Quettali Demonstratives

Demonstratives are special words that provide a handy shorthand for referring to things by proximity.

Quenya uses a three-way distinction in some cases: near the speaker, away from the speaker, and somewhat further away. This is similar to Spanish (este, ese, aquello), Japanese (kono, sono, ano), and many other languages. For other cases, Quenya uses a two-way distinction (near speaker and away), like English does.

Besides demonstratives, which indicate a specific reference, we also have interrogatives (question words), which ask a question (What? Where?), and relative pronouns, which refer to something mentioned earlier in the sentence (“...the house where he lived...’). In English, interrogatives and relative pronouns use the same words; in Quenya, they are different.

The difference between tana  and sana  is that the former refers to “that over there”, while the latter refers to “that previously mentioned”; they both translate to the same word in English. The same difference applies for tanome vs. sanome.

	Nearby		Not Close		Distant		Question/Relative
Person:							man 	ye  i 	who
Thing:	si  sina 	this	ta  tana  sana 	that	enta 	yon	mana 	ya  i 	which; what
Place:	sís  sissë  sinomë 	here	tás  tassë  tanomë  sanomë 	there		yonder	massë 	yassë  yas 	where
From:	silo  sio 	hence	talo  tó 	thence			mallo 	yallo 	whence
Toward:	sir  sira  simen 	hither	tar  tara  tamen  tanna 	thither				yanen 	whither
Time:	sí  silumë 	now; at this time	tá  talumë 	then; at that time	en 	then soon; again	malumë 	yá 	when
Manner:	sillë  sië  sin 	like this	tallë  san 	like that; thus; so				yallë 	in which manner; how
Kind:	sítë 	of this sort	taitë 	of that sort; such
Means:	sinen 	by this means	tanen 	by that means			manen 	yanen 	by which means