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Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc
If I were to say something for myself, I never thought about it that way. Most probably because the Z in "Nazgul" is certainly pronounced Z (as in "Zoom"), while in "Nazi" it is generally pronounced as C (as in... erm... oh, you English barbarians, why don't you ever pronounce "C" correctly! As in "Caesar" if it is pronounced with correct Latin spelling).
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Well, if one's first encounter with Tolkien was via the movies or an audio book/radio dramatisation, one wouldn't make that mistake, but when one first experiences the names as words on the page its different. Tolkien, as a calligrapher, understood that the 'shape' of a word on the page was as important as its sound - hence his replacement of K by C - as in Keleborn>Celeborn - done even at the risk of readers mispronouncing the name as Seleborn, because 'Celeborn' looks more attractive & less 'harsh' than Keleborn.
Hence, on the page, the 'identity' of 'Naz-' in both Nazgul & Nazi is bound to strike many readers.