II.
POEMS EARLY ABANDONED.
During his time at the University of Leeds my father embarked on five
distinct poetical works concerned with the matter of the mythology; but
three of these went no further than the openings. This chapter treats each
of them in turn.
(i) The Flight of the Noldoli.
There do not seem to be any certain indications of the date of this brief
poem in alliterative verse in relation to The Children of Hurin (though it
is worth noticing that already in the earliest of the three texts of The
Flight of the Noldoli Feanor's son Cranthir is so named, whereas this
form only arose by emendation of Cranthor in the typescript text of the
Lay (line 1719)). However, both from its general air and from various
details it can be seen that it comes from the same time; and since it seems
unlikely that (on the one hand) my father would have embarked on a new
poem in alliterative verse unless he had laid the other aside, or that (on
the other) he would have returned to this mode once he was fully engaged
on a long poem in rhyming couplets, I think it very probable that
The Flight of the Noldoli comes from the earlier part of 1925 (see
PP. 3, 81).
Each of the three manuscripts of the poem (A, B, and C) is differently
titled: A has The Flight of the Gnomes as sung in the Halls of
Thingol; B (pencilled in later) Flight of the Gnomes; C The Flight of
the Noldoli from Valinor. A has emendations that are taken up in the
text of B, and B has emendations taken up in C; almost all are characteris-
tic metrical/verbal rearrangements, as for example in line 17:
A in anguish mourning, emended to the reading of B;
B and in anguish mourn, emended to the reading of C;
C mourning in anguish.
As generally in this book, earlier variants that have no bearing on
names or story are not cited. Each text ends at the same point, but three
further lines are roughly written in the margin of A (see note to line 146).
I give now the text of the third version, C.
THE FLIGHT OF THE NOLDOLI
FROM VALINOR.
A! the Trees of Light, tall and shapely,
gold and silver, more glorious than the sun,
than the moon more magical, o'er the meads of the Gods
their fragrant frith and flowerladen
gardens gleaming, once gladly shone. 5
In death they are darkened, they drop their leaves
from blackened branches bled by Morgoth
and Ungoliant the grim the Gloomweaver.
In spider's form despair and shadow
a shuddering fear and shapeless night 10
she weaves in a web of winding venom
that is black and breathless. Their branches fail,
the light and laughter of their leaves are quenched.
Mirk goes marching, mists of blackness,
through the halls of the Mighty hushed and empty, 15
the gates of the Gods are in gloom mantled.
Lo! the Elves murmur mourning in anguish,
but no more shall be kindled the mirth of Cor
in the winding ways of their walled city,
towercrowned Tun, whose twinkling lamps 20
are drowned in darkness. The dim fingers
of fog come floating from the formless waste
and sunless seas. The sound of horns,
of horses' hooves hastening wildly
in hopeless hunt, they hear afar, 25
where the Gods in wrath those guilty ones
through mournful shadow, now mounting as a tide
o'er the Blissful Realm, in blind dismay
pursue unceasing. The city of the Elves
is thickly thronged. On threadlike stairs 30
carven of crystal countless torches
stare and twinkle, stain the twilight
and gleaming balusters of green beryl.
A vague rumour of rushing voices,
as myriads mount the marble paths, 35
there fills and troubles those fair places
wide ways of Tun and walls of pearl.
Of the Three Kindreds to that clamorous throng
are none but the Gnomes in numbers drawn.
The Elves of Ing to the ancient halls 40
and starry gardens that stand and gleam
upon Timbrenting towering mountain
that day had climbed to the cloudy-domed
mansions of Manwe for mirth and song.
There Bredhil the Blessed the bluemantled, 45
the Lady of the heights as lovely as the snow
in lights gleaming of the legions of the stars,
the cold immortal Queen of mountains,
too fair and terrible too far and high
for mortal eyes, in Manwe's court 50
sat silently as they sang to her.
The Foam-riders, folk of waters,
Elves of the endless echoing beaches,
of the bays and grottoes and the blue lagoons,
of silver sands sown with moonlit, 55
starlit, sunlit, stones of crystal,
paleburning gems pearls and opals,
on their shining shingle, where now shadows groping
clutched their laughter, quenched in mourning
their mirth and wonder, in amaze wandered 60
under cliffs grown cold calling dimly,
or in shrouded ships shuddering waited
for the light no more should be lit for ever.
But the Gnomes were numbered by name and kin,
marshalled and ordered in the mighty square 65
upon the crown of Cor. There cried aloud
the fierce son of Finn. Flaming torches
he held and whirled in his hands aloft,
those hands whose craft the hidden secret
knew, that none Gnome or mortal 70
hath matched or mastered in magic or in skill.
