Black Speech

The Black Speech, also known as the Dark Tongue of Mordor, was the official language of Mordor. 
== History ==
Sauron created the Black Speech to be the unifying language of all the servants of Mordor, used along with different varieties of Orkish and other languages used by his servants. J.R.R. Tolkien describes the language as existing in two forms, the ancient "pure" forms used by Sauron himself, the Nazgûl, and the Olog-hai, and the more "debased" form used by the soldiery of the Barad-dûr at the end of the Third Age. The only example given of "pure" Black Speech is the inscription upon the One Ring:
When translated into English, these words form the lines:
These are the first two lines from the end of a verse about the Rings of Power.
Many Orkish dialects had adopted words from the Black Speech. One Orc from the band that took Merry and Pippin prisoners utters a tirade of curses at one point that is presumably Orkish, but apparently contains at least some elements of Black Speech.
Black Speech could be understood by anyone who wore the One Ring. Samwise Gamgee wore the ring in the Tower of Cirith Ungol to be invisible from Orcs of Sauron, and in the process heard many of the Orcs' plans.
Speaking the pure Black Speech had a harshening effect on the speaker's voice and a darkening effect on the speaker's surroundings, as seen when Gandalf recited the Ring Poem at the Council of Elrond. This effect did not extend to Black Speech loanwords in other languages, such as the word "Nazgûl".
== Background ==
In real life, J. R. R. Tolkien created this language with the intention of making it harsh and ugly. The Black Speech is unfortunately one of the more incomplete languages in Tolkien's novels, as the forces of good are reluctant to utter it. Unlike Elvish languages, there are no poems or songs written in it (apart from the Ring's inscription), and because Tolkien designed it to be unpleasant in his own mind, he did not enjoy writing in it; according to Tolkien, he once received a goblet from a fan with the Ring inscription on it in Black Speech, and Tolkien, finding it distasteful, never drank from it and used it only as an ashtray. The result is a random collection of words that are hard to actually use in day-to-day conversation. We learn from the text in the ring and its translation that the Black Speech is a strongly agglutinating language.
Russian historian Alexander Nemirovski identified an ergative case in durbatuluk and thrakatuluk according to a common suffix -tuluk meaning "them all", relating to the verb's object rather than to its subject. This was found as a similarity to other ergative languages such the of ancient Mesopotamia.
== In other versions ==
Melkian had been the linguistic phylum of the servants of Melkor in an early conception of the legendarium, seen in The Lhammas. In this branch were the Black Speech, Orkish, and all other tongues of evil races. The other two phyla were Oromëan, from which descended both Elvish and Mannish languages, and Aulëan, the branch of Khuzdûl., Vol. V: , chapter VII: "The Lhammas"
== Words ==
Some of these words are true to J.R.R. Tolkien's books; most others are part of the Neo-Black Speech lexicon invented in the making of Peter Jackson's film trilogies.
*-a - to (Debased Black Speech)
