Whose Gil-Galad's daddy?

[Inderjit Sanghera]

Gil-Galad’s parentage was one of the most controversial, contradictory and changeable aspects of Tolkien’s work on the Silmarillion. We can see that in ‘The Return of The Shadow’ (HoME 6) that in early drafting’s Gil-Galad was a descendant of Feanor

And he made an alliance with the elf king of those lands…Gilgalad…a descendant of Feanor..”

HoME 6;‘At Rivendell’

Of who he was descended from ,we don’t know, but Tolkien tells us that of all the sons of Feanor, only Caranthir, Maglor and Curufin (Father of Celebrimbor) were married, though I doubt whether the genealogies of the Finweans had been developed much at this point. (The early drafts of LoTR) At first I thought he may be a Feanorian because Tolkien wanted Gil-galad and Celebrimbor to be related, but in these versions, Celebrimbor is a descendant of Daeron, the Sindarin loremaster. (I’m unsure as to if he was a brother of Luthien here, as he was in BoLT.)

But Tolkien began to shift away from this and by the time of the end of LoTR he had been made into a son of Finrod. (Who here is known as Inglor or his later nickname Felagund)

But fearing now that all strong places were doomed to fall at last before the might of Morgoth, he (Finrod) sent away his wife Meril to her own folk in Eglorest, and with her went their son…Gilgalad starlight he was called…”

HoME 11;The Later Quenta Silmarillion.

We can see that this conception (that Gil-Galad was the son of Finrod) was unchanged for some time, as HoME 5 shows us:

Bu Elrond the Half-Elven remained with Gilgalad son of Inglor Felagund…”

But when the story of Finrod and Amarie was developed (Grey Annals, HoME 11, also present in HoME 10), and her not being able to go with him into exile, a new story had to be developed.

So he was made into the son of Orodreth. Originally Orodreth was a son of Finarfin, but Unfinished Tales tells us that Tolkien wanted to put him down a generation

For some reason unknown to me, my father displaced the second king of Nargothrond and made him a member of the same family in the next generation

Unfinished tales; Of Galadriel and Celeborn

The parentage of Orodreth was also switched, but only twice. Firstly he was a son of Finrod, and his name was ‘Artanaro Rhodothir’ (HoME 12), but Tolkien ,realising his mistake, changed his parentage to Angrod. (Aegnor not being married, as he fell in love with Andreth, the Beorian wise-woman, so his parentage was assigned to the only son of Finarfin available.)

I’m going to side-track a bit here, if you don’t mind and discuss the idea that Fingon was the father of Gil-galad, which is stated in the Published Silmarillion:

Fingon in sorrow took the lordship of house of Fingolfin; but his young son Ereinion ( who was after named Gil-Galad) he sent to the havens

The Silmarillion; ‘Of the ruin of Beleriand’

And it seems this idea of Chris Tolkien was developed from this ephemeral (short-lived) idea in The Grey Annals

But his young son Findor Gilgalad he sent to the havens

HoME 11; The Grey Annals

Though it is mentioned several other times in The Grey Annals

But this, was though, a forgivable mistake by Chris Tolkien, since a lot of the published ‘Silmarillion’ is derived from the ‘Grey Annals’ it was a mistake that he would rue. He later comments on his mistakes in the Grey Annals (HoME 11) and the Shibboleth of Feanor (HoME 12)

Also in the Shibboleth of Feanor (HoME 12)[/ Tolkein states that Fingon (Here 'Findekano' his Quenya name, of which 'Fingon' is the Sindarin translation) had no wife and thus no child:

Findekano had no wifer or child

So, we can see that Tolkien’s last take on Gil-galad’s family tree is as follows:

Finarfin-> Angrod -> Orodreth-> Gil-Galad and Finduilas

HoME 12; The Shibboleth of Feanor

THAT is Tolkien’s final word on it. Gil-Galad IS NOT the son of Fingon, as the Published Silmarillion states, and so Gil-galad’s father is most definetly Orodreth, son of Angrod.