Q: Why Do the Men of Dunland Join Saruman?
ANSWER: The relationship between the Dunlendings and Rohirrim is complex but at the time J.R.R. Tolkien wrote the primary narrative of The Lord of the Rings he had not fully devised their history. Nonetheless, as can be seen from the following passage (taken from The War of the Ring, Volume VIII of The History of Middle-earth) Tolkien always envisioned some sort of ancient conflict between the Rohirrim and their neighbors:
The ‘wild hill-men’ at the assault on Helm’s Deep came from ‘Westfold’, valleys on the western side of the Misty Mountains (see p. 8 and note 4), and this application of ‘Westfold’ survived until a late stage of revision of the manuscript: it was still present in drafting for what became ‘The Road to Isengard’. Until the change in application was made, the Westfold Vale was called ‘the Westmarch Vale’.
In this connection there are two notable passages. The dialogue between Aragorn and Eomer and Gamling the Westmarcher on the Deeping Wall, hearing the cries of the wild men below (TT p. 142), takes this form in a rejected draft:
‘I hear them,’ said Eomer; ‘but they are only as the scream of birds and the bellowing of beasts to my ears.’
‘Yet among them are many that cry in the tongue of Westfold [later > in the Dunland tongue],’ said Aragorn; ‘and that is a speech of men, and once was accounted good to hear.’
‘True words you speak,’ said Gamling, who had climbed now on the wall. ‘I know that tongue. It is ancient, and once was spoken in many valleys of the Mark. But now it is used in deadly hate. They shout rejoicing in our doom. “The king, the king!” they cry. “We will take their king! Death to the Forgoil! Death to the Strawheads! Death to the robbers of the North.” Such names they have for us. Not in half a thousand years have they forgot their grievance, that the lords of Gondor gave the Mark to Eorl the Young as a reward for his service to Elendil and Isildur, while they held back. It is this old hatred that Saruman has inflamed. …’
So, hold on here. What’s all this about Eorl serving Elendil and Isildur? That’s an older timeline in which Eorl actually fought against Sauron in the War of the Last Alliance of Elves and Men. Clearly J.R.R. Tolkien changed much when he expanded the history of Gondor and Arnor and made Eorl a lord of the Third Age who assisted Gondor in a much later war. Nonetheless, the seeds of the Dunlendings’ hatred lay in ancient dispute over land — specifically the land of Calenardhon.
In the Lord of the Rings appendix “The Languages and Peoples of the Third Age” Tolkien included the following paragraph in the section “Of Men”:
Wholly alien was the speech of the Wild Men of Drúadan Forest. Alien, too, or only remotely akin, was the language of the Dunlendings. These were a remnant of the peoples that had dwelt in the vales of the White Mountains in ages past. The Dead Men of Dunharrow were of their kin. But in the Dark Years others had removed to the southern dales of the Misty Mountains; and thence some had passed into the empty lands as far north as the Barrow-downs. From them came the Men of Bree; but long before these had become subjects of the North Kingdom of Arnor and had taken up the Westron tongue. Only in Dunland did Men of this race hold to their old speech and manners: a secret folk, unfriendly to the Dúnedain, hating the Rohirrim.
The reason why the Dunlendings hated the Rohirrim was that the Rohirrim drove them from their ancient homelands. Of that event Tolkien originally told us little in the appendices. For example, in “The House of Eorl” he says only:
The people of that region had become few since the Plague, and most of those that remained had been slaughtered by the savage Easterlings. Cirion, therefore, in reward for his aid, gave Calenardhon between Anduin and Isen to Eorl and his people; and they sent north for their wives and children and their goods and sealed in that land. They named it anew the Mark of the Riders, and they called themselves the Eorlingas; but in Gondor their land was called Rohan, and its people the Rohirrim (that is, the Horse-lords). Thus Eorl became the first King of the Mark, and he chose for his dwelling a green hill before the feet of the White Mountains that we’re the south-wall of his land. There the Rohirrim lived afterwards as free men under their own kings and laws, but in perpetual alliance with Gondor.
More detail concerning the settlement of Rohan is provided in a lengthy text that J.R.R. Tolkien wrote to accompany his story of “Cirion and Eorl” (both of which were published in Unfinished Tales of Numenor and Middle-earth):
But during the Watchful Peace (from 2063 to 2460) the people of Calenardhon dwindled: the more vigorous, year by year, went eastward to hold the line of the Anduin; those that remained became rustic and far removed from the concerns of Minas Tirith. The garrisons of the forts were not renewed, and were left to the care of local hereditary chieftains whose subjects were of more and more mixed blood. For the Dunlendings drifted steadily and unchecked over the Isen. Thus it was, when the attacks on Gondor from the East were renewed, and Orcs and Easterlings overran Calenardhon and besieged the forts, which would not have long held out. Then the Rohirrim came, and after the victory of Eorl on the Field of Celebrant in the year 2510 his numerous and warlike people with great wealth of horses swept into Calenardhon, driving out or destroying the eastern invaders. Cirion the Steward gave them possession of Calenardhon, which was thenceforth called the Riddermark, or in Gondor Rochand (later Rohan). The Rohirrim at once began the settlement of this region, though during the reign of Eorl their eastern bounds along the Emyn Muil and Anduin were still under attack. But under Brego and Aldor the Dunlendings were rooted out again and driven away beyond the Isen, and the Fords of Isen were guarded. Thus the Rohirrim earned the hatred of the Dunlendings, which was not appeased until the return of the King, then far off in the future. Whenever the Rohirrim were weak or in trouble the Dunlendings renewed their attacks.
So the conflict between the Dunlendings and the Rohirrim was rooted in possession of the former region of Calenardhon. As Gondor’s people in the region (many of whom were related to the Dunlendings by ancient blood) dwindled, settlers from Dunland drifted in to empty lands and took them for their own without regard for Gondor’s claims to the area. Cirion’s decision to cede Calenardhon to Eorl’s people served three purposes: first, he rewarded the Éothéod for their valiant defense of Gondor against the Balchoth; second, he repopulated a strategically important region which was vulnerable to invasion from the east over the Undeeps, the bends in Anduin’s course near the southern borthers of Mirkwood and east of Fangorn Forest; and third, he prevented the Dunlendings, who were hostile to Gondor, from seizing control over the entire region.
However, by depriving the Dunlendings of the rich land of Calenardhon Cirion assured their continued hostility to Gondor and its allies. Hence, there were opportunities for future conflicts between the Dunlendings and Rohirrim, such as the war in Third Age year 2758. Hence, by the time Saruman went looking for servants and allies he did not have to look far. The people of Dunland were ripe for revenge against their ancient enemies. All Saruman had to do was inflame their hatred and give them hope of finally seizing control over Calenardhon.
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