The Fall of Gondolin

by J. R. R. Tolkien

  So here again we meet my father’s shifting perception of how Morgoth discovered where the Hidden Kingdom lay (see here–here). The story in the present text is clearly at odds with the passage in the Quenta Noldorinwa (p.140), where the treachery of Maeglin, taken prisoner by the Orcs, is told in this clear form: ‘he purchased his life and freedom by revealing unto Morgoth the place of Gondolin and the ways whereby it might be found and assailed. Great indeed was the joy of Morgoth …’

  The story was in fact, I think, now taking a further step in the light of the end of the passage given above, where Húrin’s cries revealed the place of Gondolin ‘to the joy of Morgoth’. This is seen from what my father added at this point in the manuscript:

  Later when captured and Maeglin wished to buy his release with treachery, Morgoth must answer laughing, saying: ‘Stale news will buy nothing. I know this already, I am not easily blinded!’ So Maeglin was obliged to offer more – to undermine resistance in Gondolin.

  Iron Mountains

  At first sight it appeared from early texts that Hisilómë (Hithlum) was a region distinct from the later Hithlum, since it was placed beyond the Iron Mountains. I concluded however that what was involved was simply a change of names, and this is certainly the truth of the matter. It is told elsewhere in the Lost Tales that after the escape of Melko from his imprisonment in Valinor he made for himself ‘new dwellings in that region of the North where stand the Iron Mountains very high and terrible to see’; and also that Angband lay beneath the roots of the northernmost fortresses of the Iron Mountains: those mountains were so named from ‘the Hells of Iron’ beneath them.

  The explanation is that the name ‘Mountains of Iron’ was originally applied to the range later called ‘Shadowy Mountains’ or ‘Mountains of Shadow’, Ered Wethrin. (It might be that while these mountains were regarded as a continuous range, the southern extension, the southern and eastern walls of Hithlum, came to be distinguished in name from the terrible northern peaks above Angband, the mightiest of them being Thangorodrim.)

  Unhappily I failed to alter the List of Names in the entry Hisilómë in Beren and Lúthien, which states that that region owes its name to ‘the scanty sun which peeps over the Iron Mountains to the east and south of it.’ At p.43 in the present text I have replaced ‘Iron’ by ‘Shadowy’.

  Nirnaeth Arnoediad: The Battle of Unnumbered Tears

  It is said in the Quenta Noldorinwa:

  Now it must be told that Maidros, son of Fëanor, perceived that Morgoth was not unassailable after the deeds of Huan and Lúthien and the breaking of the towers of Thû [Tol Sirion, Isle of Werewolves; later > Sauron’s tower], but that he would destroy them all, one by one, if they did not form again a league and council. This was the Union of Maidros and wisely planned.

  The gigantic battle that ensued was the most disastrous in the history of the wars of Beleriand. References to the Nirnaeth Arnoediad abound in the texts, for Elves and Men were utterly defeated and the ruin of the Noldor was achieved. Fingon, king of the Noldor, a son of Fingolfin and brother of Turgon was slain, and his realm was no more. But a very notable event, early in the battle, was the intervention of Turgon, breaking the leaguer of Gondolin: this event is told thus in the Grey Annals (on which see The Evolution of the Story here):

  To the joy and wonder of all there was a sounding of great trumpets, and there marched up to war a host unlooked for. This was the army of Turgon that issued from Gondolin, ten thousand strong, with bright mail and long swords, and they were stationed southwards guarding the passes of Sirion.

  There is also in the Grey Annals a very noteworthy passage on the subject of Turgon and Morgoth.

  But one thought troubled Morgoth deeply, and marred his triumph; Turgon had escaped the net, whom he most desired to take. For Turgon came of the great house of Fingolfin, and was now by right King of all the Noldor, and Morgoth feared and hated most the house of Fingolfin, because they had scorned him in Valinor, and had the friendship of Ulmo, and because of the wounds that Fingolfin gave him in battle. Moreover of old his eye had lighted on Turgon, and a dark shadow fell on his heart, foreboding that, in some time that lay yet hidden in doom, from Turgon ruin should come to him.

  The Origins of Eärendel

  The text that follows here is derived from a lengthy letter written by my father in 1967 on the subject of his construction of names within his history and his adoption of names exterior to his history.

  He remarked at the outset that the name Eärendil (the later form) was very plainly derived from the Old English word Éarendel – a word that he felt to be of peculiar beauty in that language. ‘Also’ (he continued) ‘its form strongly suggests that it is in origin a proper name and not a common noun.’ From related forms in other languages he thought it certain that it belonged to astronomical myth, and was the name of a star or star-group.

