A family of the Hobbits of the Shire about which almost nothing is known. Only one member is recorded - Dina Diggle - and even she did not appear in any published work before the 2004 edition of The Lord of the Rings. That edition first included the previously omitted Bolger family tree, in which Dina is shown as the wife of Gundahar Bolger. We can see from this that the Diggles were extant at least within the thirteenth century of the Shire-reckoning (or the twenty-ninth of the Third Age), but we know nothing beyond that. The name Diggle is a real surname; it actually derives from a diminutive form of the name Richard, but among the Shire-hobbits the punning inclusion of the word 'dig' may well have influenced its meaning.
Notes
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In fact, even Dina's dates aren't known; the years shown here as those of the birth and death of her husband Gundahar Bolger; her own dates were presumably comparable.
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2 |
Diggle is a real surname, derived from an old diminutive form of Richard, which in turn means 'powerful/brave'. Richard comes from Old French, so this real-life etymology doesn't sit easily among the typical names of the Shire-hobbits.
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- Updated 26 January 2013
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