Etymology

dwarrow

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Today it means: A dwarf (member of a race of beings usually depicted as having some sort of supernatural powers and being skilled in crafting and metalworking, often as short with long beards, and sometimes as clashing with elves). Full definition →

Middle English dwarrows
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The story

  1. Middle English · borrowed fromdwarrows
  2. English todaydwarrow

Coined by J. R. R. Tolkien as a back-formation of Middle English dwarrows, an irregular plural of dwergh, which became dwarfs in Modern English through leveling with dwarf. Within Tolkien's legendarium, dwarrow is only used in Dwarrowdelf, an alternative name for Moria (see the quotations by Tolkien).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.