Q: From where did Thorin travel when he first met Gandalf?
ANSWER: In August 2017 a reader submitted the following very interesting question.
In “The Quest of Erebor” it is said Gandalf was overtaken by Thorin as he was nearing Bree on his way to Shire. But in the Hobbit it seems Thorin’s Dwarves rarely travelled along the Old Road into Rhovanion in those days and they certainly were not frequent guests in Rivendell. So there must have been some other destinations for the dwarves travelling through Eriador.
Maybe, but if so then J.R.R. Tolkien never seems to have named them. But the events associated with Bilbo’s adventure emerged slowly over time. The first edition of The Hobbit depicted a world very different from that of the second edition. And the second edition began in 1947 but included some minor changes Tolkien made to the galleys he received in 1950.
After the second edition of The Hobbit was published, and prior to the publication of The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien wrote “The Quest of Erebor” (1954). This short text was originally intended for inclusion in the Appendices to The Lord of the Rings, but Tolkien had composed too much material. We had to wait for Unfinished Tales of Númenor and Middle-earth to read “The Quest of Erebor” and for The Peoples of Middle-earth to read (most) of the other materials that had been dropped from the LoTR appendices.
Meanwhile, Tolkien began working on a revision of The Hobbit in 1960, but he never finished it. And when he was asked to produce a third revision in 1965 he started all over. The 1960 Hobbit would have been much more like The Lord of the Rings but the only detail of significance I can find in the text is that Thorin and Company slept in the ruins of the Last Inn about a day’s ride east of Bree. I infer from the context that the Last Inn is to be identified with The Forsaken Inn of The Lord of the Rings. Aragorn mentions the Forsaken Inn and the narrative does not mention that it’s a ruin.
That a ruin existed in Bilbo’s time doesn’t mean anything about Frodo and Aragorn’s time. But I would guess that Tolkien always meant for it to be ruinous and abandoned by the time of the War of the Ring. He may not have imagined any sort of history for it, but its ruins could only have been 100-200 years old for it to still be recognized as a former inn. People typically forget about ruins’ original purposes within a few centuries.
So if Thorin wasn’t familiar with Rivendell (or traveling through the Lone-lands east of the Bree-land) by himself, then where would he have had business? Well, The Lord of the Rings offers some possibilities. And given that “The Quest of Erebor” was written for The Lord of the Rings I think it reasonable to assume that Tolkien had the geography of the story in mind.
Bree was the village on the western side of Bree hill. Staddle was a village on the south-eastern side of Bree hill. Thorin could have had business in Staddle and simply headed west toward Bree, the Shire, and the Blue Mountains right before he overtook Gandalf. But Combe also lay “in a deep valley a little further eastward”; the narrative says the village lay “down in a deep hollow away north of the Road” as Aragorn led the Hobbits out of Bree. Archet is said to have stood “on the edge of the Chetwood”, which extended all around the villages of the Bree-land. Archet is said to have been “hidden in the trees beyond” Combe, from the perspective of Aragarn and the Hobbits on the Road. Aragorn led the Hobbits north along a track (a narrow dirt pathway) through the Chetwood toward Archet, but passing on its east side.
Hence, Thorin could also have had business in Combe or Archet. The town of Bree appears to have been the westernmost village of the Bree-land, even if it was the most important of the four villages.
One could also surmise Thorin had traveled up the Greenway from Dunland, but I don’t see what purpose he would have had there. And why would he travel by himself? I think the most logical explanation is that Thorin had business in Bree-land itself. His people, living in the Blue Mountains west of the Shire, would have had been able to engage in commerce with the following groups:
- Cirdan’s folk in Mithlond
- The Hobbits of the Shire
- The Hobbits of the Buckland
- The Men and Hobbits of Bree-land
- The Men of Eryn Vorn
- The Rangers guarding Bree-land, the Buckland, and the Shire
It would have been relatively safe for Thorin to travel by himself through all those lands, with the possible exception of Eryn Vorn. We don’t know much about the Men of Eryn Vorn, except that they were a remnant of the ancient Gwathuirim (like the Men of Bree and the Dunlendings) and that they had no settled communities (towns or villages). I suspect Tolkien would consider the independent farms of Eryn Vorn to be as dependent upon the Dwarves for metalwork as the Dwarves might have been dependent upon them for food. If nothing else, both groups would have benefited from a trading relationship.
Tolkien only specifically states that the Dwarves traded with the Shire and visited Bree-land.
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Have you read our other Tolkien and Middle-earth Questions and Answers articles?
Any thoughts about the existence of a possible dwarf colony in Dunland? did you think that Thrór had mines there?
Another question to explore is what kind of Dwarf communities existed still in the Blue Mountains? Were they connected by descent from the remnants of Belegost?
Mines in Dunland? Dwarves are consistent in many ways. One is that they only seem to mine in the mountains. The only mountains in Dunland are the western reaches of the Misty Mountains, south of the Glanduin. After the Fall of Moria, would Dwarves mine nearby? It doesn’t seem likely.
Had there been mines in Dunland and Thorin had overtaken Gandalf on the Greenway rather than the East-West Road, I’d wonder why Gandalf hadn’t crossed into The Shire via Sarn Ford, rather than detour to Bree.
