#making up words

[from-the-coffee-shop-in-edoras]

A Need of the Soul

Summary: Éomer is teaching Faramir how to speak Rohirric as a surprise for Éowyn. Come for Faramir being a sweet husband, stay for the emotional links to Boromir and Théodred. Oh, and for Éomer being a big horse dork.

Context: I pulled a JRR and wrote a whole story around a special word I like! More on that at the very bottom. You can read this without knowing any of my personal Rohan head canon, but just in case it’s helpful: In my world, Éomer is married to his childhood best friend, Mereliss. My Théodred (who you can read more about here or here if you’re interested) was a nurturing soul with a curious mind, and I may be obsessed with him. And damn it, my Éomer can absolutely read and write! (See here for why that’s the case in my HC.)

As soon as Éowyn left for the morning, Faramir pulled out his secret stack of papers, the ones he had started requesting from Éomer six months ago when he first decided to try learning Rohirric. He wanted to master the language as a surprise for Éowyn, ever conscious of how much she had sacrificed on his behalf when they married. Although he knew she loved Ithilien, he also knew that sometimes she still longed for the familiarity and comfort of home, for the people, places, and culture that were now many miles away. If he could bring some of Rohan to her in the form of her language, he hoped he could brighten her heart on those days when she looked most in need of a reminder of all that she missed.

With this goal in mind, he had thrown himself wholly into the pursuit, but the process was more difficult than he had hoped. The Rohirrim didn’t keep written records in their own language, nor did they have textbooks or primers made to learn from. All Faramir had were the pages that Éomer would write out and send to him every few weeks, using Westron to describe basic grammar rules and listing common Rohirric words and phrases by their definitions and rough pronunciations. Working from written materials to learn a language that was only taught orally was maddeningly difficult, and Faramir spent long hours alone at his desk laboring at the exercises Éomer sent, unsure if he was even getting close to the sounds he was attempting to produce.

At least he would be aided today by the presence of Éomer in person. The king of Rohan was coming to Gondor to take counsel with his allies on military matters, and he had agreed to make time for some lessons while his own wife, Mereliss, kept Éowyn occupied in furtherance of the surprise. With Éowyn gone now to meet her sister-in-law, Faramir looked down his lists of Rohirric words and tried to commit a few more to memory, repeating them slowly out loud to himself while he waited for Éomer.

“If someone back home heard you slur your way through those words like that, they might assume you were a drunkard.”

Faramir looked up to see Éomer smirking at him from the doorway, still dressed in his riding clothes and holding a small pack. “Well, if the performance of the student falls short, I think we have no option but to blame the instructor,” Faramir returned with a smirk of his own.

“A fair point, I will grant you.” Éomer strode in and tossed his things on an empty chair before pulling Faramir up into a strong embrace, thumping a fist on his brother-in-law’s back with enough enthusiasm to knock the breath out of him.

When they separated, Faramir smiled and held up his stack of papers. “I do appreciate all of this. It’s a lot of work for me, but for you, too, I’m sure.”

Éomer gave a dismissive wave. “I have the easy part. Besides, there’s some benefit to me in all of this, as well. I’ll certainly enjoy the show the next time you visit Edoras and all the ladies at court discover that you can actually understand their scandalous comments about how handsome they find you. Your admirer’s club is in for a big shock.”

They both laughed, though Éomer noted the flush of pink in Faramir’s ears and cheeks and that only made him laugh all the harder. “Don’t let them see you blush, you’ll only make it worse!” He plopped down into a chair and put his feet up, smiling.

As Faramir took a seat across from him, he felt a warm, familiar echo in his heart. The easy camaraderie, the good natured teasing balanced with true affection…it couldn’t help but bring Boromir to his mind. Faramir still missed his brother every single day and looked for reminders of him everywhere that he could. But he didn’t think it was a stretch to see clear elements of Boromir reflected in Éomer–in his strength and brashness, his earnest intensity, his fierce loyalty. They were both proud men of action with an unshakeable sense of duty and love for family. Éomer could never replace Boromir, and he was surely his own man, different in many ways from the brother Faramir lost. But it lifted Faramir’s spirits to once again have such a figure in his life.

Now his brother-in-law reached into his pack and pulled out more pages, covered from top to bottom in his own scrawly handwriting. “I’ve brought you some more to learn–words you’d hear often around Rohan and that any self-respecting Rohirrim would know.”

