The Colors of Elvish: A Linguistic Exploration

Color is a basic category of language. Every culture has terminology denoting color, yet they do not all categorize color in the same way in spite of the fact that the physiology of human vision is constant across all races and populations. In designing his Elvish languages, Tolkien naturally created words for various colors. This article will explore what color terms are available in Quenya and Sindarin and what significance these color terms might have as a reflection of Elvish society.

First, though, we should look at how humans (and presumably Elves) perceive color. Much of the following technical explanation is taken from Foley, Anthropological Linguistics: An Introduction, in the chapter on ‘Color’, though greatly simplified for the purpose of this essay.

The Neurophysiology of Color

All the colors that we see are a combination of six basic colors: red, yellow, green, blue, white and black. For example, turquoise is a combination of green and blue; orange of red and yellow. Perceivable color varies along three dimensions: hue, saturation and brightness. Hue is the ‘coloredness’ of a color, its redness, yellowness, greenness or blueness. These are the fundamental hues, defined as oppositions, one pole excludes the other. Not all colors have hue; black and white do not, nor do their intermediate shades of grey. Colors with hue are known as chromatic colors; those without hue, achromatic colors. Saturated colors have vivid hues, while desaturated colors are like pastels. Brightness indicates the light reflectance of a color, from dazzling to barely visible.

So how do we perceive color? According to present-day theories, the human visual system consists of three subsystems. The first subsystem signals differences in brightness and is achromatic. The other two signal difference in hue, one for the red-green opposition and the other for yellow-blue. The system of oppositions explains the difference between pure hues and ‘mixed’ colors. Pure blue, for instance results when the yellow-blue subsystem signals ‘blue’ and the red-green subsystem is neutral, signaling neither ‘red’ nor ‘green’. Turquoise, which is a combination of green and blue results when the yellow-blue subsystem again signals ‘blue’ and at the same time the red-green subsystem signals ‘green’. Purple, on the other hand, results when the yellow-blue subsystem signals ‘blue’ and the red-green subsystem signals ‘red’. Such secondary, ‘mixed’ colors are thus cognitively ‘computed’ from input from the two subsystems. Slight differences in hue of, say, turquoise, reflect differences in the relative contributions of ‘blue’ and ‘green’ from the two subsystems. White, black and grey result when both the yellow-blue and red-green subsystems are neutral and the third subsystem of brightness is operative: high brightness signaling ‘white’, its relative absence ‘black’, with ‘grey’ in between.

Types of Basic Color Systems

A basic color term is defined on the basis of a number of criteria such as: (1) it is monolexemic, not composed of composite parts. Thus, the English bluish, or the Quenya luinicë with the same meaning, would be excluded; (2) it is not included, hyponymically, within another color term. Thus would be excluded the English scarlet or the equivalent Sindarin coll both of which are a kind of red; and (3) is attributively not restricted. Thus, the English blond which is restricted to hair and wood, or the Quenya russa ‘red-hair’, would be excluded. There may be other criteria, but these are the three main ones.

Every basic color has a focal hue, the best exemplar of a named color, and regardless of the number of color terms in a language, the focal hue is remarkably consistent across languages. So, for example, a speaker of a language with only three basic color terms will identify as the best exemplar of ‘red’ about the same hue as will speakers of English with eleven basic color terms, essentially ‘fire-engine red’. Exactly what hues count as ‘red’, however, will be less definite, not only across languages but within them.

Not all cultures have the same number of basic color terms. The maximum number of basic color terms seems to be fixed at around a dozen, but a language could have much less. If so, a given color term will be a composite category, covering a range of stimulus colors. So, for example, the Dani of Papua New Guinea have two color terms: mili, which contains black and darker browns and all the cooler colors, greens and blues; and mola, which covers white and the warmer colors, reds, yellows, orange, reddish-purple, pink and lighter browns. These color terms appear to denote both hue and brightness, so, one cannot actually speak of color per se, but rather must gloss mili as DARK/COOL and mola as LIGHT/WARM. (Foley: 154)

In languages with three color terms, the warm colors red-orange-yellow are separated out from LIGHT/WARM to have a three-way contrast: LIGHT, WARM, DARK/COOL. The focal hue for LIGHT is white, and for WARM red, but DARK/COOL continues to have variable foci in black, pure blue, or pure green. With four basic color terms, the situation becomes more complex with no less than five-attested systems. The two most common systems are: DARK/BLACK, RED, YELLOW, LIGHT/WHITE and DARK/BLACK, GRUE (blue and green), WARM (red and yellow), and LIGHT/WHITE. In GRUE, the focal hue is either blue or green or bifocal in both, but never a ‘mixed’ secondary hue such as turquoise, which is composed of both these colors.

