17-06-2004, 09:33
La simple coïncidence est aussi ce qui me semble le plus probable, quoiqu'il ne soit pas entièrement impossible que Tolkien soit tombé sur ce mot dans ces lectures, que le son lui en ait plu et qu'il l'ait réutilisé par la suite. Souvenons-nous de la lettre n° 324 pour un cas comparable :<p><font color=blue><b>324 From a letter to Graham Tayar 4-5 June 1971</b><br><font size=1>[Tayar had asked about the use of the name 'Gamgee' in <i>The Lord of the Rings</i>, and whether the name 'Gondor' had been suggested by Gondar in Ethiopia.]</font><br>In the matter of <i>Gondar/Gondor</i> you touch on a difficult matter, but one of great interest: the nature of the process of 'linguistic invention' (including nomenclature) in general, and in <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> in particular. It would take too long to discuss this – it needs a long essay which I have often in mind but shall probably never write. As far as <i>Gondor</i> goes the facts (of which I am aware) are these: 1) I do not recollect ever having heard the name <i>Gondar </i>(in Ethiopia) before your letter; 2) <i>Gondor</i> is (a) a name fitted to the style and phonetics of <i>Sindarin</i>, and (b) has the sense 'Stone-land' sc. 'Stone (-using people's) land'. Outside the inner historical fiction, the name was a very early element in the invention of the whole story. Also in the linguistic construction of the tale, which is accurate and detailed, <i>Gondor</i> and <i>Gondar</i> would be two distinct words/names, and the latter would have no precise sense. Nonetheless one's mind is, of course, stored with a 'leaf-mould' of memories (submerged) of names, and these rise up to the surface at times, and may provide with modification the bases of 'invented' names. Owing to the prominence of Ethiopia in the Italian war <i>Gondar</i> may have been one such element. But no more than say <i>Gondwana-land</i> (that rare venture of geology into poetry). In this case I can actually recollect the reason why the element <i>*gon(o), *gond(o) </i>was selected for the stem of words meaning stone, when I began inventing the 'Elvish' languages. When about 8 years old I read in a small book (professedly for the young) that nothing of the language of primitive peoples (before the Celts or Germanic invaders) is now known, except perhaps <i>ond </i>= 'stone' (+ one other now forgotten). I have no idea how such a form could even be guessed, but the <i>ond</i> seemed to me fitting for the meaning. (The prefixing of g- was much later, after the invention of the history of the relation between <i>Sindarin & Quenya</i> in which primitive initial g- was lost in Q: the Q. form of the word remained <i>ondo</i>.) .... </font><p>Il est difficile de conclure quoi que ce soit en se basant sur une ressemblance isolée, surtout sur une racine, élément bref où les ressemblances sont statistiquement probables. On pourrait tout aussi bien remarquer que la ressemblance sémantique et formelle latin <i>habere</i> et les termes germaniques (anglais <i>have</i>, allemand <i>haben</i>, etc.), bien qu'ils ne puissent être apparentés, un h latin ne pouvant correspondre à un h germanique (en fait le terme germanique se rattache plus vraisemblablement à la même source que le latin <i>capere</i>).<p>Il y a des traces des langues naturelles dans le lexique des langues de Tolkien, un certain nombre de clins d'œil ou de "calembours historiques", surtout dans les premières versions. Mais généralement, il n'est pas possible d'aller bien loin ainsi, et cela n'aide guère à comprendre ces langues. Là-dessus, on peut revoir le fuseau <a href=http://www.jrrvf.com/forum/noncgi/Forum8/HTML/000282.html>Le Sindarin "Minas" et Minar</a> par exemple.