Words and Names in Tolkien's Work

[Lalwendë]

I found a very interesting website today which has a lot about folklore of the Orkneys and some intriguing little leads to words in Tolkein's work.

Firstly, Hobbits - in Orkney they have the Hogboon or Hogboy, who dwells in burial mounds but can be a friendly spirit - like a Hobbit in his own underground Smial you might presume. What was even more arresting to me though is that on the page where this is described, look to the info bar on the right hand side as some Orcadian place names associated with mounds are listed - one of them is Hobbister.

Then we also have the Trow and the Draugr - Trow immediately brings to mind a Troll of course, but in Orkney this is closer to the Norse Draugr, a kind of unpleasant, undead Wight which inhabits burial mounds and steals the spirits of children. It's also uncanny that Alan Lee chose Maes Howe as his model when making a sketch of the Barrow-Downs!

And finally to the most intriguing find of all, an almost forgotten Orcadian mythical being - the Kett-Hontla which is a strange combination of cat and dog and linked to the Scandinavian Ketta, a Cat Ogre who is mother to the undead Draugr, and found in Beowulf as the enigmatic Grendel's mother. There she is also referred to as the merewif or woman of the mere, and this has now got me thinking about Goldberry and her mother, the River-Woman...