“The Fellowship of the Ring”, the first volume of Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings”, appeared on 29 July 1954, some seventy years ago. To mark the anniversary, Tradiling is publishing this short article on the challenges of translating Tolkien’s masterpiece.
Title page of the first edition of “The Fellowship of the Ring”
The Lord of the Rings is an extraordinary phenomenon in many ways. With this work, Tolkien more or less created the high fantasy genre. Though it has countless imitations, in the opinion of many this work remains unsurpassed. And its popularity has only grown as a result of Peter Jackson’s wonderful screen adaptation, 20 years on still considered an awe-inspiring cinematic triumph.
Translating “The Lord of the Rings” is a major challenge because of all the made-up languages in the original text and because that text itself in the frame story of the novel is a translation into English of the imagined Westron text that the story was originally written in. In fact, of course, the novel was first written in English and the Westron names, when they do appear, were made up by Tolkien subsequently.
The much-loved novel and film series has generated a voluminous authoritative fan bibliography. In this article we discuss only the names of some key characters in the trilogy. To compile it we have reread the original texts and also used the unsurpassed Tolkien Gateway wiki. Of course, there are many other texts that cover this field, at least in part. One such is Miquel Pujol’s research project Traduir la Terra Mitjana (2008).
Tolkien himself took a great interest in the translations of his work and was so upset by the “errors” in the first Dutch (1957) and Swedish (1959-1961) translations of his work that he compiled a single-spaced 23-page Guide to the Names in The Lord of the Rings (first published in 1975). The guide starts with this short paragraph:
All names not in the following list should be left entirely [Tolkien’s emphasis] unchanged in any language used in translation, except that inflexional -s, -es should be rendered according to the grammar of the language.
As a result of these considerations most of the names in the novel should be left relatively unchanged in translation, apart from accents and other spelling/pronunciation conventions. Here are some of the main characters in this group: Aragorn, Arwen Undómiel, Tom Bombadil, Boromir, Celeborn, Denethor, Elendil, Elrond, Éomer, Éomund, Éothain, Éowyn, Faramir, Galadriel, Gandalf, Gimli, Glorfindel, Gollum, Isildur, Legolas, Nazgûl, Radagast, Saruman, Théoden. (I have chosen not to italicise all names in this text, merely those that are referred to as names, rather than characters, in the discussion.)
The main exceptions to this copying approach are the English-sounding names of some of the other characters, as listed below.
| Original | French 1 | French 2 | Spanish | Catalan |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barliman Butterbur | Prosper Poiredebeurré | Filibert ‘Bébert’ Fleurdebeurre | Cebadilla Mantecona | Ordi Oliu |
| Beechbone | Branche-de-Hêtre | Osdehétu | Hayala | Osdefaig |
| Bilbo Baggins | Bilbon Sacquet | Bilbo Bessac | Bilbo Bolsón | Bilbo Saquet |
| Déagol | Dédale | Déagol | Déagol | Dèagol |
| Frodo Baggins | Frodon Sacquet | Frodo Bessac | Frodo Bolsón | Frodo Saquet |
| Goldberry | Baie d’Or | Baie d’or | Baya de Oro | Baiador |
| Gríma Wormtongue | Gríma Langue de Serpent | Gríma Langue de Serpent | Gríma Lengua de Serpiente | Gríma Llengua de Serp |
| Leaflock | Bouclesfeuilles | Bouclefeuille | Zarzillo | Rullfull |
| Meriadoc “Merry” Brandybuck | Meriadoc “Merry” Brandebouc | Meriadoc “Merry” Brandibouc | Meriadoc “Merry” Brandigamo | Meriadoc “Merry” Brandiboc |
| Pippin Took | Peregrin “Pippin” Touque | Peregrin “Pippin” Touc | Peregrin “Pippin” Tuk | Peregrin “Pippin” Tûc |
| Quickbeam | Vifsorbier | Primebranche | Ramaviva | Moixera-que-guilla |
| Samwise “Sam” Gamgee | Samsagace “Sam” Gamegie | Samsaget “Sam” Gamgie | Samsagaz Gamyi | Samseny Gamgí |
| Shadowfax | Gripoil | Scadufax | Sombragris | Grisencrín |
| Shelob | Archne | Araigne | Ella-Laraña | Aranyerra |
| Skinbark | Peaurude | Vivécorce | Corteza | Pellcorfa |
| Strider | Grands-Pas | l’Arpenteur | Trancos | Gambús |
| Treebeard | Sylvebarbe | Barbebois | Bárbol | Barbarbrat |
| Wandlimb | Mincetige | Membrejonc | Miembros de Junco | Branquilloneta |
| Witch-king of Angmar | Roi-sorcier d’Angmar | Roi-Sorcier d’Angmar | Rey Brujo de Angmar | Rei Bruixot d’Angmar |
The hobbits
Let us consider the hobbits first: Bilbo Baggins, Frodo Baggins, Samwise Gamgee, Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took. Note that the “bag” etymology” of Baggins, supposedly deriving from Westron “Labingi”, is recreated in French, Spanish and Catalan. “Bilbon” and “Frodon” seem to invite a French pronunciation. Except for the French “-on” word ending these translations follow Tolkien’s recommendations:
Baggins. Intended to recall ‘bag’—compare Bilbo’s conversation with Smaug in The Hobbit — and meant to be associated (by hobbits) with Bag End (that is, the end of a ‘bag’ or ‘pudding bag’ = culde-sac), the local name for Bilbo’s house. (It was the local name for my aunt’s farm in Worcestershire, which was at the end of a lane leading to it and no further). Compare also SackvilleBaggins. The translation should contain an element meaning ‘sack, bag’.