Faramir accepted the papers from him and skimmed his eyes down the first page, but a look of confusion slowly built on his face as he read. “Am I understanding this correctly? Why do you have twenty different words for ‘horse’?”

“I have not given you twenty words for ‘horse’! Each one of those means something very different.” Éomer grabbed the page back and pointed. “This one here, éotynde, this is an old, calm mare that would be suitable for a young child just learning to ride.” He pointed again. “And this one, éoweder, is a high spirited horse that has quickness and agility but is unpredictable and difficult to control. The others are equally unique. Do you not see?”

Faramir gently extracted the page back from Éomer’s grip, hoping to avoid a further explanation of each specific variant on the list. “I understand those distinctions, but are they really significant enough that I require a whole separate word for each one? We make do in Gondor with but one term. A horse is a horse.”

“A horse is a horse?” Éomer gaped at him, incredulous. “You think the language of the Rohirrim would put a courier horse, whose purpose is swiftness and endurance, in the same category with a farm horse, who sacrifices speed in favor of strength and power? They aren’t remotely the same thing, and a proper language wouldn’t treat them as such. If we went by your rules, we’d all be calling the blacksmith a baker because they both make things with heat!”

It was obvious from the truly scandalized look on his face that Éomer would never concede the point, so Faramir held up his hands in smiling capitulation. And if all these varieties of horse were important to Éomer, likely they would be to Éowyn as well, so Faramir would learn them as best he could. But he desired to speak to Éowyn of many things, and horses were nowhere near the top of the list. He shuffled through the papers one more time. “Have you finally given me anything that would be suitable to say to a beloved wife?”

Éomer shot him a look. “I am not the right person to consult for words of romance. And certainly not when the woman to be romanced is my own sister.”

Faramir laughed. “Fair enough. Let’s get back to your many words for ‘horse’ and I will ask Mereliss to help me with some more emotional thoughts later.”

Éomer sat back, satisfied. “I will have you sounding like a Rohirrim in no time. Now, do you know the word for a horse that likes to cause trouble in the stable with the other horses?”

**********

The next morning, Faramir spent two hours with Mereliss while Éomer and Éowyn went for a ride. When the siblings returned, Éomer sent Éowyn to Mereliss’s quarters and went himself to check on Faramir’s progress. He found his brother-in-law once again at his desk, bent over his work, and dropped casually into a nearby chair.

“Did you get all of the flowery and eloquent phrases you need?”

Faramir put down his pen and smiled. “Mereliss helped me to write a special toast to Éowyn for our upcoming anniversary. I knew what I wanted to say, and Mereliss made sure it will sound not just like a bunch of Westron bluntly converted into Rohirric words but rather something that was written by a native speaker. Something truly of Rohan. She has quite a talent for beautiful language and imagery.” He gave a sly smile. “Though she told me that you also have something of a poet’s heart when the two of you are alone in your own chambers.”

Éomer’s head snapped up, a tinge of dark red sweeping across his cheeks. “She told you what?”

Now it was Faramir’s turn to laugh at his brother-in-law’s furious blushing, so out of character for one who was otherwise always self assured and confident. Faramir had faithfully reported Mereliss’s remark, and it was clearly true that Éomer really did speak his softest thoughts to her or he would not be so flustered by the possibility that she had shared those thoughts. But Faramir had no need or desire to prolong Éomer’s self-consciousness.

“There is nothing to worry about. I know only that you are capable of words to enchant and delight your wife, which is no bad thing. But she didn’t reveal what those words are. She wouldn’t betray your privacy, and I would never ask her to.”

Éomer’s shoulders noticeably relaxed, and he laughed a little at his own embarrassment. “Well, your discussion of my clumsy attempts to please my wife aside, I am glad that she helped you. Westron is very useful, but there are some things that just cannot be said as effectively without our own words and expressions.”

“Indeed. She gave me a number of things that I quite like, ways to convey entire concepts with a single word that has no direct equivalent in any language that I know. Like sáwolthearf. Every language should have such a term.”

Sáwolthearf. The word sent a wave of fond remembrance through Éomer’s heart. It translated literally as ‘a need of the soul’ and was used in Rohan to mean someone who is necessary in order for another person to feel truly happy and complete. His late cousin Théodred, who had always been so free and generous in expressing his feelings, used to call his bride-to-be sáwolthearf, and Éomer could easily picture Eadlin practically glowing with love and pride whenever Théodred referred to her that way.

