Great job on this chapter Arcus! Some great editing and careful thought clearly went into it. I will admit to not being an expert in the languages Tolkien created, so I'm sorry I don't have more substantive comments.
LO-04 I recently re-read Appendix F in LotR, which actually uses the term "Elven-latin". Are we removing any reference to "Elf-latin" even though it is in the published LotR? The first rule of the project is that published works during Tolkien's lifetime take priority. I'm OK with the change of removing references to "Elf-latin" if it was Tolkien's later idea and it makes the history and linguistic situation more coherent, I just wanted to make sure you knew the term was used in Appendix F.
LO-05 I interpreted "of which a little is known to us" as referring to its long and changeful history.
LO-03.5 and
LO-12: Is this text from Eressea or Eriador? If it's from Eriador, does it have to be from the Second Age?
LO-18: Let me make sure I understand this change. In Tolkien's later conception, do the Noldor use "both sounds and forms that are more archaic and nearer to the written Parmaquesta"? Or did Tolkien reject that idea? I get that the Vanyar use the older form of the language, so it makes sense to change "the usage of the Vanyar" to "the usage of the Noldor", but I don't understand why the change "in fact the Noldor" to "in fact the Vanyar" must needs be made.
LO-21: How about just removing "much"? In
LO-11 "greatly" was removed to achieve the same effect.
LO-24: It seems fine to me to keep this paragraph (with the removal of the end as in
LO-25. Even though the work was written in Eriador, Pengolodh could still have knowledge of the language of Eressea. Also, it doesn't say Noldorin is the common language of the Numenoreans, it just says it was "spoken by the high men" there.
LO-28 I think we can keep the last sentence, which serves as a nice segue:
Quote:
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LO-28b {In its development in Middle-earth Noldorin grew more and more to resemble Sindarin, and though when more closely observed these tongues can readily be seen to be far-sundered, yet in sound and style and idiom they are much alike. This the loremasters ascribe in the first place to the influence of the land itself, that Beleriand which is now lost in which both tongues dwelt and changed.} But the influence of the peoples, one upon the other, and of their tongues was not without effect. In spite of estrangements and enmities...
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LO-29 We absolutely need to change the Noldor taking refuge with Thingol in Doriath. This looks good to me.
LO-32 This seems risky to me. The "ruin of their realm" could be interpreted not to mean the complete destruction of Ossiriand, but the casualties they took as reported in "The Coming of Denethor" in HoME XI:
Quote:
Now these were a woodland folk and had no weapons of metal, and the coming of the fell beasts of the North affrayed them sorely, as the Naugrim reported. Therefore Denethor, the son of Dan, hearing rumour of the might of Thingol and his majesty, and of the peace of his realm, gathered such host of his scattered folk as he could and led them over the mountains into Beleriand. There they were welcomed by Thingol, as kin long lost that return, and they dwelt in Ossiriand in the south of his
kingdom.
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I say we keep this as is.
LO-40 I agree "Finrodians" is awkward, but do we know it was just the sons of Finarfin who influenced the Beor-folk, i.e. Galadriel had no influence? Maybe we should change it to "the people of Finarfin"?
LO-41 I will have to look into this more.
LO-47 I think this is fine as a footnote, since footnotes imply editorial additions which could come later.
LO-54 Couldn't the Men east of the Ered-Lindon who held to their speech be the ones who develop Adunaic?
LO-55 I personally would vote for removing this section if we do not use the abbreviations later.
One last point: since we include some information about the language of the Dwarves and Men in this chapter, could we include more material from Appendix F of LotR? Have we used that material elsewhere?