  ‘To my mind’, he wrote, ‘the Old English uses seem plainly to indicate that it was a star presaging the dawn (at any rate in English tradition): that is what we call Venus: the morning star as it may be seen shining brilliantly in the dawn, before the actual rising of the Sun. That is at any rate how I took it. Before 1914 I wrote a “poem” upon Eärendel who launched his ship like a bright spark from the havens of the Sun. I adopted him into my mythology – in which he became a prime figure as a mariner, eventually as a herald star, and a sign of hope to men. Aiya Eärendil Elenion Ancalima “hail Eärendel brightest of Stars” is derived at long remove from Éala Éarendel engla beorhtast.’

  It was indeed a long remove. These Old English words are taken from the poem Crist, which reads at this point Éala! Éarendel engla beorhtast ofer middangeard monnum sended. But, extraordinary as it seems at first sight, in the Elvish words Aiya Eärendil Elenion Ancalima cited by my father in this letter he was referring to a passage in the chapter Shelob’s Lair in The Lord of the Rings. As Shelob approached Sam and Frodo in the darkness Sam cried out ‘The Lady’s gift! The star-glass! A light to you in dark places, she said it was to be. The star-glass!’ In amazement at his forgetfulness ‘slowly Frodo’s hand went to his bosom, and slowly he held aloft the Phial of Galadriel’ … ‘The darkness receded from it, until it seemed to shine in the centre of a globe of airy crystal, and the hand that held it sparkled with white fire.

  ‘Frodo gazed in wonder at this marvellous gift that he had so long carried, not guessing its full worth and potency. Seldom had he remembered it on the road, until they came to Morgul Vale, and never had he used it for fear of its revealing light. Aiya Eärendil Elenion Ancalima! he cried, and knew not what he had spoken; for it seemed that another voice spoke through his, clear, untroubled by the foul air of the pit.’

  In the letter of 1967 my father went on to say that ‘the name could not be adopted just like that: it had to be accommodated to the Elvish linguistic situation, at the same time as a place for this person was made in legend. From this, far back in the history of “Elvish”, which was beginning, after many tentative starts in boyhood, to take definite shape at the time of the name’s adoption, arose eventually the Common Elvish stem AYAR “sea”, primarily applied to the Great Sea of the West and the verbal element (N)DIL, meaning “to love, be devoted to”. Eärendil became a character in the earliest written (1916–17) of the major legends … Tuor had been visited by Ulmo one of the greatest Valar, the lord of seas and waters, and sent by him to Gondolin. The visitation had set in Tuor’s heart an insatiable sea-longing, hence the choice of name for his son, to whom this longing was transmitted.’

  The Prophecy of Mandos

  In the extract from the Sketch of the Mythology given in the Prologue it is told (p.32) that as the Noldoli sailed from Valinor in their rebellion against the Valar Mandos sent an emissary, who speaking from a high cliff as they sailed by warned them to return, and when they refused he spoke the Prophecy of Mandos concerning their fate in afterdays. I give here a passage that gives an account of it. The text is the first version of The Annals of Valinor – th
e last version being the Grey Annals (see The Evolution of the Story here. This earliest version belongs to the same period as the Quenta Noldorinwa.

  They [the departing Noldoli] came to a place where a high rock stands above the shores, and there stood either Mandos or his messenger and spoke the Doom of Mandos. For the kin-slaying he cursed the house of Fëanor, and to a less degree all who followed them, or shared in their emprise, unless they would return to abide the doom and pardon of the Valar. But if they would not, then should evil fortune and disaster befall them, and ever from treachery of kin towards kin; and their oath should turn against them; and a measure of mortality should visit them, that they should be lightly slain with weapons, or torments, or sorrow, and in the end fade and wane before the younger race. And much else he foretold darkly that after befell, warning them that the Valar would fence Valinor against their return.

  But Fëanor hardened his heart and held on, and so also but reluctantly did Fingolfin’s folk, feeling the constraint of their kindred and fearing for the doom of the Gods (for not all of Fingolfin’s house had been guiltless of the kin-slaying).

  See also the words of Ulmo to Tuor at Vinyamar, LV here.

  The Three Kindreds of the Elves in The Hobbit

  In The Hobbit, not far from the end of Chapter 8, Flies and Spiders, occurs this passage.

