The War of the Jewels (26 page)

$226. In $221 'the host of Fingolfin' is obviously a slip of the pen, for

'the host of Fingon', and so probably 'the banners of Fingolfin' here also: QS ($12) has 'the banners of Fingon'.

$228. 'in the rearguard', struck out in GA, is found both in AB 2 and in QS ($13). - It is not said either in AB 2 or in QS that the host of Hithlum was surrounded, only that the enemy came between them and Erydwethion, so that Fingon was forced to retreat towards the Pass of Sirion.

It seems clear that Turgon emerged from the Pass only a brief time before the coming of the decoy force out of Angband; therefore he had not yet actually encountered Hurin.

$230. The Balrogs were still at this time conceived to exist in large numbers; cf. AAm $50 (X.75): '[Melkor] sent forth on a sudden a host of Balrogs' - at which point my father noted on the typescript of AAm: 'There should not be supposed more than say 3 or at most 7 ever existed' (X.80).

$231. In AB 2 and in QS ($15) it was Cranthir, not Maglor, who slew Uldor the Accursed. It is not said in those texts that 'new strength of evil men came up that Uldor had summoned and kept hidden in the eastern hills', nor, of course, that the Feanorians, fleeing towards Mount Dolmed, took with them a remnant of the Naugrim, for it was only with the Grey Annals that the Dwarves took part in the battle (commentary on $212).

$232. Earlier in GA ($22) the Enfeng are the Dwarves of Belegost, but there was a period (Q, QS) when they were those of Nogrod (see commentary on $22); this no doubt explains Nogrod here, which was struck out and replaced by Belegost as soon as written. - The entire paragraph, and all its detail, is original in GA.

$233. In QS ($17) the banners of Fingon were white. In the account in GA of the fall of Fingolfin ($155) his shield was blue set with a star of crystal, and his arms silver; this is found also in the QS

version ($144).

$$234-5. The speeches between Turgon, Hurin, and Huor are entirely new. In $235 one might expect Huor to have said: 'I shall never look on thy white walls again' (as he does in the published Silmarillion, p. 194), since he had been to Gondolin, fourteen years before; but see p. 169.

$$235-6. Virtually all the changes in these paragraphs were made at the time of the writing of the manuscript.

$237. The name Glindur has appeared in other passages introduced into the primary text: $$119 - 20, 165.

$240. Original details in GA are the striking of Huor's eye by the venomed arrow, and the piling of the dead men of Hador's house 'as a mound of gold'.

$241. This paragraph is derived from passages in QS ($$15-16) that occur at an earlier point in the narrative; but there is no mention in GA of the sons of Bor (see commentary on $174).

$242. The statement here that 'Tol-sirion [was] retaken and its dread towers rebuilt', not previously made, is clearly in plain contradiction of what was said in QS (V.300): 'They buried the body of Felagund upon the hill-top of his own isle, and it was clean again, and ever after remained inviolate; for Sauron came never back thither.' In the published Silmarillion this passage in QS was changed.

$243. 'Cirdan held the Havens' is of course an addition to the passage in QS ($20) which is here being closely followed. - The references to Morgoth's peculiar fear of Turgon, and to Ulmo's friendship towards the house of Fingolfin, who scorned Morgoth in Valinor, have no antecedents in earlier texts. It can be seen from the rejected lines (rough and with many changes in the manuscript) that my father was to some extent working out the thought as he wrote.

The words 'from Turgon ruin should come to him' are a reference to Earendil and his embassage to Valinor.

$$244-9. The encounter of Hurin with Morgoth as told in GA is based on and for the most part follows closely the story in QS

($$21-3), but with some expansions: Morgoth's words concerning Hurin's wife and son now helpless in Hithlum, Hurin's sight of Hithlum and Beleriand far off from his stone seat on Thangorodrim.

See further p. 169.

$251. It is at this point in the narrative that the draft manuscripts QS(C) and QS(D), having concluded the 'Nirnaith' chapter with the setting of Hurin on Thangorodrim, give a new heading, in QS(C)

'Of Turin the Hapless' and in QS(D) 'Of Turin Turamarth or Turin the Hapless'. This, which was to be the next chapter (17) in QS, begins with the birth of Tuor and the death of Rian on the Hill of Slain (to which the Grey Annals likewise now turn); but QS(C) goes only so far as Turin's departure from Menegroth to go out to fight on the marches of Doriath wearing the Dragon-helm, and QS(D) continues beyond this point only to Turin's self-imposed outlawry after the slaying of Orgof (GA $259).

