Endor place-name "Middle-earth" (SA:dôr, NDOR), "centre of the world" (EN); also long form Endórë "Middle-earth" (Appendix E); allative Endorenna "to Middle-earth" in EO. The form Endór in MR:121 may be seen as archaic, intermediate between Endórë and Endor (since long vowels in a final syllable are normally shortened: Endór > Endor). Endór functions as an uninflected genitive in the source: Aran Endór, "King of Middle-earth".
Quenya
endórë
place name. Middle-earth, (lit.) Middle Land
Cognates
Derivations
- √ENED “centre, middle; three” ✧ VT41/16
Element in
- Q. et Eärello Endorenna utúlien “Out of the Great Sea to Middle-earth I am come” ✧ LotR/0967; PE17/103
- Q.
Aran Endór“King of Middle-earth” ✧ MR/121 (Aran Endór)Elements
Word Gloss endë “centre, middle, centre, middle; [ᴹQ.] core” nórë “land, country; †people, race, tribe, land, country, [ᴹQ.] region where certain people live, [ᴱQ.] nation; [Q.] †people, race, tribe, [ᴹQ.] folk, [ᴱQ.] family” Phonetic Developments
Development Stages Sources √enet > endor [endor] ✧ VT41/16 Variations
- Endor ✧ Let/224; Let/384; MRI/Endor; PE17/026; PE17/121; SA/dôr; SI/Endor; WJI/Endar
- Endóre ✧ Let/224; LotR/1115
- Endór ✧ MR/121 (
Endór)- Endar ✧ MR/126; MRI/Endar; WJI/Endar
- Endon ✧ MRI/Endor
- en(en)dor ✧ NM/282
- endor ✧ VT41/16 (
endor); VT41/16
Endor
middle-earth
endor
noun. Middle-earth
-nna
to, at, upon
-nna "to, at, upon", allative ending, originating from -na "to" with fortified n, VT49:14. Attested in cilyanna, coraryanna, Endorenna, Elendilenna, númenórenna, parma-restalyanna, rénna, senna, tielyanna, q.v. If a noun ends in -n already, the ending -nna merges with it, as in Amanna, formenna, Elenna, númenna, rómenna as the allative forms of Aman, formen, elen, númen, rómen (q.v.). Plural -nnar in mannar, valannar, q.v.
-nna
to
-n (1) dative ending, originating as a reduced form of -nă "to", related to the allative ending -nna (VT49:14). Attested in nin, men, ten, enyalien, Erun, airefëan, tárin, yondon (q.v.) and also added to the English name Elaine (Elainen) in a book dedication to Elaine Griffiths (VT49:40). The longer dative ending -na is also attested in connection with some pronouns, such as sena, téna, véna (q.v.), also in the noun mariéna from márië "goodness" (PE17:59). Pl. -in (as in hínin, see hína), partitive pl. -lin, dual -nt (Plotz). The preposition ana (#1) is said to be used "when purely dative formula is required" (PE17:147), perhaps meaning that it can replace the dative ending, e.g. *ana Eru instead of Erun for "to God". In some of Tolkiens earlier material, the ending -n (or -en) expressed genitive rather than dative, but he later decided that the genitive ending was to be -o (cf. such a revision as Yénië Valinóren becoming Yénië Valinórëo, MR:200).
Ambarenya
middle-earth
Ambarenya, older [MET] Ambarendya place-name "Middle-earth" (but the more usual word is Endor, Endórë) (MBAR)
Endamar
middle-earth
Endamar place-name "Middle-earth" (EN, MBAR, NDOR). However, Middle-earth is normally called Endor, Endórë.
ana
to
ana (1) prep. "to" (VT49:35), "as preposition _ana _is used when purely _dative formula is required" (PE17:147), perhaps meaning that the preposition ana can be used instead of the dative ending -n (#1, q.v.) Also as prefix: ana- "to, towards" (NĀ1); an (q.v.) is used with this meaning in one source (PE17:127)_
na
to, towards
na (2) prep. "to, towards", possibly obsoleted by #1 above; for clarity writers may use the synonym ana instead (NĀ1). Originally, Tolkien glossed na as "at, by, near"; the new meaning entered together with the synonyms an, ana (VT45:36).
The Quenya word for “Middle-earth” (LotR/1115). It often appeared in its shorter form Endor (S/89), similar to Valinórë/Valinor and Númenórë/Númenor. Its initial element is endë “middle” and its final element is a blending of nórë and -ndor often seen in the names of lands (PE17/26).
Properly speaking, the word Endor applied only to the land mass containing Arnor and Gondor (and Beleriand before it was destroyed) where much of action of Tolkien’s tales took place. In his Nomenclature of the Lord of the Rings, Tolkien defined Middle-earth as “the inhabited lands of (Elves and) Men, envisaged as lying between the Western Sea and that of the Far East” (RC/774).
The informal use of the term “Middle-earth” for Tolkien’s entire fictional world came from the descriptions of his works by others rather than from Tolkien. Tolkien said that Middle-earth was “not a special land, or world, or ‘planet’ as too often supposed” (RC/774). Elsewhere, he said the Quenya word for the “World” (equivalent to “Earth”) was Ambar (LotR/967, WJ/402).
Conceptual Development: The term “Middle-earth” was inspired by Old English Middanġeard or Norse Midgard (RC/774). In Northern European mythology, Midgard referred to the Earth as the land of men between the Heaven(s) and Hell(s), but Heaven and Hell as realms above and below the world did not exist within Tolkien’s cosmology. The word Endor instead referred to the home of Elves and Men in the center of the world between the East and West.
The name ᴹQ. {Endon >>} Endor first appeared in maps and notes associated with Silmarillion drafts from the 1930s, where it was given as the name for the “midmost point of Middle-earth” (SM/241, 254). It later appeared in The Etymologies with the translation “Middle-earth” (Ety/NDOR), also described as “centre of the world” (Ety/ÉNED).
In Silmarillion revisions from the 1950s-60s, this name also appeared in the (ultimately rejected) forms Endon, Endór and Endar (MR/70, 121, 126).