'Lo! slain is my' sire by the sword of fiends,
his death he has drunk at the doors of his hall
and deep fastness, where darkly hidden
the Three were guarded, the things unmatched 75
that Gnome and Elf and the Nine Valar
can never remake or renew on earth,
recarve or rekindle by craft or magic,
not Feanor Finn's son who fashioned them of yore -
the light is lost whence he lit them first, 80
the fate of Faerie hath found its hour
Thus the witless wisdom its reward hath earned
of the Gods' jealousy, who guard us here
to serve them, sing to them in our sweet cages,
to contrive them gems and jewelled trinkets, 85
their leisure to please with our loveliness,
while they waste and squander work of ages,
nor can Morgoth master in their mansions sitting
at countless councils. Now come ye all,
who have courage and hope! My call harken 90
to flight, to freedom in far places!
The woods of the world whose wide mansions
yet in darkness dream drowned in slumber,
the pathless plains and perilous shores
no moon yet shines on nor mounting dawn 95
in dew and daylight hath drenched for ever,
far better were these for bold footsteps
than gardens of the Gods gloom-encircled
with idleness filled and empty days.
Yea! though the light lit them and the loveliness 100
beyond heart's desire that hath held us slaves
here long and long. But that light is dead.
Our gems are gone, our jewels ravished;
and the Three, my Three, thrice-enchanted
globes of crystal by gleam undying 105
illumined, lit by living splendour
and all hues' essence, their eager flame -
Morgoth has them in his monstrous hold,
my Silmarils. I swear here oaths,
unbreakable bonds to bind me ever, 110
by Timbrenting and the timeless halls
of Bredhil the Blessed that abides thereon -
may she hear and heed - to hunt endlessly
unwearying unwavering through world and sea,
through leaguered lands, lonely mountains, 115
over fens and forest and the fearful snows,
till I find those fair ones, where the fate is hid
of the folk of Elfland and their fortune locked,
where alone now lies the light divine.'
Then his sons beside him, the seven kinsmen, 120
crafty Curufin, Celegorm the fair,
Damrod and Diriel and dark Cranthir,
Maglor the mighty, and Maidros tall
(the eldest, whose ardour yet more eager burnt
than his father's flame, than Feanor's wrath; 125
him fate awaited with fell purpose),
these leapt with laughter their lord beside,
with linked hands there lightly took
the oath unbreakable; blood thereafter
it spilled like a sea and spent the swords 130
of endless armies, nor hath ended yet:
'Be he friend or foe or foul offspring
of Morgoth Bauglir, be he mortal dark
that in after days on earth shall dwell,
shall no law nor love nor league of Gods, 135
no might nor mercy, not moveless fate,
defend him for ever from the fierce vengeance
of the sons of Feanor, whoso seize or steal
or finding keep the fair enchanted
globes of crystal whose glory dies not, 140
the Silmarils. We have sworn for ever! '
Then a mighty murmuring was moved abroad
and the harkening host hailed them roaring:
'Let us go! yea go from the Gods for ever
on Morgoth's trail o'er the mountains of the world 145
to vengeance and victory! Your vows are ours!
The poem ends here (but see note to line 146).
*
NOTES.
41. starry gardens C, starlit domes A, B.
42. Tengwethil's A (with Timbrenting written in margin), Tim-
brenting's B, Timbrenting C (with Taingwethil written in
margin). See note to The Children of Hurin (second version) line
812.
45. Bridhil A, B, C, emended in C to Bredhil; so also at line 112.
107. and all hues' essence: this half-line (in the form all hue's
essence) occurs also in the second version of The Children of
Hurin, line 381, where it is said of the Silmaril of Beren.
111. Tengwethil A, Timbrenting B, C.
134. that in after days on earth shall dwell: this line bracketed
later in pencil in C.
146. There are three roughly-written lines in the margin of the last page
of A which were not taken up in B and C, but which presumably
follow on line 146:
But Finweg cried Fingolfin's son
when his father found that fair counsel,
that wit and wisdom were of worth no more:
'Fools
Commentary on The Flight of the Noldoli.
Sad as it is that this poem was abandoned so soon - when in full mastery
of the alliterative line my father might have gone on to recount the
Kinslaying of Alqualonde, the Prophecy of the North, the crossing of the
Helcaraxe, and the burning of the ships, there is nonetheless in its few
lines much of interest for the study of the development of the legend.
