Sound symbolism in J.R.R. Tolkien’s constructed language Quenya: A pilot study

Abstract

In inventing languages, J.R.R. Tolkien was fascinated not only by phonaesthetic pleasure (Tolkien 2023: 536) but also by sound symbolism (Tolkien 2020: 24), i.e., the fitting relationship between words’ sounds and their meaning. Tolkien felt to have been most successful in implementing these ideas in his Elven language Quenya (Tolkien 2020: 23). While recent research supports Quenya’s high aesthetic appeal (Beinhoff 2023; Mooshammer et al. 2023), few quantitative studies appear to have been published on sound symbolism in Quenya. Taking into account the role of phonaesthetics and assuming that sound symbolism may relate to semantic valence, words with positive denotations can be expected to be perceived as more aesthetically appealing than those with negative denotations. To investigate sound symbolism within Quenya, an online experiment was conducted in which 35 participants unfamiliar with Quenya rated 20 randomised audio stimuli of Quenya words with either positive or negative denotations in terms of aesthetic appeal on a 6-point Likert scale. To examine the influence of native language, approximately half the participants were German L1 speakers and half were Japanese L1 speakers. Statistical analysis using t-tests revealed that overall, words with positive denotations were rated as significantly more appealing than words with negative denotations. This contrast was present in both participant groups but more distinct in German L1 speakers than in Japanese L1 speakers. These findings suggest that Tolkien may indeed have been successful in encoding sound symbolism in Quenya by aligning phonaesthetic appeal with semantic valence. The different results across the two rater groups point to cross-linguistic differences in perceived soundmeaning associations. These results may not only contribute to the growing body of research on the reception of constructed languages but may also open new research paths in the fields of phonaesthetics and sound symbolism.