The Dark Powers of Tolkien Read online

  THE DARK

  POWERS

  OF TOLKIEN

  To my sister, Patrice Day

  Thunder Bay Press

  An imprint of Printers Row Publishing Group

  10350 Barnes Canyon Road, Suite 100, San Diego, CA 92121

  www.thunderbaybooks.com

  Text copyright © David Day 2019

  Artwork, design and layout copyright © Octopus Publishing Group Ltd 2019

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

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  All notations of errors or omissions should be addressed to Thunder Bay Press, Editorial Department, at the above address. All other correspondence (author inquiries, permissions) concerning the content of this book should be addressed to Pyramid, an imprint of Octopus Publishing Group Ltd Carmelite House, 50 Victoria Embankment, London EC4Y 0DZ www.octopusbooks.co.uk

  THUNDER BAY PRESS

  Publisher: Peter Norton

  Associate Publisher: Ana Parker

  Publishing/Editorial Team: April Farr, Kelly Larsen, Kathryn C. Dalby

  Editorial Team: JoAnn Padgett, Melinda Allman, Traci Douglas

  PYRAMID

  Publisher: Lucy Pessell

  Designer: Lisa Layton

  Editor: Sarah Vaughan

  Copyeditor: Robert Anderson

  Senior Production Manager: Peter Hunt

  Note: All illustration credits correspond to pages in the printed book.

  Illustrations by Jaroslav Bradac (134–5), Tim Clarey (25), Alan Curless (129, 137, 154, 182–3, 198–9, 242–3), David Frankland (80–1), Melvin Grant (107) Sam Hadley (27), Pauline Martin (130) Mauro Mazzara (cover, 54, 68–9, 70–1, 100, 148, 151, 159, 164–5, 170–1, 174, 190, 204–5, 213, 216–7, 222, 226–7, 230–1, 233, 239, 240–1), Ian Miller (16–17, 22, 23, 42, 49, 50, 58, 63, 66, 74, 93, 99, 104–5, 111, 116, 120–1, 124, 129, 142, 144–5, 200–1, 202, 214–5, 219, 220–1, 236–7), Andrew Mockett (76–7, 108, 162, 177, 194–5, 208–9) Andrea Piparo (34–5, 90, 94, 186–7, 192–3, 196–7, 248–9), Lidia Postma (207), Kip Rasmussen (21, 28, 37, 41, 45, 60, 83, 84–5, 99, 119, 124, 134–5, 179, 247)

  eBook ISBN: 978-1-68412-772-6

  eBook Edition: December 2018

  This book has not been prepared, authorized, licensed or endorsed by J. R. R. Tolkien’s heirs or estate, nor by any of the publishers or distributors of the book The Lord of the Rings or any other work written by J. R. R. Tolkien, nor anyone involved in the creation, production or distribution of the films based on the book.

  THE DARK

  POWERS

  OF TOLKIEN

  DAVID DAY

  CONTENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  CHART: A CHRONOLOGY OF MIDDLE-EARTH AND THE UNDYING LANDS

  PART ONE:

  MELKOR AND THE ORIGIN OF EVIL

  Melkor – “He Who Arises in Might”

  Morgoth – “The Dark Enemy”

  CHART: DARK FORCES OF MIDDLE-EARTH

  Ungoliant, the “Dark Terror”

  PART TWO:

  MORGOTH THE DARK ENEMY IN THE FIRST AGE

  Gothmog, “Lord of Balrogs”

  CHART: WARS OF BELERIAND

  Boldog, “Orc Captain of Angband”

  Trolls of Angband

  Glaurung, “Father of Dragons”

  Draugluin, “Father of Werewolves”

  Ulfang, The Black Easterling

  Ancalagon, The Winged Fire-drake

  PART THREE:

  SAURON THE RING LORD IN THE SECOND AGE

  CHART: THE SECOND AGE OF THE SUN

  Sauron, “Dark Lord of Mordor”

  Annatar, “Lord of Gifts”

  Nazgûl, The Ringwraiths

  CHART: SAURON AND THE RINGS OF POWER

  Númenóreans, “Men of Atlantis”

  Ar-Pharazôn the Golden

  Dark Lords and Dark Knights

  Battle of Dagorlad

  CHART: RINGS OF POWER – SECOND AGE

  Sauron Vanquished

  PART FOUR:

