The Book of Lost Tales Part I: A Readthrough

[Tar-Jêx]

Originally Posted by Belegorn

You prefer Sauron to Tevildo Prince of Cats?

I quite liked Tevildo, but it didn't make sense for a cat to be an evil minion. Carcharoth seemed like it fit better in the universe than a cat, because cats have never been explained.

[jallanite]

The Elvish city of Kôr may be based on the city of Kôr in the novel She: A History of Adventure by H. Rider Haggard, one of the most influential novels in modern literature. In Henry Resknik’s interview with Tolkien in 1966, Tolkien states, “I suppose as a boy She interested me as much as anything …” See http://efanzines.com/Niekas/Niekas-18.pdf , page 40.

Haggard’s Kôr is a ruined African city where Ayesha, an immortal white queen, has ruled for two millennia. Ayesha reveals that she has learned the secret of immortality and that she possesses other supernatural powers including the ability to read the minds of others, a form of telegnosis, and the ability to heal wounds and cure illness.

Ayesha is by some considered to be the origin of Tolkien’s Elven ruler Galadriel.

One Willam H. Stoddard partly posts at http://www.troynovant.com/Stoddard/T...nd-Ayesha.html :

Chapter XIII of She, “Ayesha Unveils”, offers a striking series of events. The narrator of the story speaks with Ayesha in a hidden chamber, and learns of her agelessness. She shows him a “font-like vessel” in which she summons up images of his own journey to her country, telling him she learned of him through such images; and when he calls it magic, she tells him:

It is no magic — that is a dream of ignorance. There is no such thing as magic, though there is such a thing as knowledge of the hidden ways of Nature. This water is my glass; in it I see what passes when at times it is my will to summon it …

After this, he asks her to allow him to look on her face, and she unveils herself, revealing beauty that he compares to that of a celestial being, which he says lies “in a visible majesty, in an imperial grace, in a godlike stamp of softened power” — and he covers his eyes and goes away shaken, reflecting that it is not safe to look on such beauty.

Note how many details can be compared with Frodo’s visit to the mirror of Galadriel in The Fellowship of the Ring. Lothlórien, like Kôr, is an ancient city holding the memory of a distant past, and ruled by an undying queen. Both accounts include a pool of water that shows visions, partly out of the mind and memory of the viewer, and partly of distant places. And Galadriel not only is overwhelmingly beautiful, like Ayesha, but, when she considers accepting the One Ring from Frodo, takes on the same quality of visible majesty. Her climactic line “All shall love me and despair!” would sound entirely natural in Ayesha’s voice.

The one great difference is that Haggard makes Ayesha fundamentally evil, though capable of occasional softer feelings; but Tolkien makes Galadriel ultimately good, despite her being capable of pride, ambition, and rebellion. In the end, Galadriel is redeemed, whereas Ayesha is destroyed by those same qualities, which she is unable to renounce.

Tolkien may have unconsciously picked the name Kôr for his city from Haggard’s novel, or even purposely borrowed the name, but later changed it to Tirion upon Túna to avoid the connection.

For further discussion of Haggard’s Kôr and Tolkien’s Kôr, see John D. Rateliff’s essay “She and Tolkien, Revisited” in Tolkien and the Study of His Sources, edited by Jason Fisher.

[Orphalesion]

Yes the name connection between Kôr in She and Kôr in the Book of Lost Tales is interesting I came upon it a few years ago and it even prompted me to read it. Ayesha does seem a lot like an "evil" Galadriel and perhaps offers a glimpse of how Galadriel would have acted if she had fallen to the temptation and taken the Ring from Frodo.
It would not be the only time Tolkien was inspired by (relatively) contemporary fiction, another example Psamathos Psamathides from Roverandom who bears resemblance to a character from an earlier Children's Book (more so in the early drafts)

I find it also interesting how important Kôr was to the Elves in this early conception, much more, it seems to me than Tirion later would be. I mean in this early stage it's the Ilkorindi "The Elves that never have dwelt in Kor" instead of the Úmanyar "The Elves that have never been to Aman" and their city in exile on Tol Erresea is Kortirion (whcih could be interpreted as Kor-Tower) instead of Avallone "Near Aman". Kôr was almost an Elf Jerusalem.

