Khuzdul - The Secret Language of the Dwarves

In this video, we look at the history of Khuzdul, and how it played a major role in influencing the languages of Middle-earth. We also look at some awesome Khuzdul words and names.

Thanks to my patrons - Habimana, Ben Jeffrey, Harry Evett, Mojtaba Ro, Moe L, Paul Leone, Patricia, Barbossa, mncb1o, and Andrew Welch. Patreon -

[IbexWatcher]

I’m Jewish and I appreciate you shouting out the Hebrew influence!

Reading the books, it was easy to relate to the dwarves’ stories of continuous expulsion and migration, and the longing for lost homelands and communities

[rileywilliams]

I live in Missouri and we have a town called Humansville. Perhaps one or more residents may soon see this video themselves.

[istari]

It's fascinating to hear how Khuzdul, which the dwarves didn't use around others, still had such an influence on the languages of Men all those thousands of years later. I'm particularly intrigued at the similarity between names and words used in Númenór and dwarven words. It makes me wonder if there were any significant contacts between the dwarves in western middle-earth and the Númenóreans.

[LeHobbitFan]

Interestingly, in Khuzdûl, the KH- sound is pronounced like in the word "backhouse", whereas in Elven languages, KH- and CH- are guttural, like the Spanish "jota"
So when Christopher Lee pronounced "Khâzad-Dûm" in the Fellowship of the Ring, he actually made a teeny-weeny mistake.

There, that was your nerd fact of the day!

[rimservices]

Naming Khazad-dum "Dwarven town" is like naming a capital of Brazil Brasilia :)

[LeHobbitFan]

I'd love to spend an afternoon in Humanstown, with my human friends, where we could do human things together, such as watching the television, consuming hamburgers, or partaking in the playing of videoludic games.

[Lawrence_Talbot]

Damn how did you know I confuse Linguistics and Linguini all the time? Have bad habit of trying to order pasta, only to for the waiter to start educating me on Italian dialects 😂

[MerkhVision]

Maybe back in prehistoric times when the Dwarven language influenced the development of Mannish languages the Dwarves hadn’t yet become so secretive and freely shared their language with Men? Maybe it was the various hardships and tragedies that occurred later that made them so cautious?

[reecepip]

What about the "swearing" Gimli does in the movie? Is that legit Khuzdul?
Great video as always man!

[phoule]

There must have been some language exchange programs, for immersive language learning, between Eribor and Dale in their heyday.

[SvengelskaBlondie]

2:35 You can quite easily see that the Cirth alphabet is inspired from old Norse runes, they added a bunch of their own variants. As a Swede, I approve of that 👍

[OneFlyingTonk]

Awesome video, the most evident influence of hebrew on khuzdul are triconsonantal roots (example: Khuzdul is Kh-z-d so only the vowels are changed), one small thing: we have the translation of Balin's tomb, although I am not sure if its official but it is also a full phrase in Khuzdul if its official.

[saeedshahbazian]

Okay where was this video?! I would've swore I've watched all your videos at least a couple of times. But this just came up in my feed

[DerNibelung]

I tend to think of it this way; Khuzdul is a simplistic version of Valinorian, the mental language of the Valar. Valinorian, when spoken, was lengthy and difficult on the ears... hence a simpler version. On the same note, Entish may be closer to pure Valinorian than any other speech and a cousin to Khuzdul... since the Ents were taught by Yavanna

[Jaszi]

I thank you sir for making a video that talks about the dwarves having hidden names because I’ve looked on and off for the last 6 years to find a video where a guy mentioned at the beginning their “server is changing so this one’s gonna shutdown soon so as I walk around showing off some stuff I’m also going to talk about the lore of dwarves in middle earth” and NO ONE else I’ve seen make a video about the dwarves has mentioned that bit again about the dwarves’ names.

[jonystyles]

nice lore bro very interesting, we love your misterys videos you re the best

cheers and keep up the good work :)

[wasgzzak]

Been watching your content for years and absolutely love it. I think you’ve built an awesome niche analysing and reasonably theorising about lore in LOTR.


Genuine question to ask. If you think you’ll ever expanded to cover other universes you enjoy. Or start a new specific channel for them.


But yeah dude love your scripts and your presents skills are pretty good.

And importantly have a great time in your life and with the channel. Love your work.


Sorry if I’ve made you puke with my speech here. Thanks

[danielkover]

My favorite dwarven name is Zirakzigil. It sounds so badass. 🔥

[celtofcanaanesurix]

are we all going to forget Hobbiton is literally Hobbit town... Hobbit town and Dwarf hall? Is there a mansville and elf place in middle earth too?

[BernddasBrotB]

'Humansville or Humanstown'... So Manchester then?