  SAURON THE NECROMANCER IN THE THIRD AGE

  The Necromancer of Dol Guldur

  CHART: SAURON IN THE THIRD AGE

  CHART: HISTORY OF THE RINGS OF POWER – THIRD AGE

  Sorcerers and Rings

  Sauron and the “Great Eye”

  Easterings of Rhûn and Khand

  CHART: EASTERLINGS AND SOUTHRON ALLIES

  Southrons of Umbar and Haradrim

  CHART: EASTERLINGS AND SOUTHRON WARS

  The Witch-king of Angmar

  CHART: WARS OF THE WITCH-KING OF ANGMAR

  The Witch-king of Minas Morgul

  CHART: WARS OF THE WITCH-KING OF MINAS MORGUL

  Goblins, Orcs and Uruk-hai

  Trolls and Olog-hai

  CHART: ORCS AND DRAGONS – THIRD AGE

  Scatha the Worm

  Smaug, the Golden Dragon of Erebor

  PART FIVE:

  THE WAR OF THE RING

  CHART: BATTLES OF THE WAR OF THE RING

  Black Riders in the Shire

  Barrow-wights of Eriador

  Durin’s Bane, the Balrog of Moria

  Sméagol–Gollum and the Ring

  CHART: HISTORY OF SMÉAGOL–GOLLUM

  Saruman, the Wizard of Isengard

  CHART: HISTORY OF SARUMAN THE ISTARI

  Shelob, the Great Spider of Cirith Ungol

  The Witch-king and the Battle of Pelennor Fields

  Sauron and the Fires of Doom

  INDEX

  Without villains, there can be no heroes. The narrative drive of any heroic tale is dependent on the formidable challenge posed by its darkest forces. Consequently, we often discover that the reader’s fascination with any story is related less to the virtues of the hero and rather more to the machinations of the villain and his or her evil alliance with dark powers.

  “The Devil has all the best tunes” is an old adage in music that applies equally to literature, and there are few authors who can rival J. R. R. Tolkien in his creation of archetypal villains, races of evil beings, supernatural entities and terrifying monsters. Indeed, his inventive creations in Middle-earth include all manner of things: evil and good, high and low, remarkable and ordinary. As Tolkien once explained: “Without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless.”

  It was William Blake who infamously argued that Milton’s portrayal of Satan in Paradise Lost was so magnificent that, like any true poet, he was “of the Devil’s party without knowing it”. One might perhaps say something similar about Tolkien’s creation of two truly satanic villains: Melkor, the “Beginner of Evil”, and his disciple Sauron, the “Lord of the Rings”.

  In The Dark Powers of Tolkien, we examine both these mighty antagonistic forces at work in Tolkien’s writing and the very nature of evil itself. As a Christian medieval scholar, Tolkien’s profound moral and philosophical convictions deeply inform the narrative that plays out in his imaginary pre- or extra-Christian world.

  The most common fatal flaw of his antagonists is consistent with the biblical proverb “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18). Aristotle defined this kind of pride as hubris, the tragic flaw of noble characters who
se downfall is the result of arrogance or overconfidence. Indeed, throughout Tolkien’s writing, there is an element of pride and the desire for power, wealth or fame that often overcomes the most worthy and the most unworthy alike.

  In Tolkien’s own view, within the world of Elves and Men, “evil can and does arise from an apparently good root, the desire to benefit the world and others”. This may result in the pursuit of power and the imposition of one will over the many, which inevitably end in tyranny, or, in Tolkien’s own words, “in sheer Domination”. There are other motives, of course: the pursuit of knowledge at the cost of wisdom, as seen in such vivid examples as Sauron and Saruman; and the very human desire to escape death and seek immortality, as evidenced by Tolkien’s Atlantis-like tale of Akallabêth, telling the story of the downfall of Númenor.

  In The Heroes of Tolkien, I argued that the bloodlines of heroes were of immense importance in Tolkien, and showed how they could be traced back over thousands of years to their semi-divine origins. I also pointed out that the often immense backstories of Tolkien’s heroes and heroines are deeply intertwined with those of their ancestors and ultimately linked to the fates of dynasties and nations.

