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Gamgee Tissue is a surgical dressing invented by Dr. Joseph Sampson Gamgee in
Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1. ...
,
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
, in 1880. Gamgee Tissue has a thick layer of absorbent cotton wool between two layers of absorbent gauze. It represents the first use of cotton wool in a medical context, and was a major advancement in the prevention of infection of surgical wounds. It is still the basis for many modern surgical dressings. The name is a
trademark A trademark (also written trade mark or trade-mark) is a type of intellectual property consisting of a recognizable sign, design, or expression that identifies products or services from a particular source and distinguishes them from othe ...
of Robinson Healthcare Ltd, based in Worksop, Nottinghamshire, UK and has been since 1911.


Tolkien

In Birmingham, "Gamgee" became the colloquial name for cotton wool, which possibly led to the character name (
Sam Gamgee Sam, SAM or variants may refer to: Places * Sam, Benin * Sam, Boulkiemdé, Burkina Faso * Sam, Bourzanga, Burkina Faso * Sam, Kongoussi, Burkina Faso * Sam, Iran * Sam, Teton County, Idaho, United States, a populated place People and fictional ...
) in
J. R. R. Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawlins ...
's ''
The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's b ...
''. The connection is not certain: in Appendix F to ''The Lord of the Rings'', Tolkien mentions, but at the same time denies, the reading of ''Gamgee'' as a pun relating to the name of Sam's wife, Rosie ''Cotton''. He further elaborates the 'real'
Westron The English philologist and author J. R. R. Tolkien created a number of constructed languages, including languages devised for fictional settings. Inventing languages, something that he called ''glossopoeia'' (paralleling his idea of ''mythopoe ...
names of which 'Gamgee' and 'Cotton' are translations. However, in the same section Tolkien also addresses ''hobbit'' (which was certainly created first and translated afterward, as described in Tolkien's own comment on the initial writing of ''
The Hobbit ''The Hobbit, or There and Back Again'' is a children's fantasy novel by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. It was published in 1937 to wide critical acclaim, being nominated for the Carnegie Medal and awarded a prize from the ''N ...
'') and ''Brandywine'' (an obvious English pun on the Elvish ''Baranduin'', 'justified' as translation of a similarly alcoholic pun in Westron). In this context we may suspect that the Professor is speaking tongue-in-cheek; the ''Gamgee'' entry is phrased such that it can be read as a poker-faced, academic way of pointing out that the joke is there, whether or not he intended it. In a 1954 letter to author Naomi Mitchison, who was proofreading ''The Lord of the Rings'' for Tolkien, he addresses several questions she had, including of the Gamgee name:


References

{{Reflist * ''Absorbent and medicated surgical dressings'', J. S. Gamgee, in
The Lancet ''The Lancet'' is a weekly peer-reviewed general medical journal and one of the oldest of its kind. It is also the world's highest-impact academic journal. It was founded in England in 1823. The journal publishes original research articles, ...
,
London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, 24 January 1880 * ''The Lord of the Rings'' volume III, ''
The Return of the King ''The Return of the King'' is the third and final volume of J. R. R. Tolkien's ''The Lord of the Rings'', following '' The Fellowship of the Ring'' and '' The Two Towers''. It was published in 1955. The story begins in the kingdom of Gondor, ...
''. Appendix F, part II (page number varies by edition). Medical dressings