Why does Tolkien use neither quotes nor cursive writing, and all lower-case, in this specific "quote"?

Question

Above the arch there was a lamp, and beneath it swung a large signboard: a fat white pony reared up on its hind legs. Over the door was painted in white letters: the prancing pony by barliman butterbur. Many of the lower windows showed lights behind thick curtains.

It appears just like that in my book. No quotes. No cursive writing. No special formatting whatsoever. But this is the case in numerous other places, so it's not my book being some sort of sloppy/weird edition.

There must be some special significance to this. But what? Why would he do this?

The fact that it's also all in lower-case letters, even though both "The Prancing Pony" and "Barliman Butterbur" are spelled like I just did everywhere else, makes me really wonder if this is actually a mistake.

Answer 1

I've not been able to find a scanned early edition text in a quick search, but I have checked out the scanned copies of the 1994 Houghton Mifflin Edition and the 2001 Quality Paperback Book Club editions via the Internet Archive.

Both of these are fully authorised editions so can be expected to have a faithful rendering of the author's preferred typography. Both of these have the words that concern you capitalised.

What edition are you using? Does it pre or post-date the two editions illustrated? If you can tell us the edition people may be able to help identify if this is an error specific to that edition.