To hear Théodred’s words coming now from Faramir’s lips was no great shock to Éomer. On the contrary, it only intensified a feeling he had long had in the presence of his brother-in-law: a sense that he was not with Théodred himself, but with a kindred spirit of his cousin. Someone whose modesty, eagerness for knowledge, gentle heart and dreamer’s mind so thoroughly echoed Théodred’s own nature that Éomer felt immediately at ease in his company. Théodred had been many things to Éomer–a deeply loved cousin, but also much like an older brother and at times even a father figure–and he had carried Éomer through some of the most difficult moments he would ever experience. Éomer could never truly reconcile himself to Théodred’s loss, but having Faramir in his life helped to salve that wound.

Watching Faramir now—shuffling again through his notes and drafts, applying himself so diligently to such a difficult task and all for the purpose of simply making Éowyn smile—Éomer was struck by a profound feeling of gratitude, one that he felt should be voiced even if it was not normally in his nature to speak of his innermost feelings. He cleared his throat, and Faramir looked up.

“What you’re doing for my sister is very admirable. I know it will mean a lot to her, and for that reason it means a lot to me. Thank you, eyre-brothor.”

Faramir frowned slightly and looked back at his papers. “Eyre-brothor? I don’t think I’ve learned that yet.”

Éomer smiled. “It means ‘brother by choice.’ Write that one down.”

**********

[Language nerd notes:

“Sáwolthearf” is a real Old English word (though I modernized the thorn in the middle for readability–it’s actually “sáwolþearf”) and it really does mean “a need of the soul,” which I just think is incredibly beautiful.

I made up “eyre-brothor” by combining two other real Old English words, “eyre” (“a choice made of free will”) and “brothor” (“brother”, though once again I turned the thorn in broþor into a “th” to make it smoother to modern English-reading eyes).

“Éotynde” comes from an approx combo of “eoh” (“horse”) and “tyende” (“teaching”) for a horse that’s calm enough to be good for beginners.

Éoweder comes from an approx combo of “eoh” (“horse”) and “weder” (“weather”) because to be impressive but quick-changing, unpredictable and uncontrollable is to be like the weather.

And it’s not in the story, but Éomer’s word for a horse that likes to cause trouble in the stable with the other horses is an “éodrefa” from “eoh” (horse, again!) and “drefan,” which is “to stir things up or cause mischief”.]

#lord of the rings #lotr #tolkien #lotr fanfiction #eomer #éomer #faramir #boromir #theodred #théodred #brothers #making up words #middle earth languages #brotherly bonding #divider by saradika #the rohirrim are such horse dorks #y’all of course i’m gonna put théodred in anything i can!

[vladimasters]

Me and my roomie get into the funnest conversations 😂

Me(talking about my weird dream)- "...and then the boy gets eaten by a plant monster and I have to save him. Because for some reason that's my responsibility."

Nole(knowing what kinda person I am)- "Did you fuck it?"

Me-"No. It was too animalistic. I draw a line if they don't have sapience. That'd be plant beastiality... Is there a word for that?"

Nole-"In this day and age, there's gotta be. But I'm not putting that in my search history."

Me-"Imma call it Herbeastiality. That is now my word."

#monster fucker #making up words #monsters

[dreamdropsystem]

making up your own words is fun but people don't understand you– silly things lol

#locket #shane #words #making up words #made up words

[krabkrab-wontshutup]

i have made up a word.

#writing #linguistics #making up words #making words #creation of words

[crap-copper]

I couldn’t find the right antonym for tired to use, so now untired is a word

Happy NaNoWriMo everyone

#writing #writer #writing process #making up words #nanowrimo #national novel writing month

[bunny-ology]

Considering the lack of a word for “museum lover” (moon lover is selenophile, music lover is melophile, tree lover is dendrophile, etc tec), and “museumgoer” just refers to someone who frequents museums, I decided to come up with my own word for someone who loves museums :

Mousaphile - A person who loves museums

mousa (’muse’) coming from the the greek origin of the word museum, and phile meaning a lover of

#mousaphile #mousa #phile #etymology #museum goer #museumgoer #museum lover #museums #museum #making up words

[ribcageteeth]

