dor daedeloth

place name. Land of Great Dread; Land of Shadow of Horror

The land of Morgoth (S/127), translated “Land of Great Dread” (WJ/183), a combination of dôr “land”, a form of daer “great” and deloth “abhorrence, detestation, loathing” (SA/del, WJ/187).

Conceptual Development: In the earliest Lost Tales, this name first appeared as G. Ladwen-na-Dhaideloth “Heath of the Sky-roof” (LT2/287), revised to G. Dor-na-Dhaideloth of similar meaning (LT2A/Dor-na-Dhaideloth, LT2/287). In the Lays of Beleriand from the 1920s, Tolkien revised the meaning of last element of ᴱN. Dor-na-Dhaideloth to “[Land of the] High Plain” (LB/49).

In Silmarillion drafts from the 1930s, it generally appeared as N. Dor-Daideloth (SM/269, LR/250) or Dor-Daedeloth (LR/120, LR/256). At this time the name was usually glossed “Land of Dread”, but this was only accurate as a translation of its shorter variant Dor-Deloth (LR/405, WJ/183), which was also translated as “Loathly Land” in The Etymologies (Ety/DYEL). In one place in this period the name appeared as Dor-na-Daideloth “Land of the Shadow of Dread” (LR/405), a better indication of its full meaning. In The Etymologies from the 1930s, there was a word N. dae “shadow”, which appeared as an element in the variant name N. Daedhelos “Shadow of Fear” (Ety/DAY). These factors are probably the source of Christopher Tolkien’s translation in the Silmarillion Index: “Land of Shadow of Horror” (SI/Dor Daedeloth, SA/dae).

However, in revisions to the Silmarillion map from 1950s, J.R.R. Tolkien translated S. Dor Dae-deloth as “Land of Great Dread” (WJ/183), and later still considered changing the name to S. Dor-na-Daerachas of the same meaning (WJ/187). This indicates that he altered the sense of the element dae from “shadow” to “great”, though exactly when he did so is difficult to pin down.

Dor Daedeloth

Dor Daedeloth

In the published Silmarillion, the name Dor Daedeloth is translated as "Land of the Shadow of Horror".