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Old 08-19-2003, 11:53 AM   #3
Aiwendil
Late Istar
 
Join Date: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,224
Aiwendil is a guest at the Prancing Pony.Aiwendil is a guest at the Prancing Pony.
Sting

The problem with Rog as I see it now is this: Christopher Tolkien states rather strongly that it is no good in the later mythology, and there is certainly something (at the very least) a bit different or odd about the name. On the other hand, there is no actual evidence against the name, nor is there any identifiable phonological problem with it. The evidence against it is (curiously) both authoritative and baseless.

Ideally, we would make our decision concerning whether or not the name is to be retained independently of any practical difficulties. But I'm afraid we cannot ignore the fact that if we eliminate the name we are left in rather a bad position.

One option that has been mentioned frequently is that we update or change the name. But I am of the opinion that this is impossible. "Polwe", "Poldon", "Poldion", etc. are all reasonable Quenya names with the meaning "strength". But they are, as Jallanite said, "linguistic fan fiction". Another possibility is to drop the "g" and put a circumflex on the "o". This is slightly better than the "Pol-" possibilities, but still rather arbitrary.

It of course be a shame to lose the entire scene with Rog (especially after so much work has been put into the Balrog problem!) It would also present a host of new textual problems, since we could never simply make a clean cut - Rog's attack is not just a little vignette; it's an essential part of the plot and course of the battle. Eliminating it would cause problems for the big picture of the whole narrative.

Eliminating either his character or his name seems very artificial. All the other captains are named - moreover, each of the captains in the original tale is a full-fledged character. Amid all the splendour and heraldry of the narrative it would feel very jarring either to omit Rog entirely or to explain that his name is not known (even in a footnote). Worse, it would be fan fiction to claim that his name was lost - and an unlikely fan fiction at that. We have no reason to think that such a vital detail of the Narn e dant Gondolin would have been forgotten, especially when the rest of the tale was so completely preserved.

So yet again we have quite a few options, none of which appears to be any good.

Personally, I favor retaining the name "Rog". I certainly don't think that this is anything like a perfect solution, but in my opinion it's the best we can do.
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