Site Name
Ever since I read The Lord of the Rings I have been in love with the unique named J.R.R. Tolkien gave his characters. Judging by the many elven and hobbit name generators available online, I am not the only one.
These generators, however, do not give you the literal translation of your name. Instead, they use criteria such as the first letter of your name or the number of characters in it to give you a random name from a list.
Now We Have All Got Elvish Names!
After using countless generators and coming up with significantly lame results, (I don’t want to be named Arwen, dang it!) I stumbled upon Ardalambion. More specifically, I stumbled upon an article on Ardalambion entitled “Now We Have All Got Elvish Names.”
The author of this article went to a Nordic Tolkien Festival, which had a costume party. During the costume party everyone used a Middle-Earth name.
“The result was obvious. There were scores of Gandalfs, Aragorns, Frodos, and Arwens. You could call out, “Galadriel, is this your handkerchief?” - and about ten young women would be looking your way.” (© Ardalambion)
After that experience, he decided to translate his name into Quenya according to its etymological meaning. After I read this, I set off to translate my own name.
The Lord of the Names
I found a website called quenya lapseparma, which is a rather large list of common names that have been translated into Quenya. I knew that Shawna would not be on that list, since Shawna isn’t a very common name. But you could request that the webmaster translate your name if you knew the meaning, so I went to Behind the Name.
I searched for SHAWNA, which is a feminine form of SHAWN, which is an Anglicized form of SEÁN, which is an Irish form of JOHN, which is, finally,
“an English form of Johannes, which was the Latin form of the Greek name Ioannes, itself derived from the Hebrew name Yochanan meaning YAHWEH is gracious’” (© Behind the Name)
I remembered that in NWHAGEN, the author had translated ten or so names. One of those names was John.
From NWHAGEN:
JOHN, IVAN: The English and the Russian form of the Greek name Ioannes, from Hebrew Yochanan = “Yo (Yahweh, Jehovah) Is Gracious”.
I cannot think of any perfect Quenya rendering, but Eru[ná]antala means “God Is Giving”. Treating the participle as an adjective, we construct the name Eruantalon. Perhaps it can be contracted to Eruntalon. (For elision of a after u, compare � + *Amanyar = Úmanyar “those not of Aman” - see Silmarillion Index.)
[Added: Since I wrote this, an adjective faila "generous" has been published (PM:352). Using this word (rather than antala "giving") to translate "gracious", we can construct the name Erufailo(n) .] (© Ardalambion)
So, now I had my male elven name, but since I’m a female, that wasn’t quite right. I realized JOAN is the female equivalent of JOHN and checked quenya lapseparma.
How on earth do you say THAT?
While the male translation of my name would be Erufailon, the female translation is Eruantale or Eruntale. I like Eruantale better, so that’s what I picked. I e-mailed Lothenon of Ardhon Ellammath asking about pronunciation and this is the reply I got:
Well, judging by your name your first tongue is English, so I will try to explain it with English examples, as far as possible:
The vowels of all the elvish languages are to be pronounced more or less like in German, Italian or Spanish, i.e. more or less as in phonetic transcription. Unfortunately the English language is extremely irregular regarding pronunciation (you mainly stuck to Middle English orthography while the pronunciation changed on and on), in Elvish this is not so, a vowel always sounds the same, no matter the position in the word or the consonants in direct contact.
The sounds of A, E, I, O, U are thus always (again: more or less) as in father, pet, bee, got, doodle (disregarding length, it is only about the value now, a long vowel carries a mark upon it, so all the vowels of your elvish name are to be pronounced short [but the sound of A in father just does not occur short in English).
So we start with Eru, this could in English orthography be rendered as eh-roo, never ay-roo or ee-roo, the R is to be trilled at the tip of the tongue, just as in Spanish, Russian or whatever. There is nothing special about NT or L (but L shouldn't sound as "dark" and "hollow" as in American, where it often tends towards W), but the very word of antale can easily be pronounced very incorrectly by an English speaking person.
The A of ant sounds (as mentioned) as in father, it is NOT to be pronounced as English ant (which in Elvish transcription would be aent [ae as one letter]). Likewise the last three letters ale are not pronounced as the English ale (in Elvish transcription eil or even eiol), but ah-leh, with the vowels of father and pet.
Thus: Eruantale = eh-roo-an-tah-leh (underline marks stressed syllable)
So there you are. It can also be written Eruantalé, I suppose. Thanks so much for the help with the pronunciation, Lothenon!