Sauron's name

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Originally Posted by Alcuin

That might also explain why there was an older name for Sauron in Sindarin, Gorthaur, “abominable fear”. Perhaps the gor- was simply dropped, or maybe the Eldar in Middle-earth punned his preferred name.

Was Gorthaur in fact older? It may be the case; I don't know. It is possible that the Sindar had grim experience of Mairon/Gorthaur during the Chaining of Melkor, long before the Noldorin exiles appeared on the scene. But then again, there is no reason to think that the Eldar of Valinor had ever encountered Sauron, since he explicitly was Melkor's deputy and the Lieutenant of Angband before the Chaining and thus was gone from Valinor long before the Great Journey. (So how would they know his 'true' name?)

It would appear that Q. Sauron would have to be an Exilic name adapted from Sindarin (with no intermediate theta-form, Feanor's revanchism no longer being an issue). The Gor- element might just have been an 'optional' intensifier,* used commonly in the Sindarin version to distinguish the name from the common noun. The question arises, though, why the Quenya form became (apparently) dominant despite the adoption of Sindarin by the Exiles**; it perhaps might reflect the fact that Sauron was not a matter of general concern for the Elves until ca 1000 SA or later, and it took a long time to identify 'Annatar' with Morgoth's XO; by the time Dark Lord Jr. became a matter for discussion it was an issue for the Wise (+/- Celebrimbor), whom we might suppose to have spoken Quenya among themselves.

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*As was, I think, certainly the case back in the days of Thu/Gorthu

**In external reality, of course Gorthaur had been his his 'Noldorin' name