Where did the Uruk-hai live prior to the War of the Ring?

Q: Where did the Uruk-hai live prior to the War of the Ring?

ANSWER: This question was submitted in May 2018. Before I address the question directly, let me provide a little background. “Uruk-hai” is a tribal name. It means, literally, “orc-folk”. Who and what the Uruk-hai were has been debated for many years. Some people identify them with Saruman’s half-orcs. Some people insist they must be separate and distinct from uruks, the great soldier Orcs Sauron bred in Mordor. J.R.R. Tolkien himself provided examples of Elvish tribal names that were all variants of quendi (the Elvish name for “elves”), so there is precedent in Tolkien’s own writings for a social group using the racial name to refer to itself.

I have always maintained that the Uruk-hai were a tribe of Uruks. Whether Saruman cross-bred them with men is as unclear to me as it is to most people. We don’t know why they abandoned their allegiance to Sauron for Saruman, although Saruman did make his own ring of power. Maybe that was how he was able to wrest control over the Uruk-hai. There is a very subtle reference to Saruman’s powerful will in the chapter where Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli chase the Uruk-hai and their allies across the fields of northern Rohan. Aragorn says it feels as though some great will impedes their progress while speeding the Orcs. That’s probably Tolkien subtly revealing to the reader that Saruman was using his ring-enhanced power (in violation of the Valar’s directives, of course).

The full question I received reads thus:

Though a number was never given by Tolkien, we do know that Saruman’s army in the Battle of Hornburg was “of great size”, and consisted of both Dunlendings and Uruk-hai. The Peter Jackson films suggest 10’000 overall – this seems somewhat reasonable, given that Saruman was aiming to defeat Rohan, and according to the Unfinished Tales the Muster of Rohirrim was made up of 100 eoreds of 120 riders each, or a total of 12,000, not including the King’s guard. It also states that this refers to a couple of hundred years previously to the War of the Ring, and the population of Rohirrim had increased since then.

We know the Dunlendings would have lived and farmed in Dunland, but what about the Uruks? Such a large number could not possibly have all lived in The Wizard’s Vale (though there were farmlands there). For starters, Gandalf would have noticed them as he arrived in the Vale in July of 3018, before being imprisoned.

So, my question is: “Where did the Uruk-hai live prior to the War of the Ring?”

First, let me say that you might be surprised how many soldiers could be squeezed into a relatively small area, especially if there were underground chambers that could house them. Peter Jackson’s depiction of Isengard, while fantastic and of an immense scale that probably does not reflect J.R.R. Tolkien’s imagination, is nonetheless one of the most faithful aspects of the “Lord of the Rings” movies. I found his portrayal of Isengard to be about as perfect as one can hope.

Isengard could have hidden an entire underground city, and it’s not like Tolkien didn’t populate Middle-earth with underground cities. So all Saruman really needed to solve was the logistics problem of bringing in enough food for all his servants. And Tolkien shows that he was buying food supplies from as far away as the Shire. Isengard was probably buying every scrap of spare food from Dunland, too.

As for where the Uruk-hai would have lived prior to entering Saruman’s service, my guess is they came from the Misty Mountains. Sauron originally bred the Uruks in Mordor. From there they spread to Ithilien and then migrated northward to the Misty Mountains (and probably also Mirkwood). Saruman should have been able to find a clan of Uruks.

The Tale of Years in Appendix B of The Lord of the Rings says that Saruman only fortified Isengard starting in 2953, after Sauron had returned to Mordor. Hence, Saruman could have found a way to recruit Uruks to his own service. But perhaps it wasn’t until he looked in the Orthanc Stone around Third Age year 3000, falling victim to Sauron’s stronger will, that he recruited Uruks to his service. Sauron could have sent a tribe to Isengard. That might explain the conversation Frodo and Sam heard between the Uruk and Tracker Orc in Mordor, where they were bickering over why the alarms were suddenly raised.

Hardly twenty paces from where the hobbits lurked the small orc stopped. ‘Nar!’ it snarled. ‘I’m going home.’ It pointed across the valley to the orc-hold. ‘No good wearing my nose out on stones any more. There’s not a trace left, I say. I’ve lost the scent through giving way to you. It went up into the hills, not along the valley, I tell you.’

‘Not much use are you, you little snufflers?’ said the big orc. ‘I reckon eyes are better than your snotty noses.’

‘Then what have you seen with them?’ snarled the other. ‘Garn! You don’t even know what you’re looking for.’

‘Whose blame’s that?’ said the soldier. ‘Not mine. That comes from Higher Up. First they say it’s a great Elf in bright armour, then it’s a sort of small dwarf-man, then it must be a pack of rebel Uruk-hai; or maybe it’s all the lot together.’

If this is indeed a reference to the Uruk-hai of Isengard, then it seems to imply they originally came from Mordor. But some people argue that it can only refer to the Uruks of Minas Morgul, who fought with the Uruks of Cirith Ungol over Frodo’s mithril shirt.

For my part, what makes the most sense is that Saruman’s association with Uruks must be fairly brief. His use of Uruks as soldiers seems to have taken everyone by surprise. Although “The House of Eorl” in Appendix A to The Lord of the Rings says that Saruman began harassing Rohan soon after Thengel became king, Saruman’s treachery was a complete and total surprise to everyone when Gandalf revealed it in Third Age year 3018 (probably first to Rohan when he escaped from Orthanc in September 3018). Saruman had until that time acted on his own; that Gandalf and Radagast went to him willingly in the belief he was still opposing Sauron can only mean they had no idea he was served by Uruks. His first soldiers must have been men, no doubt recruited mostly from Dunland.

Thus I think it’s safest to assume that Saruman recruited his Uruks sometime between T.A. 3000 and 3018. If they were the “rebel Uruk-hai” they probably came from Mordor, and they could have been the first generation of cross-bred half-Orcs if indeed they were half-breeds. But I am not really convinced the Uruk-hai were half-Orcs. The only one Tolkien described in any detail, the squint-eyed southerner in Bree, appears to have been mostly human in appearance because he could pass for a man.

But 18 years may not be long enough for Saruman to raise an army of half-Orcs and/or Uruk-hai. So perhaps he began recruiting among the Orcs of the Misty Mountains sometime between T.A. 2953 and 3000. He would still have to keep his plans secret, feigning friendship with Rohan. I don’t think he could easily have recruited Uruks directly from Mordor prior to 3000, as Sauron should have learned right away that some of his elite troops had been prized away from him. That is why I suspect the Uruk-hai were recent recruits. If their treachery occurred after 3000 then Sauron would have had to defer taking action against Saruman until after the War of the Ring. And, also, Sauron also seems to have been surprised by Saruman’s treachery.

The fact that Mordor sent Orcs to assist the Uruk-hai in their raid on the Fellowship, with no apparent prior knowledge of the Uruk-hai’s changed allegiance, seems to suggest that Mordor only learned of their treason after Grishnákh reported how the raid went to the Nazgûl who was waiting for the raiders on the east bank of Anduin.

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