Most notably, there here appears the earliest version of the actual words
of the Feanorian Oath. The Oath was first referred to in the outlines for
Gilfanon's Tale (I. 238, 240):
The Seven Sons of Feanor swore their terrible oath of hatred for ever
against all, Gods or Elves or Men, who should hold the Silmarils
but it was there sworn after the coming of the Elves from Valinor, and after
the death of Feanor. In the present poem is the first appearance of the.
story that the Oath was taken in Valinor before the departure of the
Gnomes. It has also been referred to in The Children of Hurin, lines
631 ff. of the first version, where it is implied that the mountain of
Tain-Gwethil was taken in witness - as it was in The Silmarillion (p. 83):
here (line i x x) Feanor himself swears by Timbrenting that he will never
cease to hunt for the Silmarils.
I cannot explain why line 134
that in after days on earth shall dwell
was bracketed (always a mark of exclusion or at least of doubtful reten-
tion) in the C-text. The line reappears in identical form in the Lay of
Leithian (Canto VI, 1636); cf. The Silmarillion 'Vala, Demon, Elf or
Man as yet unborn'.
The fixed epithets of certain of the Sons of Feanor are changed from
those in The Children of Hurin (see p. 86): Celegorm is now 'the fair'
and Maidros 'the tall', as thev remained; Maglor is 'the mighty' (in The
Silmarillion 'the mighty singer'). The line concerning Maidros
him fate awaited with fell purpose (126)
may show that a form of the story of his end was already in being (in the
Tale of the Nauglafring he survived the attack on Dior the Fair but
nothing more is told of him), but I think it much more likely that it refers
to his capture and maiming by Morgoth.
In Feanor's speech occur two interesting references: to the Nine
Valar, and to his father Finn. The number of the Valar is nowhere stated
in the Lost Tales (where in any case the name includes lesser divine
beings; cf. e.g. I. 65 - 6 'With them came many of those lesser Vali... the
Manir and the Suruli, the sylphs of the airs and of the winds'); but 'the
Nine Valar' are referred to in the 'Sketch of the Mythology' (1926) and
named in the 1930 'Silmarillion'. Manwe, Ulmo, Osse, Aule, Mandos,
Lorien, Tulkas, Orome, and Melko.
Feanor's father has not been named since the tale of The Theft of
Melko and the Darkening of Valinor (I. 145 ff.), where he was called
Bruithwir, slain by Melko. In ?he Children of Hurin there is no
indication that Feanor was akin to other princes of the Gnomes - though
there can be no doubt that by that time he in fact was so. But the essential
features of the Noldorin royal house as it had now emerged and as it was
to remain for many years can now be deduced. In the first version of The
Children of Hurin (line 29 and note) Turgon was the son of Finwe
(actually spelt Finweg), as he had been in the Lost Tales (I. 115), but
this was changed to Finwe's heir, with the note 'he was Fingolfin's son';
and in the second version Turgon the mighty, IFingolfin's son is found
in the text as written (48 - 9). We thus have:
Finwe (Finweg)
|
Fingolfin
Turgon
Further, Finweg appears in The Children of Hurin (first version 1975,
second version 19, 520) as the King of the Gnomes who died in the Battle
of Unnumbered Tears; in two of these cases the name was later changed
to Fingon. In the lines added at the end of the A-text of The Flight of
the Noldoli (note to line 146) Finweg is Fingolfin's son. We can there-
fore add:
Finwe (Finweg)
I
Fin lhn
Finweg Turgon
(> Fingon)
Now in The Flight of the Noldoli Feanor is called Finn's son; and in the
'Sketch of the Mythology' Finn is given as an alternative to Finwe:
The Eldar are divided into three hosts, one under Ingwe (Ing)..., one
under Finwe (Finn) after called the Noldoli...*
Thus Feanor has become Fingolfin's brother:
Finwe (Finweg, Finn)
|
Feanor
Seven sons Finweg Turgon
(> Fingon)
(Only in a later note to lines 1713 - 20 of The Children of Hurin has
Finwe's third son Finrod appeared, father of Felagund, Angrod, Egnor,
and Orodreth.)
Feanor's speech also contains a curious foreknowledge of the making
of the Sun and Moon (92 - 6):
The woods of the world whose wide mansions
yet in darkness dream drowned in slumber,
the pathless plains and perilous shores
no moon yet shines on nor mounting dawn
in dew and daylight hath drenched for ever
Very notable are Feanor's concluding words (117 - 18):
till I find those fair ones, where the fate is hid
of the folk of Elfland and their fortune locked
Cf. The Silmarillion, p. 67: 'Mandos foretold that the fates of Arda lay
locked within them', and Thingol's words to Beren (ibid. p. 167):
'though the fate of Arda lie within the Silmarils, yet you shall hold me
generous'. It is clear that the Silmarils had already gained greatly in
significance since the earliest period of the mythology (see I. 156, 169
note z; II. 259).
