The Sons of the Valar, the Valfǫður, and Túrin Turambar, Part One

Two sections at the end of the 1937 "Quenta Silmarillion" record a prophecy which is familiar to many as The Second Prophecy of Mandos. It speaks of Túrin Turambar, who shall return from death to defeat and kill Melkor in the Last Battle, the Dagor Dagorath, thus exacting vengeance for himself, his family, and all Mankind. The "Quenta Silmarillion" then mentions Túrin one last time right after the prophecy ends:

But of Men in that day the prophecy of Mandos doth not speak, and no Man it names, save Túrin only, and to him a place is given among the sons of the Valar.

(Lost Road 333) 

The phrase "sons of the Valar" at first glance seems to reflect Tolkien's early view that the Valar could have children. Who would the "sons of the Valar" be, if not their children? But if their children, what is Túrin doing among them? Tolkien had a number of similar phrases that could easily be lumped together and confused, as if all these terms have precisely the same meaning. This will prove not to be the case. We'll take each one in turn, which will give us a better understanding of them all as well as an answer to the presence of Túrin. 

Only a few offspring of the Valar are ever mentioned, mainly in The Book of Lost Tales, and for so short a list it contains nearly as many surprises as names. 

• Fionwë is the son of Manwë and Varda, though he is once called the son of Tulkas, perhaps in a slip of the pen (LT I.58; Shaping 57, 68).
• Manwë and Varda also have a daughter, Erinti (LT I.58). 
• Aulë and Yavanna are the parents of Oromë and Nessa (LT I.66-67, 264). 
• Oromë and Vána are the parents of Nielíqui (LT I.93). 
• Tulkas and Nessa are the parents of Telimektar (LT I.75,101). 
• Even Melkor has a son, Gothmog, whose mother is an ogress Ulbandi or Fluithlin (LT II.216).

In time, Tolkien abandoned the whole idea of children being born to the Valar. 

• Fionwë became Ëonwë and Erinti became Ilmarë, neither any longer Children of the Valar, but Maiar, that is, less powerful Ainur who accompanied the Valar to Arda. 
• Oromë and Nessa are recast as Valar in their own right, and 
• Nielíqui, their daughter vanishes. 
• Gothmog remains, though he is no longer Melkor's child and 
• his ogress mother is heard of no more. 
• Telimektar is a constellation, set in the heavens to remind Melkor that his day will come. 
  

There are five terms we need to consider:

• The Children of the Gods
• The Children of the Valar
• The Valarindi
• The Sons of the Gods
• The Sons of the Valar

The Children of the Gods

This phrase appears six times, five of these in the two volumes of The Book of Lost Tales. It is an oddly vague and fluid term. It appears four times in the first volume, and seems always to include both the Valar and Maiar (LT I.145, twice on 184, 189). Yet, it is hard to see the Valar themselves described as "Children of the Gods" along with those said to be their children. Two of these four uses come in direct address, once by Manwë and once by Yavanna, and both times there are Elves present, too. If the Elves are excluded, the text gives no clue that this is so. If the Elves are included, then we have both Valar and Elves called "Children of the Gods." 

In the second volume of The Book of Lost Tales the phrase describes Thingol and Melian (LT II.8). Melian is one of the lesser Ainur who entered Arda with the Valar, and who will become known as the Maiar. With Thingol we again see "Children of the Gods" counting Elves. In The Lost Road Fionwë and Erinti are also "Children of the Gods" (Lost Road 162). For the two of them it is literally true. 

Since The Book of Lost Tales employs no phrase but this one, and since it is used only once more in the course of the legendarium, the permeable boundaries of its definition are possibly indicative of its being the first such phrase. Yet, it is also possible that "Children of the Gods" applies to all those who have seen the light of the Two Trees. If so, it could work as the suffix-ing/ingas does in Eorlingas, the People of Eorl.

The Children of the Valar

Occurring only twice, this phrase first appears in the 1937 "Quenta Silmarillion," recording their presence at the overthrow of Melkor at the end of the First Age (Lost Road 329); and the second is in "Ainulindalë" in Morgoth's Ring, where it describes Fionwë and Ilmarë as the eldest of these (Morgoth 20).

