"Sigelwara Land" is an essay by J. R. R. Tolkien that appeared in two parts, in 1932 and 1934.[1] It explores the etymology of the Old English word for the ancient Aethiopians, English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelhearwan, and attempts to recover what it might originally have meant. Tolkien suggested that its two elements were most likely sun/jewel and coal/hearth, perhaps meaning something like a soot-black fire-demon.
The Tolkien scholar and philologist Tom Shippey suggests that Tolkien's detailed study of the word may have influenced him in his creation of elements of his fantasy world of Middle-earth, including the Silmarils or forged sun-jewels, the Balrogs or dark fire-demons, and the Haradrim, men of the hot south.
Tolkien's essay treats the etymology of the Old English word for the ancient Aethiopians, English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelhearwan. Tolkien concluded that, while the meaning of the first element was evidently English, Old (ca.450-1100);: [[Sól (sun)|sigel]] "Sun", the meaning of the second element English, Old (ca.450-1100);: hearwan was not definitely recoverable, but might be guessed at:
The phrase English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelwara land appears in Exodus, a free translation of the Book of Exodus (Codex Junius 11):
The main thrust of Tolkien's argument in this two-part paper seems to have been that English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelwara was a corruption of English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelhearwa, and had come to mean something different in its later form than it had in its original. He begins by pointing out that Ethiopians in the earliest writings are presented in a very positive light, but by the time they written of as "Sigelwarans", the perception has become the opposite. He does not speculate why, but instead demonstrates a clear relationship between English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sigelwara and English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sigelhearwa and shows how discovering the original meaning of the word English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelhearwa is almost impossible; that trying to do so must be "for the joy of the hunt rather than the hope of a final kill".The word English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sigel as a conflation of two words, the inherited word for Sun, the feminine English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sigel and an Old English neuter English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sigle or English, Old (ca.450-1100);: sygle for "jewel, necklace", loaned from Latin Latin: sigilla.
Suggesting a connection of English, Old (ca.450-1100);: hearwa with Gothic Gothic: hauri "coal", Old Norse Norse, Old: hyr-r "fire", Old English English, Old (ca.450-1100);: heorþ "to roast", English, Old (ca.450-1100);: heorð "hearth", Tolkien tentatively concludes that in the English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelhearwan we may be looking at "rather the sons of Muspell than of Ham", an ancient class of demons "with red-hot eyes that emitted sparks and faces black as soot", English equivalent of the Norse fire giants ruled by Surtr,that had been forgotten even before the composition of this version of Exodus.
Tom Shippey notes that the demons "with red-hot eyes" make appearances in Tolkien's fiction as Balrogs.[3]
One of the many peoples encountered in The Lord of the Rings are "black men like half-trolls".[4] This description recalls the English, Old (ca.450-1100);: Sigelwara as black demons; furthermore their homeland of Far Harad, the great southern region of Middle-earth, recalls Sub-Saharan Africa, sometimes referred to as Latin: Aethiopia in pre-modern times. In drafts of The Lord of the Rings Tolkien toyed with names such as Harwan and Sunharrowland for the Haradrim generally and their land; Christopher Tolkien notes these names are derived from the Old English Sigelwara, and refers to Tolkien's essay Sigelwara Land.[5]