In the later mythology the Elves seemed to yearn for the lands of Aman/Eldamar/Valinor and not so much for Tirion itself, with the possible exception of Turgon.
For instance, if Tirion was as important to the psyche of the Exiles as Kôr had been, Galadriel's lament would have said "Maybe thou shalt find Tirion" instead of "Maybe thou shalt find Valimar" and it would be "The Undying City" instead of "The undying Lands"

[Formendacil]

The "Link" at the start of this tale is brief: Eriol wants to know more, and eventually Lindo tells a tale at the Hall of Fire that answers what happens next.

Although obvious similarities in theme and action abound between this and the later text, I was struck rereading this chapter just how much Tolkien's plotting improved between this version and the later versions. One key example is that in the earlier text, the strife between the Valar and the Noldoli is almost completely manufactured by Melko. Although he goes about whispering half-truths and lies amongst the Elves, there is no real evidence that this causes any harm--it is only when Melko goes lying to Manwë with accusations that real division comes about.

Interesting too, what the narrator says about Manwë: "Heavy was Manwë's heart at these words, for he had feared long that that great amity of the Valar and Eldar be ever perchance broken, knowing that the Elves were children of the world and must one day return to her bosom." I find this passage intriguing, because it suggests that Manwë, who is elsewhere shown to be naively hopeful about Melko's ability and likelihood of repenting, is far more foreseeing and prepared--indeed, overly so, given that the Gnomes have done NOTHING yet--for the Elves to go astray.

Anyway, Finwë's embassy attempts a clumsy defence, but Melko's evil goes off without a hitch, and the Noldoli are banished from Kôr, finding a new home, Sirnúmen, the precursor to Formenelos. And this is what I mean when I say the later plot is much improved: there, Melkor's words cause more than just unease--people (well, Fëanor anyway) cause strike, and the punishment of banishing is enacted for that, leading to a genuine rift between the Valar and Noldor: genuine because even if Melkor was an actor behind it, his lies led to actions, not just to accusations.

A major difference--and, I think, another example of the later text's strength--is the long pause between the two major calamities: the death of Fëanor's father and the theft of the jewels, and the death of the Two Trees. In The Silmarillion, these actions are joined, happening as part of a single catastrophe, while here they are strung out. To me, the narrative between the two events seems to stagnate a little; Melko seems to have no idea what to do with himself once he has stolen the jewels--and, indeed, his motivation to take them in the first place seems to be mere greed.

It fascinates me that Fëanor was not originally Finwë's son, but all the more so because, as CT shows in the notes and commentary, Tolkien wavered between having his great desire for revenge be due to his grief as a son or father--and although Bruithwir would remain a distinct (if undifferentiated) character, I find myself wondering if the decision to go with "father" as the dead character was one that allowed much of the later history to develop. I do not think it would have made Fëanor as likely to be welded to the royal house, since the death of a royal grandson would not have had the same whole-nation motivating factor as the death of the Tribal Father--and I doubt whether the Seven Sons of Fëanor would have developed, since six surviving sons would have uncut the unsalvable grief of losing a most beloved child.

Which is not to say that it COULDN'T have been written! But I do think that the choice of father rather than son was more conducive to developing the story as we would have it and I incline to suspect it might have contributed to its fermentation. Imagine how different the legendarium would have been without the Seven Sons of Fëanor! Would there have been an Oath? Would the House of Finwë and its domestic drama have ever risen to such a central place?

Other thoughts...

1.) Lacking a connection to Fëanor, Finwë seems rather more saintly in the original text--more worth of his epessë Nólemë, anyway.

2.) I like the triennial/septennial celebrations and the 21-yearly jubilees.

3.) The story of the messenger killed by the angry Valar and Eldar is the only regret I have about losing the gap between the two calamities. Not to say that this taboo-breaking tale would necessarily have fit in the later tale, but it has weight to it, and it feels like an thematic precursor to the kinslayings.

4.) There is ONE point where the lies of Melko are seen to have had some impact, but it's a bit "too little, too late." After Manwë tries to convince the Noldoli to stay in Valinor by revealing Men and their nature, Fëanor produces a speech of indignation that directly parallels Melkor's lies in the Silm, and the narrator does day that "it is a matter for great wonder, the subtle cunning of Melko... pouring from Fëanor his foe."

