Name origins

[Majimaune]

hey mate
I was wondering if anyone knew if tolkien had any spanish background or something like that cause i am doing spanish at school and we had to do a map of spain with all the names of everywhere in spanish and here are the names: Aragon, Bilbao and the word for killer is something like maldedor which is sort of like Mordor
I was just wondering hope someone can stop that wondering
Thanks

[Gothmog]

As far as I am aware, Tolkien had no Spanish in his background. However, he had a great love of languages. He took ideas from many of them to create his own languages for Middle-earth. :)

[Hammersmith]

I'll just chip in and say that England is quite aware of the Aragon province, and has several roads named after it.

[Majimaune]

i did not know that the provence aragon was so well known thanks:)

[Eledhwen]

King Henry VIII's first wife was Katherine of Aragon.

Also, there was a short sword called (in England) a Bilbo, as it was from a design originating in Bilboa.

You will notice that in each case, the Spanish word came to England; though Tolkien never said whether these original words had any influence on his nomenclature.

[Noldor_returned]

Hey. I was thinking about this and realised most of the name origins (apart from Hobbits) are based on Elvish (either Silvan or Quenya). As far as Aragorn and Bilbo are concerned, you're probably right.

[Thorondor_]

In a letter to W.H. Auden, Tolkien talks about the "spanish strand"; his tutor was half spanish and, in his early teens, he tried to learn this language through his books; later on, he describes spanish as the only Romance language which gives him the "the acute aesthetic pleasure derived from a language for its own sake".

In a letter to C. Plimmer, he confesses his "particular love for the latin language, and among its descendants for spanish".

[Randir Łazęga]

Tom Shippey in The Road to Middle-Earth mentions about hill in south Herefordshire called Great Bilbo, but he don't know what is ethymology of that name.

About Spanish inspiration in Tolkien works:
One of early languages make by Tolkien called naffarin is inspitated by Latin and Spanish. Tolkien wrote about that in A Secret Vice.

[Eledhwen]

I looked it up in Streetmap, and here it is! (http://www.streetmap.co.uk/newmap.srf?x=335500&y=229500&z=3&sv=great+bilbo&st=3&tl=Great+Bilbo,+Herefordshire+&searchp=newsearch.srf&mapp=newmap.srf)