  The same is certainly true of Tolkien’s villains and dark forces. To entirely understand ancient feuds and hatreds between nations, races and empires in The Lord of the Rings, one must explore thousands of years of Middle-earth history back to the days before the lands of Beleriand and the kingdom of Númenor sank beneath the seas. And to fully understand the source of evil directing events in the War of the Ring we must look back into the forces that brought about the creation of Arda (the earth) itself – and even a time before the World and Time itself came into existence.

  The Dark Powers of Tolkien is organized in such a manner as to place the emergence and evolution of those powers in their appropriate historical context and chronological order. This has been done to provide readers – particularly those of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings – with insights into the deeper (and often hidden) motives for the actions of many of Tolkien’s villains and their allies.

  The books in this series collectively make up a reference library on the creative works of J. R. R. Tolkien and his world of Middle-earth and the Undying Lands. They are assembled with a view towards the author’s ambition to create a mythology for England. With this in mind, these books consistently examine Tolkien’s writing in the context of the myths and literature of other nations of the world. This was a perspective that was immensely important to Tolkien. Consequently, the series often attempts to trace the mythological, historical and philological sources of Tolkien’s inspiration. At other times, the commentaries examine other mythologies, historical documents and literatures that have themes, characters and events in common with Tolkien’s original tales.

  As with all the books in this series, The Dark Powers of Tolkien is written and illustrated in a way that is both informative and accessible to the general reader. All the illustrations, charts and commentaries in The Dark Powers of Tolkien are meant as guides and aids to the reading and comprehension of Tolkien’s works. These are handbooks that attempt to give new and entertaining perspectives on Tolkien’s world, but are no substitute for the reading of the works themselves.

  A CHRONOLOGY OF MIDDLE-EARTH AND THE UNDYING LANDS

  MELKOR

  AND THE

  ORIGIN OF

  EVIL

  MELKOR – “HE WHO ARISES IN MIGHT”

  In Ainulindalë – Tolkien’s creation story – Melkor, “He Who Arises in Might”, is portrayed as the most powerful, inventive and magnificent of the angelic powers known as the Ainur, “Holy Ones”. These are the angelic beings who, at the command of Eru, the One (God), take part in the “Great Music” of Creation, as a kind of heavenly choir.

  In Tolkien’s pre- or extra-Christian world, Melkor most resembles the Old Testament rebel archangel Lucifer, who provoked a war in heaven. John Milton’s magnificently rebellious Lucifer–Satan in Paradise Lost, too, has much in common with Melkor–Morgoth in his many wars with the Valar, the Angelic Powers of Arda.

  Just as Lucifer questioned the ways of God, so Melkor asks why the Ainur cannot be allowed to compose their own music and bring forth life and worlds of their own. This is the nub of Melkor’s complaint: he wants to have freedom from tyranny over his spirit and freedom to have mastery over his own creations, just as Lucifer proclaimed his own desire to create things of his own in a manner equal to God.

  Melkor the Vala descends on to Arda

  Dungeons of Utumno

  Both Tolkien’s Melkor and Milton’s Lucifer are legitimately heroic in their steadfast “courage never to submit or yield”; however, in truth, both rebel angels are primarily motivated by overweening pride and envy. It is worth noting how, in Paradise Lost, Satan’s minions relate to him: “Towards him they bend / With awful reverence prone; and as a God / Extol him equal to the highest in Heaven.” It is a description that is comparable to Melkor enthroned in his subterranean halls, and reveals the true motive of both antagonists: to become God the Creator themselves.

  Tolkien informs us that Melkor “had been given the greatest gifts of power and knowledge”, and how, when he first entered Arda, “he descended in power and majesty greater than any other of the Valar”. However, once within the world, Melkor became akin to a black cloud and a nightmare loosed upon the waking world. In the Iron Mountains in the northern wastes of Middle-earth, Melkor built his fortress of Utumno and dug the foundations of his armoury and dungeon of Angband. Thereafter, Melkor waged five great wars against the Valar. These wars, before the rising of the first moon and sun and the arrival of Men within the spheres of the world are comparable to the cosmological myths of the ancient Greeks, in which the unruly giant Titans of the earth rose up to fight the Gods, causing mountain ranges to rise and seas to fall. Ultimately, the titanic forces of the earth were conquered and forced underground, just as Melkor’s forces are defeated in those primeval wars with the Valar.

