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Dining-room

lfsaldenbirch , , ,

This hyphenated word is made from two common words.  Tolkien never uses “dining room” as two separate words.  We may be certain that in Bilbo’s native language there was a specific  – and probably important! – word for dining-room, not just some subcategory of “room”.  In the OED, this hyphenated form is the preferred spelling.

  • 01.002 dining-rooms,
  • 02.001 went into the dining-room.
  • 02.002 in the kitchen before turning out the dining-room.
  • 02.002 in the dining-room by the open window,
  • 04.012 in Bilbo’s dining-room that seemed so long ago,

Just updating this entry to note that it’s a food word just as much as cellar or pantry is!

“dining-room, n.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, June 2017. Web. 7 September 2017.

Devour

lfsaldenbirch ,

“De-” as in “down” and the root is related to “voracious”.  Thus, to “gulp down”.

  • 01.109 certainly not after devouring so many of the dwarves
  • 05.055 This thing all things devours:
  • 06.063 and devouring people waked suddenly from their sleep.

“devour, v.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, June 2015. Web. 27 July 2015.

Dell

lfsaldenbirch ,

Originally any deep hole or pit, the current meaning of a small lush valley is related to “dale”.

  • 06.004 and there were dells below the level of the path overhung with bushes
  • 06.004 in one of these dells under the bushes people were talking.
  • 06.006 as he crawled into the bushes at the edge of the dell.
  • 13.064 and before long came to a deep dell

“dell, n.1.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, June 2015. Web. 27 July 2015.