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Also, Shire just means Farm.
And all of the evil characters/places have Arabic or Germanic sounding names.
I love his work, but he was racist. Same thing with Lovecraft, though Lovecraft was more xenophobic because he rarely left the house, and foreigners were scary.
Which evil characters? Azog, Radbug, Morgoth, Sauron, Saruman. Not even remotely Germanic or Arab-sounding. Linguists have drawn comparison between Black Speech and ancient Mesopotamian languages, specifically Hurro-Urartian languages, which originated in what is now the Armenian Highlands. Again, not remotely Arabic, which is Semitic language. The only comparisons to Germanic languages I can think of in the Tolkien universe are dwarves and men.
If you’re gonna accuse a dead person of something awful, have your facts straight.
I had a professor that compared Black Speech to proto Germanic, so if that is completely incorrect I apologize for repeating it.
nah it’s cool. We’re all trying to chase that leftist capital.
Harad/Haradrim/ Swirters were basically Arabic/African dark skinned swarthy people that served as heroless bad guys, unless I missed out on something. https://share.google/GGo7jZXCys45ZC8W7
The Haradrim swore allegiance to Sauron after long years of oppression by the Númenóreans and conflict with Gondor, during which Sauron worked to seduce them to his side. However, not all of them joined Sauron. Many sided with the blue wizards. You could draw parallels to modern times; not all Russians support Putin, and not all Iranians support Khomeini.
It’s worth mentioning Dunlendings also went the same way after excessive Númenórean exploitation of their natural resources and resulting wars. They fought for Saruman (Sauron by proxy) alongside Uruk-hai in Helm’s Deep.
Of course the Haradrim were dark-skinned - they were from the southern hemisphere of Arda, the huge landmass south of Gondor and Mordor. Most of it is on or below the equator.
I knew someone that actually read the Silmarillion would be able to correct me. Thank you for the correction.
They were the scary evil guys that brought Oliphants into the battle.
It’s kinda funny with anime and manga. They use Japanese names for a bunch of stuff like special martial arts techniques or special moves. Not knowing Japanese, the names sound cool and mysterious.
Learning the actual translations, Treebeard is pretty par for the course.
Like from Naruto, Sasuke uses the Copy Wheel Eye (sharingan), Hinyata uses the White Eye (byakugon), and Naruto’s big move is Spiral Sphere (rasengan). Copy Wheel Eye’s upgraded version is called Kalidoscope Copy Wheel Eye.
They aren’t horrible names, but they feel less cool.
Though it would be funny if Saitama has special moves that are just other languages saying “normal punch” or “serious punch”. “Hip bump with moderate vigor” or something.
Edit: fixed spelling of byakugon
No. he just translated it into treebeard for localization for English speakers. educate yourself.
so many names could be translated from the original language they come from.
Larry? that’s City of Laurels
Remember president Helmet Head, he should have used an helmet (Kennedy)
Overt bad guy: Sauron
Secret bad guy: Saurumon
I don’t follow Digimon lore
While I made the same association when first reading the books, I’ll point out that the name Saruman is one the humans gave him. His Quenya name, Curumo, has little to do with Sauron, nor with the latter’s original name Mairon before he revealed his allegiance to Melkor and the elves dubbed him Sauron (Quenya) and Gorthaur (Sindarin).
There is a connection between them, but it isn’t by name. They were both originally Maiar of Aulë, both ambitious and cunning, both desiring order. But where Sauron thought siding with Melkor would get him the means to impose his noble order, Saruman stuck with the Valar and was eventually sent to protect the newly awakened elves from Melkor.
Still, that shared ambition for order eventually made allies of them, while their respective cunning saw each scheming against the other. If Gandalf and those meddling mortals hadn’t gotten in the way, the final stage of the War of the Ring would have been a struggle between these two former colleagues. Depending on where the Ring ended up, that might have been an interesting struggle, the two most cunning Maiar going head to head, but I think it’s for the best we never found out how that would have gone.
Now tell me about a very specific part on a commercial airliner.
I don’t know what you’re referencing and planes aren’t really my specialty, but personally, I’m fascinated by the whole concept of the Instrument Landing System.
Unfortunately, I don’t think I have the technical understanding to confidently explain how it works, but it’s using the modulation of different radio frequencies and the ways they cancel out to indicate to pilots whether they’re correctly facing and approaching the runway. If the plane isn’t in the right approach path, certain side frequencies will come out stronger and can be used to determine the exact angle you’re off.
It’s friggin’ fascinating.
Anyway, were you referring to a specific part or just seeing if I can also nerd out about some other random topic?
Check out @airplanefactswithmax on the social medias. He’s an airplane mechanic that always starts talking about airplanes, and it always devolves into a way too in depth lesson in lotr. Seems right up your alley!
sir, this is a Wendy’s.
God forbid a nerd engage in some nerddom in such a non-nerd community as… checks notes rpgmemes
God forbid someone cracks a joke. leave it to some emotionally damaged nerd to get all bent out of shape from…checks notes a meme.
Really? You use the meme that basically says “you’re dumping a lot of irrelevant info in the wrong place” and have the audacity to get pissy when they hit you back with…a different meme?
The gall to call someone “emotionally damaged” when you immediately read an attack from an exchange of memes.
