View Single Post
Old 03-27-2009, 04:15 AM   #35
Findegil
King's Writer
 
Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 1,694
Findegil is a guest of Tom Bombadil.
About Falathar, Aerandir, Erellont and Faramir/Gelmir, Arminas:

I looked up some more elements of the names:
FALAS - coastline, surfe; THAR - beyond => The name has a meaning like beyond the surf, out at the high see
Aerandir => Seewanderer
ERE - lonely; EL - Star; LONT - probably related to LOND way on see, passage as in Aqualonde = passage of the swans => I have no clou how to combine that with a good sense.

The three companiones were named in the Quenta Silmarillion for the first time. There Aerandir was named Airandir and that name was later changed on the copy made for the Later Quenta Silmarillion material. We can not say when this change was made, and we have no clou when exactly the note about Faramir and Arminas was written.

With all this uncertainties it would probably be the best solution to be ambiguous: We could us the not in the place were Faramir/Gelmir and Arminas leave Nargothrond and stick to the names of Earendils companions. Thus we leave all decisions to the reader. He can chose for himself out of the following possible interpretations:
a) Falathar, Aerandir and/or Erellont were epessi of Faramir/Gelmir and Arminas
b) Faramir/Gelmir and Arminas were companions of one of Earendils earlier journeys.
The only choice we remove is the possibilty that Earendil had more then three mariners with him on his last travel. But I see no way around here. We could either stick to three or we must ad some construction that makes clear that there were more. At least of course we could also skip the names and the number. But then we would have Faramir/Gelmir and Arminas named earlier and looking like Earendils sole companions.

Respectfully
Findegil
Findegil is offline   Reply With Quote