The name derives from the Sindarin word daer ("large, great"). In the earlier Etymologies the Doriathrin name is given as Dairon shown as related to the Doriathrin word for shadow, dai. Consequently, Christopher Tolkien speculated in The Silmarillion, that the name perhaps included the Sindarin word dae "shadow".
Sindarin
daeron
masculine name. Daeron
Element in
- S. Angerthas Daeron “Angerthas of Daeron” ✧ LotR/1123
- S. Certhas Daeron “Daeron’s Runes” ✧ LotR/1123
- S. i Cirdh Daeron “*the Runes of Daeron” ✧ NM/164
Elements
Word Gloss daer “great, large” -on “masculine suffix”
Daeron
Daeron
Famous minstrel and loremaster of Thingol (LotR/1123, S/95). In his essay on the The Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor, Tolkien stated that the first element of this name was daer “great” (VT42/11), although Christopher Tolkien suggested the initial element might be dae “shadow” in the Silmarillion Appendix (SA/dae), probably unaware of this essay when he was compiling The Silmarillion. The second element is probably the personal suffix -on often used in masculine names (WJ/400).
Conceptual Development: In the very earliest Lost Tales, this character first appeared as G. Kapalen, soon revised to Tifanto and finally Dairon (LT2/49), the last of these glossed “The Fluter” in the Gnomish Lexicon (GL/29). The form remained Dairon in the Lays of Beleriand from the 1920s and Silmarillion drafts from the 1930s (LB/104, SM/113, LR/292). In The Etymologies, Ilk. Dairon was designated as Ilkorin, derived from dair “shadow of trees” (Ety/DAY), which is likely the source of Christopher Tolkien’s derivation in the Silmarillion Appendix (see above).
The form Daeron emerged towards the end of the 1930s (LR/301), but Tolkien continue to use Dairon in the drafts of the Lord of the Rings appendices and the initial Silmarillion revisions from the 1950s-60s (PM/76; WJ/13, 110), not committing to Daeron until fairly late in his writings.