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appendix f 1495
that form only in the name Dwarrowdelf, to represent the name
of Moria in the Common Speech: Phurunargian. For that meant
‘Dwarf-delving’ and yet was already a word of antique form. But
Moria is an Elvish name, and given without love; for the Eldar,
though they might at need, in their bitter wars with the Dark
Power and his servants, contrive fortresses underground, were
not dwellers in such places of choice. They were lovers of the
green earth and the lights of heaven; and Moria in their tongue
means the Black Chasm. But the Dwarves themselves, and this
name at least was never kept secret, called it Khazad-dûm, the
Mansion of the Khazâd; for such is their own name for their
own race, and has been so, since Aulë gave it to them at their
making in the deeps of time.
Elves has been used to translate both Quendi, ‘the speakers’,
the High-elven name of all their kind, and Eldar, the name of
the Three Kindreds that sought for the Undying Realm and
came there at the beginning of Days (save the Sindar only). This
old word was indeed the only one available, and was once fitted
to apply to such memories of this people as Men preserved, or
to the makings of Men’s minds not wholly dissimilar. But it has
been diminished, and to many it may now suggest fancies either
pretty or silly, as unlike to the Quendi of old as are butterflies to
the swift falcon – not that any of the Quendi ever possessed
wings of the body, as unnatural to them as to Men. They were
a race high and beautiful, the older Children of the world, and
among them the Eldar were as kings, who now are gone: the
People of the Great Journey, the People of the Stars. They were
tall, fair of skin and grey-eyed, though their locks were dark, save
in the golden house of Finarfin; 1 and their voices had more
melodies than any mortal voice that now is heard. They were
valiant, but the history of those that returned to Middle-earth in
exile was grievous; and though it was in far-off days crossed by
the fate of the Fathers, their fate is not that of Men. Their
dominion passed long ago, and they dwell now beyond the circles
of the world, and do not return.
1 [These words describing characters of face and hair in fact applied
only to the Noldor: see The Book of Lost Tales, Part One, p.44.]