#come vibe with me #bug hunter #making up words

[lucidloving]

@roach-works // Melissa Broder, "Problem Area" // Mary Oliver, "The Return" // @annavonsyfert // Koyoharu Gotouge, Demon Slayer // Haruki Murakami, Dance Dance Dance // David Levithan, How They Met and Other Stories // Tennessee Williams, Notebooks

#theme: saving yourself #my favourite thing about myself is how i always pick myself back up #and make things better #again and again #web weaving #webs #poetry #aesthetic #prose #prose poetry #art #collage #literature #books #book quotes #novels #novel quotes #poems #quotes #words #positivity

[emilnikos]

I need non autistic people to realise meltdowns are a real debilitating thing that has a serious effect on your mental and physical health NOWWWWW!!! The way its been trivialized and lessened pisses me the fuck off. It's not a tantrum and it doesn't come from "being too weak-willed" it's painful and it's embarrassing AND MOST OF ALL IT'S INVOLUNTARY!! Don't claim to be an ally to autistic or disabled people and then make fun of people who have meltdowns. Literally get the hell out of my sight

#i can't believe i have to day it but autism /is/ a disablity. its disabling. meltdowns are part of that. #'oh this is a lukewarm take' you dumbshit fucks have been throwing the word neurodivergent and meltdown around so #casually they have both been said at me with the same disdain as a swear word. you guys will accept making fun of autistic people #if someone jn your circle who is 'cool' does it first. at your big ages. shut the hell up

[thebestestdancers]

why should palestinians have to leave behind their land because israel wont stop killing them. why should anyone have to leave behind their life and memories and sentimental value just because an aggressor is left unchallenged. please think this sentiment through and delete it from your thoughts. instead of blaming an oppressed people for living in a hostile land, ask who is making that land hostile to live in.

#this is vaguely worded except the first part because ive seen thsi sentiment time and time again #when the trans genocide began everyoen started blaming trans peopel for living in florida isntead of the people making it unlivable #every timw a cop kills a person of color everyones told to just move somewehre w better cops (doesnt exist) > #< rather rhan examine who gave the cops such pwoer and what use the cops are anyways #i know its rasier to blame the victims of this kind of thing. the oppressors deisgn it taht way and encourage that sentiment #but oleeeeeease im begging u. navajo peopel should not just give up their reservation bc it sucks. whyd the us put them there?

[toinfinityx]

hi loser. 🫵

(it’s tradition.)

hi loserer...

its a word now

deal with it

#eatsleepbleed #making up words #one brain cell at a time

[theoldkyokodied]

The Allegiance of the Ascended Vampire and the New God of Magic

#bloodweave #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #gale x astarion #astarion x gale #gale dekarios #astarion ancunin #yes this is about astarion helping gale defeat mystra and take her place with the crown in exchange for gale helping him with the ritual #the ‘they can make each other worse’ part of their relationship turned to the max #I enjoy them being reluctantly soft for each other more but from time to time I just think about how powerful they could get together #toxic evil boyfriends. take love and twist it up until it’s unrecognisable #I like to think that astarion approached gale with that offer after realising no one else in camp is gonna help him #and that he can use gales own hunger for power which backfired when astarion actually became emotionally invested in gale #and after gale kept his word despite everyone’s concerns astarion changed his plan from not fullfilling his end of the bargain to actually #helping gale kill mystra (mostly so that gale could belong to him and him alone. and letting him take the place as a god bc having a god #at you beck and call is definitely appealing. especially one as eager to please as gale) #anyway what I want to say with this is please please please let me kill mystra i don’t even care if the weave gets destroyed again

[menelaiad]

the infamous 'last sighting of a barbary lion in the wild' photo taken by marcelin flandrin (1925) haunts me to my core. there's something so achingly poetic about it.

#this is so random for me but i saw this the other night and it genuinley hasnt left my brain #there's a lot of debate around this subspecies and whether they are #extinct or w/e #hence my wording BUT #this photo and that kinda ....... 'last one in the wild' fact has sTUCK with me #so small. in the space. so alone. walking away. leaving their prints behind. #it honestly nearly moves me to tears if i think about it too much #straight up put this in my drafts last night and now it makes me TOO emotional

[lino-nyangi]

right now as we speak the IOF are kidnapping palestinian male civilians from the north of gaza in dozens, stripping them out of their clothes and shoes, blindfolding and lining them up. women and children are kicked to the south while men are taken hostage to military bases in israel. please continue to be loud about palestine.( x , x ) links contain images of events described above.

