Narmer the Numenorean

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

If I had to pick a Numenorian dynasty in Harad it would be the Ptolemaics, but that implies a RL parallel to Gondor as opposed to the assumption that Gondor really existed as Gondor.

And Aragorn as Alexander? It works up to a point; he certainly invaded the right places. Of course, the other thing Alexander's famous for is dying young...

(It would also get rid of the annoying 'Egypt must have been founded by Europeans' theme this thread suffers from; to be clear, I definitely don't believe that, but in the Legendarium, civilisation descends from Numenor, so.)

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

Wikipedia claims Narmer's name likely means "stinging/raging catfish". The first part can sort of fit with his Elvish name and Scorpion title. What does "catfish" mean? A variation of Scorpion? Egyptians would be able to tell the difference, that can't be it. Unless it's Gondorians who never saw Scorpions before and somehow decided the closest animal is catfish? If I accept this idea I also have to maintain that Gondor must have had very poor observational skills. So pray tell, what happened there? Linguistic corruption over the years? Misreading of the hieroglyphs by modern people? What were they supposed to mean initially?

The immediate explanation is that the Egyptians simply heard the name 'Narmer' as their own, similar word. This happened back in the First Age, when the Noldor all wound up with names that sounded like their Quenya names, but had different, or sometimes no, meanings. See also 'Kangaroo'.

If we want an actual explanation... well, Europeans are kind of famous for our terrible habit of saying 'eh, close enough' about species names. Possums, blackbirds, corn... not to mention the ones with weird modifiers. Is 'land catfish' any weirder than 'sea horse'?

Alternately, the original meaning was 'scorpion from the sea' - Scorpion for the name, and the sea part because that's what Gondor is now - just sea, out of which came Narmer. Then later, when they mythologised and separated Scorpion and Narmer, they looked at that name and said 'what's a sea scorpion? Must mean catfish!'

hS