Combining words in Elvish

[Galin]

Originally Posted by galadriela

Thank you for this interesting input. Could you explain me then, according to your findings, whether anardil is OK?

I think Anardil is attested by Tolkien, noting that Roman has asterisked the meaning 'Sun-lover' but not the name itself. As for the suggested meaning, I would agree with it as of today (and would be a bit surprised if it turned out to mean something very different, if Tolkien ever specifically explained it somewhere that is).

and if I understand correctly, galad is S and dil is Q? Therefore, it is not OK to mix the two dialects? Assuming it is, does galadil mean "light lover"?

Yes Quenya words do not begin with the sound g- (S. Galadriel Q. Naltariel or Altariel).

That said, Feanor is a hybrid name, for example; and as we see with the examples Roman notes, there are some 'phonetic adaptations' of already existing names, or accidental forms. So while mixing is possible in a few ways, I think that we fans should rather try to make 'pure' Quenya or Sindarin names, as otherwise we would (arguably) be tinkering with something that the author himself should really establish, within the art of realistic world-building.

Anyway Tolkien himself gave Sindarin Gaerdil as a seeming equivalent to Quenya Earendil (among other versions).

What do you mean?

That's one of the adaptations I'm speaking of, but this is a very internal sort of detail. In other words, Earendil existed as a name, and so it is 'likely enough' that some Sindarin speaker would render Gaerdil or Gaerennil instead of Quenya Earendil.

However should we really imagine some Quenya name to have existed in Middle-earth, to be possibly 'rendered' into Sindarin, just to allow -ndil or -ndur to be coupled with a Sindarin word? Well we could -- but again I think it's better to keep it simpler if possible, and thus 'tinker less', so to speak, with Tolkien's World here.

Or at least I usually think so!


If that makes sense I'm not sure I'm explaining it well.