Fascinating bit concerning the German translation:
„ […] With regard to German: I would suggest with diffidence that Elf, elfen, are perhaps to be avoided as equivalents of Elf, elven. Elf is, I believe, borrowed from English, and may retain some of the associations of a kind that I should particularly desire not to be present (if possible): e. g. those of a Drayton or of A Midsummer Night’s Dream (in the translation of which, I believe, Elf was first used in German[5]). That is the pretty fanciful reduction of elf to a butterfly-like creature inhabiting flowers. I wonder whether the word Alp (or better still the form Alb, still given in modern dictionairies as a variant, which is historically the more normal form) could not be used. […]
— J. R. R. Tolkien: Nomenclature of The Lord of the Rings, Eintragung für Elven-smiths.
via https://www.ardapedia.org/wiki/Elben#Etymologie
The German translator Margaret Carroux actually chose “Elb” (a newer form that is discussed in Grimm’s “Deutsche Mythologie” in 1835) instead of “Alp/Alb”, which is probably for the better because the only German word with Alp/Alb that I know is “Alptraum” (nightmare). And TIL that the Nachtalb that supposedly creates nightmares is connected to elves.
Explanation: JRR Tolkien, a foundational writer of fantasy in the mid-20th century AD, disliked ‘dwarfs’ as the plural of ‘dwarf’, and ‘elfs’ as plural of ‘elves’.
So when writing his (eventually immensely popular and influential) books, The Hobbit, and The Lord of the Rings, he used ‘dwarves’ and ‘elves’, even making special note of it so the reader didn’t think he just made a mistake. Considering Tolkien was an English professor who specialized in linguistic history, who was gonna try and tell him that they were a bigger authority than him on how antiquated words should be inflected?
This usage is now standard in English, replacing ‘dwarfs’ and ‘elfs’ almost entirely.
This is an oft repeated factoid with lots of variations (my favorite is the tale that Tolkien’s editor underlined “dwarves” and corrected it to “dwarfs” citing the OED. Upon seeing this correction, Tolkien allegedly replied “I wrote the OED, and I said dwarves”). This link seems to be a good resource in explaining the reality behind the difference: he was writing a lot very quickly, and made a mistake based in familiarity of plurals rather than philology or linguistics.
Plural elves has been the standard before Tolkien: https://www.websters1913.com/words/Elf
As for dwarves, this is what Wikipedia has to say, with reference to P. Gilliver et al. The Ring of Words: Tolkien and the Oxford English Dictionary:
Modern English has two plurals for the word dwarf: dwarfs and dwarves. Dwarfs remains the most commonly employed plural. The minority plural dwarves was recorded as early as 1818. However, it was later popularized by the fiction of philologist and legendarium author J. R. R. Tolkien, originating as a hypercorrective mistake. It was employed by Tolkien for some time before 1917.[6] Regarding his use of this plural, Tolkien wrote in 1937, “I am afraid it is just a piece of private bad grammar, rather shocking in a philologist; but I shall have to go with it.”[6]
lmao, that’ll teach me to try to make an explanation about linguistics history. At least I learned something instead! XD
Meme still applicable, though.
Admittedly this is on LOTR memes comm, so a little bit of fantasy is surely permitted ;)
Doubt his publication would survive peer review.