Valarindi

Another, similar term that appears six times is Valarindi. The word literally means Children or Offspring of the Valar, but it also includes the Maiar: "With [the Valar] came many lesser spirits, their children, or beings of their own kind but of less might; these are the Valarindi" (Shaping 263). It is a word found only in "The Annals of Valinor" and "The Annals of Aman" (Shaping 263, 264, 285-286; Lost Road 110; Morgoth 49). So it has a distinctly Valinorean flavor. The word occurs only in connection with the entry of the Ainur into Arda.

The Sons of the Gods

Tolkien speaks eight times about "the sons of the gods." Four of the eight occur in different versions of "The Annals of Beleriand" (Shaping 309 twice; Lost Road 143, 144). We find it once in the "Quenta Noldorinwa," and twice in the 1937 "Quenta Silmarillion" (Shaping 165n9; Lost Road 328, 330). Once it appears in the "Lhammas" (Shaping 176). In every one of these passages, the context is battle and war. 

In seven of the eight the battle is The War of Wrath:

• "The sons of the Gods under Fionwë son of Manwë prepare for war" (Shaping 309).
• "The sons of the Gods wrestled with Morgoth in his dungeons...." (Shaping 309).
• "Here the sons of the Gods prepared for war, and Fionwë son of Manwë was their leader" (Lost Road 143).
• "The sons of the Gods wrestled with Morgoth in his dungeons...." (Lost Road 144).
• "...the overthrow of Morgoth by the sons of the Gods" (Lost Road 176).
• "Beleriand was ablaze with the glory of [Fionwë's] arms, for the sons of the Gods were young and fair and terrible, and the mountains rang beneath their feet (Lost Road 328).
• "...the victorious host of Valinor and the might and splendour of the sons of the Gods...." (Lost Road 330).

The eighth refers to the Dagor Dagorath on the Last Day. It is the final line of the narrative of the "Quenta Noldorinwa":

• "But of Men in that day the prophecy speaks not, save of Túrin only, and him it names among the Gods" (Shaping 165n9).

This passage Tolkien emended, changing "among the Gods" to "among the sons of the Gods." So, just as the terms "Children of the Gods" and "Children of the Valar" seem to apply to those who have seen the light of the Two Trees, and Valarindi describes those Ainur, both Valar and Maiar, in the context of their entry into Arda, "sons of the Gods" places those so called in an exclusively martial context while also admitting Túrin to their company. 

The Sons of the Valar

"Sons of the Valar" is by far the most common of all these phrases, used fifteen times. Tolkien's deployment of it indicates that it is synonymous with "sons of the Gods." For in fourteen of these instances the context is again strictly martial, specifically the War of Wrath (Shaping 37, 39, 149, 154, 157, 158, 160, 163, 164; Lost Road 326, 332; Peoples 242), the guarding of the Calacirya (Morgoth 133), and the Dagor Dagorath (Lost Road 333). Again Túrin appears at the Dagor Dagorath "among the sons of the Valar" (as quoted at the start of this post). The only exception is a statement in "The Grey Annals" that compares Thingol to the "sons of the Valar," but does not say that he was one of them: "In Beleriand King Thingol on his throne was as the sons of the Valar" (Jewels 14). As we have seen above, Thingol seems set apart, as one of the first of the Elves to awaken, as the husband of Melian, and as one who has seen the light of the Two Trees.

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This post has grown so long that I have split it into two parts. I hope to post the second part soon. I will add a link when I have done so.

I cannot sufficiently express my gratitude for the amazing usefulness of The Digital Tolkien Project in this and all my posts on Tolkien. Indispensable.

Faramir, Smooth Operator, Shows His Quality

I just noticed this a little while ago. I was reading Faramir’s declaration of love to Éowyn in “The Steward and the King.” One word jumped out at me — sorrowless (RK 6.v.964). I recognized it from another context. Many of you will, too. Then I wondered how often it showed up. In The Lord of the Rings the word occurs only twice, once here and once in Strider’s song about Beren and Lúthien back in “A Knife in the Dark” (FR 1.xi.193). With sorrowless in mind, a couple of other phrases in Faramir’s declaration suddenly stood out.