Stick to your day job, m8. The jokes ain’t landing especially when the whole “joke” is a weak-ass personal attack.
Do better. Or better yet, give up.
The man understood what language and names are used for, to say the least.
Sure… but Tolkien could tell you Treebeard’s name in hall a dozen languages he’d made up for his setting (or for fun, before the setting was a thing), including full etymologies.
I don’t know if Tolkien’s notes support this, but I always assumed that Treebeard’s Entish name was something completely unpronounceable for anyone who isn’t an ent, and “Treebeard” was a nickname that he picked for himself. Maybe because he finds it funny that other species think he looks like a tree. (I’m sure that ents look clearly different from trees to other ents.)
Edit: he says so himself.
Hrum, now, well, I am an Ent, or that’s what they call me. Yes, Ent is the word. The Ent, I am, you might say, in your manner of speaking. Fangorn is my name according to some, Treebeard others make it. Treebeard will do.
Didn’t he also say that his actual Entish name would take too long to pronounce for regular mortals to bother with?
Right, wouldn’t an Entish Introduction (great band name) take a month of common time?
Fangorn is my name according to some
“Fangorn” means “Treebeard.”
In Sindarin (the most common Elvish language), not Entish.
So many get this backwards.
The languages (there are multiple, including historical languages that explain the transition into the modern languages) came first - by about 40 years.
He did not invent languages for his world. He invented a world to explain how his languages would come to exist.
It keeps blowing my mind when I learn that other languages haven’t obfuscated the meanings of names behind two thousand years of linguistic divergence.
Your name almost certainly means something basic too, you just don’t remember what it is.
Yep. Some common names:
Steve ← Steven ← Stephanus ← στέφανος = crown (or wealth)
Linda ← -linde = tender, soft
James ← Iacomus ← Iacobus ← Ἰάκωβος ← Ἰακώβ ← יַעֲקֹב = heel, footprint / follow, watch, observe
Karen ← Catherine ← Αἰκατερίνη ← Ἑκάτη = one who works from far away (referring to a goddess)
Karen- one who complains to management
“Treebeard some call me” - it’s a nickname
Makes sense. The biggest strength of robust worldbuilding isn’t showing it all to your audience, it’s hinting at small pieces of it that shows a connection between them and hints at something deeper. Having what feels like a detailed history makes the world feel real, because you can see shadows of it in the foreground. If you actually dig into all of it explicitly in your story that just makes it feel shallow, because you’re showing the whole iceberg.
It’s why the mystery of the clone wars and Anakin’s apprenticeship and betrayal of Obi-wan were intriguing in the original Star Wars trilogy, but end up just being some action movies once it’s all fleshed out on screen. Depth stops being depth if you bring it all up to the surface.
I wish more writers would understand what you’re pointing out here, I’ve actually stopped reading quite a few books over the years because the actual story takes a back seat to the world building.
Hello, my name is Personface
Charles Gunhaver, reporting for duty. Rock, Rock on!
You killed my father
Prepare today
Guy who walks around the forest: Strider.
Guy who betrays everyone to side with Sauron: Sauron-man.
Family who are very proud of their feet: Proudfeet
In my headcanon, that’s not his real name. The books were written after the facts, so I imagine the writers wanted him to be remembered only as a Sauron henchman, erasing him from history.
Really, your headcanon has some precedent in the books. If Wormtongue had written the history, he literally would’ve called Gandalf “bad news.” And in fact, Saruman’s actual name was Curumo. …uh, or Curunir. Or Sharkey, or Tarindor, or…
I mean, part of the problem is that every person (and place, and country, and river…) has like a half dozen names depending on who’s talking and what time or place they’re in. Gandalf himself is Greyhame, Gandalf, Stormcrow, and Lathspell in Rohan alone; and Mithrandir, Olorin, Incanus, and Tharkun to other people in Middle Earth.
Aragorn and Strider and Elessar and Estel and Wingfoot and Longshanks are the same person in different contexts. Galadriel is also Alatariel and Artanis and Nerwen. Legolas is Laicolasse and Greenleaf (all three of which, in fairness, mean the same thing in different languages).
And that’s before we even talk about what their names “really” were in the “original” Red Book of Westmarch, before Tolkien “translated” them to English. The “actual” sound that came out of Bilbo’s mouth when he introduced himself was Bilba Labingi, but Tolkien decided that the name Labingi “actually” would’ve sounded like the word for bag or sack to the “original hearers.” Likewise Frodo’s name is “translated” from Maura Labingi and Sam “actually” introduced himself as Banazir Galpsi.
He also nearly named Celeborn Teleporno, which would have been
awfulamazing.Not “nearly” and not “Celeborn Teleporno”.
Celeborn is his name in the language Sindarin.
Teleporno is his name in the language Quenya.
I think you can see the similarities between “Cele/Tele” and “born/porn(o)”, right?
Similarly Galadriel (Sinadrin) has a Quenya name - Altáriel.
We have very similar situations here on Earth with differences in spelling/pronunciation between languages (and ages): James vs Iacobus or Catherine vs Aikaterínē.
Not “nearly.” That’s actually his name in the “pretranslated” language that the book was “originally” written in, within the fiction.
