The Book of Lost Tales Part I: A Readthrough

[jallanite]

Originally Posted by Orphalesion

So many goddesses/Valier of youth are associated with flowers and springtime, but never do we get a Valier known simply as "the Beautiful" …

Except for Vána, significantly.

In the published Silmarillion, in the Index of Names, Christopher Tolkien notes under the entry Vanyar: “The name (singular Vanya) means ‘the fair’, referring to the golden hair of the Vanyar ….”

In the Book of Lost Tales, Part One, he states in the “Appendix: Names in the Lost Tales – Part 1” under the entry Vána (bolding by me):

   A derivative of the QL root vᴀɴᴀ, together with vanë ‘fair’, vanessë ‘beauty’, vanima ‘proper, right, fair’, úvanimo ‘monster’ (ú-=‘not’), etc. Here also are given Vanar and Vani=Valar, Vali, with the note: ‘cf. Gnomish Ban-’. See Valar.
   Vána’s name in Gnomish was Gwân or Gwani (changed later to Gwann or Gwannuin); gwant, gwandra ‘beautiful’, gwanthi ‘beauty’.

Both the Norse Vanir and the goddess Venus are by some believed to derive from PIE root wan/wen* ‘beautiful’. The Norse goddess Freyja is called Vanadís in the Skjáldskaparmál, meaning ‘dís of the Vanir’.

Nessa I consider to be derived by Tolkien from Artemis, Nessa being sister of the archer god, connected with deer, and as you point out, at one later stage in Morgoth’s Ring is distinguished from the wife of Tulkas and called “the ever-maid”. She remains quite distinct from Vána, save in being young and beautiful.

Erinti/Ilmarë, daughter to Manwë and Varda, I see as derived from both the Greek Hebe, daughter of Zeus by Hera, and her Latin counterpart, Juventas, the goddess of youth, daughter of Jupiter by Juno.

But it is part of Tolkien’s game, as you point out, that none of Tolkien’s Valar exactly correspond to any deity taken from a real mythology.