Numinor in CS Lewis

Your discovery of 'Numinor' in C.S.L.'s That Hideous Strength is discovery of a plagiarism: well, not that, since he used the word, taken from my legends of the First and Second Ages, in the belief that they would soon appear. They have not, but I suppose now they may. The spelling Numinor is due to his hearing it and not seeing it. Númenóre or Númenor means in High-elven simply West-land. As for the shape of the world of the Third Age, I am afraid that was devised 'dramatically' rather than geologically, or paleontologically.  I do sometimes wish that I had made some sort of agreement between the imaginations or theories of the geologists and my map a little more possible.  But that would only have made more trouble with human history.

J.R.R. Tolkien
#169 From a letter to Hugh Brogan 11 September 1955

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice map of Numenor.

Anonymous said...

what a wonderful gem of a find! I am reading that hideous strength, and quite flipped my lid when I saw CS mention Numinor (and spell it incorrectly...)! This is a fantastic explanation of what I've just found on page 201. Thanks so much for posting

Anonymous said...

Somehow missed this use by old CS first time I read the Trilogy. This time I ran to the 'puter and found this answer. Thanks for the post!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for this! I also am re-reading THS and was startled to see Numinor mentioned. I missed it the first time around (and I don't think the spelling was the reason). Thanks again!

Anonymous said...

Numinor was Yumi's brother in Ulysses31