William, your name is really cool! It’s an ancient Germanic name that has been imported to many other languages. It’s a compound of “Wil – will” and “helm – helmet/protection.” Put together it’s a poetic way to say “Guardian,” making three ways to translate this, “Protection of will”, “Helmet of will”, and “Guardian.”
Quenya
In Quenya, we have two words that mean “will.” Indo is your will, your resolve, but also your mood. Níra is your resolve, your individual will. For “helm” we have a full word, castolo which has a suffix version -car. For “Protection” we have the word cauma, but it’s also the word for “Shield, shelter,” so it’s a looser translation.
Putting them together: Indocar, Indocauma, Níracar, and Níracauma.
With a masculine name suffix: Indocaro, Indocaumo, Níracaro, and Níracaumo.
This name has some feminine versions in some languages, so here it is with a feminine name suffix added: Indocare, Indocaume, Níracare, and Níracaume.
Making names meaning “Protector/Guardian” is a slightly different process. We start with the verb Varya– “to protect” and add a variety of suffixes that make the verb into a word for the person who does the verb, called “agental suffixes.”
First, with the gender-neutral suffix: Varyar.
Second, let’s add some masculine agental suffixes: Varyaro, Varyamo, and Varyando.
And lastly, let’s add some feminine agental suffixes: Varyare, Varyame, and Varyalle.
For your RP and fanfic characters, all of these names work well. Enjoy!
Sindarin
In Sindarin, we have one word for “will, intent” and that is a cognate to the Quenya word, Ind. We have two words for “Helmet” – Thôl and Castol.
Putting them together: Inthol and Ingastol. These are gender neutral, and I wouldn’t suggest adding name suffixes to these, because names made of compound words in Sindarin don’t usually have name suffixes added unless it’s a Father-Name.
Next, let’s take the Sindarin verb Beria- “to protect” and add agental suffixes to it.
Gender-neutral suffix: Berior.
Masculine agental suffixes: Berioron and Beriadir.
Feminine agental suffix: Berioril and Beriadis.
Again, all of these names are perfectly fine for characters’ names in a Middle-earth context.
William, I hope you found this article fun and interesting!
If you’d like your name translated in this series, comment below and I’ll consider it for a future article!
Sources:
Wiktionary, “Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/Wiljahelmaz” Last edited: December 11th, 2020.
Hanks, Patrick & Hodges, Flavia. A Dictionary of First Names Oxford University Press. 1990. pg 339.