In no other version is Feanor seen on this occasion holding flaming
torches in his hands and whirling them aloft.
The lines (38 - g)
Of the Three Kindreds to that clamorous throng
are none but the Gnomes in numbers drawn
go back to the tale of The Flight of the Noldoli (I. 162): 'Now when...
(* In the 1930 'Silmarillion' it is expressly stated that Ing and Finn are the Gnomish forms
of Ingwe and Finwe.)
Feanor sees that far the most of the company is of the kin of the Noldor', on
which I noted (I. 169) 'It is to be remembered that in the old story the
Teleri (i.e. the later Vanyar) had not departed from Kor.' Later evidence
shows that the old story had not been changed; but the fact that in
the present poem the Elves of Ing (Ingwe) were on Timbrenting
(Taniquetil) in the mansions of Manwe and Varda shows the entry of the
later narrative (found in the 'Sketch') of the destruction of the Trees. In
the old tale of The Theft of Melko and the Darkening of Valinor
(I. 143 ff. and commentary I. 157) the great festival was the occasion of
Melko's attack on the place of the Gnomes' banishment northward in
Valinor, the slaying of Feanor's father, and the theft of the Silmarils; and
the destruction of the Trees followed some time afterwards. Now how-
ever the festival is the occasion of the attack on the Trees; the First
Kindred are on Taniquetil but most of the Gnomes are not.
The name by which Varda is here called, Bridhil the Blessed (changed
in C to Bredhil), is found in the old Gnomish dictionary, and also
Timbridhil (I. 269, 273, entries Tinwetari, Varda). On Timbrenting
see p. 127, where the form Tindbrenting occurring in The Children of
Hurin (in a note to second version line 812) is discussed. Both forms are
found in the 'Sketch':
Timbrenting or Tindbrenting in English, Tengwethil in Gnomish,
Taniquetil in Elfin.
The form with -m- is therefore evidently due to a change of pronunciation
in English, ndb > mb.
In line 41 the earlier reading starlit domes, changed to starry
gardens, is probably to be related to the account in the tale of The
Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor of Manwe's abode
on Taniquetil (I. 73):
That house was builded of marbles white and blue and stood amid the
fields of snow, and its roofs were made of a web of that blue air called
ilwe that is above the white and grey. This web did Aule and his wife
contrive, but Varda spangled it with stars, and Manwe dwelt there-
under.
This idea of a roof lit with stars was never lost and appears in a changed
form long after, though it is not mentioned in The Silmarillion.
The lines (21 - 3)
The dim fingers
of fog came floating from the formless waste
and sunless seas
find an echo in The Silmarillion (p.76):
it blew chill from the East in that hour, and the vast shadows of the sea
were rolled against the walls of the shore.
The lines at the end of the A-text (note to line 146) show that Fingolfin
has taken Finwe Noleme's place as the voice of reason and moderation
amid the revolutionary enthusiasm of the Noldoli in the great square of
Kor (see I. 162, 171).
Lastly may be noticed the term 'Foam-riders' used (line 52) of the
Third Kindred (the Solosimpi of the Lost Tales, later the Teleri); this has
been used once before, in AElfwine of England (II. 3I4), where it is said
of AElfwine's mother Eadgifu that when he was born
the Foamriders, the Elves of the Sea-marge, whom she had known of:
old in Lionesse, sent messengers to his birth.
Analysis of the metre of the poem.
At the end of the second text (B) of The Flight of the Noldoli my father
made an analysis of the metrical forms of the first 20 and certain subse-
quent lines. For his analysis and explanation of the Old English metre see
On Translating Beowulf, in The Monsters and the Critics and Other
Essays, 1983, pp. 61 ff. The letters A, + A, B, C, D, E on the left-hand
side of the table refer to the 'types' of Old English half-line; the letters
beneath the analyses of 'lifts' and 'dips' are the alliterations employed in
each line, with 0 used for any vowel (since all vowels 'alliterate' with each
other) and X for a consonant beginning a lift but not forming part of the
alliterative scheme of the line; the words 'full', 'simple', etc. refer to
the nature of the alliterative pattern in each case.
