When the first host split again in two groups, the Lesser Folk and the Greater Folk, their languages started to diverge, but they continued to remain in kinship. From Hadorian language descended the languages of Northmen of Rhovanion (like Rohanese and the language of Dale). The Halethian language, instead, was the common ancestor of the languages of the Lossoth of Forochel, the Forest-folk of Minhiriath, and of the so-called Hill-men and it was strictly related to Drúadan.

After the crossing of the Blue Mountains, the Edain started to use the Sindarin as common tongue; however, from the mingling of Edain's ancient languages descended the Adûnaic, the language of Númenor. Sometimes, Mannish is a term referring specifically to Adûnaic. Because most of the Bëorian speakers had been killed after the Dagor Bragollach, Hadorian accent become most prevalent among Adûnaic speakers. When the Númenóreans started to colonize Middle-earth's shores, their language started to mingle with tongues of the so-called Middle Men. Thus, from the Adûnaic spoken in the King's Men's colony of Umbar, that was influenced by the Haradrim languages, descended a variant of Adûnaic. While from the Adûnaic spoken in the Faithful's colonies of Eriador and Gondor descended Westron, also known as the Common Speech because it was the most common mannish language in Middle-earth, the equivalent of English, though it was influenced by Sindarin and other languages in Eriador. Westron was rapidly adopted also by the Hobbits, when they established themselves in the Shire. However, they kept some features of their original tongue, Hobbit-speech, perhaps relative of the languages of the Northmen. The combined variant of Westron and Hobbit-speech spoken by the Shire-folk was called Shire-speech while the variant spoken by the Bucklanders was called Bucklandish.

Mannish languages of Middle-earth

• Taliska
  • Adûnaic
    • Black Númenorean variant
    • Westron
      • Hobbit-speech
        • Bucklandish
        • Shire-speech
  • Northern languages
    • Rohanese
    • Language of Dale
  • Languages of Men of Eriador
• Halethian language
  • Dunlendish
  • Languages of the Hill-men of Eriador and Gondor
  • Language of the Forest-folk of Minhiriath
  • Languages of Forodwaith and the Lossoth
• Drúadan
• Many tongues of Haradrim
• Many tongues of Easterlings