A five-term system will generally categorize the colors as follows: DARK/BLACK, GRUE, RED, YELLOW, LIGHT/WHITE, although in some languages, GRUE may be split so GREEN is a separate color while blue is relegated to DARK/COOL or BLUE is separated and green becomes a composite category with YELLOW. Beyond this, the order in which other basic color terms emerges is apparently random. Thus, BROWN, GREY, and PURPLE appear as basic color terms in no fixed order, though ORANGE and PINK do generally appear to be distinctly late in their emergence as basic color terms. English has eleven basic color terms: red, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, white, black, grey, brown, and pink.

There does seem to be some universal patterns of color-naming systems which emerge across languages. So, for instance, no language has a word for ‘green’ unless they first have a word for ‘red’. Nor are all possibilities of terms allowed. For example, there is no attested four-term system with ORANGE, LIGHT/WHITE, YELLOW, and GRUE.

Some languages may have more than one basic color term corresponding to a single one in English. So, Russian has two basic color terms for BLUE: goluboj LIGHT-BLUE (sky-blue) and sinij DARK-BLUE, while Hungarian has two terms for RED: piros LIGHT-RED and vörös DARK-RED. (Foley: 159)

So, let us take a look at the two Elvish languages and see what we can determine about how the Elves ‘see’ the world color-wise.

The Colors of Quenya and Sindarin (and Valarin)

In devising his languages, Tolkien gives us several color terms, some of them basic, others not. If we examine the color terms that are common to Quenya, Sindarin and Valarin, we find the following words corresponding to English RED, YELLOW, GREEN and BLUE:

Color        Valarin           Quenya                     Sindarin

RED          nasar              carnë                      car(a)n

YELLOW   tulca               malina                    malen

GREEN      ezel/ezella      laica/laiqua              laeg/calen

BLUE        ulban              luinë (lúnë)/ninwa    luin

These, of course, are the primary colors which make up the red-green and yellow-blue opposition subsystems in our visual system. Does this mean that the Valar only see in these colors? Unlikely. Not being physical creatures, they probably ‘see’ in different spectra beyond the visible light spectrum to which humans, and presumably Elves, are limited, such as ultraviolet, infrared, electromagnetic, etc. These, however, are the only color terms found in Valarin that are recorded by the loremasters who made a study of the language. And we know that the forms of the terms are Quenyanized adaptations of the original Valarin words and utilized only by the Vanyar who are the closest of the Elves to the Valar. Neither the Noldor nor the Teleri appear to have used these Valarin constructs, but developed their own terminology based on Common Eldarin roots.

When we look at the color terms normally used by Quenya speakers and Sindarin speakers, we see that in all of them the words are etymologically the same. There are two terms, however, that do not correspond: calen for GREEN in Sindarin and ninwa for BLUE in Quenya. Ninwa occurs only in Qenya, the earliest form of the language of the Elves which Tolkien created (see BOLT1: Appendix, s.v. Nielluin) and so could conceivably be discounted as an ephemeral form later replaced by the more common luinë or lúnë, cognate of Sindarin luin. On the other hand, other color terms with the same -wa ending — helwa (pale blue), hiswa (grey) and narwa (fiery red) [see below] — also occur in Quenya, so it is conceivable that ninwa is a legitimate color term in that language.

The Sindarin color terms for GREEN are of more interest to us, in both etymological and anthropological terms. Tolkien tells us that laeg, which has the actual meaning ‘viridis; fresh and green’, became a poetical form for the color, replaced by calen. He also states that the Silvan form leg- was commonly used in compounds, thus Legolas, which in strict Sindarin would be Laegolas. In general, though, Sindarin preferred the word calen to designate that color we know as GREEN (Letters, no. 211, 297).

Why? What would induce the Sindar to substitute a word that had no etymological connection with the original word for this color? Tolkien does not say. He tells us only that calen originally meant ‘bright-coloured = green’ (see Etymologies, s.v. KAL-). Etymologically, KAL- was the general root word for ‘shine’ and its normal glosses in both Quenya and Sindarin include words such as cala (Quenya) and calad (Sindarin), both of which mean ‘light’.

If we think of the world which the Sindar inhabited prior to the arrival of the Noldor upon the shores of Beleriand, they lived under perpetual starlight. Light, as known in Valinor, did not exist. Colors would necessarily be muted even in the lighted halls of Menegroth. Then, Ithil rose and a brighter light swept through the lands of Middle-earth. Yet, even this silvery light was dim in comparison to the light of Anor which blazed forth seven days after Ithil first rose, casting her golden light upon all. And what did the Sindar see?

A world primarily made of green in all its myriad shades and hues, bright and fresh and no doubt glorious to their eyes. Surely, laeg was too small a word, not encompassing enough to describe what they were experiencing as they looked upon a world lit by the Sun, a world dominated by GREEN! Someone, some bard, perhaps Daeron himself, decided that a new word needed to be invented to describe this wondrous color and thus calen came into being.

I imagine that it took some time for the new word to replace the old, spreading from Doriath perhaps. No doubt the Noldor quickly adopted it and that helped its spread to the furthest reaches of the land. Eventually laeg became archaic and used only in poetry, if used at all, or as an element in personal names, and then usually in its Silvan form. Calen became the normal word for ‘green’ and we see this in a number of placenames: Tol Galen, Parth Galen, and Pinnath Gelin, to name just three. [galen/gelin (plural) are the lenited forms of calen/celin.]

