Amon Gwareth is Sindarin. It has meant "Hill of Watching", from amon "hill" and gwareth "watching", since its first conception. Christopher Tolkien wrote that his father later changed the name to Amon Gwared but this change did not make it in the published Silmarillion.
Sindarin
amon gwareth
place name. Amon Gwareth
Changes
- Amon Gwareth → Amon Gwared ✧ WJ/200
Elements
Word Gloss amon “hill, mountain with steep sides; lump, clump, mass, hill, (isolated) mountain; lump, clump, mass; [G.] steep slope” gwareth “watch, guard, ward; vigilance” Variations
- Amon Gwared ✧ WJ/200; WJI/Amon Gwareth
Amon Gwareth
Hill of Watching
Amon Gwareth
Amon Gwareth
Amon Gwareth is Sindarin. It has meant "Hill of Watching", from amon "hill" and gwareth "watching", since its first conception. Christopher Tolkien wrote that his father later changed the name to Amon Gwared but this change did not make it into the published Silmarillion.
The hill upon which Gondolin was built (S/126). The first word is clearly amon “hill”, but the meaning of the second word is unclear.
Conceptual Development: In the earliest Lost Tales, G. Amon Gwareth was translated “Hill of Watch” (LT2/158), and appeared in the Gnomish Lexicon as the lenited form Amon ’Wareth “Hill of Ward”. Similar translations of N. Amon Gwareth appeared early drafts of the Silmarillion from the beginning of the 1930s (SM/34, 137, 139), but the name was left untranslated in Tolkien’s later writings. It is unclear whether the name retained its original meaning. The closest forms in The Etymologies from the 1930s is N. gwarth “betrayer” < ᴹ√WAR “give way, betray” (Ety/WAR), but it seems unlikely this was connected.
According to Christopher Tolkien, this name was at one point revised to Amon Gwared (WJ/200) in the his father’s later writings, but this form did not appear in the published Silmarillion.