For Brandybuck Tolkien recommends the following:
Brandybuck. A rare English name which I have come across. Its origin in English is not concerned; in The Lord of the Rings it is obviously meant to contain elements of the Brandywine River and the family name Oldbuck […]. The latter contains the word ‘buck’ (animal): either Old English bucc ‘male deer’ (fallow or roe), or bucca ‘he-goat’. gets a similar treatment, with the English-sounding “-ybuck” suffix turned into -ebouc (fr), -igamo (es) and -iboc (ca).
In his introductory remarks Tolkien states that some names contain
elements in the modern English language that it is desirable to match by equivalents in the language of translation, with regard to their original meaning, and also where feasible with regard to their archaic or altered form.
This is the case with buck, but none of the translations seem to attempt to reproduce the likely English meaning.
Déagol is the cousin of Sméagol (Gollum). These were hobbit-like creatures.
The ents
The ents named in English are Beechbone, Leaflock, Quickbeam, Skinbark, Treebeard, Wandlimb. The old Entish names also appear in the books. For example, Treebeard is also known as Fangorn. This can lead to confusion about the status of ent names. (Here, as in other cases, any errors in the table are my own.)
The other characters
In the table above, the remaining characters are Barliman Butterbur, Goldberry, Gríma Wormtongue, Shadowfax, Shelob, Strider and the Witch-king of Angmar. In the published translations all these names are translated somewhat creatively in line with Tolkien’s advice. For example, Grima Wormtongue is Grima Llengua de Serp in Catalan: the indecipherable Grima remains unchanged, whereas Wormtongue is translated in line with Tolkien’s admonition: “it is desirable to match by equivalents in the language of translation”. As a point of interest, Barliman Butterbur seems to have inspired translators more than any other character in our selection.
We are just scratching the surface of what might be called “Comparative Ringology”, the comparison of The Lord of the Rings in different languages. There are hundreds of characters, places, objects, events, and so on, in the trilogy, each with multiple names in various languages in the story. Together they comprise one of the magical cornerstones of a gigantic publishing endeavour that has focused the efforts of creative literary translators around the world over the years, to the delight and puzzlement of new generations of readers.
Long may this continue, as Tolkien’s works are translated into further languages. Believe me, this is an ongoing process. In the last two years, new translations have appeared in Slovenian, Asturian, Mongolian and Chinese. And only this year Yr Hobyd appeared in Welsh, translated by Adam Pearce. Here is one reader hoping that this milestone will lead swiftly on to the publication of Arglwydd y Modrwyau.
—
Published translations
The Lord of the Rings has been published twice in French by the same publishing house, Christian Bourgois (Paris):
- Tolkien, J. R. R., Ledoux, F., & Munch, P. (1972-1973). Le seigneur des anneaux.
- Tolkien, J. R. R., Lauzon, D. (2014-2015 ) Le Seigneur des anneaux.
In the table above the first name in French is from the earlier translation in each case. It is unusual for the same publishing house to publish two translations of the same text. Clearly, there was some dissatisfaction with the earlier version and perhaps the treatment of names in the French text was one of the issues.
See also Correspondances des traductions françaises.
The Spanish translation was first published 1978 – 1980:
- Tolkien, J. R. R., Porrúa, F., & Horne, M. (2002). El señor de los anillos. Barcelona: Minotauro.
Catalan came a little later:
- Tolkien, J. R. R. (1986). El senyor dels anells.[Translated by Francesc Parcerisas; 4th reprinting]. Barcelona: Editorial Vicens-Vives.
