View source for Sigelwara Land

{{Short description|Essay by J. R. R. Tolkien}}
{{Use Oxford spelling|date=November 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}

{{#tag:imagemap|
File:Tolkien's Sigelwara Etymologies.svg{{!}}thumb{{!}}upright=2{{!}}right{{!}}{{{caption|Imagemap with clickable links. Tolkien's ''Sigelwara'' etymologies,<ref name="Sigelwara Land"/> leading to major strands of [[Tolkien's Legendarium|his Legendarium]], the [[Silmaril]]s, [[Balrog]]s, and [[Harad]]rim<ref name="Shippey 2005"/> }}}

rect  10  10  170  200 [[Silmaril]]
rect 300  10  500  200 [[Balrog]]
rect 700  10  890  200 [[Harad]]

<!--rect 250 200  650  350 [[Sigelwara Land]]-->
rect 650 200  900  350 [[Aethiopia]]

rect  10  400  400  500 [[Sól (Germanic mythology)]]<!-- same as Sigel -->
rect 500  400  890  500 [[hearth]]

rect  10  510  200  665 [[sowilō]] <!-- Sun-rule -->
rect 210  510  450  665 [[Seal (emblem)|seal]] <!-- ''Sigillum'' -->

rect  10   10  900  675 [[commons:File:Tolkien's Sigelwara Etymologies.svg]]
}}

"'''Sigelwara Land'''" is an essay by [[J. R. R. Tolkien]] that appeared in two parts, in 1932 and 1934.<ref name="Sigelwara Land">[[J. R. R. Tolkien]], "Sigelwara Land" [https://www.jstor.org/stable/43625831 ''Medium Aevum'' Vol. 1, No. 3. December 1932] and [https://www.jstor.org/stable/43625895 ''Medium Aevum'' Vol. 3, No. 2. June 1934.]</ref> It explores the etymology of the [[Old English]] word for the ancient [[Aethiopia]]ns, {{lang|ang|Sigelhearwan}}, and attempts to recover what it might originally have meant. Tolkien suggested that its two elements were most likely sun/jewel and coal/hearth, perhaps meaning something like a soot-black fire-demon.

The Tolkien scholar and philologist [[Tom Shippey]] suggests that Tolkien's detailed study of the word may have influenced him in his creation of elements of his fantasy world of [[Middle-earth]], including the [[Silmaril]]s or forged sun-jewels, the [[Balrog]]s or dark fire-demons, and the [[Harad]]rim, men of the hot south.

== Essay ==
Tolkien's essay treats the etymology of the [[Old English]] word for the ancient [[Aethiopia]]ns, {{lang|ang|Sigelhearwan}}. Tolkien concluded that, while the meaning of the first element was evidently {{lang|ang|[[Sól (sun)|sigel]]}} "Sun", the meaning of the second element {{lang|ang|hearwan}} was not definitely recoverable, but might be guessed at:

{{blockquote|a symbol ... of that large part of ancient English language and lore which has now vanished beyond recall, {{lang|ang|[[The Wanderer (Old English poem)|swa hit no wære]]}}.{{efn|"As if it had never been", a quotation from the Old English poem [[The Wanderer (Old English poem)|''The Wanderer'']] }}}}

The phrase {{lang|ang|Sigelwara land}} appears in ''[[Exodus (poem)|Exodus]]'', a free translation of the [[Book of Exodus]] ([[Codex Junius]] 11):

