I am learning German and I understand Herr and its various meanings as gentleman, mister, sir, etc. I also realize it can refer to God as the Lord. I have a German translation of a favorite book of mine, The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. The title, auf Deutsch, is Der Herr der Ringe. This brings me to my question - a hypothetical one. If I were a native German speaker and was unfamiliar with Tolkien's work and encountered this book, why would I consider Der Herr in the title to be the Lord ( a powerful supernatural being) of the Rings and not consider Der Herr to mean The Gentleman of Rings and perhaps think it is a story of a rich man who likes to wear jewelry?
I suppose my question made more general is what contextual clues are there to help one pick a particular meaning from a word that that has different but related definitions?