So, how many basic colors did the Elves see? A glance at the following table will show that besides the four colors mentioned above we have:

Color             Quenya                     Sindarin

BLACK          morë*                      môr/morn*

*these words also mean dark, darkness

WHITE          ninquë/fána (fánë)   nimp/fain/faen/glân

GREY            sinda/mista/hiswa     thind/mithren

BROWN        varnë                       baran

ORANGE       culuina                    ****

Thus, Quenya ‘sees’ nine basic colors to Sindarin’s eight, though these languages may have more than one color term associated with that particular color. Since there are no Elves to whom we can go to ask to point to the focal hue for that particular color and name it, we have no real way of knowing which word the average Elf would choose. Tolkien tended to translate different color terms using the same English gloss. Neither language has a word corresponding to English PURPLE or PINK. This, of course, does not mean that the Elves did not have these words in their languages; rather, Tolkien never bothered to provide us with these terms. On the other hand, it is known that in some human cultures, ‘pink’ is considered a kind of red rather than a separate color, while ‘purple’ may be considered a kind of blue or even assigned to DARK/BLACK or associated with GRUE (Foley:159). An example of a real-world language where a single color term can cover more than one color is the Welsh glas, translated as ‘blue’, ‘green’ and ‘grey’ or ‘grey-green’.

The terms fána, fain and faen appear to be words associated with the whiteness of clouds and this could be considered as the focal hue for ‘white’, in other words the best exemplar of the color for that culture, although ninquë and nimp, both of which have the secondary meaning of ‘pale’, appear to be the most common terms for ‘white’ in both languages. This may be a case where we have two basic color terms for English ‘white’. Faen also means ‘radiant’ and its Quenya cognate, fana, was used exclusively to denote the ‘veils’ or ‘raiment’ with which the Valar (and Maiar) clothed themselves, with the added notion of ‘shapes of light and whiteness’ (PE17:26).

A quick glance at the words will show that the words in one language are cognates of the other. Again, there are some anomalies. We see glân as a Sindarin word for ‘white’, though etymologically, it means ‘clear’ (VT 45:13). Its one recorded use is as a title for one of the Wizards: Curunír ’Lân ‘Saruman the White’, and might be attributively restricted to being used as a title rather than as a basic color term, such as nimp and fain (UT:390).

We also see that Quenya has one more term for ‘grey’ than Sindarin: hiswa, derived from the root KHIS-/KITH-. From this root we also get words for ‘fog, mist’ (Quenya hiswë, Sindarin hith). Like ninwa ‘blue’, this is a Qenya word and may not have survived into later Quenya as Tolkien devised it.

Secondary Color Terms

As interesting as all this is, of more interest are the hyponymical terms, those terms found within another color term, such as scarlet as a kind of red, and aquamarine as a kind of green. When we look at these color terms we see a great variety:

Color                    Quenya                   Sindarin

RED

golden-red            culina/culda*          coll*

*culda and coll can also be translated as ‘scarlet’

fiery-red               narwa                    naru

copper                  aira                       gaer

YELLOW

gold                     laurë                      glawar

GREEN

yellow-green        wenya                    ****

BLUE

pale blue             helwa                     elu/gwind

sky blue              menelluin               menelluin*

*While this word appears only in Quenya sources, it can conceivably be found in Sindarin, cf. aran ‘king’ which is found in both languages.

WHITE

snow white           lossë                      gloss

shining white        silmë                     silivren (also, glittering white)

silver                   telpë                      celeb

GREY

pale grey             ****                      mith

silver grey           sindë                      ****

BROWN

golden brown       varnë                     baran (also, dark brown, yellow brown)

light brown          marya/malwa         maidh/malu (also, fallow, fawn)

red-brown            rusca                     rhosc (also, russet)

Again, we see how most of the terms of one language are cognates of the other. Perhaps the most interesting thing to note is that in both languages, the word for the basic color term ‘brown’ (varnë in Quenya and baran in Sindarin), is also used attributively for ‘golden brown’, ‘dark brown, and ‘yellow brown’. This is the only color in which we find this situation in both languages.

Just looking at the number of color terms available for each of the colors in both languages, it appears that RED, WHITE and BROWN have more attributive color terms than the others. If we add the basic color terms to the list we find that in Quenya RED has the most terms (five), while BLUE, WHITE, GREY and BROWN are equally distributed (four color terms each), but in Sindarin WHITE has the most color terms (seven), followed by RED and BLUE (four each), with GREY, and BROWN each having three color terms.

