by Codex Regius
Codex Regius
Middle-earth seen by the barbarians
3rd, extended edition
Codex Regius Middle-earth
seen by the barbarians
Non-fiction
3nd, extended edition
Wiesbaden/Ljubljana 2016
Published by: © 2016 Codex RegiusOther collected essays from Lalaith’s Middle-earth Science Pages: (see lalaithmesp.blogspot.de )
The Moon in ‘The Hobbit’ (2014)
Words of Westernesse (2014)
Dynasties of Middle-earth (2015)
All rights reserved.
Authors: Codex Regius (https://codex-regius.eu)Contact: [email protected] Cover and layout: Codex RegiusAndreas Möhn/Metka Klemenćić, Mühlborngasse 1, 65199 Wiesbaden
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Preface
In no case do you get one answer which is universally accepted because it is true: in each case you get a number of totally incompatible answers, one of which is finally adopted as the result of a physical struggle. History is written by the winners.
(George Orwell, “As I Please”,
4 February 1944)
J.R.R. Tolkien has frequently been accused of racist attitudes. Some critics have argued that ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and related books put an uncomfortable emphasis on bloodline, ‘mingling’ and ‘dwindling’, ‘High Men’ and ‘lesser men’, tall white men with grey eyes on the good side and dark, ‘swarthy’ or ‘black’ men on the evil side. Not to mention the author’s notorious comment about orcs looking like the ‘most repulsive Mongol-type’.
But Tolkien was of course well aware of the consequences of racial politics, having survived both World Wars, and there is in fact much evidence found in his texts that the ethnic notions even of the ‘good’ Men of Middle-earth would often have sad consequences. Well-known examples are how the Dúnedain fight the Kin-strife over their idea of racial purity or how the Númenóreans rout the natives along the river Gwathló for no other reason than that they oppose large-scale ecological destruction.
Much more about the darker side of ethnic politics in Middle-earth may be discovered. What would the history of Arda look like if it was written by those who had lost the conflict: minor Mannish peoples whom history had passed over, dismissing them as wild and cowardly barbarians or enemies who knew not sense or reason?
‘The Lord of the Rings’, ‘The Silmarillion’ and the books that followed tell us much about the epic fight of the Elves and their human allies - the Edain, the Númenoreans, the Dúnedain and the Men of Rohan - against the Dark Lords and their subjects. But we hear little about how the lesser peoples perceived this struggle: those Mannish folks who sometimes just happened to dwell on the wrong side of the border or wisely tried to stay out of the conflicts fought during their lifetime. Their story was never compiled and only shows up in short references, spread over many different sources. Yet it is worth to do these peoples justice and to extract from the available material what can be found of their lost history.
‘Middle-earth seen by the barbarians’ developed from a series of online essays that I once published on ‘Lalaith’s Middle-earth Science Pages’. For this printed version I updated the contents and added images and illustrations, and I revised the structure of the chapters so that you may comfortably immerse into some lesser known aspects of the complex and diversified history of Man in Middle-earth. This omnibus includes Vol. 1 of the original ‘Middle-earth seen by the barbarians’ on the history of the indigenous peoples in Eriador and Gondor - the Middle Men - and Vol. 2 on the Men of Darkness in the east and south and the third Realm in Exile: the lordship of Umbar, now with full-colour maps and, for the first time, including data from the original Baynes map of Middle-earth. As a bonus, a previously unpublished essay on the Men of Angmar and the Hillmen of Rhúdaur is included in this new edition.
I shall assume that you are familiar with the main corpus of the stories of Middle-earth: ‘The Lord of the Rings’, ‘The Silmarillion’ and ‘Unfinished Tales’; some additional material is found in ‘The Peoples of Middle-earth’. Quotes from these and other sources are referenced with abbreviations that indicate the title of the source text. For some books, the quoted chapter is also included. For example, LP refers to ‘The Languages and Peoples of the Third Age’, otherwise known as Appendix F of ‘The Lord of the Rings’.