Let’s start with his words. I’ll highlight the words and phrases I noticed:

… you are a lady beautiful, I deem, beyond even the words of the elven-tongue to tell. And I love you. Once I pitied your sorrow. But now, were you sorrowless, without fear or any lack, were you the blissful Queen of Gondor, still I would love you. Éowyn, do you not love me?’ Then the heart of Éowyn changed, or else at last she understood it. And suddenly her winter passed, and the sun shone on her.

To the first highlighted passage compare two verses uttered by Beren, found in both The Lay of Leithian and the Silmarillion (Lays 277; S 178).

Lúthien Tinúviel

more fair than mortal tongue can tell.

To the second compare the words of Strider’s song:

And long ago they passed away

In the forest singing sorrowless.

And for the third there is again Strider’s song (FR 1.xi.192):

When winter passed, she came again,

And her song released the sudden spring,

Clearly, Faramir, the younger brother, put his time in the library at Minas Tirith to good use. He woos Éowyn by subtly, very subtly comparing her to Lúthien. How well versed in Elvish poetry she might have been is uncertain. To judge by her brother’s initial attitude towards Lothlórien, not much. But the most likely place in Rohan to find people knowledgeable about Elvish poetry would be in the ruling family.

If I see anymore connections, I’ll let you know. This one seems pretty cool, though.

Of course we can't understand Tom Bombadil

The difficulty many of us face in understanding Tom Bombadil arises from the fact that he is part of nature and we all too often think of ourselves as separate from nature. We cannot grasp mastery apart from domination. We cannot grasp a steward who does not rule. We are thus far more like Denethor and Saruman than any of us would care to admit. It’s also why neither of them understands Gandalf.

Everything but us is a part of Faerie of its very nature, as Tolkien says in On Fairy-stories.1 We are not naturally enchanted. Not now, and perhaps we never were. Yet, if we were, our disenchantment dates from the moment we began to regard ourselves as ruling stewards, as viceregents rather than vicegerents. We are like Sauron unable to imagine that “we should wish to cast him down and have no one in his place,” let alone that “we should try to destroy the Ring itself….” (TT 3.v.497). So, of course we can’t understand Tom Bombadil.

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1

Given Tolkien’s description in On Fairy-stories (see below), I have no doubt that he would say that we are disenchanted, not the world. It would take long thought to work out the dynamics of this point of view in opposition to the standard view that the world is disenchanted.

“Faerie contains many things besides elves and fays, and besides dwarfs, witches, trolls, giants, or dragons: it holds the seas, the sun, the moon, the sky; and the earth, and all things that are in it: tree and bird, water and stone, wine and bread, and ourselves, mortal men, when we are enchanted."

Gandalf in Latin by Way of Pope Leo

As was widely noted back in May of this year Pope Leo XIV quoted Tolkien in his encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, specifically Gandalf's statement in chapter 9 of book 6 of The Lord of the Rings (RK 9.vi.879). I was talking to James Tauber, the Mad Max of Digital Humanities, the creator of the fabulously useful Digital Tolkien Project, and an all around nice guy. We were lamenting the absence of a Latin version of this encyclical, because we were wondering how the Tolkien quotation would be rendered in Latin. James suggested that while we wait for the official Latin version to appear I should try my hand at a translation of my own. 

I thought about it, toyed with it, and here it is. Not without blemishes, that's for sure. It is also not a literal translation. Why not? Well, Gandalf is in a council meeting here talking rather vaguely about evil people, not abstract forces. Nor is he in a library penning a scholarly treatise on the metaphysics of evil. Latin, moreover, is far more inclined to speak of "the Romans" than of "Rome" when addressing real world actions. In English we might say either "Rome waged three wars against Carthage" or "The Romans waged three wars against the Carthaginians" but in Latin it would be far more idiomatic to use the much more vivid phrasing of the latter. 