What does this mean in terms of Elvish culture? Probably not much. One can look at these words in one of two ways linguistically, externally and internally. Externally, we simply see Tolkien’s genius at work as he creates various words in both languages covering a whole range of color terms, both primary and secondary, noticing how he leaves out such colors as ‘pink’ and ‘purple’ for both languages, as well as ‘orange’ for Sindarin. This could have been a simple oversight on his part, though having given names for most of the colors of the rainbow (indigo is also left out), one would think he would come up with a word for ‘purple’, which is certainly a basic color in the English lexicon. Perhaps he did, but the term has yet to show up in any of his linguistic papers which are slowly but surely being disseminated.

Internally, of course, we can look upon the Elvish languages as ‘languages’ rather than as constructs, as real as English or Latin or Ki-Swahili. It may be then, that ‘purple’ was not seen by the Elves as a separate color, but as a kind of blue or lumped together with DARK/BLACK, as is the case with Berinmo, a language of Papua-New Guinea (Kay and Reiger: 7). English has devised a monolexemic term for this color, but some real world languages will use a compound word which literally translates as ‘red-blue’, as in the Welsh cochlas (sometimes listed as glasgoch ‘blue-red’), although they may ‘borrow’ a basic color term from another language: Welsh porffor derived ultimately from Greek porphýra via English. So if anyone wants to create a neo-Eldarin term for this color they could easily do as the Welsh have done: *carneluinë or *luincarnë in Quenya and *caranluin or *luingaran/luingarn in Sindarin. ‘Pink’, on the other hand, might merely be considered a shade of red. The Quenya term culuina ‘orange’ is very similar to culina ‘golden red’, its Sindarin cognate being coll. Thus, it is conceivable that the Sindar ‘saw’ orange as being a kind of red rather than a separate color in its own right, as we do in English.

If looking at the distribution of color terms as an internal aspect of the Elvish languages, one can possibly conclude that for the Amanian Elves (those born in Aman), RED was perhaps the most important color, but WHITE was the most important for the Sindar. The fact that RED is, even in our own culture, the exemplar of all chromatic colors (colors with hue), while WHITE is exemplar of the achromatic color (colors without hue), points to the environments under which the two Elvish cultures (Amanian and Beleriandic) developed: the Amanian culture developing under the bright light of the Two Trees; the Beleriandic culture blossoming under the light of the stars, where light and shadow predominate.

Conclusion

Tolkienian linguistic scholars tend to study the Elvish languages as external history, i.e. they examine how Tolkien developed these languages over time, noticing the subtle and not so subtle changes that he made in word meanings, grammatical structures, and even spelling conventions. This can be a fruitful, though often frustrating, endeavor, as glosses come and go and it is sometimes difficult to determine what might have been a hardcore aspect of the language and what was merely an ephemeral idea.

A prime example is ulban. The Book of Lost Tales records the very earliest examples of the Elvish languages, Qenya and Noldorin, first developed by Tolkien between 1915 and 1920. Here, we are told that ulban means ‘monster’. Jump forward to the late 50s and to his linguistic essay ‘Quendi and Eldar’ (HoME XI) where we learn that ulban is the Valarin term for ‘blue’.

So which is it? Did Tolkien forget that he’d already defined the word decades earlier? Possibly. More likely, he simply decided that ulban was a Quenya word adopted and adapted from Valarin, rather than derived from a Common Eldarin root. This was, after all, his ‘private hobby’ and he could do with it as he pleased. It was only with the publication of the Lord of the Rings that he tried to reconcile his languages to conform to the published works.

Studying the Elvish languages as if we were linguistic anthropologists is, of course, more problematic. There are no Elves to whom we can go and ask our questions. We have only what Tolkien deigned to give us. Yet, one has to ask questions such as ‘Why did he go to the trouble of creating all these color terms?’ and ‘Why do some colors, such as RED or WHITE, have an almost embarrassment of riches in color terms while others do not? Could there be cultural reasons for this, and if so, what might those reasons be?

Here, of course, we enter the realm of pure speculation, which can be fun in its own way. This is where the savvy fan fiction writer is able to enter into Tolkien’s world creatively. What is the cultural significance of a people who can distinguish between various shades of WHITE but cannot ‘see’ ORANGE? Given that the Noldor lived in a chromatic world, is it possible that many of the Sindarin color terms were adopted and adapted from Noldorin Quenya rather than developing independently among the Sindar who lived in a predominately achromatic world prior to the rising of Ithil and Anor? How would each culture influence the other in terms of how they defined color and how they separated colors, one from another?

And then, there is the interesting question of just how wide a range of colors the Elves saw compared to those recognized by the various human cultures with which they interacted. Elvish acuity was sharper and clearer than that of any Mortal. Is it possible that they were able to ‘see’ beyond the visible light spectrum? If so, how might that affect the way in which they saw the world around them? How might we, as writers of fan fiction, utilize this trait in our stories about the Elves?

