Translation for “The King’s Tree”

Hello all,

I’m the pastor of a little church in Ohio called Kingstree Church. We’ve recently planted a white oak in the church lawn and I’d love to give it a good elvish name. I was thinking something like “The King’s Tree,” or “Tree of the King,” or thereabouts.

A little digging turned up “Aranalda” — but that sounds pretty feminine (which, I guess makes sense because I think “Alda” for tree is feminine?). I was wondering if there’s a way to get a more masculine sounding name…?

It could be in Quenya or Sindarin, or even one of the older forms that Tolkien worked in earlier on.

And, again, it doesn’t need to strictly be “King’s Tree,” just something that orbits that idea would be great.

Thank you for any suggestions you might have!

Christopher

That's is a very wholesome idea!

Usually in Sindarin, if we use the word "tree" in a name, we use "-orn", otherwise you could also choose to use "galadh".

With that you can make quite a few names that have a meaning close to "King's tree". Allow me to suggest:

Aranorn - literally Tree of the King

Argelaidh - King of trees

Mallorn - Golden-tree

Celeborn - Silver-tree (already a name used by Tolkien, but still good as you mentioned it is a white oak)

Galadhrîn - Crowned Tree

*Galadhnim - Tree of white

*Nimrif - White bark

Nimloth - White Blossom

*Not sure about these two. Some else any thoughts?

I hope this helps you.

Thank you so much! These are all great. I really appreciate your response and the span of suggestions you gave — much to consider.

I was also wondering about Aldatár for a Quenya version. Might that work as well?

Glad I could help!

If you say Aldatár it would mean "King of Trees", for "Tree of the King", you could choose either Aranalda or Aranornë.

But I don't know too much about Quenya, so someone else will have to look into those details.

Ok, I might be able to work with “King of Trees,” though I like “Tree of the King” better. Aranornë — in that construction, the “ë” makes and “ay” sound as in “hay” correct?

Oh, and as an aside—how strict is the word order for Quenya? Is Aldatar necessarily king of Trees?

Thank you so much!

ë is pronounced as the e in "wet" and "end".

I don't know the exact details about word order, but words ending in -tar usually translate to King of ..., and with Aran it is more often possessive, so King's