  For, as Tolkien explains, Melkor’s fall is also a moral one: “From splendour he fell through arrogance to contempt for all things … He began with the desire for Light, but when he could not possess it for himself alone, he descended through fire and wrath into a great burning, down into Darkness.” And so, Melkor – like Lucifer – brings corruption into the World. All evil that is, was or will be in Tolkien’s world has its beginning in Melkor, but in his beginnings Melkor, again like Lucifer, was not evil.

  Just as Melkor was Morgoth’s name before his flight from Valinor and return to Middle-earth, Lucifer was Satan’s name before his fall in a war of angels in heaven. It was an event recorded in the Gospel of Luke: “I saw Satan fall like lightning from Heaven.”

  Certainly, by the time of Dante and Milton, Lucifer (meaning “light-bringer”) and Satan (meaning “accuser” or “slanderer”) had become interchangeable as the name for the Devil. Furthermore, Lucifer, with his biblical epithet “Lucifer son of Morning”, was universally recognized as the name for the Morning Star, the brightest “star” in heaven, the planet Venus.

  It is of course ironic that Lucifer the bringer of light becomes Satan the bringer of darkness. It is doubly ironic in Tolkien’s world, where the Morning Star is the Silmaril carried into the heavens by Eärendil the Mariner, who in the final Great Battle leads the Host of Valar in a war of annihilation against the Dark Enemy and all his allies. And Morgoth, like Satan, is hurled out into the Abyss for ever.

  Satan

  MORGOTH, “THE DARK ENEMY”

  Melkor’s transformation into Morgoth, the “Dark Enemy of the World”, coincides with his return to Middle-earth and his subterranean fortress in the “Iron Hell” of Angband in Beleriand. Like the fallen Lucifer, transformed into Satan on his throne in Hell, Morgoth in Angband gathers about him other fallen rebel beings and a multitude of evil and twisted forms of life. Among Satan’s great allies were Mammon, Beelzebub, Belial and Moloch, while about Morgoth are Balrogs, O
rcs, Trolls, Werewolves and Serpents. Both Satan and Morgoth are loud in their defiance, and the spirit of that defiance is beautifully captured in Satan’s proclamation in Paradise Lost that he would “rather rule in hell than serve in heaven”.

  We might admire these rebel angels if we believed that their defiance was (as they claim) truly in the name of liberty – however, both lie. Their rebellions are truthfully provoked by envy and the usurpers’ desire to become tyrants themselves. As Milton confirmed, Satan’s true motive was to “set himself in glory above his peers”. Never were there two more natural tyrants than Satan and Morgoth.

  Morgoth on the Iron Throne of Angband

  Oromë the Hunter slaying Morgoth’s monsters

  In Morgoth, Tolkien tells us, “we have the power of evil visibly incarnate”. This warrior king is like a great tower, iron-crowned, with black armour and a shield black, vast and blank. He wields the mace called Grond, the Hammer of the Underworld, which strikes down his foes with the force of a thunderbolt. The fire of malice is ever in Morgoth’s eyes, his face is twisted and battle-scarred, and his hands burn perpetually from having come into contact with the phosphorescent fire of the stolen Silmarils.

  Aspects of Morgoth’s dreadful nature can also be found in the tales of the ancient Goths, Germans, Anglo-Saxons and Norse, where similar demonic entities come into conflict with the Gods. The result of this struggle inevitably results in a cataclysmic end of the world known to the Norse as Ragnarök and to the Germans as Götterdämmerung (“Twilight of the Gods”).

  Certainly, Morgoth can be compared to the figure of Loki in Norse myth, the trickster and transformer and the embodiment of discord and chaos. Loki is also quite literally the father of the monstrous beings who will join him in the final battle at the end of the world: Jörmungandr, the world serpent; Hel, the goddess of the Underworld; and Fenrir, the wolf who will devour the sun and the moon. Morgoth is also a master deceiver and creator of discord, and furthermore engenders the great evil of fire-breathing Dragons and winged Fire-drakes in preparation for the final Great Battle with the Powers of Arda at the end of the First Age.