5. Ungwë Lianti covets the gems of the Noldor, but unless I'm missing something, she doesn't actually devour them in the old story. To quote: "so came all that treasury of most lovely gems fairer than any others that the world has ever seen into the foul keeping of Wirilómë, and was wound in webs of darkness and hidden deep in the caverns of the eastern slopes of the great hills that are the southern boundary of Eruman." The dread and horror of Ungoliant is far less here, but I'll grant that I like the mental image this evokes: a lost treasure in the most desolate of places in the most binding of cobwebs.

6. We get our first mention of miruvor--by way of a blade steeped in it, for no apparent reason.

7. Speaking of things in The Lord of the Rings, I was immediately reminded of the Nazgûl by this passage: "Know then that Oromë had great stables and a breeding ground of good horses not so far from this spot, where a wild forest land had grown up. Thither Melko steals, and a herd of black horses he captures, cowing them with the terror he could wield." The parallel to the theft of the black horses from the Rohirrim is even stronger if you consider that at least the mearas were considered to be of the lineage of the horses of Oromë.

[Orphalesion]

Originally Posted by Formendacil

Melko seems to have no idea what to do with himself once he has stolen the jewels--and, indeed, his motivation to take them in the first place seems to be mere greed.

Well the Silmarills weren't that important yet in a metaphysical sense, they were just the most beautiful of the gems created by the Noldoli. But even the later version Melkor is motivated, fundamentally motivated by greed, cosic-scale greed for the light untainted and the flame unperishable, but still greed.

It fascinates me that Fëanor was not originally Finwë's son, but all the more so because, as CT shows in the notes and commentary, Tolkien wavered between having his great desire for revenge be due to his grief as a son or father--and although Bruithwir would remain a distinct (if undifferentiated) character, I find myself wondering if the decision to go with "father" as the dead character was one that allowed much of the later history to develop. I do not think it would have made Fëanor as likely to be welded to the royal house, since the death of a royal grandson would not have had the same whole-nation motivating factor as the death of the Tribal Father--and I doubt whether the Seven Sons of Fëanor would have developed, since six surviving sons would have uncut the unsalvable grief of losing a most beloved child.

Which is not to say that it COULDN'T have been written! But I do think that the choice of father rather than son was more conducive to developing the story as we would have it and I incline to suspect it might have contributed to its fermentation. Imagine how different the legendarium would have been without the Seven Sons of Fëanor! Would there have been an Oath? Would the House of Finwë and its domestic drama have ever risen to such a central place?

Other thoughts...

1.) Lacking a connection to Fëanor, Finwë seems rather more saintly in the original text--more worth of his epessë Nólemë, anyway.

It is interesting how the family tree of Finwë developed out of necessity as roles needed filling in the various tales. Fëanor's sons will show up soon in the LT, of course still unrelated to Nólemë who only has two children here: Turgon (who is not born until they return to Middle Earth and Isfin (Aredhel). Later as Fëanor was integrated into the family tree Nólemë would be split into Finwe, Fingolfin and Fingon to account for all the different tales of the Elven king's death, the leaders of the Rodothlim from Turamba's tale would be integrated into the family, Finrod arose to reconcile the dualistic nature of the original character from the lay of Leithian.
I'm sadly no expert on it but it would interest me if any of the Finweans were created superfluously just to bolster the family tree (I always had that impression with Angrod and Aegnor)

However while I do love the screwed up family drama of Finwe's descendants later on as much as the next guy, there is something to be said about this early version were not everybody has to be related and Elves seem to be able to rise to leadership position on merit of skill, charisma....or luck.

3.) The story of the messenger killed by the angry Valar and Eldar is the only regret I have about losing the gap between the two calamities. Not to say that this taboo-breaking tale would necessarily have fit in the later tale, but it has weight to it, and it feels like an thematic precursor to the kinslayings.

Oh man, that would have never flown in the later mythology.

