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Mondósar[1] was a town in the northwestern part of the island of Tol Eressëa, according to the early version of the legendarium in The Book of Lost Tales. It later became known as Oxford.[2]
History[]
Mondósar[1] was established some time after the island was permanently anchored in the Bay of Eldamar by the Vala Ulmo, at an unknown date in the Years of the Trees.[2]
After the Faring Forth, and the removal of Tol Eressëa to the Great Lands, Mondósar[1] was conquered by Horsa, one of the sons of Eriol, the Mannish mariner who visited the Lonely Isle years prior.[2]
In The Notion Club Papers discovered by Howard Green in 2012, the Notion Club and its members are based in Oxford.[3]
Etymology[]
Mondósar is the Quenya name for "Oxford", probably a compound of mundó ("bull;[4] ox")[1] and the root ÞAR[5] ("saw;[6] across, beyond")[7].[8]
In other versions[]
In The Book of Lost Tales, Oxford was identified as Taruithorn in Gnomish.[9] It consisted of the words tarog ("ox"), from the element tarag ("horn; steep mountain peak[10]")[11] or târ ("a horn"), and tarn ("gate").[9] Its Qenya cognate was Taruktarna.[12] Some of its earlier, rejected names are Taruitharn and Taruithron.[9] The town was called Oxenaford ("ford for oxen")[13] in Old English.[2]
In other writings[]
In a story entitled The End of Bovadium,[14] Tolkien coined the Latinized name Bovadium to refer to Oxford.[15] In the story's "apparatus…of mock-scholarship", Bovadium is a contracted form of Vadum Bovinum ("shallow water, ford") in Latin.[13]
Background[]
Oxford is the city in which J.R.R. Tolkien spent a great deal of his life living in. Both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings were written in North Oxford. The Tolkien family resided in 20 Northmoor Road and in March of 1947 they moved to 3 Manor Road.[16]
In a 1968 letter to the producer of the BBC documentary Tolkien in Oxford, Tolkien signed his name as Arcastar Mondósaresse ("Tolkien in Oxford").[1]
According to Pauline Baynes's A Map of Middle-earth that was annotated by Tolkien, Hobbiton was at approximately the same latitude as Oxford.[17]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Christie's, Valuable Printed Books and Manuscripts, Sale 7275, lot 152. See also "Tengwar Specimen #70 - "Tolkien in Oxford" Tengwar" on forodrim.org
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 The History of Middle-earth, Vol. II: The Book of Lost Tales Part Two, VI: "The History of Eriol or Ælfwine and the End of the Tales", outline 13, pgs. 292-3
- ↑ The History of Middle-earth, Vol. IX: Sauron Defeated, Part Two: "The Notion Club Papers", "Foreword and List of Members"
- ↑ The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Letter 342, pg. 422
- ↑ Parma Eldalamberon, issue XVII: Words, Phrases and Passages in various tongues in The Lord of the Rings, pgs. 14, 187-8
- ↑ Parma Eldalamberon, issue XII: Qenyaqetsa: The Qenya Phonology and Lexicon together with The Poetic and Mythologic Words of Eldarissa, pg. 82 (entry "SAŘA")
- ↑ The History of Middle-earth, Vol. V: The Lost Road and Other Writings, Part Three: The Etymologies, entry "THAR"
- ↑ "Mondósar" on eldamo.org
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Parma Eldalamberon, issue XI: I·Lam na·Ngoldathon: The Grammar and Lexicon of The Gnomish Tongue, pgs. 68-9
- ↑ The Collected Vinyar Tengwar Volume 5, Vinyar Tengwar 46, "Addenda and Corrigenda to the Etymologies", pg. 17
- ↑ The History of Middle-earth, Vol. V: The Lost Road and Other Writings, Part Three: The Etymologies, entry "TARÁK"
- ↑ "Taruithorn" on eldamo.org
- ↑ 13.0 13.1 Sam Leith, "The endless ‘unearthing’ of Tolkien’s archive needs to stop", dated October 3, 2025, The Telegraph, (archive)
- ↑ The J.R.R. Tolkien Companion and Guide, I: Chronology, pg. 737 (entry "2 December 1968")
- ↑ John Garth, "Tolkien’s road goes on – but there’s traffic ahead at Bovadium", dated May 24, 2025, "John Garth on Tolkien's life and works"
- ↑ The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion, pg. lxxiv
- ↑ Daniel Helen, "Tolkien’s annotated map of Middle-earth transcribed", dated November 10, 2015, Tolkien Society