Quiz: Prescription Drug or Tolkien Elf? :)

[lio45]

I found this quiz hilarious (and very on point)...

(No idea if it's been shared in here already.)

It's been a running gag between my sis and myself ever since we saw "Tolkien Elf" in the definitions for a crossword puzzle that we were doing... we were like "well, that can be pretty much any ridiculous combination of letters, it's not like that's a legit entry from a standard dictionary", had a laugh, and since then I've reused elf names (seriously, though also meant as a joke) in my own crossword puzzles -- we sometime like to craft them for each other.

I managed an honorable 21/30. Can anyone do better?

http://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/arts/literature/drug-or-tolkien-elf-quiz.htm

[The_Snark]

Twenty-six here. There's a few tricky ones that aren't clear/give misleading impressions, but most of them seemed more or less intuitive to me; Tolkien was fairly predictable in which letters and phonemes he liked to use for Elves. (I have read the Silmarillion, albeit not recently, so maybe I just have more exposure than most.)

[Knaight]

I got 21. The fanfiction elf threw me off, and I was leaning pretty heavily on organic chemistry suffixes, which occasionally make it into drug names. The short protein drugs got me every time though.

[factotum]

27 here. I didn't get the Elf who was apparently the one who first awoke at Cuivienen, but I don't remember that elf ever actually being named in the books, so not sure where that comes from?

[Brother Oni]

Only 23. *Hangs head in shame*

I guess this is why they keep the scientists away from the customers. :smalltongue:


I got 21. The fanfiction elf threw me off, and I was leaning pretty heavily on organic chemistry suffixes, which occasionally make it into drug names. The short protein drugs got me every time though.

To be fair, there wasn't a single -mab suffix in any of those, which is a surefire clue for a monoclonal antibody drug.

[Starwulf]

19 for me, but then again I've never read Tolkien beyond "The Hobbit" and that was back when I was 17 or 18.

[gooddragon1]

30. Imin almost fooled google, but I scrolled down and became sure (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEEIGrTjs6M).

To be fair, I'd probably get maybe 10-12 of them right. I barely remember the hobbit book.

[Knaight]

To be fair, there wasn't a single -mab suffix in any of those, which is a surefire clue for a monoclonal antibody drug.

Nope. The -one suffix on the other hand was a pretty reliably indicator.

[Aedilred]

25. I found most of them relatively easy, although got caught out a couple of times (well, five, obviously). I did have some benefit from recognising a lot of the elf names, I imagine, though I'd likely have pegged them all as elves anyway.

30. Imin almost fooled google, but I scrolled down and became sure (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEEIGrTjs6M).

To be fair, I'd probably get maybe 10-12 of them right. I barely remember the hobbit book.

I have to ask, what's the point in taking a quiz like that and then googling all the answers?

[Spiryt]

You scored
25 out of 30

Clearly, Tolkien's fiction is a gateway drug.:smallfrown:

[Lethologica]

Twenty-six here. There's a few tricky ones that aren't clear/give misleading impressions, but most of them seemed more or less intuitive to me; Tolkien was fairly predictable in which letters and phonemes he liked to use for Elves. (I have read the Silmarillion, albeit not recently, so maybe I just have more exposure than most.)
It me! The hard ones were drugs that actually sounded like Tolkien elves; I recognized a solid majority of the elven names. (26.)

[Asmodean_]

13.

To be fair I haven't actually properly read the LotR books in one sitting yet. Usually half a book here, read something else (like WoT) for a couple months, ooh look LotR I should probably finish reading that.

[comicshorse]

20

Not bad considering I always hated chemistry

[Jormengand]

I got 21, more by being good at chemistry than by being good at elves. Not that I'm amazing at either.

[BWR]

24. Anything with a z or x was obviously not Tolkien.

[Eldariel]

29/30 - missed Imin. Helps knowing enough of the Elvish languages to recognize most of the components: Elvish names are little more than compounds after all. I will admit I got lucky on some guesses though.