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References:

Foley, William A., Anthropological Linguistics: An Introduction, Oxford: Basil Blackwell Publishers, Ltd. (1997)

Kay, P. and Regier, T., ‘Color Naming Universals: the Case of Berinmo’, Cognition, 2007 Feb; 102(2):1289-98. Epub 2006 Feb 7

Humphrey Carpenter, The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1981)

J.R.R. Tolkien, Book of Lost Tales 1, HoME I, Appendix: Names in the Lost Tales 1, Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1984)

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lost Road, HoME V, The Etymologies, Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1987)

J.R.R. Tolkien, War of the Jewels, HoME XI, Quendi and Eldar: ‘Note on the Language of the Valar’, Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1994)

J.R.R. Tolkien, Unfinished Tales, The Istari, Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1980)

Parma Eldalamberon 17, ‘Words, Phrases & Passages in The Lord of the Rings’, The Tolkien Trust (2007)  

Vinyar Tengwar 45, ‘Addenda and Corrigenda to the Etymologies — Part One’, November 2003

Biblical Motifs in Tolkien’s Silmarillion

Author’s Note: In writing this essay, I presume prior knowledge and familiarity with the Silmarillion on the part of the reader. Therefore references are primarily, though not exclusively, reserved for citations other than from the Silmarillion.

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Reading the Silmarillion, even on a casual level, one is struck from the very beginning by the biblical overtones of the language and the story. This was deliberate on the part of Tolkien, for the greater part of the book deals with the events of the First Age of Middle-earth, a mythic age when the Valar walked under the skies of Arda and warred against the Enemy, Morgoth, beside Elves and Men. The language of the text, therefore, reflects the mythological and cosmogonic nature of much of the narrative. (1)

Interwoven with the epic tales of great deeds and terrible battles are three motifs that echo the biblical stories of Creation, the Fall, and what could be called ‘the Saving of the Remnant’. We will look at each of these and see how Tolkien works these motifs into his mythology, how they reflect his Christian and Catholic orientation, and in what ways they diverge (if at all) from orthodox Judeo-Christian theology.

Creation

The Silmarillion, like the Bible, begins with Creation. Eru, the One, also called Ilúvatar, invites the Ainur, angelic beings of great power, to participate in the creation of what we would call our universe. Ilúvatar does this by proposing three musical themes from which creation would derive, thus echoing the medieval concept of the ‘Music of the Spheres’. After the third and final theme is played out, Ilúvatar shows the Ainur a Vision of their joint creation, brings it into actual existence by uttering a single word Eä! — Be! — and invites those who desire it to enter into the created universe (or Eä as the Elves called it) and become its guardians in preparation for the coming of Elves and Men, whom only Ilúvatar has any hand in creating and who are known as the Eruhíni — The Children of Eru. Some of the most powerful of the Ainur accept Ilúvatar’s offer and enter into Eä.

Arriving in Eä, however, they discover that the universe is still formless and that it is their task to bring the Vision into Reality.Thus, through long uncountable ages the Valar and Maiar, as they are now called, endeavor to bring to fruition the Vision of Ilúvatar, preparing a place, Arda, which is our solar system, for the habitation of the Eruhíni.

What is interesting to note is that Tolkien seems to have addressed the controversy between creationism and evolution decades before the discussion entered into mainstream consciousness. His retelling of the creation story indicates his adherence to the biblical account without excluding evolution as a viable means by which the Creator has brought the universe into existence. The Valar and Maiar are agents of Ilúvatar in making Arda habitable for Elves and Men and the shaping of the earth undergoes several stages of development over time with many setbacks brought about by the interference of Melkor, a Vala who sets his own will against the Will of Ilúvatar and the other Valar in an attempt to dominate all creation.Thus, the description of Melkor’s ruining of Arda such that monsters roamed the earth hints at the origin of dinosaurs, the existence of which is never alluded to in the biblical account of creation.

Tolkien diverges from the biblical account in two telling instances, and it is not surprising that he does so, since he is not telling the biblical story so much as he is reinterpreting the mythic aspects of all creation stories, yet clearly influenced by his Christian upbringing.

The first divergence deals with the origin of evil. In Tolkien’s mythology, there is no War in Heaven as it figures so greatly in extra-biblical Christian mythology and in the Book of Revelation.Melkor, also called Morgoth, the Enemy, and clearly based on the Christian personification of Evil, Lucifer, while he attempts to undermine the Themes of Ilúvatar in the great Song of Creation, is not ostracized from the heavenly court, but is allowed to enter into Eä along with the other Ainur, thus preserving Melkor’s free will. War with Melkor does occur, however it is not waged in the Timeless Halls of Ilúvatar, but across the empty wastes of Eä and upon the verdant soil of Arda in a time that is before Time as Elves and Men would reckon it.

