Odd rhyme in Tolkien's Troll Song

Cafe Society
1

The Troll Song sung by Sam Gamgee (“Troll sat alone on a seat of stone…”) has a distinctive metrical structure and rhyme scheme: it consists of 7-line stanzas, with the fifth line consisting of 4 syllables, where the first syllable pair are a feminine rhyme with the last two syllables of the previous line, and the second pair are likewise. For example the fourth and fifth line of the first stanza are:

For meat was hard to come by
Done by! Gum by!

In the second stanza we have:

As should be a-lyin’ in graveyard
Caveyard! Paveyard!

And in the third stanza:

Afore I found his shinbone.
Tinbone! Thinbone!

In The History of Middle-Earth, an earlier draft of the song is printed. It has the same structure and rhyme scheme, except for an apparent anomaly in the third stanza. The fourth and fifth lines here read:

Before I found his carkis.
Hark’ee! Mark’ee!

“Carkis” seems to be a humorous or rustic misspelling of “carcass”. But why is it rhymed with “hark’ee” and “mark’ee”? Every dictionary I’ve consulted says that the British pronunciation of “carcass”, like the American, ends with a schwa and an S (/əs/). I’m not sure I’ve ever heard “hark’ee” or “mark’ee” pronounced, but I would expect them to end with a long E sound (/i/). So not only do they have a different vowel than “carkis”, they are missing the final “S”. Am I mistaken about the pronunciation of either “carkis” or “hark’ee”/“mark’ee”? Or is there some other explanation for Tolkien’s choice of these words to rhyme?

2

Carcass is derived from the French ‘carcasse’ and pronounced with the “s” at the end. But it’s spelled without an “e” at the end in English, and a person might get the pronunciation wrong by treating the word “carcass” (or carkis) as if it was French and should have the “s” dropped - leaving it “carkey”

This is probably why the poem was changed by Tolkien ultimately, since he tried to use a few French-derived words in his Middle Earth books as possible.

3

William the Troll: “Mutton yesterday, mutton today. And blimey, if it don’t look like mutton again tomorrow”

Google AI either knows “Lots!” or “no, none at all!” about words than The Professor:

  • The word “mutton” comes from the Anglo-French word mutun, which comes from the Old French word mouton.
  • The Old French word mouton comes from the Vulgar Latin word moltō, which comes from the Gaulish word multon-.
  • The Gaulish word multon- comes from the Proto-Celtic word moltos, which means “ram” or “wether”.
  • The word “mutton” is related to the Old Irish word molt, which means “wether”.