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Hungry Ghoul
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<img src="http://www.barrowdowns.com/images/posticons/vilya.jpg" align=absmiddle> Re: Also wondered....
I have incidentally thought of that, too, just lately. If I remember correctly, the Professor explained it somewhere...
Letter #183, to W.H. Auden:
<blockquote>
Quote:<hr> The name is the modern form (appearing in the 13th century and still in use) of
midden-erd > middel-erd, an ancient name for the
oikoumené, the abiding place of Men, the objectively real world, in use specifically opposed to imaginary worlds (as Fairyland) or unseen worlds (as Heaven or Hell).<hr></blockquote>
Letter #211 picks exactly this thought up again:
<blockquote>
Quote:<hr> [...] middle because thought of vaguely as set amidst the encircling Seas and (in the northern imagination) between ice of the North and the fire of the South.<hr></blockquote>
'I heed no call of clamant bell that rings / Iron-tongued in the towers of earthly kings. / Here on the stones and trees there lies a spell / Of unforgotten loss, of memory more blest / Than mortal wealth...'</p>