5. Ungwë Lianti covets the gems of the Noldor, but unless I'm missing something, she doesn't actually devour them in the old story. To quote: "so came all that treasury of most lovely gems fairer than any others that the world has ever seen into the foul keeping of Wirilómë, and was wound in webs of darkness and hidden deep in the caverns of the eastern slopes of the great hills that are the southern boundary of Eruman." The dread and horror of Ungoliant is far less here, but I'll grant that I like the mental image this evokes: a lost treasure in the most desolate of places in the most binding of cobwebs.

Actually, won't we see later that Ungwë Lianti had a much bigger role planned for her than ultimately materialized? The sun and the moon journey from east to west because Melko holds the north and Ungweliant the south. The (truly) lost tale when she, for a time capture the sun and moon in her nets and her planned demise at the hands of Earendel.
It's a pity that in the published Silmarillion all that is left of her fate is basically "she ran away....and probably ate herself"
She is really one of these tales that later ere lost like Ulbandi and Nuin.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Orphalesion

Well the Silmarills weren't that important yet in a metaphysical sense, they were just the most beautiful of the gems created by the Noldoli. But even the later version Melkor is motivated, fundamentally motivated by greed, cosic-scale greed for the light untainted and the flame unperishable, but still greed.

I suppose one could call it that--though you've already conceded implicitly that there is an order of magnitude in difference between "cosmic-scale greed for the light untainted and flame imperishable" and the rather petty greed-for-gems we see here.

More to the point of what I was thinking, though, Melko's greed in the Lost Tales seems almost spontaneous: he sees gems and simply must have them, whereas although the later Melkor also lusts for the creations of the Noldor (including the Silmarils which do, indeed, have heightened importance), this is a long-standing desire on his part and it is not just a desire to possess something beautiful, but bound up far more clearly with his desire to dominate the other Valar and the created universe. Here that desire to dominate, though perhaps logically implicit, has not yet been drawn out by Tolkien.

And later, when it DOES become a key element of Melkor's plot and character, I would argue that it moves his motivations beyond the realm of even cosmic greed towards pride. Of course, as they say, pride is the root of all sins (including greed) and as the originator of all evil Melkor appropriately partakes of them all, but his greed is later more clearly subordinated to his pride, whereas in the early text it seems to arise separately.

[Orphalesion]

Originally Posted by Formendacil

I suppose one could call it that--though you've already conceded implicitly that there is an order of magnitude in difference between "cosmic-scale greed for the light untainted and flame imperishable" and the rather petty greed-for-gems we see here.

More to the point of what I was thinking, though, Melko's greed in the Lost Tales seems almost spontaneous: he sees gems and simply must have them, whereas although the later Melkor also lusts for the creations of the Noldor (including the Silmarils which do, indeed, have heightened importance), this is a long-standing desire on his part and it is not just a desire to possess something beautiful, but bound up far more clearly with his desire to dominate the other Valar and the created universe. Here that desire to dominate, though perhaps logically implicit, has not yet been drawn out by Tolkien.

And later, when it DOES become a key element of Melkor's plot and character, I would argue that it moves his motivations beyond the realm of even cosmic greed towards pride. Of course, as they say, pride is the root of all sins (including greed) and as the originator of all evil Melkor appropriately partakes of them all, but his greed is later more clearly subordinated to his pride, whereas in the early text it seems to arise separately.

Indeed you are right, I sometimes forget the Catholic foundation of the later mythology and that Melkor's original sin was nihilistic pride, the folly to think himself as an equal or even superior to Eru.
Melko is really a much more petty creature than Morgoth. Here he just wants to grab the gems, which previously he had pretended to care little about later the other gems are just a cherry on top of his real target, the Silmarils containing the Light Untainted, which he hates and yet hungers for.

[Formendacil]

It's a post six months in the making! Well, it's a post six months in the delaying--and for a rather short chapter, compared with some of the others in The Book of Lost Tales, but I haven't abandoned this thread.

In the meantime, there's definitely been time enough for those fallen behind in their reading to catch up.

"The Flight of the Noldoli" is really the conclusion to the previous couple chapters--chapters artificially divided as much by Christopher Tolkien as by the text--and it bears a strong resemblance to its successor texts in The Silmarillion. One of the interesting things about this text, as opposed to some of the others, is that we get to see a complete example of Tolkien brainstorming an idea: "the all-important battle of Cópas Alqaluntë where the Gnomes slew the Solosimpi must be inserted," with both the previous, shorter text still present and the later rider added. So often with Tolkien, we either cannot see the original text (erased pencil written over by the next version is common indeed in the Lost Tales) or we see notes that lead nowhere--and, indeed, this note is among a couple others that do not get a clear path to completion.