If you are interested in more discussions of J.R.R. Tolkien’s fictional world of Middle-earth, check out Codex Regius’ other volumes: ‘Words of Westernesse’, ’Dynasties of Middle-earth’ and ‘The Moon in “The Hobbit”’.
More essays on Tolkien’s works that have been released for free are available on ‘Lalaith’s Middle-earth Science Pages’:
http://lalaithmesp.blogspot.de/
List of Abbreviations
AA ‘The Annals of Aman’, in: The War of the Jewels, 1994.
AD ‘Aelfwine and Dírhaval’ in: The War of the Jewels, 1994.
AE ‘Aldarion and Erendis’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
AF ‘Atrabeth Finrod ah Andreth’, in: Morgoth’s Ring, 1993.
AG ‘Of Tuor and his Arrival in Gondolin’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
AI J.R.R. Tolkien - Artist and Illustrator, by W. Hammond and Chr. Scull, 1995.
AK ‘The Akallabêth’ in: The Silmarillion, 1977.
AL ‘The Appendix on Languages’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
ATB The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, 1961
CE ‘Cirion and Éorl’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
CG The Complete Guide to Middle-earth, by R. Foster, 1978.
Co The Tolkien Companion, by J. E. A. Tyler, 1976.
DA ‘The Drowning of Anadune’, in: Sauron Defeated, 1991.
DM ‘Of Dwarves and Men’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
DN ‘A Description of Númenor’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
EL ‘Tar-Elmar’ in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
FI ‘The Battles at the Fords of Isen’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
FR The Fellowship of the Ring, 1965.
GA ‘The Grey Annals’ in: The War of the Jewels, 1994.
GC ‘The History of Galadriel and Celeborn’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
GF ‘The Disaster of the Gladden Fields’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
GL ‘The Grammar and Lexicon of the Gnomish Tongue’ = Gilson, Ch. et al.: Parma Eldalamberon 11
GN ‘Guide to the Names in the Lord of the Rings’, in: A Tolkien Compass, by J. Lobdell, 1974
H The Hobbit, 1937/1966 (chapters given in Roman numerals)
HA ‘The History of the Akallabêth’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
HE ‘The Heirs of Elendil’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996
HH ‘Narn i Hín Húrin’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
HH1 ‘The History of the Hobbit, Part 1’, by John E. Rateliff, 2007
HH2 ‘The History of the Hobbit, Part 2’, by John E. Rateliff, 2008
HoMe The History of Mi
ddle-earth. Vol. I to XII.
HR ‘The Hunt for the Ring’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
KR ‘Annals of the Kings and Rulers’, Appendix A in: The Return of the King, 1965.
L# Letter No. #, in: The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, 1981.
LE ‘The Line of Elros’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
LP ‘The Languages and Peoples of the Third Age’, Appendix F in: The Return of the King, 1965.
LQ ‘The Later Quenta Silmarillion’ in: The War of the Jewels, 1994.
LR The Lord of the Rings, 1965 ff.
LW ‘Last Writings: The Five Wizards’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
MR Morgoth’s Ring, The History of Middle-earth, Vol. X, 1993.
MT ‘Myths Transformed’, in: Morgoth’s Ring, 1993.
NC ‘The Notion Club Papers’, in: Sauron Defeated, 1991.
NE ‘Of the Naugrim and the Edain’, in: The War of the Jewels, 1994
NW ‘Noldorin Word-lists’, in: Gilson, Ch. et al.: Parma Eldalamberon 13
PBD Tolkien’s Draft of the Pauline Baynes map, published in 2015
PBM The Pauline Baynes map, 1970
PM The Peoples of Middle-earth, The History of Middle-earth, Vol. XII, 1996.
PR ‘The Problem of Ros’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996.
QE ‘The Quest for Erebor’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
QL ‘Qenyaqetsa – The Qenya Phonology and Lexicon’ = Gilson, Ch. et al.: Parma Eldalamberon 12
QS ‘The Later Quenta Silmarillion’, in: The War of the Jewels, 1994
Q&A ‘Quendi and Eldar’, in: The War of the Jewels, 1994
RA Lowdham`s Report on Adunaic, in: Sauron Defeated, 1991.