It may be noticed that the scansion of the first half of line 8 (with the
first lift -goli-) shows that the primary stress fell on the second syllable of
Ungoliant; and that sp can only alliterate with sp (lines 9, 130), as in
Old English (the same is of course true of sh, which is a separate
consonant).
(ii) Fragment of an alliterative Lay of Earendel.
There exists one other piece of alliterative verse concerned with the matter
of the Lost Tales, the opening of a poem that has no title and does not
extend far enough to make clear what its subject was to be. The fall of
Gondolin, the escape of the fugitives down the secret tunnel, the fight at
Cristhorn, and the long wandering in the wilds thereafter, are passed
over rapidly in what were to be the introductory lines, and the subject
seems about to appear at the end of the fragment:
all this have others in ancient stories
and songs unfolded, but say I further...
and the concluding lines refer to the sojourn of the fugitives in the Land
of Willows. But at the end of the text my father wrote several times
in different scripts 'Earendel', 'Earendel son of Fengel', 'Earendel
Fengelsson'; and I think it extremely likely, even almost certain, that this
poem was to be a Lay of Earendel. (On Fengel see the next section.)
The text is in the first stage of composition and is exceedingly rough,
but it contains one line of the utmost interest for the history of Earendel.
It is written on examination paper from the University of Leeds and
clearly belongs in time with The Lay of the Children of Hurin and The
Flight of the Noldoli: more than that seems impossible to say.
Lo! the flame of fire and fierce hatred
engulfed Gondolin and its glory fell,
its tapering towers and its tall rooftops
were laid all low, and its leaping fountains
made no music more on the mount of Gwareth, 5
and its whitehewn walls were whispering ash.
But Wade of the Helsings wearyhearted )
Tur the earthborn was tried in battle
from the wrack and ruin a remnant led
women and children and wailing maidens
and wounded men of the withered folk 10
down the path unproven that pierced the hillside,
neath Tumladin he led them to the leaguer of hills
that rose up rugged as ranged pinnacles
to the north of the vale. There the narrow way
of Cristhorn was cloven, the Cleft of Eagles, IS
through the midmost mountains. And more is told
in lays and in legend and lore of others
of that weary way of the wandering folk;
how the waifs of Gondolin outwitted Melko,
vanished o'er the vale and vanquished the hills, 20
how Glorfindel the golden in the gap of the Eagles
battled with the Balrog and both were slain:
one like flash of fire from fanged rock,
one like bolted thunder black was smitten
to the dreadful deep digged by Thornsir. 25
Of the thirst and hunger of the thirty moons
when they sought for Sirion and were sore bestead
by plague and peril; of the Pools of Twilight
and Land of Willows; when their lamentation
was heard in the halls where the high Gods sate 30
veiled in Valinor .. the Vanished Isles;
all this have others in ancient stories
and songs unfolded, but say I further
how their lot was lightened, how they laid them down
in long grasses of the Land of Willows. 35
There sun was softer, ... the sweet breezes
and whispering winds, there wells of slumber
and the dew enchanted
*
NOTES.
The next lines are
where stony-voiced that stream of Eagles
runs o'er the rocky
but the second of these is struck out and the first left without
continuation.
31. The second half-line was written in the Vanished Isles, but in was
struck out and replaced by a word that I cannot interpret.
36. The second half-line was written and the sweet breezes, but and
was struck out and replaced by some other word, possibly then.
Commentary.
For the form Tur see I I. 148, 260.
In the tale of The Fall of Gondolin Cristhorn, the Eagles' Cleft, was in
the Encircling Mountains south of Gondolin, and the secret tunnel led
southwards from the city (II. 167 - 8 etc.); but from line 14 of this
fragment it is seen that the change to the north had already entered the
legend.
Lines 26 - 7 (the thirty moons when they sought for Sirion) go
back to the Fall of Gondolin, where it is said that the fugitives wandered
'a year and more' in the wastes (see II. 195, 214).
