Sigelwara Land
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<imagemap> File:Tolkien's Sigelwara Etymologies.svg|thumb|upright=2|right|Imagemap with clickable links. Tolkien's Sigelwara etymologies,<ref name="Sigelwara Land"/> leading to major strands of his Legendarium, the Silmarils, Balrogs, and Haradrim<ref name="Shippey 2005"/>
rect 10 10 170 200 Silmaril rect 300 10 500 200 Balrog rect 700 10 890 200 Harad
rect 650 200 900 350 Aethiopia
rect 10 400 400 500 Sól (Germanic mythology) rect 500 400 890 500 hearth
rect 10 510 200 665 sowilō rect 210 510 450 665 seal
rect 10 10 900 675 commons:File:Tolkien's Sigelwara Etymologies.svg </imagemap>
"Sigelwara Land" is an essay by J. R. R. Tolkien that appeared in two parts, in 1932 and 1934.<ref name="Sigelwara Land">J. R. R. Tolkien, "Sigelwara Land" Medium Aevum Vol. 1, No. 3. December 1932 and Medium Aevum Vol. 3, No. 2. June 1934.</ref> It explores the etymology of the Old English word for the ancient Aethiopians, {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}, and attempts to recover what it might originally have meant. Tolkien suggested that its two elements were most likely sun/jewel and coal/hearth, perhaps meaning something like a soot-black fire-demon.
The Tolkien scholar and philologist Tom Shippey suggests that Tolkien's detailed study of the word may have influenced him in his creation of elements of his fantasy world of Middle-earth, including the Silmarils or forged sun-jewels, the Balrogs or dark fire-demons, and the Haradrim, men of the hot south.
EssayEdit
Tolkien's essay treats the etymology of the Old English word for the ancient Aethiopians, {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}. Tolkien concluded that, while the meaning of the first element was evidently {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} "Sun", the meaning of the second element {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} was not definitely recoverable, but might be guessed at:
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a symbol ... of that large part of ancient English language and lore which has now vanished beyond recall, {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}.Template:Efn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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The phrase {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} appears in Exodus, a free translation of the Book of Exodus (Codex Junius 11):
Template:Translated blockquote The main thrust of Tolkien's argument in this two-part paper seems to have been that {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} was a corruption of {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}, and had come to mean something different in its later form than it had in its original. He begins by pointing out that Ethiopians in the earliest writings are presented in a very positive light, but by the time they written of as "Sigelwarans", the perception has become the opposite. He does not speculate why, but instead demonstrates a clear relationship between {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} and {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} and shows how discovering the original meaning of the word {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} is almost impossible; that trying to do so must be "for the joy of the hunt rather than the hope of a final kill".
The word {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} as a conflation of two words, the inherited word for Sun, the feminine {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} and an Old English neuter {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} or {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} for "jewel, necklace", loaned from Latin {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}.
Suggesting a connection of {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} with Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌹 {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} "coal", Old Norse {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} "fire", Old English {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} "to roast", {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} "hearth", Tolkien tentatively concludes that in the {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} we may be looking at "rather the sons of Muspell than of Ham", an ancient class of demons "with red-hot eyes that emitted sparks and faces black as soot", English equivalent of the Norse fire giants ruled by Surtr, that had been forgotten even before the composition of this version of Exodus.
Influence on Tolkien's fictionEdit
Tom Shippey notes that the demons "with red-hot eyes" make appearances in Tolkien's fiction as Balrogs.<ref name="Shippey 2005">Tom Shippey (2005), The Road to Middle-earth, Houghton Mifflin, ch. 3 'Philological Inquiries', pp. 48-49; Template:ISBN</ref>
One of the many peoples encountered in The Lord of the Rings are "black men like half-trolls".<ref>J. R. R. Tolkien (1955), The Return of the King, 2nd edition (1966), George Allen & Unwin, book 5 ch. 6 p. 121; Template:ISBN</ref> This description recalls the {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} as black demons; furthermore their homeland of Far Harad, the great southern region of Middle-earth, recalls Sub-Saharan Africa, sometimes referred to as {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} in pre-modern times. In drafts of The Lord of the Rings Tolkien toyed with names such as Harwan and Sunharrowland for the Haradrim generally and their land; Christopher Tolkien notes these names are derived from the Old English Sigelwara, and refers to Tolkien's essay Sigelwara Land.<ref>J. R. R. Tolkien (1989), ed. Christopher Tolkien, The Treason of Isengard, Unwin Hyman, ch. XXV p. 435 & p. 439 note 4</ref>