[Thufir]

Already saw this posted on a forum about the LotR Card Game. I just named elf for all the names I recognised and drug for all the ones I didn't... turns out there were 3 elves in the quiz I'd never heard of before.

[Scarlet Knight]

Harder than I thought - 24.

I have used drug names for my characters in the past.

[Palanan]

Huh. I scored 27 out of 30, but after scrolling through these comments, I think I took the wrong Middle-Earth quiz.

Mine was heavily focused on the Silmarillion and the Rings of Power. Sadly, it's probably been ten years since I've read The Silmarillion, so I was a little out of date on some details.

And I never remembered that the oldest of elves could grow a beard. I thought that was a dwarfbait question. :smalltongue:

.

[Eldariel]

Huh. I scored 27 out of 30, but after scrolling through these comments, I think I took the wrong Middle-Earth quiz.

Mine was heavily focused on the Silmarillion and the Rings of Power. Sadly, it's probably been ten years since I've read The Silmarillion, so I was a little out of date on some details.

And I never remembered that the oldest of elves could grow a beard. I thought that was a dwarfbait question. :smalltongue:

.

...yeah, that sounds like a completely different quiz. This just lists a bunch of names and asks if they're Elves from Tolkien's works, or prescription drugs :smalltongue:

[Eldan]

28. A good few elves I knew (about 10), two drugs i recognized and a lot of elves with words in their names I recognized. Also, all the easy drugs with letters in their names that don't occur in elvish.

[gooddragon1]

I have to ask, what's the point in taking a quiz like that and then googling all the answers?

I don't like losing. Though I included what my actual score would likely have been for transparency.

[goto124]

Note to elf: Should name every elf after drugs.

(Typo intentional.)

[Elenna]

29/30. I only missed Imin. But I've read The Hobbit, LoTR, and the Silmarillion several times each.

EDIT: I know absolutely nothing about drugs. My thought process was: Do I recognize this name? Does it at least seem vaguely familiar? If so, it's an elf name. Otherwise, does it sound like Elvish? If so, it's probably an elf's name. I agree with The_Snark - most of them were pretty intuitive.


And I never remembered that the oldest of elves could grow a beard. I thought that was a dwarfbait question. :smalltongue

Yep. Cirdan has a beard, actually, and I believe he's one of the Elves who awoke at Cuivienen.

[veti]

24/30. Most of them were fairly obvious. Anything with a Z or X, Qv, or anything that can't be said with a falling cadence - is not Tolkien.

This quiz reminded me of one of the great comedy sites from way back:

Porn star or My Little Pony (http://brunching.com/pornorpony.html)?

[Knaight]

29/30. I only missed Imin. But I've read The Hobbit, LoTR, and the Silmarillion several times each.

EDIT: I know absolutely nothing about drugs. My thought process was: Do I recognize this name? Does it at least seem vaguely familiar? If so, it's an elf name. Otherwise, does it sound like Elvish? If so, it's probably an elf's name. I agree with The_Snark - most of them were pretty intuitive.

Imin got me as well, mostly because it is so close to Imine, which is a functional group in organic chemistry, and that sort of thing crops up in drug names routinely. I was working from the other direction though, having read The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and the Silamarillion exactly once each; and I read the Silimarillion last while I was all of eight years old. Some elves were recognizable, but mostly I was leaning on chem and biochem, which is less reliable for brand names.

[Bobblit]

23/30, and I had no idea what I was doing. Some of the drugs were pretty misleading, but others were obviously not Tolkien elf names. The quiz would be a LOT harder if it mixed elf names from different authors, not only Tolkien (well, it would be impossible unless you knew all the drugs and all the elves xD).

[Feytalist]

Reminds me of another popular quiz:

Drug or Pokemon? (http://www.sporcle.com/games/LinkinMarc/Drug_or_Pokemon)

Similarly amusing how close the names are sometimes.


Anyway, I got 27. Not really surprising. I've been reading The Silmarillion off and on, continuously for about 15 years.