The reading of line 7 as first written (it was not struck out, but Tur the
earthborn was tried in battle was added in the margins):
But Wade of the Helsings wearyhearted
is remarkable. It is taken directly from the very early Old English poem
Widsith, where occurs the line Wada Haelsingum, sc. Wada [weold]
Haelsingum, 'Wada ruled the Haelsingas'. One may well wonder why the
mysterious figure of Wade should appear here in Tuor's place, and
indeed I cannot explain it: but whatever the reason, the association of
Wade with Tuor is not casual. Of the original story of Wade almost
nothing is known; but he survived in popular recollection through the
Middle Ages and later - he is mentioned by Malory as a mighty being,
and Chaucer refers to 'Wade's boat' in The Merchant's Tale; in Troilus
and Crisyede Pandare told a 'tale of Wade'. R. W. Chambers (Widsith,
Cambridge 1912, p. 95) said that Wade was perhaps 'originally a sea-
giant, dreaded and honoured by the coast tribes of the North Sea and the
Baltic'; and the tribe of the Haelsingas over which he is said to have ruled
in Widsith is supposed to have left its name in Helsingor (Elsinore) in
Denmark and in Helsingfors in Finland. Chambers summed up what
few generalities he thought might be made from the scattered references
in English and German as follows:
We find these common characteristics, which we may assume be-
longed to their ancient prototype, Wada of the Haelsingas:
(1) Power over the sea.
(2) Extraordinary strength - often typified by superhuman stature.
(3) The use of these powers to help those whom Wade favours.
... Probably he grew out of the figure, not of a historic chief, but of a -
supernatural power, who had no story all his own, and who interested
mortal men only when he interfered in their concerns. Hence he is
essentially a helper in time of need; and we may be fairly confident that
already in the oldest lays he possessed this character.
Most interesting, however, is the fact that in Speght's annotations to
Chaucer (1598) he said:
Concerning Wade and his bote Guingelot, as also his strange exploits
in the same, because the matter is long and fabulous, I passe it over.
The likeness of Guingelot to Wingelot is sufficiently striking; but when
we place together the facts that Wingelot was Earendel's ship,* that
Earendel was Tuor's son, that Tuor was peculiarly associated with the
sea, and that here 'Wade of the Helsings' stands in the place of Tuor,
coincidence is ruled out. Wingelot was derived from Wade's boat,
Guingelot as certainly, I think, as was Earendel from the Old English
figure (this latter being a fact expressly stated by my father, II. 309).
Why my father should have intruded 'Wade of the Helsings' into the,
verses at this point is another question. It may conceivably have been
unintentional - the words Wada Haelsingum were running in his mind
(though in that case one might expect that he would have struck the line
out and not merely written another line against it as an alternative): but
at any rate the reason why they were running in his mind is clear, and this
possibility in no way diminishes the demonstrative value of the line that
Wingelot was derived from Guingelot, and that there was a connection
of greater significance than the mere taking over of a name- just as in the
case of Earendel.
*
(iii) The Lay of the Fall of Condolin.
This was the title that late in his life my father wrote on the bundle of
papers constituting the abandoned beginning of this poem; but it seems
that it was not conceived on a large scale, since the narrative had reached
In which he undertook 'fabulous exploits'. It is conceivable that there was some
connection between Earendel's great world-girdling voyage and the travels of Wade as
described by the twelfth-century English writer Walter Map, who tells how Gado
(sc. Wade) journeyed in his boat to the furthest Indies.
the dragon-fire arising over the northern heights already within 130 lines.
That he composed it while at the University of Leeds is certain, but I
strongly suspect that it was the first versification of matter from the Lost
Tales undertaken, before he turned to the alliterative line. The story, so
far as it goes, has undergone virtually no development from the prose tale
of The Fall of Condolin, and the closeness of the Lay to the Tale can be
seen from this comparison (though the passage is exceptional):
(Tale, II. 158)
Rejoice that ye have found it, for behold before you the City of Seven
Names where all who war with Melko may find hope.'
Then said Tuor: 'What be those names?' And the chief of the Guard
made answer: "Tis said and 'tis sung: "Gondobar am I called and
Gondothlimbar, City of Stone and City of the Dwellers in Stone, &c.
(Lay) Rejoice that ye have found it and rest from endless war,
For the seven-named city 'tis that stands upon the hill,
Where all who strive with Morgoth find hope and valour still.'
'What be those names,' said Tuor, 'for I come from long afar?'
"Tis said and 'tis sung,' one answered, '"My name is Gondobar
And Gondothlimbar also, the City hewn of Stone,
The fortress of the Gnome-folk who dwell in Halls of Stone, &c.
I do not give this poem in extenso here, since it does not, so far as the
main narrative is concerned, add anything to the Tale; and my father
found, as I think, the metrical form unsuitable to the purpose. There are,
: however, several passages of interest for the study of the larger develop-
ment of the legends.
In the Tale, Tuor was the son of Peleg (who was the son of Indor,
II. 160), but here he is the son of Fengel; while on a scrap of paper giving
rough workings of the passage cited above* Tuor himself is called Fengel
- cf. 'Earendel son of Fengel' at the end of the fragment of an Earendel
Lay, p. 141. Long afterwards Fengel was the name of the fifteenth King
of Rohan in the Third Age, grandfather of Theoden, and there it is the
, 'Old English noun fengel 'king, prince'.