The fostering of Tuor by Dark-elves was recorded both in AB 2

(V.137) and in QS ($24); rejected in GA, there appears instead the first mention of Annael and the Grey-elves of Mithrim (see commentary on $252). Glorwendil's death of grief for her husband Hundor son of Haleth is referred to in the course of the narrative of the Nirnaith Arnediad in QS ($13).

$252. In both AB 2 (V.138) and in QS ($19) it was recorded that 'the Elves of Hithlum' were enslaved in the mines of Morgoth at this time, such of them as did not escape into the wild, and one would naturally assume that this referred to Noldorin Elves of Fingolfin's people - although the very reference to Tuor's fostering by 'Dark-elves' shows that there were other Elves in Hithlum, and 'Grey-elves' may be simply a later term for the Dark-elves of Beleriand owning allegiance to Thingol. In his message to the new-come Noldor by the mouth of Angrod (GA $64) Thingol did not indeed suggest that there were any of his people (Grey-elves) in Hithlum: among the regions where the Noldor might dwell he named Hithlum, adding that 'elsewhere there are many of my folk, and I would not have them restrained of their freedoms, still less ousted from their homes.'

$253. At the end of this paragraph my father pencilled: '(September-Dec.)'; this clearly refers to the months of Turin's journey from Hithlum to Doriath in the latter part of 472 (the Battle of Unnumbered Tears was fought at midsummer of that year, $219).

According to the earlier dating ($183) he was born in the winter of 465; this was changed ($$175, 188) to 464, but without indication of the time of the year. If he were born in the winter of 464, he would still have been seven years old in the autumn of 472.

$256. The whole content of this paragraph is new to the history. In the sentence 'Smiths and miners and masters of fire' the published Silmarillion (p. 196), which derives from this passage, has 'makers of fire': this was a misreading of the manuscript.

$257. It was said earlier in GA ($$151 - 2) that after the Dagor Bragollach Turgon sent Elves of Gondolin to the mouths of Sirion and to the Isle of Balar to attempt shipbuilding (it is perhaps a question, why did he not approach Cirdan at that time?), and that he 'ever maintained a secret refuge upon the Isle of Balar'. But the phrase in the present passage 'and mingled with Turgon's outpost there' was struck out, and the subsequent 'when Turgon heard of this he sent again his messengers to Sirion's Mouths' suggests of itself that the idea of a permanent outpost from Gondolin on Balar had been abandoned.

Here, in an alteration to the text, Voronwe's story is extended back, and he appears in a new role as captain of the last of the seven ships sent out into the Western Ocean by Cirdan (it is not said that he was an Elf of Gondolin). In earlier texts he has of course played no such part. In Q (IV.141) Tuor at the mouths of Sirion met Bronweg (> Bronwe) who had been of old of the people of Turgon and had escaped from Angband. With $$256-7 cf. the story of Tuor in Unfinished Tales, pp. 34-5 and note 13.

$258. If Turin were born in the winter of 464 (see commentary on $253) he would have been in his seventeenth year in 481; it seems therefore that the older date (465) for his birth is retained. The Annals, very cursory, do not mention the occasion of Turin's going to war (the ceasing of all tidings out of Hithlum).

The scribbled note 'Turin donned the Dragon-helm of Galion' is not in the typescript of GA. The Dragon-helm goes back to the old Lay of the Children of Hurin, and was described in Q (IV.118), in the context of Hurin's not having worn it at the Battle of Unnumbered Tears; in the Lay (not in Q) Turin's taking it to war at this time is mentioned (III.16, line 377: 'then Hurin's son took the helm of his sire').

$259. It is here that QS came to an end as a continuous narrative (see V.321, 323).

$260 The first two sentences of this annal are derived from Q

(IV.123) and AB 2 (V.138); but those texts do not give the place of Turin's lair, here said to be in Dimbar.

