Q. camba n. “(cupped) hand, hollow of the hand” (Category: Hand)
A word for “hand” in notes on Eldarin Hands, Fingers and Numerals from the late 1960s, based on the root √KAB “hold, contain, retain” (VT47/7-8). Tolkien said that it “referred to the whole hand, but as flexed, with fingers more or less closed, cupped, in the attitude of receiving or holding”, so it thus referred more specifically to a “cupped hand”. In drafts of these notes Tolkien gave it the glosses “closed or hollowed hand (facing up) for receiving or offering” or simply “hollow of the hand” (VT47/20 note #16). In these drafts he also considered changing the form of the root to √KAM, but that seems to have been a transient idea; see the entry on that root for discussion.
Conceptual Development: In The Etymologies of the 1930s, Tolkien instead had ᴹQ. kambe {“closed hand” >>} “hollow (of hand)” with final -e instead of -a, although with the same root ᴹ√KAB “hollow” (Ety/KAB; EtyAC/KAB). In notes from 1968, Tolkien had Q. kambeya “his hand” (VT49/17), indicate final e was still a possibility in his later writings. For purposes of Neo-Quenya, I’d stick to the better documented camba with the sense “(cupped) hand, hollow of the hand”.
References ✧ VT47/8, 20
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| ✶kambā > kamba | [kambā] > [kamba] | ✧ VT47/8 |
Q. #cambë n. “hand” (Category: Hand)
References ✧ VT49/17
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| kambeya | 3rd-sg-poss; colloquial-possessive | “his hand” | ✧ VT49/17 |
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