There are some puzzling statements made concerning Fingolfin, whose
appearance here, I feel certain, is earlier than those in the alliterative
poems; and the passage in which he appears introduces also the story of
Isfin and Eol.
(* This is the page referred to in Unfinished Tales p. 4: some lines of verse in which
appear the Seven Names of Gondolin are scribbled on the back of a piece of paper setting
out "the chain of responsibility in a battalion".' Not knowing at that time where this isolated
scrap came from I took this as an indication of very carly date, but this is certainly mistaken:
the paper must have survived and been used years later for rough writing.)
Lo, that prince of Gondobar [Meglin]
dark Eol's son whom Isfin, in a mountain dale afar
in the gloom of Doriath's forest, the white-limbed maiden bare,
the daughter of Fingolfin, Gelmir's mighty heir.
'Twas the bent blades of the Glamhoth that drank Fingolfin's life
as he stood alone by Feanor; but his maiden and his wife
were wildered as they sought him in the forests of the night,
in the pathless woods of Doriath, so dark that as a light
of palely mirrored moonsheen were their slender elfin limbs
straying among the black holes where only the dim bat skims
from Thu's dark-delved caverns. There Eol saw that sheen
and he caught the white-limbed Isfin, that she ever since hath been
his mate in Doriath's forest, where she weepeth in the gloam;
for the Dark Elves were his kindred that wander without home.
Meglin she sent to Gondolin, and his honour there was high
as the latest seed of Fingolfin, whose glory shall not die;
a lordship he won of the Gnome-folk who quarry deep in the earth,
seeking their ancient jewels; but little was his mirth,
and dark he was and secret and his hair as the strands of night
that are tangled in Taur Fuin* the forest without light.
In the Lost Tales Finwe Noleme, first Lord of the Noldoli, was the '
father of Turgon (and so of Isfin, who was Turgon's sister), I. 115; '
Finwe Noleme was slain in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears and his -'
heart cut out by Orcs, but Turgon rescued the body and heart of his
father, and the Scarlet Heart became his grim emblem (I. 241, II. 172).
Finwe Noleme is also called Fingolma (I. 238 - 9, II. 220).
In the alliterative poems Fingolfin is the son of Finwe (Finweg) and
the father of Turgon, and also of Finweg (> Fingon), as he was to remain,
(see p. 137). Thus:
Lost Tales.
Finwe Noleme (Fingolma)
(slain in the Battle of
Unnumbered Tean).
Turgon. Isfin.
Alliterative Poems.
Finwe.
Fingolfin.
Turgon. Finweg (> Fingon):
(slain in the Battle
of Unnumbered Tears).
But whereas in the Lay of the Fall of Condolin Fingolfin has
(* Taur Fuin is the form in the Lost Tales; it was here emended later to Taur-na-Fuin,
which is the form from the first in The Children of IIurin.)
emerged and stepped into Finwe's place as the father of Turgon and
Isfin, he is not here the son of Finwe but of one Gelmir:
Gelmir.
Turgon Isfin.
In an early prose text - one of the very few scraps (to be given in the
next volume) that bridge the gap in the prose history between the Lost
Tales and the 'Sketch of the Mythology' - Gelmir appears as the King of
the Noldoli at the time of the flight from Valinor, and one of his sons is
there named Golfin.
There is too little evidence extant (if there ever was any more written
down) to penetrate with certainty the earliest evolution of the Noldorin
kings. The simplest explanation is that this Gelmir, father of Golfin/
Fingolfin = Fingolma/Finwe Noleme, father of Fingolfin. But it is also
said in this passage that Fingolfin was slain by the Glamhoth 'as he stood
alone by Feanor', and whatever story lies behind this is now vanished
(for the earliest, very obscure, references to the death of Feanor see
I. 238 - 9).
This passage from the Lay of the Fall of Gondolin contains the first
account of the story of Eol the Dark Elf, Isfin sister of Turgon, and their
son Meglin (for a very primitive form of the legend see II. 220). In the
prose tale of The Fall of Gondolin the story is dismissed in the words
'that tale of Isfin and Eol may not here be told', II. 165. In the Lay,
Fingolfin's wife and daughter (Isfin) were seeking for him when Isfin
was taken by Eol. Since in the 'Sketch' Isfin was lost in Taur-na-Fuin
after the Battle of Unnumbered Tears and there trapped by Eol, it is
possible that at this stage Fingolfin was the Elvish king who died (beside
Feanor?) in the great battle. It is also possible that we see here the genesis
of the idea of Isfin's wandering in the wilds, although of course with
subsequent shifts, whereby Fingolfin died in duel with Morgoth after the
Battle of Sudden Flame and Fingon (Isfin's brother) was the Noldorin
king slain in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears, the story that she was
seeking her father was abandoned. What this passage does certainly show
is that the story of Isfin's sending her son to Gondolin is original, but that
originally Isfin remained with her captor Eol and never escaped from
him.