Even in this early text, when Fëanor is no kin to Finwë and swears no oath, the Noldoli end their unpleasant journey blaming him--he is the instigator, and by casting Nólemë as friendlier to the Valar and opposed to leaving, Tolkien creates a division between the two that doesn't turn to complete opposition, because Nólemë will not leave his people, continuing with them (as king) into exile. Nólemë's role in the story here, beyond the point of Finwë's death in The Silmarillion is essentially that of Fingolfin--a correspondence highlighted by the fact that Turgon is his son in this older version.

Tolkien is always good at leaving crumbs of stories never told--RPG germs, you could almost call them. There are at least two in this tale:

Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien

Songs name that dwelling the Tents of Murmuring, for there arose much lamentation and regret, and many blamed Fëanor bitterly, as indeed was just, yet few deserted the host for they suspected that there was no welcome ever again for them back to Valinor - and this some few who sought to return indeed found, though this entereth not into this tale.

--emphasis mine

Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien

Yet even so such things may not slay the Gnome-kin, and of those there lost still 'tis said some wander sadly there among the icehills, unknowing of all things that have befallen their folk, and some essayed to get them back to Valinor, and Mandos has them, and some following after found in long days their unhappy kin again.

[jallanite]

This marks the point where the villains are not the obvious characters. Previously the main villain is Melko with some lieutenants. Beside these there have appeared Ossë, Makar, and Meássë representing the dark side of the Valar, and also Ungweliant. But now most of an entire kindred of the Eldar, the Gnomes, has turned against Manwë and the other Valar, as well as turning against Melko.

In his later versions of his legendarium Tolkien makes the situation more complex with the slaying of Finwë and the appointment of the obvious heir Fëanor as new high king. But in the Book of Lost Tales nothing indicates any relationship between either Bruithwir or his son Fëanor with the Gnomish king Nólemë.

Fëanor announces his intention to set out into “the wide and magic world” to seek the gems that Melko has stolen and seemingly most who hear Fëanor are willing to follow Fëanor. King Nólemë follows the counsel of his advisers and is so also willing to follow Fëanor, even when Nólemë does not agree with Fëanor’s counsel.

It is not told whether Nólemë takes part with Fëanor in Fëanor’s stealing of the vessels or whether Nólemë was one of the later arrivals at the battle who slew the Solosimpi or cast them into the sea. “So first perished the Eldar neath the weapons of their kin, and that was a deed of horror.”

The Noldoli have now lost any chance of reconciliation with Manwë. A “servant of Véfantur” spies the Noldoli from the North and pleads with them to return, but the Noldoli only answer him scornfully. The servant then warns them in prophecy of ill adventures that will afterwards befall them, ending with the warning: “Great is the fall of Gondolin.”

In later accounts it is Mandos himself who proclaims the prophecy but no mention is made of Gondolin. Tolkien may have felt that a prophecy so specific beggared credibility, as well as raising the question of why the Noldoli would later give so ill-omened a name to their future city.

The prophecy is recalled by Turgon in “The Fall of Gondolin” in The Book of Lost Tales II in an interpolated sentence, possibly added after Tolkien wrote “The Flight of the Noldoli”. The prophecy is there attributed to Amnon the Prophet of Old. But here in “The Flight of the Noldoli” Tolkien wrote, “these word were treasured long among then as the Prophecies of Amnos, for thus was the place where they were spoken called at that time.”

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Nólemë's role in the story here, beyond the point of Finwë's death in The Silmarillion is essentially that of Fingolfin--a correspondence highlighted by the fact that Turgon is his son in this older version.

One could say that Finwe Noleme is Fingolfin - who at a later stage of the language was Finwe Nolofinwe, 'Sindarized' as Fingolfin. Or rather, Noleme was split into two characters, father and son, the 'father' half displacing Bruithwir. This identification can even be seen in his tomb: Finwe Noleme died in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears but his heart was recovered and brought to Gondolin, as was in the later legend the case with Fingolfin's body after his duel with Morgoth.