Where does 🧝Legolas' name come from?

[jallan]

Khôr’nagan posted:

So, although it doesn't come close to proving it, I think that does give at least a little evidence that Tolkien might have named him from the original Legatus.

But this is really a dead end.

So many of Tolkien’s invented names and words have some similarity to real-life words. How could they not have?

Do an experiment.

Invent a word. Search for it in Google. You may be surprised to find how often the exact word you invented appears.

Of course the shorter the word the more likely it will appear already created.

Trying the plumb the source of an author’s imagination in such matters is futile when the author himself will likely often not know the source of his or her imaginings.

Does Amon Hen mean Supreme-Egyptian-God of the Chicken?

Certainly for example Tolkien was not thinking of the fish tuna when he invented the name Túna. Unfortunately I cannot help thinking of it every time I encounter the name.

 

[Cian]

Thanks for the kind words!

Originally posted by jallan: Does Amon Hen mean Supreme-Egyptian-God of the Chicken?

Amonhotep son of Amonhenpekt (?)

 

[Khôr’nagan]

Originally posted by Cian
Amonhotep son of Amonhenpekt (?)

Okay, now I'm really confusticated. What are you two talking about?

 

[jallan]

Search amon god on the web,
Khôr’nagan.

 

[Lantarion]

Or Amun, but it's really the same (e.g. Amon-Ra is the same as Amun-Ra, or even Amun-Re).
Amonhenpekht, lol!

In case you haven't searched yet Khôr, I believe that Amon was the primary god in Egyptian mythology and religion, and later the only god that was allowed to be worshipped. Linking another, equally important god Ra (the god of the Sun, which made him the supreme god at one time) into one entity, Amun-Ra is a sort of mix of the two, combining into one even more powerful god.

This is how I understand it, I'm not sure it's 100% correct.

 

[Khôr’nagan]

Interesting... Very odd. Well, anyway, I do agree that talking about all this is a dead end, because there is little to no chance that any actual evidence for either side will ever be found. Still, a debate is a debate, even if it is an utterly hopeless one.

 

[Starflower]

a little addition to this interesting debate about whether the names are derived from real life names : Gil-Galash was ruler of one of the Euphrates civilisations.
Does this mean Tolien got Gil-galad's name from this ?Maybe - maybe not, but it's a fun coincidence anyway

:0

 

[jallan]

I think Gil-galash is an error for Gilgamesh. I only know of Gil-galash from a dubious reference at Small Gods

There’s also the Biblical placename Gilgal where Saul was crowned.

There is also the region of Galaad mentioned in the Bible in the Latin Vulgate (which the King James version and later Protestant translations usually render as Gilead.) The name appears as a personal name in the later Grail stories, rendered as Galahad in English in Thomas Malory’s Le Morte Darthur.

You can find parallels to almost all of Tolkien’s names and words in some language or other, but usually no evidence that they played in part in Tolkien’s mind when he coined the word or phrase and very seldom will the meaning in the other language have any signficance in respect to Tolkien’s use.

Tolkien’s earliest surviving work ion Elvish languages do contain words and names that do seem to be based on obvious sources. But as he revised his Elvish tongues such apparently obvious sources grew less and less.

So one can usually never know whether because one of Tolkien’s words or names echoes a real name or real word in another tongue in the reader’s ear whether in fact there was any influence.

Tolkien himself might not have known. In many cases Tolkien developed his forms from previously created stems following rules he had worked out for the creation of different grammatical forms in his languages.