Q: Did Yavanna Create Hobbits Like Aulë Created Dwarves?
ANSWER: In August 2021 a reader asked me:
There’s a theory that’s popular in the fandom right now that Yavanna created hobbits like Aule created dwarves. I think it’s mostly an attempt to make a relationship between Bilbo and Thorin more poetic, but a lot of people seem to believe it’s actually canon. There are a lot of reasons I think this is nonsensical (especially their interactions with the Old Forest, which must be Yavannah’s domain), but is there something I’m missing? Is there some evidence or some way it would make sense?
There is no “hobbit creation myth” in any of the Tolkien books and texts I’ve read. The only text I know of where Tolkien specifically addresses their origin is in a footnote to Letter No. 131 (the Milton Waldman letter):
The Hobbits are, of course, really meant to be a branch of the specifically human race (not Elves or Dwarves) — hence the two kinds can dwell together (as at Bree), and are called just the Big Folk and Little Folk. They are entirely without non-human powers, but are represented as being more in touch with ‘nature’ (the soil and other living things, plants and animals), and abnormally, for humans, free from ambition or greed of wealth. They are made small (little more than half human stature, but dwindling as the years pass) partly to exhibit the pettiness of man, plain unimaginative parochial man – though not with either the smallness or the savageness of Swift, and mostly to show up, in creatures of very small physical power, the amazing and unexpected hero ism of ordinary men ‘at a pinch’
So their creation myth cannot be distinct from that of other humans. Their ancestors must have been among the ancestors of all humankind.
This question seems to crop up on random Tolkien fan sites every few years. People have been asking it at least for 20 years, and perhaps since The Silmarillion was first published in 1977. I don’t think I’ve ever been asked to answer it before.
Tolkien associates Yavanna with the creation or emergence of the Eagles of Manwë and the Ents (the “Shepherds of the Trees”). She didn’t create them. Rather, Ilúvatar created their spirits and they “came from afar” in answer to her prayers. Their tasks were to assist the Valar (the Eagles) and to protect trees (Ents) against other creatures (including the Children).
Hobbits were not assigned any such mystical or spiritual task by either Ilúvatar or the Valar. So there would be no reason for Yavanna to have a hand in their making.
Yavanna appears to have had the closest relationship with the Eldar (among the Children), because she gave them a special corn that the Maidens of Yavanna were charged with growing and using to create lembas. Tolkien implies in Letter No. 144 (to Naomi Mitcheson) that Hobbits learned agriculture from the Entwives.
Tolkien wrote on an an unsent draft of Letter No. 247 (to Colonel Worskett):
No one knew whence they (Ents) came or first appeared. The High Elves said that the Valar did not mention them in the ‘Music’. But some (Galadriel) were [of the] opinion that when Yavanna discovered the mercy of Eru to Aulë in the matter of the Dwarves, she besought Eru (through Manwë) asking him to give life to things made of living things not stone, and that the Ents were either souls sent to inhabit trees, or else that slowly took the likeness of trees owing to their inborn love of trees. (Not all were good [words illegible]) The Ents thus had mastery over stone. The males were devoted to Oromë, but the Wives to Yavanna.
The draft was composed in 1963, and the hand-written note would have been added at that time or later. So even at this late date (years after he stopped editing the manuscripts for The Silmarillion and during the time he worked on other texts more closely associated with The Lord of the Rings) Tolkien still thought of Yavanna as being associated with Ents and Eagles.
There’s just no basis for assuming she had anything to do with the evolution (which Tolkien alluded to in his letters) of the Men who became the Hobbits.
See Also
Who Were the Spirits from Afar That Yavanna Summoned?
Where Did Hobbits Live in the First Age?
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There’s nothing to support this, but for myself, I like to think that when Iluvatar was busy changing the world from flat to round and removing Valinor and adding new lands and seas, he changed a clan of Men who were migrating West on their own, still half mad from their days as slaves under Melkor in the East. They woke up one day with the cruel memories of their past erased, an increased interest in the simpler things in life, a bit shorter and stealthier than before, and with hairy feet.
And a sometimes-kindled yearning for heading West in their hearts. Tough little buggers.
Honestly, I haven’t read all the HOME stuff yet, but I’ve never felt the whole “breaking and remaking the world” thing gets enough attention as an event. With that big a reformat, as an author/subcreationist, you can decree anything. Recover the 2 other silmarils. Put all the remaining Dragons to sleep for an age. Create po-tay-toes.
-dale
When he is telling Frodo about Gollum’s acquisition of the Ring, Gandalf remarks that he knows more about the origins of Hobbits than they themselves do. The question is, did he acquire that knowledge while wandering around Middle-Earth on his mission, or before he came, when he was a Maia back in Valinor? If while in Middle-Earth, from whom would he get it, as the hobbits’ records were scanty and none of the other races seemed to know much about them? So he may well have had some knowledge about them from his time as Olorin. Perhaps those who sent him tipped him off that “those little chaps are going to be important some time, but that’s all we can tell you just now.”
Interesting point.
Did the Istari keep their knowledge from Valinor? Whenever Gandalf mentions lore, it always seems to be things he learned on Middle Earth over the thousands of years he was there. They do not appear to have started with any info as to Sauron’s whereabouts when they arrived, and nor about where to find the ring. But you would think that they would be well-briefed on their enemy and on the nature of their mission.
The year of the coming of the Istari is not mentioned in the Tale of Years, but the introductory text for the Third Age states that it was after “maybe a thousand” years, and about the same time as the shadow fell on Greenwood.
The entry for TA1050 reads: “Hyarmendacil conquers the Harad. Gondor reaches the height of its power. About this time a shadow falls on Greenwood, and men begin to call it Mirkwood. The Periannath are first mentioned in records, with the coming of the Harfoots to Eriador.”
This is obviously pre-Shire by a good margin, but if the Istari were in Middle-earth at about this time, and with other ToY entries specifically stating that some Hobbits had settled in the Angle, then it seems this history must be what Gandalf was referring to. This supposition is supported by the statement in Concerning Hobbits that “their own records began only after the settlement of the Shire”: Hobbits didn’t have a recorded history of this time, although they did have ancient legends which touched on it.
It’s clear throughout all of Tolkien, in Lord of the Rings and elsewhere, that Hobbits are just a branch of humankind. Wanting them to be something else, and trying to set up some kind of symmetry with Dwarves, is typical of over-analytical “gamist” modern fandom that concerns itself with “plot holes” more than with just enjoying the story. They’re humans, nothing more or less.
Indeed. It is pretty clearly stated in the Prologue that Men and Hobbits are related, although the exact nature of the relationship is not known. It could be that Gandalf knew the details, but chose not to reveal it for some reason: we’ll never know for sure. Gandalf of course is very secretive at times, perhaps understandably so, given his advice to people to doubt their own hands when dealing with Sauron. Perhaps the habit of keeping his own counsel became so ingrained that he avoided sharing even seemingly harmless information in case it wasn’t harmless after all.