Name Changes?

[Aiwendil]

So the 'Ros' that was intended in 'Maedros' to be a reference to his red-brown hair cannot be so, since in the Appendix Tolkien states the Isle of Cair Andros means 'Ship of Long foam' and so the arguments on the Bëorian elements of 'ros' go out the window as well.

But "Maedhros" was not intended to have a Beorian etymology (obviously). The change to "Maedron" appears to be in light of the change (which failed) of "ros-" to a Beorian stem.

In other words, the original situation, the one that was preserved by the failure of the "Ros" idea, is that there are two distinct stems, one meaning "red-brown" and the other meaning "foam". Tolkien wanted to alter this so that the single meaning was "foam", and this was Beorian. But "Cair Andros" is a sindarin name, so the solution change was no good.

In other words, I think that "Maedron" is dependent on the abandoned idea, and should thus not be used.

Regarding "Amrod": the sense I get from the quote is that "Amrod" is the form to be used. It is difficult to judge what he means by "whenever encountered" (if that's even what he wrote). But it is clear that "Amrod" would have been the Sindarization of the name actually used. The difference comes down to a translation of "Ambarto" vs. a translation of "Umbarto".

Of course, this situation is different from most name decisions because in fact both names are certainly valid and the decision is not which to take as canonical but which to use when he must be referred to.