#do we realize how fucked up this is #i have no words #this is not making headlines and probably never will #they were taken from a UN SCHOOL SHELTER #palestine #free palestine #gaza

[mokeonn]

"But if college was free, then people would abuse that and get useless degrees" hell yeah I would! If I could go to college without debt I would make it my job to get a degree in every little thing that interested me. I'd get a doctorate in film studies. I'd have a bachelor's degree for every science I like. I'd try to learn at least 5 languages with varying results. I would learn something "useful" like coding and then follow it up with a ""useless"" degree like art history. I'd be the world record speed run holder for getting every degree possible.

But I can't afford college without going into massive debt, so instead I spent the last 5 years trying to figure out what I am passionate enough about to consider going into debt over, because unfortunately being passionate about everything is extremely expensive to pursue.

#simon says #i love learning so much and I hate the USA's college debt system #once they make that shit free I will be unstoppable #this topic sprung up because I had the idea that im very academic and annoyingly analytical that I might as well get a degree in it #because without a degree you just seem like an autistic asshole #but with a degree? then you look like a CREDIBLE autistic asshole #don't worry I will still learn but I still want that funky piece of paper to tell everyone I learnt it #also there's some things that are VERY difficult to learn #like I would love to persue this topic further but unfortunately I would need help with that #also before you say 'try taking [blank] classes instead! it's less expensive than a degree!' im broke #my only learning resource is the library sorry about that #also this is not the post to give me unwarranted financial advice #finances are one of the topics I DO NOT care about and I WILL NOT listen to a word you say

[inkskinned]

i love when words fit right. seize was always supposed to be that word, and so was jester. tuesday isn't quite right but thursday should be thursday, that's a good word for it. daisy has the perfect shape to it, almost like you're laughing when you say it; and tulip is correct most of the time. while keynote is fun to say, it's super wrong - i think they have to change the label for that one. but fox is spot-on.

most words are just, like, good enough, even if what they are describing is lovely. the night sky is a fine term for it but it isn't perfect the way november is the correct term for that month.

it's not just in english because in spanish the phrase eso si que es is correct, it should be that. sometimes other languages are also better than the english words, like how blue is sloped too far downwards but azul is perfect and hangs in the air like glitter. while butterfly is sweet, i think probably papillion is more correct, although for some butterflies féileacán is much better. year is fine but bliain is better. sometimes multiple languages got it right though, like how jueves and Πέμπτη are also the right names for thursday. maybe we as a species are just really good at naming thursdays.

and if we were really bored and had a moment and a picnic to split we could all sit down for a moment and sort out all the words that exist and find all the perfect words in every language. i would show you that while i like the word tree (it makes you smile to say it), i think arbor is correct. you could teach me from your language what words fit the right way, and that would be very exciting (exciting is not correct, it's just fine).

i think probably this is what was happening at the tower of babel, before the languages all got shifted across the world and smudged by the hand of god. by the way, hand isn't quite right, but i do like that the word god is only 3 letters, and that it is shaped like it is reflecting into itself, and that it kind of makes your mouth move into an echoing chapel when you cluck it. but the word god could also fit really well with a coathanger, and i can't explain that. i think donut has (weirdly) the same shape as a toothbrush, but we really got bagel right and i am really grateful for that.

grateful is close, but not like thunder. hopefully one day i am going to figure out how to shape the way i love my friends into a little ceramic (ceramic is very good, almost perfect) pot and when they hold it they can feel the weight of my care for them. they can put a plant in there. maybe a daisy.

#warm up #writeblr. #i am not going to personally comment on the pineapple debate #some things are too big for me. #maybe we could have everything on earth choose their own names. #wouldn't that be fun #it is a creative writing exercise. okay. ily #''why only these languages?'' ..... bc i dont know every language #sorry :( #PLEASE leave me comments about what words u think are correct. i love learning them #btw! this isn't saying these are the most BEAUTIFUL words for it... just the words that are the most CORRECT #like i quite like the word ''keynote'' as mentioned. it's got a lot of fun sounds in it. #but it is not CORRECT. #''gloaming''' is interesting and fun and poetic but it is NOT correct . evening is MORE correct #but less beautiful. #does that make sense?