RK The Return of the King, 1965.
RP ‘Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age’ in: The Silmarillion, 1977.
RS The Return of the Shadow, The History of Middle-earth, Vol. VI, 1988
S The Silmarillion, 1977.
TA ‘The Ainulindalë’, in: The Silmarillion, 1977.
TC ‘The Calendars ‘, Appendix D in: The Return of the King, 1965.
TD ‘The Drúedain’ in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
TE ‘The Etymologies’, in: The Lost Road and other Writings, 1987.
TG ‘Of Tuor and his Arrival in Gondolin’, in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
TI ‘The Istari’, in: Unfinished Tales, 1980.
TM The Atlas of Middle-earth, by K.W. Fonstad, 1981/1991.
TR The Treason of Isengard, The History of Middle-earth, Vol. VII, 1989
TT The Two Towers, 1965.
TY ‘The Tale of Years’, Appendix B in: The Return of the King, 1965.
UT Unfinished Tales, 1980.
WH ‘The Wanderings of Húrin’ in: The War of the Jewels, 1994.
WJ The War of the Jewels, The History of Middle-earth, Vol. XI, 1994.
WP ‘Word, Phrases and Passages in various tongues in The Lord of the Rings’, in: Gilson, Ch.: Parma Eldalamberon 17, 2007
WS ‘Writing and Spelling’, Appendix E in: The Return of the King, 1965.
YF ‘The Tale of Years [of the First Age]’, in: The War of the Jewels, 1994
YS ‘The Tale of Years of the Second Age’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996
YT ‘The Tale of Years of the Third Age’, in: The Peoples of Middle earth, 1996
FA First Age
SA Second Age
TA Third Age
TABLE OF CONTENTS
The indigenous peoples of Eriador and Gondor
Nomenclature
Migrations in the First Age Drúedain, Southern Atani and Bórrim
The Second Age Before the Númenórean colonisation
The Third Age The Middle Men of Arnor and the Hillmen of Angmar and Rhúdaur
The Lossoth and the Forodwaith
The Culture
Their Origin: the Forodwaith
The Lossoth and the Dúnedain
The lost history of the Men of Darkness
Geography
Cultural features The Swarthy Men
History The First Age
The third Realm in Exile
2280 - 3320 SA:Númenórean Period
3320 - 3441 SA: Sauronian Period
3441 SA - 1050 TA: Ancient Realm
1050 - 1448 TA: Gondorian Period
1448- 1810 TA: Middle Realm. Castamirion Dynasty
1810 - 1944 TA: Interregnum
1944 - 3019 TA: New Realm
The last Black Númenórean
The mysterious king Bladorthin
Was Bladorthin Elf or Man?
When did Bladorthin place his order?
Bladorthin and his age
The hidden history of Dorwinion
THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES OF ERIADOR AND GONDOR
and their relationships to the Númenóreans and their allies
In the Third Age of Arda, historians and philosophers of the Dúnedain seem to have developed an odd classification scheme for Mannish peoples. It was derived from their political view but often used to defend nationalistic or racist claims that had been prevalent even among the ‘Free Peoples’ of Middle-earth.
The Dúnedain who were Third-Age descendants of Westernesse or Númenor, the island that sunk in the late Second Age, obviously placed themselves at the top of the list. They thought of themselves as Elf-Friends or High Men of the West, which was intended to suggest cultural as well as genetic superiority. Below them were the Middle Men arranged, the descendants of those peoples that had never lived in Númenor yet were considered distant relatives of the Edain, though often dismissed as ‘wild’. They included, among others, the Éothéod and Rohirrim, the Pre-Númenóreans of Eriador and Gondor and sometimes even the Drúedain, whose history is told in TD and shall not be repeated here. The third and lowest class is comprised of the Men of Darkness, most often simply called ‘Enemies’.
