Sauron

S1A1U1R1O1N1
UK/ˈsaʊ(ə)ɹɒn/UK/ˈsɔːɹɒn/US/ˈsaʊɹɑn/US/ˈsɔɹɑn/

proper noun

The title character and the main antagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, where he rules the land of Mordor.

Less commonScrabble 6

Meanings

Sauron1

proper noun
  1. The title character and the main antagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, where he rules the land of Mordor.
nounSauron (plural Saurons)

plural Saurons

  1. An evil, tyrannical, or widely disliked person.

    'I don't think there are any Saurons around today but, in 1939 there was one, sitting in the middle of Europe. […]

    2004 January 8, “The story goes on being relevant”, in Birmingham Evening Mail
    2 more examples

    For aspiring Saurons and Darth Sidiouses, the game allows the player to fill the boots of a big evil Overlord with a handful of minions to start out with.

    2007 February, “Overload”, in GameAxis Unwired, page 12

    Torture, indeed, like enslavement, has traditionally been iconic of pure evil, the practice of a Sauron or a Saddam Hussein.

    2013, Douglas V. Porpora, Alexander G. Nikolaev, Julia Hagemann May, & Alexander Jenkins, Post-Ethical Society: The Iraq War, Abu Ghraib, and the Moral Failure of the Secular, University of Chicago Press, published 2013, →ISBN, page 196
proper noun
  1. alternativeastronomyAlternative form of SAURON.

SAURON2

proper noun

alternative Sauron

  1. abbreviationacronymastronomyAcronym of steep and uneven ring of non-thermal radiation, an ORC (“odd radio circle”) found in the southern sky.

Origin

Sauron · proper noun, noun, proper noun

From the Quenya name of the dark lord Sauron in the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, whose name Tolkien created in his constructed language Quenya, from saura (“foul, putrid”).

Full word history & related roots →

SAURON · proper noun

Backronym inspired by the type of radio object it falls under, the ORCs, and the master of orcs in Tolkien literature, Sauron. Coined in 2022 by the discovery team made up of researchers from MeerKAT, South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (SARAO), and University of the Western Cape (UWC).

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Bulgarian Саурон
  • Саурон (Sauron)title character and the main antagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings
Polish Sauron
  • Saurontitle character and the main antagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings

Rhymes & wordplay

Anagrams

Cite this entry
APA

Sauron. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Sauron

MLA

“Sauron.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Sauron. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Sauron,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Sauron.

Source: Sauron on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.