It’s 100% plausible that Thorin’s westbound journey began within the Bree-lands. However, it’s been said that there were Dúnedain settlements in the angle between Mitheithel and Bruinen, and there was that abandoned farmstead Thorin & Co. came across on their eastbound journey, apparently near the Trollshaws. Which is to say, scattered and hidden though it may be, there’s likely more to the population of Eriador than enters into the stories. And when you consider the Dwarves penchant for mountainous terrain, perhaps there were some small delvings in the Weather Hills. Not that any of this is important to the story. All that mattered was the chance meeting, if chance it was.
Well before Thrain removed with his son to Blue Mountains, (to those as I like to call them Thorin’s Halls, those “fair halls in the mountains” that they established after wandering in Eriador) they dwelt in Dunland:
“From the sack and the burning many of Thrór’s kin escaped; and last of all from the halls by a secret door came Thrór himself and his son Thráin II. They went away south with their family into long and homeless wandering. With them went also a small company of their kinsmen and faithful followers.”
…
“From Dunland, where he was then dwelling, he went north with Nár, and they crossed the Redhorn Pass and came down into Azanulbizar.”
…
“So Thráin and Thorin with what remained of their following (among whom were Balin and Glóin) returned to Dunland, and soon afterwards they removed and wandered in Eriador, until at last they made a home in exile in the east of the Ered Luin beyond the Lune. Of iron were most of the things that they forged in those days, but they prospered after a fashion, and their numbers slowly increased. But, as Thrór had said, the Ring needed gold to breed gold, and of that or any other precious metal they had little or none.”
The Return of the King, LoTR Appendix A, Annals of the Kings and Rulers: Durin’s Folk
…
“… when Thráin was lost [Thorin] was ninety-five, a great Dwarf of proud bearing. He had no Ring, and (for that reason maybe) he seemed content to remain in Eriador. There he laboured long, and gained such wealth as he could; and his people were increased by many of the wandering Folk of Durin that heard of his dwelling and came to him. Now they had fair halls in the mountains, and store of goods and their days did not seem so hard, though in their songs they spoke ever of the Lonely Mountain far away, and the treasure and the bliss of the Great Hall in the light of the Arkenstone.”
Unfinished Tales, Part 3, Ch 3, The Quest of Erebor: Appendix
So trading with the Dunlendings is not that unlikely, even after Dwarves removed from Dunland temporary settlement. Dunland is a hilly country at the foot of southern Misty Mountains. It seems likely that Dwarves of Thrór’s followers build some mountain home for themselves and to provide for their needs established trading ties with local peoples. We know little of Dunland, we only glimpse it a little during return journey of our heroes up north:
“Soon the dwindling company, following the Isen, turned west and rode through the Gap into the waste lands beyond, and then they turned northwards, and passed over the borders of Dunland. The Dunlendings fled and hid themselves, for they were afraid of Elvish folk, though few indeed ever came to their country; but the travellers did not heed them, for they were still a great company and were well provided with all that they needed; and they went on their way at their leisure, setting up their tents when they would.
On the sixth day since their parting from the King they journeyed through a wood climbing down from the hills at the feet of the Misty Mountains that now marched on their right hand.”
…
“Next day they went on into northern Dunland, where no men now dwelt, though it was a green and pleasant country. September came in with golden days and silver nights, and they rode at ease until they reached the Swanfleet river, and found the old ford, east of the falls where it went down suddenly into the lowlands.”
The dwarven settlement in Dunland was most likely abandoned but contacts with Dunlendings could have been maintained (it needs not to be thought that any Dwarf remained after Thrain and Thorin moved to Ered Luin, but maybe some actually did stay, dwarven numbers were larger than we think, there were definitely many, many more Dwarves we simply don’t hear about, after sack of Erebor large number of survivors went to Dain in Iron Hills, some portion went with Thrór into exile, and some dispersed and were wandering, some of those wanderers later joined Thrain and Thorin in Ered Luin, and who knows this settlement may have been actually an ancient small colony or outpost, or even trading post dating back millennia when Khazad-dur was actually more like an empire controlling most of the Misty Mountains as their territory, maybe Thrór and his followers rediscovered it, or they actually made it from scratch, some simple underground tunnels and halls). Dunlendings could provide foodstuffs, as it was a land of shepherds in the uplands, also forested so skins and precious furs, and they would in exchange get dwarven goods.
Dunedain settlements are also prime candidate, those would be ideal place for business venture. Though the Dunedain hidden settlements would be probably self sufficient in many ways, they would still have many needs for more refined goods, Rangers would also probably need weapons and armor (Dunedain could have some craftsmen of their own but dwarven services were needed always even in societies with developed arts and crafts, Dunedain may also hold some old treasures and heirlooms from old kingdom).
As for other settlements near Trollshaws, The Hobbit actually hints there may be more people living around as the three Trolls speak about eating people:
“‘Yer can’t expect folk to stop here for ever just to be et by you and Bert. You’ve et a village and a half between yer, since we come down from the mountains. How much more d’yer want?'”