A troop of pre-Haladin on the march
NOMENCLATURE
Ethnographic terminology in the sources is often confusing. According to S, the Quenya term Atani was a generic word for Men (already applied to them in Valinor, WPP) while the Sindarin equivalent Edain was more or less limited to the Three Houses who had first entered Beleriand, or Elendili (Elf-friends).
‘But when the Eldar became aware of other kinds of Men … they distinguished the Elendili as Núnatani, Dúnedain (pl. of Dúnadan) “western men”. … Other men were called Hrónatani, rhúnedain;’ - that is: Easterlings, Eastrons -, ‘but more commonly Hrávani (S Rhovain) “Wild-men, Savages”’ (WPP) This latter expression is of course pejorative and should be avoided in serious discussions.
The Three Houses, or tribes, were subsequently most often referred to by the names of their most renown leaders: Bëorians or Bëorrim, Hadorians (though their original leader had been a certain Marach) and Haladin, who were sometimes renamed Haladin or Haladin. But though the eponymic heroes Bëor, Hador and Haleth had all lived in Beleriand, the same epithets are often indiscriminatingly applied to their ancestors from the times before they had reached the West of Middle-earth.
The matter is further blurred by LP referring to ‘Atani’ as the native tongue of Edain though it was only spoken by Hadorians and Bëorians while the language of the Haladin was entirely distinct. Another epithet is ‘the Lesser Folk’, as PR refers to the first Bëorians from the time when they became distinct from the Hadorians. (Lesser seems to refer to number here, not to quality.) Hence, we may infer a Greater Folk of Hadorian origin, though this is nowhere stated.
To simplify the further discussion, it may help standardise the nomenclature in the following, non-canonical, manner:
Northern Atani: the common ancestors of Bëorians and Hadorians. Southern Atani: the Haladin. This distinction is based on their migratory pattern.
pre-Bëorrim, pre-Marachrim, pre-Haladin: the ancestors of the three Edainic peoples, canonically also known as Atanatári or Fathers of Men, before they entered Beleriand, including their kinsmen who separated from them before they
crossed the Ered Luin mountain range. Marach’s name is preferred here because he preceded Hador as the leader of his tribe.
Bëorians, Hadorians, Haladin (Halethrim): Canonical terms for Dúnedain in Beleriand and their later descendants, including scattered groups who left Beleriand during the First Age.
Bórrim: Rhúnedain, the Swarthy Men, led by Bór, who settled in Eriador and Beleriand, originally unrelated to the Atani but merging with them and absorbed by them.
Middle Men: Canonical term officially referring to the Second Age descendants of the Northern Atani in Eriador, including Edain who had left Beleriand and did not relocate to Númenor in the early Second Age. In the Third Age, this term described all Men who were not Dúnedain but generally on good terms with them, including the Northmen and particularly the Rohirrim.
pre-Númenóreans: Second and Third Age descendants of the Southern Atani who were scattered from southern Eriador to Umbar, including the Dunlendings and the Men of Bree.
Few data on the indigenous Mannish peoples have survived the First Age. The Elves of Beleriand did not look beyond the Ered Luin while early Men possessed no written records. It can be deduced that they immigrated into the north-west of Middle-earth on at least two distinct paths, one leading them through the far North, the other through the South. The latter road was taken earlier, and not by Atani.
‘Historians in Gondor believed that the first Men to cross the Anduin were indeed the Drúedain. They came (it was believed) from lands south of Mordor, but before they reached the coasts of Haradwaith they turned north into Ithilien, and eventually finding a way across the Anduin (probably near Cair Andros) settled in the vales of the White Mountains and the wooded lands at their northern feet. ”They were a secretive people, suspicious of other kinds of Men by whom they had been harried and persecuted as long as they could remember, and they wandered west seeking a land where they could be hidden and have peace.”’ (TD) Hence, the Drúedain or ‘”Pukel-Men” occupied the White Mountains (on both sides) in the First Age.’ (TD)
