what's the meaning of the name Smaug?

does anyone know?

From Wikipedia:

Tolkien noted that "the dragon bears as name—a pseudonym—the past tense of the primitive Germanic verb smugan,[8] to squeeze through a hole: a low philological jest."[7]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smaug

It's the same in Norwegian. In fact, in my dialect "smaug" is past tense of "smyge", which is the same verb as the one in your quote, Radaghast

Interesting, Ringo. What's the correct pronunciation? I wonder if it's an exception to the 'au' as 'ow' rule.

I can't be the only person who always pronounced the name as Sch-morg?
Never liked the awwwwwg sound.

Sch-morg?

Yes.

Pronouncing the AUG the same as Aug-menting or August or naught. It sounds more dragony to me.

It's definitely not 'ow', but I don't think it the sound I pronounce it with exists in the English language. I will have to try to think of an example

I agree, though I don't hear or pronounce an 'org' sound in any of those words.

Throwing an 'r' in there is a rather contorted result of what linguists call over compensation, which may in large part be due to American media.  I don't think Tolkien would have had the same impulse.

I'd have to think to come up with examples, but since the British have long been accustomed to dropping r's that appear after a vowel but before a consonant, a recent development has been to put the r's back, often where they don't belong.

Edit: cross post. Do you folks actually throw and 'r' into 'august' these days? Perfect example.

Ringdrotten wrote:It's definitely not 'ow', but I don't think it the sound I pronounce it with exists in the English language. I will have to try to think of an example

I tried Google Translate—Norwegian. It sounds like it could be right but I'm no expert.

http://translate.google.com/#auto/no/smaug

You don't hear org when saying August? How are you saying it?   

Like the 'Au' rhymes with 'law'.

Radaghast wrote:

Ringdrotten wrote:It's definitely not 'ow', but I don't think it the sound I pronounce it with exists in the English language. I will have to try to think of an example

I tried Google Translate—Norwegian. It sounds like it could be right but I'm no expert.

http://translate.google.com/#auto/no/smaug

Good thinking :)The transition between 'a' and 'u' is too distinct there, but it's close. The 'a' would sound a little bit more like a mix of an 'a' and an 'e' the way it is pronounced in 'especially'. Hard to describe, and I do a pretty lousy job at it, sorry

Or-gust. Never heard it pronounced differently to that.

Ringdrotten wrote:

Radaghast wrote:

Ringdrotten wrote:It's definitely not 'ow', but I don't think it the sound I pronounce it with exists in the English language. I will have to try to think of an example

I tried Google Translate—Norwegian. It sounds like it could be right but I'm no expert.

http://translate.google.com/#auto/no/smaug

Good thinking :)The transition between 'a' and 'u' is too distinct there, but it's close. The 'a' would sound a little bit more like a mix of an 'a' and an 'e' the way it is pronounced in 'especially'. Hard to describe, and I do a pretty lousy job at it, sorry

No problem. I once heard the pronunciation of 'Mjolnir' (different from the Americanized pronunciation) and I expect it's something like trying to describe the pronunciation of that

Carcharoth wrote:Or-gust. Never heard it pronounced differently to that.

Sounds Cockney or something. Where do you get that r from? As in my earlier post I think it's a rather recent development, but would like to know if I'm right.

No idea how you'd pronounce it without an R finding its way in there. The au that rhymes with law has a R sound in it. Law sounds just like lore. Unless you pronounce it as if you just stubbed your toe. 'Ow-gust'. Never heard that though.

Aha! I believe an American would say you are not pronouncing your r's at all!

If you can't imagine pronouncing 'law' without an r, by our lights what you consider pronouncing an r we would call just hinting at it. We would never consider what what you are doing as actually pronouncing it, more like dropping it!

Carcharoth wrote:You don't hear org when saying August? How are you saying it?   

I have never in my life heard anyone pronounce August with an R.

Eldo: think of a very proper British pronunciation of the word 'argust'. It comes out as 'august'!

They will swear up and down they are pronouncing that r, but we know better. In certain positions of words they pronounce r's like milksops, not the manly, affirmative 'r' that we use.   

halfwise wrote:Aha!  I believe an American would say you are not pronouncing your r's at all!

If you can't imagine pronouncing 'law' without an r, by our lights what you consider pronouncing an r we would call just hinting at it.  We would never consider what what you are doing as actually pronouncing it, more like dropping it!

So we are dancing around the technical definition of pronunciation? I use the term as in when the word August is said, there is a clear R sound contained within it. Not sure what is coming out of your mouth if there isn't a r sounding!

Where does this "R" sound in August come from?  There's nothing even remotely similar to an "R" in the word.

Edit: could say the same thing about the word Smaug. I guess some people see "AU" and mentally add an "R"?

"Smaug" is a norwegian word. Though not in bokmål, but nynorsk. So you won't get it in Google Translate.

http://www.nob-ordbok.uio.no/perl/ordbok.cgi?OPP=smaug&nynorsk=+&ordbok=bokmaal