$261. The first part of this follows AB 2 (on Tuor's 'coming to Hithlum' see V.151), but the statement that Morwen and Nienor

'had been carried away to Mithrim' seems altogether aberrant.

$263. The final form of the annal concerning Tuor, with the date changed to 488 and his age changed to sixteen, and the appearance of Lorgan chief of the Easterlings, is probably derived from the story in Of Tuor and his Coming to Gondolin (Unfinished Tales pp.

18-19): in the manuscript of that work the date 488 was inserted against the paragraph beginning 'Therefore Annael led his small people ...' (p. 18), and Tuor's age was changed from fifteen to sixteen in the same sentence. On the other hand that text has 'after three years of thraldom' (p. 19) as it was written, whereas in GA

'three' is a change from 'seven'.

$264. This is the original annal for 488. When the preceding passage on Tuor was given the date 488 the entry concerning Haldir of Nargothrond became a continuation of that year. The event was referred to in the Lay of the Children of Hurin (III.75, lines 2137-8), where Orodreth's son was named Halmir; Halmir in AB 2

was changed to Haldir (V.138 and note 38), which is the form in the Etymologies (explained as meaning 'hidden hero', stem SKAL {1}, V.386).

$265. In Q Blodrin was a Gnome, with the later addition that he was a Feanorian (IV.123 and note 5); the story told here that he was one of the faithful Easterlings who became a traitor after his capture by Morgoth is a new development. In Q his evil nature was ascribed to his having 'lived long with the Dwarves', and this was derived from the Lay (III.32). - On the pencilled query concerning the Dragon-helm see $266.

$266. In Q Thingol's messengers arrived on the scene because they had been sent to summon Turin and Beleg to a feast (IV.123). - The attempt to develop the subsequent history of the Dragon-helm and weave it into the existing story was inherently very difficult. Here, the questions arise at once: (1) Why was the Dragon-helm in Menegroth? This may be answered by supposing that when Turin came to Menegroth for the feast at which he slew Orgof ($259) he brought the Helm with him from Dimbar, and after the slaying he fled from the Thousand Caves without it; on this assumption, the Helm remained in Doriath during the following years (484 - 9). But (2) if this is granted, why should Beleg now carry it off into the wilds on what must have seemed an almost certainly vain search for Turin, who had been captured by Orcs and haled off to Angband?

In my father's later work on the Turin legend he concluded finally that Turin left the Dragon-helm in Dimbar when he went to Menegroth for the fatal feast, and that (in the later much more complex story) Beleg brought it from there when he came to Amon Rudh in the winter snow: hence in the (extremely artificial) passage in the published Silmarillion, p. 204, 'he brought out of Dimbar the Dragon-helm of Dor-lomin'.

$267. In the Lay, likewise, it was Finduilas who asserted against the disbelief and suspicion in Nargothrond that it was indeed Flinding (Gwindor) who had returned (III.69 - 71).

$268. In this passage a new element enters the story: Turin's assumption of a riddling name, Iarwaeth (cf. the later Agarwaen

'Bloodstained', The Silmarillion p. 210), and his asking Gwindor to conceal his true name 'for the horror he had of his slaying of Beleg and dread lest it were learned in Doriath'; and here also appears the final form of the name of the re-forged sword, Gurthang 'Iron of Death' for earlier Gurtholfin > Gurtholf (V.139 and note 39)

'Wand of Death' (Gurthang is a change on the manuscript from a rejected name that cannot be read: the second syllable is tholf but ]

the first is not Gur, and the meaning given is probably 'Wand of Death'). The form Mormegil appears in the earliest Annals (AB 1), emended to Mormael (IV.304 and note 52); Q had Mormaglir and AB 2 Mormael.

$$269-72. The greater part of this narrative appears for the first time in the Grey Annals: Gwindor's revelation to Finduilas of Turin's identity, his warning to her, and his assertion that all in Angband knew of the curse upon Hurin; Turin's assurance to Gwindor concerning Finduilas and his displeasure with him for what he had done; the honour done to Turin by Orodreth when he learned who he was and the king's acceptance of his counsels; Turin's unhappy love for Finduilas leading him to seek escape from his trouble in warfare.

$271. morrowgift: the gift of the husband to the wife on the morning ('morrow') after the wedding.