caras

noun. a moated fort

Cognates

• Q. caraxë “*jagged hedge of spikes, [ᴹQ.] jagged hedge of spikes, [ᴱQ.] row of spikes or teeth” ✧ NM/351

Element in

• S. Caras Galadhon “City of the Trees” ✧ NM/351

Variations

• Caras ✧ UT/257

caras

noun. moated fortress

      caras "moated fortress" (UT:257), probably to be compared to Sindarin ("Noldorin") _caras_ "a city (built above ground)", derived from the stem _KAR_ "make, do" (LR:362); the basic meaning may be simply "something made, construction" (compare Quenya car "building, house"). Extensions involving a suffixed stem-vowel and a final _-s_ are attested; cf. for instance _SPAL_ and its extended form _SPALAS_ (LR:387). Hence, _KAR_ could easily have a longer form *_KARAS_. Sindarin caras evidently includes the Grey-elven derivative ending [[-as]], though ([[-as]] is basically used to derive verbal nouns, like English_ -ing_, but these may often take on a more concrete meaning; _car-as_ can probably be compared to English build-ing); the Nandorin ending may be related to the Sindarin one. Yet another possibility would be equating this ending [[-as]] with the collective ending seen in [[Danas]], q.v., and assume that [[car]] means something like "house" (as in Quenya); hence [[caras]] = "group of houses, village", later taking on the meaning "moated fortress" if the Nandor used to surround their villages with moats.