Gamgee was an old Hobbit family of the Shire, originally from the village of Gamwich; Samwise Gamgee of the Fellowship of the Ring was this family's most famous member, and from him two further branches of the family, the Fairbairns and the Gardners, were descended.[1]
Etymology
The meaning of the name "Gamgee" in the archaic Hobbit-speech is unknown. J.R.R. Tolkien's inspiration for the name, however, was that "gamgee" was a word for cotton wool during his childhood. In 1932, his family met a man in Cornwall, England, whom Tolkien named "Gaffer Gamgee".[2] Prior to the writing of The Lord of the Rings, a character with this name appears once in Tolkien's tale Mr. Bliss. "The Gaffer" would later become the name of Samwise Gamgee's father, Hamfast.
References
- ↑ The Lord of the Rings, Appendix C: Family Trees
- ↑ Colin Duriez, J.R.R. Tolkien: The Making of a Legend, ch. 10: "Of Hobbits and Inklings", pg. 162