Greetings, LOTR and Silmarillion Berries! DH would love to use Eärendil as a middle for [name_f]Rhiannon[/name_f]. Eärendil is a good middle name for a baby boy but he wants to use it for a girl! That being said, we need help:
Is it OK to use this name as-is for a girl?
[name_m]How[/name_m] can we feminize this name while maintaining the original pronunciation as much as possible?
It would be so great if someone who can read/write Sindarin or Quenya could help us out on this. Thanks <3
Bump! Anyone?
Quenya speaker here (nerd, I know). Names that end in -dil are male but they can be feminised as “dilmë”, so that’d yield Eärendilmë here. That’s… rather long, so here are some names that are similar in sound and meaning (eär means “sea”):
I clicked on this out of interest and I am very impressed by your knowledge. Those are beautiful names and meanings!
So I’m not a LOTR fan (never seen the movie or read the books), but I do like the challenge.
Some ideas:
Earendil (Idk how to do the dots above the a on my key board)
Change it to Earenda?
However, I don’t think most people would be like, "THAT’S A BOYS NAME!"if you used Earendil on a girl. It’s such a unique name and doesn’t sound that masculine, that I do think you could just use it as a middle the way it is.
A few more ideas:
Eara
[name_u]Wren[/name_u] (there are the letters [name_u]REN[/name_u] in the middle of Earendil)
[name_f]Delilah[/name_f] (from the Dil)
[name_f]Erin[/name_f]
[name_u]Arya[/name_u]
@waverly123, thanks for your input. You always give sage advice 
We may just go with the original, though it irks me that I would know it’s a male name (even if no one else did!)
@Melusina ([name_u]LOVE[/name_u] that name btw, would use it if DH hadn’t vetoed), thank you so much. We had considered Ardamire (can’t do the accents on my phone) but DH is iffy. And he doesn’t like -wen endings, unfortunately. I think Eariel (with appropriate accents) is a distinct possibility
[name_m]Just[/name_m] a thought - if you don’t even know how to do the accents on your keyboard, I would seriously rethink using the name. Think how much of a pain that will be for your daughter later in life. Plus having to explain the back story of why her parents chose that middle & where it comes from, and how to pronounce it.
OK, so the character Eärendil ends up as the embodiment of the brightest star in the sky, aka [name_f]Venus[/name_f], according to the Silmarillion Writers Guild. The association with [name_f]Venus[/name_f] + the assurance that Eärendil is unisex, makes me think DH and I should just go for it. Also, Tolkien borrowed the name from Anglo-[name_m]Saxon[/name_m] mythology, which gives the name a nice rich history. Unless anyone else has name contributions, we may “lock in” [name_f]Rhiannon[/name_f] Eärendil on our name list.
[name_m]Aren[/name_m]'t you afraid you might regret giving this name to a girl when the next one might be a boy. Especially since you plan on having a big family.
That said. I love Eärendil as a middle name.
I agree with noetje. I would save it for a boy. There are a lot of cool female names in Tolkien books. Few suggestions Elentári, Tintallë, Estë.
I’d save it for a boy. It’s on our list of potential middles. Most people won’t know where the name came from, and they’ll probably ask, which means your daughter can either evade the question with, “oh, it’s a Tolkien name”, or be honest, “yeah, they named me after a boy from Tolkien mythology.” Since I do know the story (it’s one of my favorites), I’d assume the parents just read the name in a book and didn’t know anything about it, or wanted to pretend to love Tolkien without doing the proper research. To me, it would be like someone naming their daughter [name_m]Atticus[/name_m] and claiming to love the book, or naming a son [name_u]Artemis[/name_u] and claiming to love Greek mythology. There are so many stunning choices for a Tolkien fan. Is it the sound, the meaning or the story that attracts you to the name?
Here are some of my favorites (besides [name_f]Arwen[/name_f] and Éowyn of course :)):
Ailinel- ‘lake’
Almiel- ‘daughter of good fortune’
[name_u]Amari[/name_u]ë- ‘good’, ‘home’ or ‘of the home’
Elenwë- ‘star person’
Evenstar- ‘evening star’
Fíriel- ‘mortal woman’
Haleth- ‘warrior’ or ‘guard’
Isilmë- moonlight’
Lalaith- ‘laughter’
Lothíriel- ‘flower garland’ or ‘flower maiden’
Lúthien- ‘daughter of flowers’
Mairen- ‘good’
Míriel- ‘jewel daughter’
Níniel- ‘tear maiden’
Silmariën- ‘maiden of shining/silver light’
Tindómiel- ‘daughter of twilight’
[name_m]Tin[/name_m]úviel- ‘nightingale’ or ‘daughter of twilight’
Undómiel- ‘evening star’
And some Wen’s, in case hubby changes his mind about not liking them:
Morwen- ‘black haired maiden’
Urwen- ‘fire maiden’
Whoa, I just saw these responses. Yes, you’ve hit the nail on the head with my concerns! DH loves the sound, look, meaning, and story behind Earendil (forgive my lack of accents, typing on a phone). But it’s still the name of a male character! I suppose any female child named after a man would face the same problem. As far as saving it for a boy, the only issue is we have so many deceased males on both sides whom we want to honor, so our first 4 boy names are fairly locked in, and people in our family and line of work tend to have mostly girls anyway (due to radiation exposure, stress, etc etc).
Hugs and kisses to Redwoodfey for the lovely list. We have considered [name_f]Arwen[/name_f] but it is too matchy with our other girls (internal rhyme and competing nn). Same problem with Morwen. [name_f]Eowyn[/name_f] is a no, as DH and I are not at all fond of horses Tinuviel we have already locked in as a middle for another girl (keeping the combo secret for a few years as it is our naming pride and joy). I will broach your other gorgeous suggestions to DH and see what he thinks!
@mhairi, yes, Elentari is one of my absolute faves, especially paired with [name_f]Rhiannon[/name_f] (making “great star queen”). DH said “maybe” lol.