Eärendil and Wade's Boat, Or, what do you mean you're not going to tell us the story?

Artwork copyright Donato Giancola

Alan and Shawn over at The Prancing Pony Podcast (which, if you don't already listen to it, why not?) have just published another excellent and fun new episode (# 141, "Starship Trooper") on Eärendil and the poem about him that Bilbo sings in Many Meetings (FR 2.i.233-36).

Crucial to the tale of Eärendil the Mariner is his ship, Vingelot or Vingelótë, without which Eärendil would have been stuck in a port on a western bay where lonely sailors pass the time away talking about their homes. The name Vingelot gives us a tantalizing and frustrating example of how very easily stories can be lost, likely forever.

In Chaucer's Merchant's Tale is a (for us) obscure reference to 'Wades bote' (IV E 1424). Wade, son of Weyland the Smith, evidently had many stories told about him in the Middle Ages, of which virtually all trace has vanished. The boat was named Guingelot, which is even closer to Vingelot than appears at first glance, since in Norman French the word would have been pronounced something like Wingelot or Wingelok (Skeat).

In his 1598 edition of Chaucer Thomas Speight commented upon this line, and Thomas Tyrwhitt in his 1775 edition was scathing about Speight's neglect, as quoted below:

Ver. 9298. Wades bote] Upon this Mr. Speght remarks, as follows: "Concerning Wade and his bote called Guingelot, as also his straunge exploits in the same, because the matter is long and fabulous, I passe it over." Tantamne rem tam negligenter?* Mr. Speght probably did not foresee, that Posterity would be as much obliged to him for a little of this fabulous matter concerning Wade and his bote, as for the gravest of his annotations. The story of Wade is mentioned again by our author in his Troilus, iii. 615. 

He songe, she playde, he tolde a tale of Wade.

It is there put proverbially for any romantic history; but the allusion in the present passage to Wades bote can hardly be explained, without a more particular knowledge of his adventures, than we are now likely ever to attain.

Tolkien, too, had many ideas about the 'straunge exploits' of Eärendil in his ship, the vast majority of which are known only, as with Wade, through comments and outlines (Lost Tales 2.252-277) and some thirty lines of poetry, in which Tuor, the father of Eärendil, is briefly called Wade (Lays 142):

'But Wade of the Helsings    wearyhearted'                     

 Upon which Christopher Tolkien comments (Lays 144):

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.

  

* 'so great a matter [handled] so negligently?'