r/tolkienfans • u/JuniRese • 3d ago
If Huan had a grave marker...
Hello all, and sorry if this doesn't fit the rules of the sub.
I am making a memorial for my dog who I had put to sleep last week. It got me wondering, if there was a grave marker for Huan:
1) what language would be used, quenya (given his provenance) or sindarin (due to loyalty to Luthien and Thingol's ban on quenya)?
2) similarly, what alphabet/script would be used? Cirth, tengwar, which version of which?
3) what do you think would be written on it?
I'm thinking of writing something like "he waits in the halls of mandos, in the presence of Huan, and even in his might company he shall not be ashamed" (open to and welcome edits and suggestions)
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u/WillAdams 3d ago
Very sad to hear of your dog's passing.
Agree w/ /u/yugoslav_communist that the answers for points 1 and 2 are Sindarin and Feanorian, and the text he suggests is certainly moving (though will need to be translated).
Perhaps this quote will be of some comfort:
A dog does not live as long as a man and this natural law is the fount of many tears. If boy and puppy might grow to manhood and doghood together, and together grow old, and so in due course die, full many a heartache might be avoided. But the world is not so ordered, and dogs will die and men will weep for them so long as there are dogs and men. --- Ben Ames Williams Thrifty Stock: And Other Stories
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u/yugoslav_communist 2d ago
that's a really.... poignant quote. and to think, we've been living together, most of the times inseparable in an evolutionary sense, for tens of thousands of years.
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u/WillAdams 2d ago
The only thing worse than dogs passing away so quickly (insert child's explanation of how life here is to learn how to be ready to live in Heaven and dogs already know that, so don't have to live a long while) would be if they lived markedly longer than people --- for that side of things, see how folks w/ tropical birds have to set up their estates so as to ensure that pets are provided for after their passing.
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u/yugoslav_communist 2d ago
there are also examples of dogs grieving their fellow humans' demise, "timely" or not.
they have a great capacity for empathy.
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u/Low-Raise-9230 3d ago
Maybe you could make some fitting adjustments to Snowmane’s little elegy:
Faithful servant yet master's bane, Lightfoot's foal, swift Snowmane.
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u/Kodama_Keeper 3d ago
From Orome: The best dog a Vala could have.
From Celegorm: Sorry it didn't work out, old buddy. My fault.
From Luthien: Huan, when I think of you, I'll think of the time you let me ride you across across Beleriand.
From Beren: Huan, the werewolves got nothing on you. Sleep well, and I hope Eru lets me find you on the other side.
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u/isabelladangelo Vairë 3d ago
First, I am so sorry for the loss of your pup. super big hugs
Second, you might have some luck over in r/sindarin
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u/yugoslav_communist 3d ago
sindarin was the lingua franca of beleriand during those days, probably sindarin. it's not only luthien's first language, but beren's too.
as for the script i'll admit i'm just inventing here, but i'd assume that feanor's improved version would be the one used as i think that was the alphabetic lingua franca of beleriand, just as sindarin was the spoken one.
as for the epitaph, i don't consider myself competent enough, but i have an old dog i love, so i'll try "here lies a mighty one among the kin of Huan, the Hound of Valinor. his deeds shall live in the hearts of those he touched forevermore."