319 From a letter to Roger Lancelyn Green 

8 January 1971

The Ox. E. D. has in preparation of its Second Supplement got to Hobbit, which it proposes to include together with its progeny: hobbitry, -ish, etc. I have had, therefore, to justify my claim to have invented the word. My claim rests really on my 'nude parole' or unsupported assertion that I remember the occasion of its invention (by me); and that I had not then any knowledge of Hobberdy, Hobbaty, Hobberdy Dick etc. (for 'house-sprites');¹²⁶ and that my 'hobbits' were in any case of wholly dissimilar sort, a diminutive branch of the human race. Also that the only E. word that influenced the invention was 'hole'; that granted the description of hobbits, the trolls' use of rabbit was merely an obvious insult, of no more etymological significance than Thorin's insult to Bilbo 'descendant of rats!' However, doubt was cast on this as far back as 1938. A review appeared in The Observer 16 Jan 1938, signed 'Habit' (incidentally thus long anticipating Coghill's perception of the similarity of the words in his humorous adj. 'hobbit-forming' applied to my books). 'Habit' asserted that a friend claimed to have read, about 20 years earlier (sc. c. 1918) an old 'fairy story' (in a collection of such tales) called The Hobbit, though the creature was very 'frightening'. I asked for more information, but have never received any; and recent intensive research has not discovered the 'collection'. I think it is probable that the friend's memory was inaccurate (after 20 years), and the creature probably had a name of the Hobberdy, Hobbaty class. However, one cannot exclude the possibility that buried childhood memories might suddenly rise to the surface long after (in my case after 35—40 years), though they might be quite differently applied. I told the researchers that I used (before 1900) to be read to from an 'old collection' — tattered and without cover or title-page – of which all I can now remember was that (I think) it was by Bulwer Lytton, and contained one story I was then very fond of called 'Puss Cat Mew'. They have not discovered it. I wonder if you, the most learned of living scholars in this region, can say anything. Esp. for my own satisfaction about Puss Cat Mew — I do not suppose you have found a name precisely hobbit or you would have mentioned it. Oh what a tangled web they weave who try a new word to conceive!