In the Judeo-Christian accounts of the origin of evil, creation becomes corrupted through a single human disobeying the command of God at the behest of an outside agent, Satan. In the Silmarillion, we are told that creation is corrupted from its very inception by the inclusion of Melkor’s dissonant music into the Three Themes of Creation, which Ilúvatar allows, knowing that from out of this evil great good will arise. (2) This is Tolkien’s way of showing that Evil, while clearly ontic, in other words, having actual being, is derivative and can never be original, only imitative. It is no accident, either of theology or of language, that Tolkien likens Evil to a shadow and shadows disappear in the full light of the noonday sun. (3)

A second divergence from the biblical account occurs in the making of the sun and moon. In Tolkien’s universe, the Sun and Moon are not products of the primeval creation of Arda but are derived from the Two Trees of Valinor, which are the sources of Light in all of Arda. The Elves awake under a starlit sky and there is neither Sun nor Moon to light their way. Only when Melkor and the Great Spider Ungoliant poison the Two Trees do the Valar create the Sun and Moon from their last drops of Light. Thus, the two primary lights of the heavens that have been worshiped by humans as gods in our own history are in fact derivative of the True Light that no longer shines in Valinor. They are products of sub-creation, not primary creation.

This removes these celestial objects from the plane of divinity; there is nothing intrinsically sacred or divine about them, save that they are the last hints of the True Light which once shone in Valinor, Tolkien’s Paradise on earth.

The Fall of Angels, Elves and Men

However, it is not creation that is the main focus of the Silmarillion, rather, it is the story of the Fall, for as Tolkien once remarked, all stories are ultimately about the Fall. (4) In Tolkien’s mythology, there are actually several ‘falls’ from grace, and not just by Men. All three races — the Valar, Elves and Men — fall, but for different reasons and with different consequences.

Unlike the biblical account wherein the Fall of Man caused a spiritual separation between Man and his Creator, the falls of the Valar and the Elves do not result in any such separation. For the Valar, their ‘fall’ is due to a failure to trust in Ilúvatar’s plans for the Elves. (5) They seek to protect the Elves from the ravages of Melkor and so encourage them to migrate from Middle-earth to Valinor.

It is interesting to note that in the discussion of the Valar as to what should be done about Melkor, Manwë consults with Ilúvatar, who tells the Valar to take up arms against Melkor on behalf of the Elves,but when the discussion turns to what should be done for the Elves themselves, no such consultation with Ilúvatar takes place. The decision to bring the Elves to Valinor for their own safety is made out of fear, and Ilúvatar is never consulted about the decision, yet, neither does he forbid them from carrying out their plan, however misguided it might have been in retrospect.

The Valar’s lack of trust in Ilúvatar’s plans is further compounded by the raising of the Pelóri Mountains, ostensibly placed to guard against the possibility of Melkor attacking Aman, but in reality effectively cutting Valinor off from the rest of Middle-earth and thereby divorcing the Valar from their guardianship of Arda. (6) The consequences of this separation for human-Valarin relations becomes incalculable as the seeming disinterest of the Valar towards the fate of Men gives Melkor the opportunity to enslave humans to his will, turning them away from Ilúvatar and his plans for them.

The story of the making of the Silmarils by Fëanor and their subsequent abduction by Melkor gives rise to the Fall of the Noldor. This ‘fall’ is actually a consequence of the Valar’s decision to bring the Elves to Valinor and the reason for their fall is similar to that of the Valar — lack of trust. Only this time it is the Valar against whom that lack is directed. The Noldor — and particularly, Fëanor — accuse the Valar of doing nothing against Melkor in revenge for the poisoning of the Two Trees and the stealing of the Silmarils and so they take it upon themselves to do what the Valar presumably will not — pursue Melkor to Middle-earth and there bring war upon him.

The Noldor leave Valinor against the wishes of the Valar, not because the Valar (or even Ilúvatar) desire for them to remain there, but because their motivation for leaving is suspect.The Noldor have launched a crusade, and like any good crusade, it begins with the shedding of innocent blood, and even more horrific, the shedding of the blood of their kin. (7)

It is the unremitting arrogance of the leader of the Noldor, Fëanor, that drives the Noldor towards their doom, for as Námo, Lord of Mandos, the Doomsman of the Valar, rightly tells them, none of the Elves are a match against Melkor, the most powerful of all the Valar. Their crusade is doomed to futility from the beginning and all their endeavors will eventually come to naught.

It appears a given for Tolkien that the Elves, unlike Men, by their very nature cannot succumb to evil, yet they can be deceived by it and many times are. (8) It is the Noldor’s greatest weakness — the blind pursuit of knowledge — that is the ultimate cause of their downfall, not once but twice. Melkor is able to manipulate the Noldor while in Valinor, deceiving them as to his real purpose and causing strife and suspicion that will ultimately bring about the break between the Valar and the Noldor and the subsequent exile of the latter.

The second deception occurs in the Second Age when Sauron, Melkor’s lieutenant, convinces Celebrimbor, a grandson of Fëanor, to make the various Rings of Power. Again, it is the Noldor’s insatiable pursuit of knowledge that allows them to be blind to the evil in Sauron and to cause them to suffer a selective amnesia concerning him. Evil is always ready to take advantage of the arrogance of others for its own ends, and the Noldor have a plentitude of arrogance at their disposal. The making of the One Ring by Sauron corrupts the other Rings of Power, and limits the efficacy of the Elven rings, which Celebrimbor is able to hide from Sauron so he never touches them. The forging of the One Ring leads to the murder of Celebrimbor by Sauron and the destruction of the Elven realm of Eregion, forcing the remaining Elves to flee north with Elrond to the hidden valley of Imladris.

