Answers for Short Questions from Tolkien Fans
One of the reasons why your questions sit in the queue waiting to be answered for months on end is that while I feel they are deserving of an answer, I cannot think of a long enough answer to justify an entire blog post. Why should a question have a long answer? Well, if you read these articles on a desktop computer (and I still use my computer far more often than I use my smart phone to browse the Web), the pages just look terribly empty because I have so many widgets in the margin. Really, that’s why I don’t like to write short articles for this blog.
And it’s fun to do the research, too, but sometimes you ask a question for which I am confident there won’t be a long answer. So I occasionally group a few questions together and that is what this article is for. So here are a few older questions, awaiting answers, and I apologize for making you all wait so long.
Q: Did any of the Valar Participate in the War of Wrath?
I believe Tolkien would have included Tulkas and Oromë in the Host of Valinor, but he never wrote about the War of Wrath in detail after the 1930s. What I have been able to piece together about the War of Wrath can be found in these articles:
- How Was Beleriand Destroyed in the War of Wrath? from October 2012
- What Happened to Maglor after the War of Wrath? from June 2016
- Where Does Tolkien Say that Elrond and Elros Joined the Host of Valinor? from January 2016
Q: Are There Major Differences in the Story or Characters between the Different Editions of The Hobbit?
ANSWER Yes. This question, submitted in April 2017, really is worthy of a lengthy, detailed reply. And I could probably write a long article. But after more than a year of waiting, I see that’s probably never going to happen.
I refer you to The Annotated Hobbit by Douglas A. Anderson for a full, in-depth analysis of the changes between the various published editions of The Hobbit. The most significant change is how J.R.R. Tolkien rewrote the chapter “Riddles In the Dark”. Gollum was originally willing to stake the magic ring in the riddle game. But some other changes were made to adjust the length of Bilbo’s journey and to alter some names and details to be more consistent with later works.
In 1960 J.R.R. Tolkien began writing a completely new version of The Hobbit, which more closely matched the tone and style of The Lord of the Rings. Unfortunately he never completed this work. You can read what he did finish in The History of the Hobbit, Volume 2 (Return to Bag-End) by John Rateliff.
Q: Did J.R.R. Tolkien Have The Lord of the Rings in Mind When He Wrote The Hobbit?
ANSWER: In May 2017 a reader submitted this question: “I have always been curious if the master had visions of LOTR is the back of his head as he wrote the Hobbit? Or was LOTR developed afterward, as he contemplated how he could expand on the published story, and decided on the ‘Magic’ ring as the vehicle he would use going forward.”
The official explanation is that The Lord of the Rings was completely unforeseen when Tolkien composed The Hobbit. We learned in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien that his publisher, George Allen & Unwin, asked him to write a sequel to The Hobbit soon after it was published in 1937. At the time Tolkien said he couldn’t imagine what else to say about hobbits, but he began working on a plot in December 1937. As we learned from Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth and the twelve volumes of The History of Middle-earth, the road from the Yorkshire glade where Edith danced for J.R.R. Tolkien to Sam’s “Well, I’m back” was truly long and winding.
Tolkien wanted to publish The Silmarillion after The Hobbit, but he could not find a publisher for it. As we learned from The History of The Hobbit, the “children’s story” emerged from Tolkien’s Silmarillion world. In other words, as he composed the tale for his children, J.R.R. Tolkien drew upon elements he had established for the stories set in Beleriand. These elements were edited away for the published Hobbit, but they returned in new form in The Lord of the Rings. The chief connection between the three stories is the tale of Beren and Luthien (including their encounter with Sauron). Tolkien identified the Necromancer of The Hobbit with the character Thû from the older Silmarillion stories; he renamed this character again as Sauron, retaining the older “Necromancer” label and dropping Thû altogether.
Tolkien never intended to publish The Hobbit. He loaned the incomplete manuscript to a friend, M.E. Griffiths, who loaned it to her friend Susan Dagnall, who passed it on to George Allen & Unwin. They asked him to finish the children’s story. But Tolkien wanted to write about his elves and their great tragedy, so he turned the sequel to The Hobbit into the final chapter of the elves’ story.
Q: How Does Light Work in Tolkien’s Universe?
ANSWER: The full question I received in May 2017 read thus:
Light in Arda seems to have different physical properties than we currently ascribe to it. The Phial of Galadriel contains and radiates the light of a star, and Ungoliant drinks light and spews it out as tangible darkness. How does light work in Tolkien’s universe and do we know of any literary antecedents which may have inspired his treatment of it?
I think a few Biblical and mythology scholars could explain the literary antecedents better than me. They certainly existed.
I could have written a very lengthy blog post about this topic but I would never be able to do it justice. Whole books have been written about the use of light and darkness as metaphors in literature and religion. Tolkien’s use of the metaphors strikes me as being quite consistent with well-established literary tradition.
As for how the narratives appear to ascribe physicality (or physical effects) to the the light of the Two Trees and the light of the Star of Eärendil, I think these are deliberate metaphors for the power of God. God’s power is effected or realized in Arda in many ways, but the hallowed lights in the stories are one of the “purest” manifestations of that power. When Ungoliant spins dark webs from the light, she is perverting that holiness into something profane or obscene. That is the best way I can summarize how I understand Tolkien’s use of light and darkness as manifestations of power.