*alba - elf
*agh -and (for conjoining sentences)
*ash - one
*burz - dark
* burzum - darkness
*durb - rule
* carnish - ambush
*gazat - dwarf
*ghâsh - fire
*gimb - find
*glob - filth
*gûl - wraith
*hai - folk
*-ishi - in
*krimp - bind
*lug - tower
*mas - mine
*nazg - ring
*nugu - nine
*olog - troll
*ombi - seven
*ronk - pit/pool (bagronk, as muttered by an Orc in , means "dung-pit")
*sha -and (for binding nouns)
*shara - man
*sharkû - old/old man (Debased Black Speech)
*shre - three
* snaga- slave
* thrak - bring
*-tul -them
*ûk - all
*-um -ness
*uruk - orc
*zagh - mountain pass/mountains
== See also ==
*Neo-Black Speech
*Orkish
== Translations==
Foreign Language 	Translated name
Afrikaans 	Swart Spraak
Albanian 	Fjala e zezë
Amharic 	ጥቁር ንግግር
Arabic 	الكلام الأسود
Aragonese 	Luenga negra
Armenian 	Սեւ ելույթը
Asturian 	Llingua negra
Azerbaijani 	Qara çıxış
Basque 	Hizkuntza beltza
Belarussian Cyrillic	Чорная мова
Bengali 	ব্ল্যাক বাক
Bosnian 	Crni Govor
Bulgarian Cyrillic 	Черна реч
Burmese 	အနက်ရောင်မိန့်ခွန်း
Cambodian 	សុន្ទរកថាខ្មៅ
Catalan 	Llengua Negra
Cebuano 	Itom nga Sinultihan
Chinese 	黑暗語
Cornish 	Kows Du
Croatian 	Crni Govor
Czech 	Černá řeč
Danish 	Sort Tale
Dutch 	Zwarte Taal
Esperanto 	Nigra lingvo
Estonian 	Must kõne
Faroese 	Svartur mál
Filipino 	Itim na pananalita
Finnish 	Musta kieli
French 	Noir parler/Langue noire
Frisian 	Swarte Rede (Western)
Galician 	Lingua negra
Georgian 	შავი ენა
German 	Schwarze Sprache
Greek 	Μαύρη Ομιλία
Gujarati 	બ્લેક સ્પીચ
Haitian Creole 	Nwa Lapawòl
Hebrew 	שפה השחורה
Hindi 	काले भाषण
Hmong 	Hais lus dub
Hungarian 	Fekete Beszéd
Icelandic 	Svartur Tal
Indonesian 	Bicara Hitam
Irish Gaelic 	Teanga dhubh
Italian 	Linguaggio Nero
Japanese 	暗黒語
Javanese 	Wicara Ireng
Kannada 	ಕಪ್ಪು ಭಾಷೆ
Kazakh 	Қара тіл (Cyrillic) Qara til (Latin)
Korean 	암흑어
Kurdish 	Axaftina Reş (Kurmanji)
Kyrgyz Cyrillic 	Каралар тили
Laotian 	ພາສາສີດໍາ
Latin 	Lingua Atra
Latvian 	Melnā runa
Lithuanian 	Juodoji kalba
Luxembourgish 	Schwaarz Ried
Macedonian Cyrillic 	Црна говор
Malagasy 	Mainty Miteny
Malaysian 	Ucapan Hitam
Malayalam 	ബ്ലാക്ക് സ്പീച്ച്
Maltese 	Diskors Iswed
Maori 	Kōrero Pango
Marathi 	काळा भाषण
Mongolian Cyrillic 	Хар хэлсэн үг
Nepalese 	काला भाषण
Norwegian 	Svart Tale
Occitan 	Lenga negra
Pashto 	تور وینا
Persian 	زبان سیاه
Polish 	Czarna Mowa
Portuguese 	Língua Negra
Punjabi 	ਕਾਲੇ ਸਪੀਚ
Romanian 	Limba Neagră
Romansh 	Linguatg Naira
Russian 	Чёрное наречие
Samoan 	Tautala Uliuli
Sanskrit 	राजिका वाच्
Sardinian 	Limba de sos Nieddos
Scottish Gaelic 	Dubh Òraid
Serbian 	Црни Говор (Cyrillic) Crni Govor (Latin)
Sicilian 	Lingua nera
Sindhi 	ڪارو تقرير
Sinhalese 	කළු කථාව
Slovak 	Temná reč
Slovenian 	Črni govor
Somali 	Hadalka Madow
Spanish 	Lengua Negra
Sundanese 	Hideung Biantara
Swahili 	Nyeusi Hotuba
Swedish 	Svartspråket
Tajik Cyrillic 	Суханронии сиёҳ
Tamil 	கறுப்பு பேச்சு
Telugu 	బ్లాక్ స్పీచ్
Thai 	แบล็กสปีช / ภาษามืด
Turkish 	Kara Lisan
Turkmen 	Gara dil
Ukrainian Cyrillic 	Чорна говірка
Urdu 	سیاہ خطاب
Uzbek 	Қора Нутқ (Cyrillic) Qora Nutq (Latin)
Venetian 	Lenguajo moro
Vietnamese 	Chữ Đen
Welsh 	Lleferydd Du
Xhosa 	Intetho Abamnyama
Yiddish 	שוואַרץ שפּראַך
== References ==
 
Category:Languages
de:Schwarze Sprache
es:Lengua Negra
fr:Noir parler
it:Linguaggio Nero
pl:Czarna Mowa
ru:Чёрное наречие