When we turn to Men we see that in fact Men fall twice. The First Fall, which is apparently the biblical event, occurs ‘off-stage’ and is barely mentioned. (9) There are only hints that at some distant past Men came under the sway of Melkor and worshiped him rather than Ilúvatar, but that some repented. The ones who repented eventually made their way into Beleriand, the realm of the Elves, and became known as the Edain, the Elf-friends. From the moment Finrod chances upon the people of Bëor, the destinies of the Second Children of Ilúvatar would become forever interwoven with those of the Elves, especially with those of the Exilic Noldor. (10)

As a consequence of their alliance with the Elves, the Edain are granted by the Valar, after the War of Wrath that marks the end of the First Age, the island of Númenor for their habitation. Númenor is the furthest west of all mortal lands and the closest to the Blessed Realm, and while the Númenóreans are granted anywhere from three to five times the normal life span of other humans, they are still mortal and destined to die.

At first this does not greatly concern the Númenóreans, but through the influence of Sauron they begin to question the ‘unfairness’ of their fate and begin to envy the Elves and the Valar, believing that humans are just as worthy of immortality as any. Soon, a culture of death permeates the land, for such a culture can only arise where death is feared.

Death vs. Immortality

A word must be said here about Tolkien’s concept of death in his mythology. In the biblical account of the Fall, we are told that death entered the universe as a consequence of humanity’s disobedience to God, or, as the author of the deutero-canonical Book of Wisdom claims, ‘through the Devil’s envy’ (11) In the Silmarillion, however, we are told that death is Ilúvatar’s gift to the Secondborn — Men — just as immortality, or rather, serial longevity, is the gift given to the Firstborn — Elves. Why the discrepancy? Why does Tolkien claim that death is a gift rather than a curse as Judeo-Christian theology claims?

Perhaps one way to look at it is that death was always meant to be the lot of humans from the very beginning, although the human life span would probably have been longer than it is in the present day, as evidenced by the extraordinary length of years attributed to the pre-diluvial patriarchs. (12) The consequence of disobedience did not lead to physical death but to spiritual death, a severing of the spiritual bond between creature and Creator. In the account of the Fall of Númenor we see that at first the Númenóreans have the power to voluntarily give up their lives, to choose to die when the time was right for them to do so and to return the gift of life to the Giver of Life. It is perhaps this ability that humans lost when they fell, so that acceptance of death as part of the natural order of things was replaced by the fear of death. For the Númenóreans, a concomitant consequence of the fear of death was the shortening of their life spans, a phenomenon which occurs in the Bible as the life spans of humans becomes progressively shorter the further away from the primeval beginnings of human existence we find ourselves. (13)

It is upon this fear of the Númenóreans that Sauron ultimately plays, a fear that eventually leads to the Númenóreans committing the greatest of sins and bringing about their destruction. It is the only time the Valar voluntarily lay down their vice-gerency of Arda to Ilúvatar, who removes Valinor from Middle-earth, forever separating Paradise from the earthly plane.

And so, for a second time, Men fall and the world is forever changed.

The dichotomy between death and deathlessness is of paramount importance to understanding Tolkien’s mythology.The theme of fear of death and the search for immortality is carried over in the making of the Rings of Power and the corruption of the Nine that ultimately creates the Nazgûl, the Ringwraiths. These Rings of Power, especially the One Ring of Sauron, do not grant the bearer of the ring immortality; rather they prolong the person’s life into an intolerable state of suspension between life and death. We glibly speak of how there are fates worse than death without truly believing it, yet in this instance, that statement holds true. Unending existence is not the same as eternal life and death comes as a blessing, if it comes at all.

When a society begins to see death as a curse, where envy for those who are by nature immortal sours an appreciation for one’s own nature as God has given it, then a culture of death arises and fear of death becomes paramount, so that the curse of death becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is a lesson that our own society has failed to learn.

Saving the Few

The final biblical motif that runs through the Silmarillion is what can be called ‘The Saving of the Remnant’. In the Bible, God uses catastrophes from which a remnant of people survive to further his plans of salvation for the world. From the Flood to the Babylonian Exile to the destruction of the Second Temple, a small group of people survive the cataclysm and become a beacon of hope for the rest of the world. This is a common motif in all the world’s mythologies — after a cataclysm, a remnant of the ‘faithful’ survive to start anew.

In the Silmarillion, we see two instances where this occurs. During the First Age, the Fall of Gondolin triggers the final blitzkrieg by Morgoth/Melkor against the remnant of Elves and Men that can only lead to their utter destruction. But it is from this remnant that salvation comes in the person of Eärendil, a scion of both races, who convinces the Valar to come to the aid of the Elves and their mortal allies against Morgoth.