  The feasting people were Wood-elves, of course … They differed from the High Elves of the West, and were more dangerous and less wise. For most of them (together with their scattered relations in the hills and mountains) were descended from the ancient tribes that never went to Faerie in the West. There the Light-elves and the Deep-elves and the Sea-elves went and lived for ages, and grew fairer and wiser and more learned, and invented their magic and their cunning craft in the making of beautiful and marvellous things, before some came back into the Wide World.

  These last words refer to the rebellious Noldor who left Valinor and in Middle-earth became known as the Exiles.

  SHORT GLOSSARY OF OBSOLETE, ARCHAIC AND RARE WORDS

  affray attack, assault

  ambuscaded placed in ambuscade, ambushed

  ardour burning heat (of breath)

  argent silver or silvery-white

  astonied earlier form of astonished

  bested beset [also spelt bestead]

  blow bloom

  boss raised centre of a shield

  broidure embroidery

  burg a walled town

  byrnie coat of mail

  car chariot

  carle peasant or servant

  chrysoprase a golden-green precious stone

  conch shellfish used as a musical instrument or instrument of call

  cravenhood cowardice [apparently unique here]

  damascened etched or inlaid with gold or silver

  descry catch sight of

  diapered diamond-patterned

  dight arrayed

  drake dragon. Old English draca.

  drolleries something amusing or funny

  emprise enterprise

  fain gladly, willingly

  fell (1) cruel, terrible (2) mountain

  glistering sparkling

  greave armour for the shin

  hauberk defensive armour, long tunic of chain-mail

  illfavoured having an unpleasant appearance, ugly

  kirtle garment reaching to the knees or lower

  lappet small fold of a garment

  leaguer/-ed [lands] besiege/-d

  lealty faithfulness, loyalty

  let allowed (if occasion let, let fashion)

  malachite a green mineral

  marges margins or edges

  mattock two-headed agricultural tool

  mead meadow

  meshed entangled inextricably

  plash splash

  plenished filled up

  puissance power, strength, force

  reck take thought of

  rede counsel

  repair go frequently to

  repast food; meal, feast

  rowan mountain ash

  ruth sorrow, distress

  sable black

  scathe harm

  sojourned stayed

  sward expanse of short grass

  swart dark-hued

  tarry/-ied linger/-ed

  thrall/thralldom slave/slavery

  twain two

  vambrace armour for the fore-arm

  weird fate

  whin gorse

  whortleberry bilberry

  writhen twisted, arranged in coils

  THE HOUSE OF BËOR

  THE PRINCES OF THE NOLDOR

  MAP OF BELERIAND

  WORKS BY J.R.R. TOLKIEN

  THE HOBBIT

  LEAF BY NIGGLE

  ON FAIRY-STORIES

  FARMER GILES OF HAM

  THE HOMECOMING OF BEORHTNOTH

  THE LORD OF THE RINGS

  THE ADVENTURES OF TOM BOMBADIL

  THE ROAD GOES EVER ON (WITH DONALD SWANN)

  SMITH OF WOOTTON MAJOR

  Works published posthumously

  SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN KNIGHT, PEARL AND SIR ORFEO*

  THE FATHER CHRISTMAS LETTERS

  THE SILMARILLION*

  PICTURES BY J.R.R. TOLKIEN*

  UNFINISHED TALES*

  THE LETTERS OF J.R.R. TOLKIEN*

  FINN AND HENGEST

  MR BLISS

  THE MONSTERS AND THE CRITICS & OTHER ESSAYS*

  ROVERANDOM

  THE CHILDREN OF HÚRIN*

  THE LEGEND OF SIGURD AND GUDRÚN*

  THE FALL OF ARTHUR*

  BEOWULF: A TRANSLATION AND COMMENTARY*

  THE STORY OF KULLERVO

  BEREN AND LÚTHIEN*

  The History of Middle-earth – by Christopher Tolkien

  I THE BOOK OF LOST TALES, PART ONE

  II THE BOOK OF LOST TALES, PART TWO

  III THE LAYS OF BELERIAND

  IV THE SHAPING OF MIDDLE-EARTH

  V THE LOST ROAD AND OTHER WRITINGS

  VI THE RETURN OF THE SHADOW

  VII THE TREASON OF ISENGARD

  VIII THE WAR OF THE RING

  IX SAURON DEFEATED

  X MORGOTH’S RING

  XI THE WAR OF THE JEWELS

  XII THE PEOPLES OF MIDDLE-EARTH

  * Edited by Christopher Tolkien

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