{{translated blockquote
|language=ang
|title=[[Codex Junius]] 11
|quote=.. be suðan Sigelwara land, forbærned burhhleoðu, brune leode, hatum heofoncolum.
|source="Exodus" ll. 68-88<ref name="Exodus">{{cite web |title=Junius 11 "Exodus" ll. 68-88 |url=http://mcllibrary.org/Junius/exodus.html |publisher=The Medieval & Classical Literature Library |accessdate=1 February 2020}}</ref>
|translation=...&nbsp;southward lay the [[Aethiopia|Ethiop's land]], parched hill-slopes and a race burned brown by the heat of the sun&nbsp;...
}}
The main thrust of Tolkien's argument in this two-part paper seems to have been that {{lang|ang|Sigelwara}} was a corruption of {{lang|ang|Sigelhearwa}}, and had come to mean something different in its later form than it had in its original. He begins by pointing out that Ethiopians in the earliest writings are presented in a very positive light, but by the time they written of as "Sigelwarans", the perception has become the opposite. He does not speculate why, but instead demonstrates a clear relationship between {{lang|ang|sigelwara}} and {{lang|ang|sigelhearwa}} and shows how discovering the original meaning of the word {{lang|ang|Sigelhearwa}} is almost impossible, that trying to do so must be "for the joy of the hunt rather than the hope of a final kill".

The word {{lang|ang|sigel}} is a conflation of two words, the inherited word for [[Sun]], the feminine {{lang|ang|sigel}}, and an Old English neuter {{lang|ang|sigle}} or {{lang|ang|sygle}} for "jewel, necklace", loaned from Latin {{lang|la|sigilla}}.

Suggesting a connection of {{lang|ang|hearwa}} with Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌹 {{lang|got|hauri}} "coal", Old Norse {{lang|non|hyr-r}} "fire", and Old English {{lang|ang|heorþ}} "to roast" and {{lang|ang|heorð}} "[[hearth]]", Tolkien tentatively concludes that in the {{lang|ang|Sigelhearwan}} we may be looking at "rather the sons of [[Muspelheim|Muspell]] than of [[Hamitic|Ham]]", an ancient class of demons "with red-hot eyes that emitted sparks and faces black as soot", English equivalent of the Norse [[Jötunn|fire giants]] ruled by [[Surtr]],
that had been forgotten even before the composition of [[Exodus (poem)|this version of ''Exodus'']].

== Influence on Tolkien's fiction ==
{{further|J. R. R. Tolkien's influences}}

[[Tom Shippey]] notes that the demons "with red-hot eyes" make appearances in Tolkien's fiction as [[Balrogs]].<ref name="Shippey 2005">Tom Shippey (2005), ''[[The Road to Middle-earth]]'', Houghton Mifflin, ch. 3 'Philological Inquiries', pp. 48-49; {{ISBN|978-0261102750}}</ref>

One of the many peoples encountered in ''The Lord of the Rings'' are "black men like half-[[Troll (Middle-earth)|trolls]]".<ref>J. R. R. Tolkien (1955), ''[[The Return of the King]]'', 2nd edition (1966), George Allen & Unwin, book 5 ch. 6 p. 121; {{ISBN|0 04 823047 2}}</ref> This description recalls the {{lang|ang|Sigelwara}} as black demons; furthermore, their homeland of Far [[Harad]], the great southern region of [[Middle-earth]], recalls [[Sub-Saharan Africa]], sometimes referred to as {{lang|la|Aethiopia}} in pre-modern times. In drafts of ''The Lord of the Rings'' Tolkien toyed with names such as ''Harwan'' and ''Sunharrowland'' for the [[Haradrim]] generally and their land; [[Christopher Tolkien]] notes these names are derived from the Old English Sigelwara, and refers to Tolkien's essay ''Sigelwara Land''.<ref>J. R. R. Tolkien (1989), ed. Christopher Tolkien, ''[[The Treason of Isengard]]'', Unwin Hyman, ch. XXV p. 435 & p. 439 note 4</ref>

== See also ==
* [[White Aethiopians]]
* [[Sowilō]]

== Notes ==
{{notelist}}

== References ==
{{reflist}}

{{J. R. R. Tolkien}}

[[Category:Essays by J. R. R. Tolkien]]
[[Category:1932 essays]]
[[Category:Works originally published in British magazines]]
[[Category:Africa in mythology]]
[[Category:Old English]]