The second instance is at the destruction of Númenor. While most of the Númenóreans had fallen into idolatry and turned away from Ilúvatar and the Valar, a small group remained faithful and survived the cataclysm.They return to Middle-earth where they build new kingdoms and forge alliances with the Elves, which alliance eventually brings about the downfall of Sauron. It is through this remnant of the Edain that divinity is infused into humanity. Certain unions between Maiar, Elves and Men result in a blending of angelic and elvish strains within a specific group of mortals. This blending finds its greatest expression in the union of Aragorn and Arwen at the end of the Third Age when all the separate bloodlines are reunited in their son, Eldarion.

The people of Middle-earth hold great store by the fact that the blood of Lúthien and Beren, Eärendil and Elwing flows through the veins of certain families of Men and the concept of the ‘Heir of Isildur’, through whom all three bloodlines flow, and who will re-establish the Reunited Kingdoms, prefigures the ‘Son of David’ theme in biblical messianic literature, culminating in the person of Jesus of Nazareth in Christian theology.

The interweaving of the biblical motifs of Creation, the Fall, and the Saving of the Remnant within the stories making up the Silmarillion show Tolkien’s debt to his Christian upbringing, yet also show his genius in presenting these motifs in original ways which allow us to appreciate them anew.

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References:

1. Humphrey Carpenter, The Letters of J.R.R., Boston: Houghton Mifflin (1981)

2. J.R.R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion, 2^nd Edition, New York: Ballantine Books (1999)

3. J.R.R. Tolkien, Morgoth’s Ring, HoME XI, in particular ‘Notes on Motives in the Silmarillion’ and ‘Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth’

4. New American Bible

Notes:

1. Letters, no. 131.

2. ‘And thou, Melkor, shalt see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined.’ [Silmarillion, ‘Ainulindalë’]

3. Consider, for instance, the way Sauron is often referred to by the peoples of Middle-earth as ‘the Shadow’.

4. Letters, no. 131

5. See, for instance, in Morgoth’s Ring, ‘The Converse of Manwë and Eru’ which is appended to ‘Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth’.

6. ‘The last major effort, of this demiurgic kind, made by the Valar was the lifting up of the range of the Pelóri to a great height. It is possible to view this as, if not an actually bad action, at least as a mistaken one. Ulmo disapproved of it. It had one good, and legitimate, object: the preservation incorrupt of at least a part of Arda. But it seemed to have a selfish or neglectful (or despairing) motive also; for the effort to preserve the Elves incorrupt there had proved a failure if they were to be left free: many had refused to come to the Blessed Realm, many had revolted and left it....Thus the ‘Hiding of Valinor’ came near to countering Morgoth’s possessiveness by a rival possessiveness, setting up a private domain of light and bliss against one of darkness and domination: a palace and a pleasaunce (well-fenced) against a fortress and a dungeon.’ [Morgoth’s Ring, ‘Notes on Motives in the Silmarillion’]

The Hiding of Valinor occurs only after the creation of the Sun and Moon and Melkor’s attack on Tilion: ‘But seeing the assault upon Tilion the Valar were in doubt, fearing what the malice and cunning of Morgoth might yet contrive against them. Being unwilling to make war upon him in Middle-earth, they remembered nonetheless the ruin of Almaren; and they resolved that the like should not befall Valinor. Therefore at that time they fortified their land anew, and they raised up the mountain-walls of the Pelóri to sheer and dreadful heights, east, north, and south.’ [Silmarillion, ‘Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor’]

7. One need only to give a cursory glance at our own history to know this is true. There are many accounts of medieval Christian crusaders beginning their march to free the Holy Land from the infidels by first murdering all the Jews in their vicinity.

8. Letters, no. 131.

9.‘A darkness lies behind us,’ said Bëor, ‘and we have turned our backs upon it, and we do not desire to return thither even in thought.’ [Silmarillion, ‘Of the Coming of Men into the West’] Also, see the discussion between Finrod and Andreth in the ‘Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth’.

10. ‘And in the meanwhile, Men, or the best elements in Mankind, shaking off his [Melkor’s] shadow, came into contact with a people who had actually seen and experienced the Blessed Realm.... In their association with the warring Eldar Men were raised to their fullest achievable stature, and by the two marriages the transference to them, or infusion into Mankind, of the noblest Elf-strain was accomplished, in readiness for the still distant, but inevitably approaching, days when the Elves would ‘fade’.’ [Morgoth’s Ring, Notes on Motives in the Silmarillion]

11. Wisdom 2:24.

12. Genesis 5 and 11.

13. So, for instance, the pre-Deluvian Patriarchs generally live over 900 years (Genesis 5), but after the Deluge, the life spans of the Patriarchs begin to lessen. Noah, the last of the pre-Deluvian Patriarchs, lives 950 years (Genesis 9:29), but his son, Shem, lives only 500 years (Genesis 11:11). By the time we get to Abraham, nine generations later, he only lives 175 years (Genesis 25:7).