[tomandtish]

Imin got me as well, mostly because it is so close to Imine, which is a functional group in organic chemistry, and that sort of thing crops up in drug names routinely. I was working from the other direction though, having read The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and the Silamarillion exactly once each; and I read the Silimarillion last while I was all of eight years old. Some elves were recognizable, but mostly I was leaning on chem and biochem, which is less reliable for brand names.

Same here for the Imin. 28/30. Of course, my wife has psoriatic arthritis, I suffer from diabetes and migraines, and two family members are battling cancer. I've actually SEEN half the drugs on that list. Heck, I'm taking Frova now.

[Starwulf]

Reminds me of another popular quiz:

Drug or Pokemon? (http://www.sporcle.com/games/LinkinMarc/Drug_or_Pokemon)

Similarly amusing how close the names are sometimes.


Anyway, I got 27. Not really surprising. I've been reading The Silmarillion off and on, continuously for about 15 years.

Hehe, I took the Pokemon one, got 36/40 with 3:41 left on the clock. One of them I can't believe I messed up considering I ran with it on my run-through of White 2(or was it Black 2? not sure). And then one of them I knew was a drug, but I accidentally hit p instead of d. The other two I genuinely had no clue(I mistook a pokemon for a drug, and a drug for a pokemon). So it should have been 38/40 ><

[Anarion]

I got 24 on the elf one. That was surprisingly hard, and I'm impressed at how similar the prescription names are to Tolkien names. Maybe chemists are all just Tolkien fans?

[Eldariel]

I got 24 on the elf one. That was surprisingly hard, and I'm impressed at how similar the prescription names are to Tolkien names. Maybe chemists are all just Tolkien fans?

Most medical names stem from Latin while Tolkien's vocabulary is largely Celtic so both are parts of the Indo-European family. Thus the resemblance isn't that surprising especially since both have a motive to avoid the common Germanic and Romance stems.

[Aedilred]

Most medical names stem from Latin while Tolkien's vocabulary is largely Celtic so both are parts of the Indo-European family. Thus the resemblance isn't that surprising especially since both have a motive to avoid the common Germanic and Romance stems.

Weren't the elven languages supposedly based on Finnish?

[factotum]

Weren't the elven languages supposedly based on Finnish?

Finnish was an inspiration for Quenya (e.g. high Elven), while Welsh was the basis for Sindarin (common or garden Elvish). A lot of the Elvish names from the books are actually Sindarin--Galadriel and Celeborn are both Sindarin names, for example.

[lio45]

Same here for the Imin. 28/30. Of course, my wife has psoriatic arthritis, I suffer from diabetes and migraines, and two family members are battling cancer. I've actually SEEN half the drugs on that list. Heck, I'm taking Frova now.

I could easily have imagined Frova Baggins as the Tolkien character's twin sister, but obviously I'm not taking the drug... :P

[Winter_Wolf]

17 of 30. Proving that I know neither elves nor dugs very well, but I know drugs a lot better than elves. Possibly owing to drug commercials but no elf commercials.

And one of twelve on the PS/MLP thing. And that one pretty much by accident. Proving that I know even less about these two fields than I do about elves and drugs.

Now I want someone to start a rock band called Elves, Drugs, and MLP Porn Stars.

[Eldariel]

Finnish was an inspiration for Quenya (e.g. high Elven), while Welsh was the basis for Sindarin (common or garden Elvish). A lot of the Elvish names from the books are actually Sindarin--Galadriel and Celeborn are both Sindarin names, for example.


Weren't the elven languages supposedly based on Finnish?

There's a lot more to it than that. Basically, the things that really enthralled Tolkien were Welsh words. He used a parallel to the word "cellar door" - a word most English-speakers will acknowledge sounds beautiful when you detach the form of the meaning. Tolkien said Welsh was a treasure trove of such words - full of words which have an aurally pleasant phonemic guise. In Finnish he fell in love with the grammar. He didn't simply just mix'n'match languages nor take pieces and stitch them together: he took great care to make the languages have a natural aesthetic to them and spent a lot of time letting the ideas and languages evolve.

