Westron

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Westron, natively Adûni or Sôval Phâre (Common Speech), is a conlang by J. R. R. Tolkien.

In the Third Age of Middle-earth, it was the common language of most Men and also of the hobbits of northwestern Middle-earth. Contrary to a common misconception, Westron is not English, but a descendant of Adûnaic, a very different language; it was merely represented by English in the books (and the films) in order to create the impression of familiarity the hobbits, from whose viewpoint the events are narrated, had with the Westron names. Otherwise, Westron names would have seemed as strange to the English reader as Sindarin ones. For instance, the Westron name of Rivendell was Karningul, which sounds as foreign as the Sindarin name Imladris. This procedure of rendering Westron as English, however, had the consequence that we have only little material about Westron.

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This article is part of a series on the languages and worlds of J. R. R. Tolkien.

Conlangs: Adûnaic * Avarin * Black Speech * Khuzdul * Quenya * Quendian * Sindarin * Westron
Conworld: Middle-earth
Conpeoples: Elves
Terms and techniques coined: Diachronics * Legendarium * Lámatyáve * *