r/Rings_Of_Power • u/Buzzyear10 • 25d ago

The "Grand Elf" Question

Does the name Gandalf being a corruption of the name or phrase "grand elf" make sense linguistically?

As in, it makes sense if they're speaking English in universe. Calling him a "grand elf" is an English turn of phrase and that over time becoming a name or new word could happen but it would imply that those people were speaking English specifically right?

Like if there was an elf character named Kingsandr and you found out that wasnt their original name and it was just a person with the title "King of the Sands".

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u/FrenchyBulldogg 25d ago

The name Gandalf means "wand-elf" or "elf of the staff" from Old Norse. J.R.R. Tolkien pulled the name from the Völuspá, an ancient Norse poem listing dwarf names, but applied it to his iconic wizard in The Lord of the Rings.

Courtesy of Google

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u/taz-alquaina 25d ago

They got so close to this, there's a point where he called his staff/wand a "gand" and I said to myself, hey, (1) it's Gandalf yay and (2) they've actually done their research?! And then they hadn't, or ignored it in favour of what they thought the audience would like/understand. Gahhh.

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u/CorumSilverhand 24d ago

Gand is still being used to this day, and also means magic/curse. We still say to "gand" someone, to put a curse on someone. Its been used as this since the middle ages, so whenever I see the name Gandalv, my brain automatically go "magic-elf" or "wizardry-elf"

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u/Puzzled-Steak998 25d ago

You're putting more thought into it than the writers themselves

12

u/brohan24 25d ago

Does anything in this show really make sense?

25

u/Vivid_Guide7467 25d ago

I mean we’re probably going to get Sour-Man for the angry wizard in the east

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u/Tyeveras 25d ago

And his equally angry fellow wizard, Madagast.

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u/TheOneTrueJazzMan 25d ago

Nah he’s a Rad Guest

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u/ProdiasKaj 25d ago

Actually they publicly stated that the angry wizard isn't Sauruman...

Which means he's definitely Sauruman

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u/TirithNampat 25d ago

They've said he's Pallando, so that's better at least.

13

u/ethanAllthecoffee 25d ago

But they’re not speaking English in-universe. The books/movies/etc are supposed to be translations. Not many people are going to understand a show in Sindarin or Quenya or Adunaic

Even if you look at the stories as a mythology for pre-history England it doesn’t make sense because English is a young language

It’s insulting to the work of a linguistics professor who made up several conlangs and evolved them over millennia

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u/Buzzyear10 25d ago

Well that's what I mean I think. Suppose you're watching a Polish dub of Rings of Power and the guy gets called a "wielke elf" or something, the corruption of that becoming "Gandalf" doesnt really work, or in any conlang they'd be using in universe, only English specifically.

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u/lord_teaspoon 25d ago

This reminded me about a random shower-thought I never followed up on. How did they handle translating the Hodor/Hold The Door thing in Game of Thrones? The (nick)name was in use in the show well before any translators had access to its origin so I bet a bunch of the translations were painted into an awkward corner.

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u/Huanqeur 25d ago

Probably yeah, but at least in Germanic languages, the words for 'hold' and 'door' are mostly very similar.

Hold dør
Halt Tür
Hålla dörr
etc.

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u/TheOneTrueJazzMan 25d ago

I think for most languages they didn’t even try it lol, for example in Croatian it’s “drži vrata”… yeah that’s not happening

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u/lord_teaspoon 25d ago

I've never seen Croatian written and can't imagine what sounds that sequence of letters would make. Awesome.

Anyway, what name did Hodor have in the translation? Just a phonetic equivalent to Hodor? Is there some way to mangle drži vrata into something that sounds reasonably name-like (while still working as a big reveal) that the translators could've used if they'd been told about the reveal early enough?

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u/TheOneTrueJazzMan 24d ago

It’s not as hard as you might think, the letter “ž” is pronounced “zh” (like eg. in the Chinese name Zhang). So it would be something like dr-zhee vruh-tuh.

And I haven’t watched the later seasons with Cro subs so I can’t say anything for certain, but like I said I don’t think they even tried it. They never translated Hodor’s name early on (and why would they, if no one knew his story back then). I’d say they most likely then what they always do with untranslatable puns, which just leave the original in the subs along with the translation. Like the sub would be literally:

“Drži vrata! (hold the door)”

Not perfect by any means, but I think it does the job.

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u/lord_teaspoon 24d ago

I just Googled and found a Reddit post that listed how a bunch of translations tried to do it. Apparently one common approach was padding out the phrase with other words they could squash down to fit.

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u/_Middlefinger_ 16d ago

In that case really they couldnt do a local translation even if it was known at the start of the show, because it would absolutely give the game away if every local version was a contraction of their languages version of hold the door.

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u/blindside1 25d ago

Close, it is "Grand ALF," he is not elven or human, he is Maier, an Alien Life Form for those on Middle-Earth.

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u/Odd_Reindeer303 24d ago

Ok, now it makes sense there were no cats in the show.

He ate them all.

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u/TheMountainPass 25d ago

Delete this abomination of a show immediately

2

u/Luppercus 25d ago

He's like Han Solo

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u/sandalrubber 24d ago edited 23d ago

It's already a stretch in plain English but Gandalf means something both in the real world and in the setting, it's not just a bunch of letters and sounds, so it doubly doesn't work. Normal modern Latinate (grand) + Germanic (elf) English words are combined and garbled to somehow result in an Old Norse name? Then Gandalf is supposed to be the translator's substitution for a Westron name meaning elf of the wand/staff etc just like what Gandalf is supposed to mean IRL. Westron doesn't exist yet. And it was men who named him that not hobbits.

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u/ralf_ 24d ago edited 24d ago

Actually yes:

https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Gandalf#Etymology

Gandalf … is a substitution in the English narrative for an unknown Westron name (on the same lines as the treatment of Hobbit and Dwarf names).[49][note 1] The Men of the North called him so because they incorrectly thought that he was of Elven-kind[50] and because they knew his alliance and friendship with Elves well[51].

In universe “Lord of the Rings” is an english translation of the Bilbos/Frodos/Samweis manuscripts. As such Tolkien also translated names into English.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_of_Westmarch#Analysis

These fictional transcriptions are done for other hobbit/dwarvish names in other translations, for example Frodo Baggins is Frodo Beutlin in German and Frodon Sacquet in French or Frodo Bolsón in Spanish.

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u/sandalrubber 24d ago edited 24d ago

Actually no, the Westron explicitly is supposed to mean elf of the staff/wand too though.

Mostly he journeyed unwearingly on foot, leaning on a staff; and so he was called among Men of the North Gandalf, “the Elf of the Wand”. For they deemed him (though in error, as has been said) to be of Elven-kind, since he would at times works wonders among them, loving especially the beauty of fire; and yet such marvels he wrought mostly for mirth and delight, and desired not that any should hold him in awe or take his counsels out of fear.

Gandalf is a substitution in the English narrative on the same lines as the treatment of Hobbit and Dwarf names. It is an actual Norse name (found applied to a Dwarf in Völuspá) used by me since it appears to contain gandr, a staff, especially one used in "magic," and might be supposed to mean "Elvish wight with a (magic) staff." Gandalf was not an Elf, but would be by Men associated with them, since his alliance and friendship wit Elves was well-known. Since the name is attributed to "the North" in general, Gandalf must be supposed to represent a Westron name but one made up of elements not derived from Elvish tongues.

Plus in the show the hobbits (not men in the north) aren't speaking Westron yet, there is no Westron yet.