Quenyan grammar in general is based on Finnish while the vocabulary has many traits in common with Latin (but influences from Germanic roots, Celtic roots and indeed Finnish). There's something that looks vaguely Finnish or Uralic but largely the vocabulary is still strange to us Finnish-speakers. Though of course, double consonants on both sides of syllable boundaries and long vowels (spelt with accent in standard orthography) occur in Quenya and are typical for Uralic languages. Honestly, Quenya is probably closer to Latin than Finnish in terms of word stress, prosody, pronunciation, and phonology in general. The most pervasive feature of Finnish in the languages is the grammar; I could easily inflect the various Elvish forms just by being a Finnish native speaker. The logic is the exact same.

Now, Sindarin is indeed based heavily on Welsh but it lacks a complete grammar. It's has irregularities but features lesser use of suffixes (it uses functional words more). Affixes are used and both, different word forms and affixed forms might feature changed word stems (a trait inherent to Uralic languages but one that was not present in Quenya - Quenya behaves more like Latin in that regard).

[Themrys]

27. I've read the Silmarilion.

@Lio: Frova could be a hobbit or human name, but not an elvish one. Just doesn't fit the pattern.

[Mister Tom]

26.
I have a dry flaky rash on my feet; my doctor has given me an ungoliant to take care of it

[The_Snark]

I'd look for a second opinion in your place.

[joshspace]

Haha! I got a 25.

[nyjastul69]

20 for me. I've read the Hobbit and LotR fairly recently, bit it's been over 30 years since I read the Silmarilion.

[BayardSPSR]

24 seems to be in the usual "haven't re-read the Silmarillion this year" range, so I'm satisfied with that.

In other news, I will now be using random pharmaceuticals to name my elf NPCs.

[The Fury]

I only got 19. Though I'm pretty sure that I have a bottle of Tolkien elves in my medicine cabinet. Maybe I should talk to my doctor about that.



In other news, I will now be using random pharmaceuticals to name my elf NPCs.

Since one of my players named their character after Rasheed Wallace, and another followed suit and named hers after LeBron James, I decided to name any female elf the party encounters after an NBA player. Prescription drugs might have been the smarter option, but I'm sort of committed to the bit now.

[Lethologica]

The real question is, which poor sod gets to be named after Metta World Peace?

[sleepy hedgehog]

Yup, I got 17.
I beat guessing randomly, mostly because I recognized a few drug names...

[Arcane_Secrets]

Harder than I thought - 24.

I have used drug names for my characters in the past.

Azor always made me think of a prescription drug that dwarves would take. I had in my head a commercial where dwarves talk about living a stressful life (cut to battle scenes) but to deal with high blood pressure they take Azor (at which point, like in An Unexpected Journey, a dwarf holds up an Erlenmeyer flask which gets crushed by the two pendulum hammers and forms a prescription drug bottle).

I've otherwise used botanical Latin names, like Chione. They're not necessarily nearly unpronounceable but they're sufficiently obscure that it's not immediately obvious what I'm doing.

[miner3203]

24 - I'm going to stick myself in the "hasn't read the Silmarillion recently enough to get all the elf-names to stick" boat. Although yeah, a lot of the drugs were really obvious--most of the ones I got wrong were because I guessed drug and it was actually an elf...lol

[Grytorm]

Got only 23/30, it seems like there is a subtle difference between Elves and prescription drugs. But it is hard to say what exactly that would be.

[DataNinja]

it seems like there is a subtle difference between Elves and prescription drugs. But it is hard to say what exactly that would be.

I think it's that elves protest a bit more when you try to swallow them, with a drink of water. :smallwink:

[trueexciting]

You scored
22 out of 30

[TheNotoriousSMP]

I got 19. Not bad considering it's been a while since I've read any of Tolkein's work.

[laotze]

Reminds me of another popular quiz:

Drug or Pokemon?

Similarly amusing how close the names are sometimes.


Anyway, I got 27. Not really surprising. I've been reading The Silmarillion off and on, continuously for about 15 years.

Apparently I'm rusty as hell on my Tolkien but still a perfect score Pokemon master after all these years.