So let's start with the English, followed by the Latin:

‘Other evils there are that may come; for Sauron is himself but a servant or emissary. Yet it is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till. What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.'

alii vel mali vel malefici sunt qui forsan venient. nam Sauron ipse est tantum unus ex servis aut legatis. at non est nobis regere tempestates omnes huius mundi, sed viribus quam maximis succurrere aetatibus nostris ut malis veteribus eradicatis posteri agros laetos arent. Quae tempestas illis erit eam non est nobis regere.

Here's some notes on some of the Latin phrasing I adopted.

alii vel mali vel malefici -- "others whether evil or evildoers" -- I didn't like the sound of just "alii mali" and it didn't seem to say quite enough on its own. So I added "malefici," which means "evildoer" in general, but often indicates "sorcerers" or "enchanters." 

qui forsan venient -- "that may come." venient is a future indicative, which technically means "will come." I could have also used veniant, a present subjunctive, "may come." I decided that Gandalf really had little or no doubt that other evils were going to come someday, and so an indicative verb (talks about facts) seemed better than a subjunctive verb (talks about possibilities). But I didn't want to eliminate all doubt. Forsan,"perhaps" diminishes the certainty of the future indicative venient.

regere -- "master," but it means "rule" as a king (rex) rules. This is more about control and domination than a form of government, just as we use "democracy" to refer to a principle of one-person-one-vote, not we-all-go-down-to-the-forum-and-vote-on-laws.

tempestates -- "tides." At first glance it's tempting to think Tolkien is talking about the tides in the ocean. But as a good student of early Medieval England he would have known that only a fool of a Took would try to govern those tides. Here the word primarily has its older, original meaning going all the way back to Old English: "A portion, extent, or space of time; an age, a season, a time, a while" (OED). Latin tempestas has a similar range, from period of time to tempest, from weather to misfortune. This works well with Gandalf's later use of "weather" in the last sentence, since I can use both regere and tempestas there, too. The weather imagery also suits the farming imagery, while using the word that actually means tides of the sea (aestus) would clash with that. 

succurrere -- is perfect for "succour," as well as being its semantic and etymological ancestor, literally run to the aid of or assist.

eradicatis -- "uprooting." The verb eradico, with the prefix -e- (out) attached to the stem -radic- (root), means root out, uproot, utterly destroy, eradicate. It leads nicely into the the agrarian metaphor.

So there it is. It's been a long, long time since I've composed anything in Latin, but I don't think I've made any horrendous gaffes. 

When the Vatican gets around to publishing the encyclical in Latin, I'll have a look their translation. And I'll probably be rather embarrassed. 

One thing I know. Tolkien would have been blown away to be cited by the Pope. 

Sometimes a Goad Is Just a Goad -- Adventures in an Ancient Greek Dictionary

The phrase "it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks" has for centuries years been a common English translation of the phrase in Acts 26:14, "σκληρόν σοι πρὸς κέντρα λακτίζειν." Jesus says this to Saul/Paul on the road to Damascus. Jesus is comparing him to a draught animal kicking when his driver prods him with his goad (=prick) to get him moving.

Unsurprisingly, this translation has also been the cause of much snickering.

The Greek noun kentron (κέντρον) basically means "goad," and sometimes a goad is just a goad. Pretty sure that is the case here. I can't see the risen Jesus making bawdy puns as a way of persuading Saul that he is who he says he is. Jesus was not an internet troll. (Though Paul might have been.)

But it need not be, and thereon hangs a tale. Scanning through the various meanings of the word, one stood out immediately. Because it was defined only by another Greek noun, πόσθη, posthe. That's a dead giveaway that this sense of the word is obscene. It's a 19th Century thing, equal parts prudish and prurient. So I then looked up that word. It's defined only in Latin. So there's dead giveaway # 2. The definition? membrum virile. You got that? verbum sat sapienti. (That's Latin for "nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more.")

Next I looked up the verb related to kentron, which is kenteo (κεντέω), "to goad," and scanned through its definitions. I found another entry defined only by another Greek verb, βινέω, bineo. Dead Giveaway # 3. I looked that verb up. Again the definition is in Latin (DG #4) -- "inire, coïre" -- but with a brief explanation in English: "of illicit intercourse."