Eol here dwells 'in a mountain dale afar in the gloom of Doriath's
forest', 'in the forests of the night', 'where only the dim bat skims from
Thu's dark-delved caverns'. This must be the earliest reference to Thu,
and at any rate in connected writing the earliest to Doriath (Artanor of
the Lost Tales). I have suggested (II. 63) that in the Tale of Tinuviel
'Artanor was conceived as a great region of forest in the heart of which
was Tinwelint's cavern', and that the zone of the Queen's protection 'was
originally less distinctly bordered, and less extensive, than "the Girdle of
Melian" afterwards became'. Here the description of Eol's habitation
in a forest without light (where Thu lives in caverns) suggests rather the
forest of Taur-na-Fuin, where
Never-dawning night was netted clinging
in the black branches of the beetling trees
and where
goblins even
(whose deep eyes drill the darkest shadows)
bewildered wandered
(The Children of Hurin, p. 34 lines 753 ff.)
The passage also contains an interesting reference to the purpose of the
miners of Gondolin: 'seeking their ancient jewels.'
Earlier in this Lay some lines are given to the coming of Tuor to the
hidden door beneath the Encircling Mountains:
Thither Tuor son of Fengel came out of the dim land
that the Gnomes have called Dor-Lomin, with Bronweg at his hand,
who fled from the Iron Mountains and had broken Melko's chain
and cast his yoke of evil, of torment and bitter pain;
who alone most faithful-hearted led Tuor by long ways
through empty hills and valleys by dark nights and perilous days,
till his blue lamp magic-kindled, where flow the shadowy rills
beneath enchanted alders, found that Gate beneath the hills,
the door in dark Dungorthin that only-the Gnome-folk knew.
In a draft for this passage the name here is Nan Orwen, emended to
Dungorthin. In The Children of Hurin (lines 1457 ff.) Turin and
Flinding came to this 'grey valley' after they had passed west over Sirion,
and reached the roots of the Shadowy Mountains 'that Hithlum girdle'.
For earlier references to Nan Dungorthin and different placings of it see
p. 87; the present passage seems to indicate yet another, with the
hidden door of Gondolin opening into it.
A few other passages may be noticed. At the beginning there is a
reference to old songs telling
how the Gods in council gathered on the outmost rocky bars
of the Lonely Island westward, and devised a land of ease
beyond the great sea-shadows and the shadowy seas;
how they made the deep gulf of Faerie with long and lonely shore . . .
That the Gods were ferried on an island by Osse and the Oarni at the time
of the fall of the Lamps is told in the tale of The Coming of the Valar
(I. 70), and that this isle was afterwards that of the Elves' ferrying
(becoming Tol Eressea) is told in The Coming of the Elves (I. 118).
When Gondolin was built the people cried 'Cor is built anew! ' and the
guard who told Tuor the seven names said:
Loth, the Flower, they name me, saying 'Cor is born again,
even in Loth-a-ladwen,* the Lily of the Plain.'
I have noticed earlier (II. 208) that whereas it is explicit in The Silmaril-
lion that Turgon devised the city to be 'a memorial of Tirion upon
Tuna', and it became 'as beautiful as a memory of Elven Tirion', this is
not said in The Fall of Condolin: Turgon was born in the Great Lands
after the return of the Noldoli from Valinor, and had never known Kor.
'One may feel nonetheless that the tower of the King, the fountains and
stairs, the white marbles of Gondolin embody a recollection of Kor as
it is described in The Coming of the Elves and the Making of Kor
(I. 122 - 3).
There is also a reference to Earendel
who passed the Gates of Dread,
half-mortal and half-elfin, undying and long dead.
The Gates of Dread are probably the gates of the Door of Night, through
which Earendel passed (II. 255).
(* This is the only point in which the Seven Names differ from their forms in the Tale
(II. 158). In the Tale the name of the city as 'Lily of the Valley' is Lothengriol. For
ladwen 'plain' see II. 344. In a draft of the passage in the lay the name was Loth Barodrin.)