dor-na-daerachas

place name. Land of Great Dread

A proposed replacement name for Dor Daedeloth that Tolkien made in very late notes from 1971 (WJ/187), translated “Land of Great Dread” (WJ/183). The first few elements seem to be dôr “land”, na(n) “of” and daer “great”. This means the final element achas (perhaps lented from ✱gachas) must mean “dread”, but there are no other clear equivalents to this word in Tolkien’s writing. In a Discord chat from 2022-10-17, Röandil proposed the first element might instead by dae (still meaning “great”), and that the second element rachas might be related to Q. raxë “danger”.

Elements

Word	Gloss
dôr	“land, land, [N.] region where certain people live, [ᴱN.] country; [G.] people of the land”
na(n)	“of; with, along with, accompanied by, provided with or by, associated with, marked with, of; provided with or by, associated with, marked with, with, along with, accompanied by; [N.] by”
daer	“great, large”
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