Q: Where Else Did J.R.R. Tolkien Mention Explosives?
ANSWER In June 2017 a reader asked the following question:
Although we know from the attack on Helm’s Deep that Saruman made use of explosives, few people or blogs seem to notice that Sauron made use of similar – or possibly the same – technology. “The Return of the King” fleetingly mentions only that after his troops had taken the Pelennor wall the men of Gondor saw them “blasting breaches in it”. Do any of JRRT’s other writings provide any further informatiuon on this aspect of Sauron’s arsenal?
Well, the goblins (orcs) of The Hobbit use gunpowder or some kind of flash powder when they capture Thorin & Company, and the narrator says that goblins invented gunpowder.
There is one passage in “The Fall of Gondolin” which some people have interpreted to suggest that some of Melko’s metal dragons may have employed gunpowder: “others of bronze and copper were given hearts and spirits of blazing fire, and they blasted all that stood before them with the terror of their snorting or trampled whatso escaped the ardour of their breath.” I think the identification may be too liberal. I don’t know of any other references to gunpowder or blasting powder in the Middle-earth texts.
Q: What Would a Political map of Gondor Look Like?
ANSWER: This was the first of several questions submitted by an inquisitive reader in June 2017. Well, I don’t know of any official political maps (drawn by any member of the Tolkien family) but I think at least some of the maps on LindeFirion should satisfy your curiosity. I didn’t see anything I would argue with on the couple of maps I examined. However, I have not looked at ALL the maps on that site and I cannot offer a blanket endorsement. But they don’t need my endorsement.
Q: Did Gondor Control Land to the East of the Rhûn Sea?
Also, at its height Gondor controlled all the land [as follows:]
“The realm then extended north to the field of Celebrant and to the Southern eaves of Mirkwood; west to the Greyflood; east to the inland Sea of Rhûn; south to the River Harnen and thence along the coast to the peninsula and haven of Umbar. The Men of the Vales of Anduin acknowledged it’s authority; and the kings of Harad did homage to Gondor…”
Karen Wynn Fonstad’s atlas implies it controlled land east of the Sea of Rhún and it didn’t control the land directly south of Mirkwood. Did it control that land? If possible could you give an aproximate map of the land Gondor had under Hyrmendacil? Another thing, how do you think Gondor was divided up in that time?
The only way to determine how accurate and reliable Karen Fonstad’s map is would be to compare it to a similar map drawn by J.R.R. Tolkien or at his direction, and I don’t know of any such map.
As all cartographers do, Karen Fonstad extrapolated the boundaries of the territories in question given the best information she had available. There is one passage that speaks of a Gondorian king destroying enemy camps beyond the Inland Sea. Technically, that would mean that Gondor’s authority extended that far at least until the army withdrew. If you allow for the uncertainty of conflation due to averaging the boundaries of a realm that was changing over time, I would say the map is reasonably accurate. She was probably erring on the side of caution while defining boundary interpretations that were defensible based on the published (and publicly available) texts.
As for any political subdivisions of Gondor in that time period, I have no textual sources upon which to base any extrapolations or suppositions. In my mind, the political subdivisions of Gondor at the height of its power (and even how the realm was governed) remain vague and ambiguous.
Q: Did Aragorn Rule the Vales of Anduin?
ANSWER Finally, our friend from June 2017 asked: “Do you think the Vales of Anduin pledged loyalty to Aragorn after he re-established the Kingship Gondor? I mean it did say he reclaimed all the land the 2 realms held save Rohan.”
I don’t believe Aragorn’s authority extended into the (central or upper) Vales of Anduin. Tolkien mentions in one or two places that Aragorn and Eomer fought many battles after the Third Age. I can imagine they might have fought with some of the Easterlings living near southern Mirkwood. And Aragorn does seem to have allied himself with the Beornings, the Woodmen, and the Men of Dale. But I don’t see why Aragorn would have laid claim to the lands around southern Mirkwood or demanded a pledge of loyalty from their leaders. He didn’t claim Mordor for himself, but rather gave its southern lands to Sauron’s freed slaves. I see Aragorn more as a liberator than as a conqueror.
See Also
- Short Questions and Answers from March 2018
- More Questions with Short Answers from July 2017
- Answers Too Short for Their Own Articles
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Have you read our other Tolkien and Middle-earth Questions and Answers articles?
As to explosives… While not literally mentioned as such, we have Gandalf’s marvelous fireworks to consider. “…The dragon passed like an express train, turned a somersault, and burst over Bywater with a deafening explosion.”
In a sense, all examples of explosives and fireworks come from the hands of Maiar. A Dark Lord or Dark Lord wannabe can’t be everywhere at once, so they fashioned weapons that mimic their own powers. Initially, Gandalf veils his innate power behind plausibly man/dwarf/elf-made objects.Later we see him revealed, bare power-to-bare power – Gandalf vs. Balrog, Gandalf vs. Nazgúl, etc. No explosives necessary, void where prohibited.