#and we know miriel did change her mind later and wanted to live

[soothingmoonlight]

OP, I am pretty sure you mean Christopher Tester's rendition of Fëanor's speech. I watched it too and absolutely loved it! I am posting a link to the video below for anyone who wants to watch/hear his delivery of Fëanor's speech to the Noldor.

I recently watched a rendition of Fëanor's speech to the Noldor on TikTok and I gotta say, hearing it spoken gives it so much more power than just reading it.

While reading the Silmarillion I've always thought that it was a very charismatic speech, even if Fëanor is basically asking his people to leave the only home they've known to literally fight a god. Tolkien wrote an absolute banger of a speech where just reading it already has me going "yeah, yeah that makes sense I get why the Noldor would up and leave after hearing this".

But hearing it being spoken and not only read as part of an audiobook, but actually spoken by a voice actor in an interpretation of how Fëanor would've spoken it really gave it a lot more depth that I wasn't expecting. It was very rousing, it's like your mind was silenced and all you can do is hang onto Fëanor's every word. By the time the voice actor finished the speech, I was ready to pack my bags, cross the ocean to a place I've never been to, and potentially die fighting a god. While my brain still paused at the subtle hints of manipulation (because that speech was manipulative to a degree. But I think that deserves its own post), it was mostly overridden by the 'fuck yeah let's do this' mentality.

The people who stayed back (before the Kinslaying of Alqualondë) during the Flight of the Noldor after hearing that speech are the real deal. It honestly takes strength to not get dragged in by the roaring emotions.

[arofili]

Fëanor’s age at the time of his father’s remarriage

Over the years I’ve seen many different claims about how old Fëanor was at the time of Finwë’s marriage to Indis. I wanted to clear up the “truth” of this canon...mostly by acknowledging that It’s Complicated.

This is all very complicated because Tolkien never really made up his mind on a) timekeeping and b) the rate of elven maturity. Personally I ignore any attempt to make a Tree Year 10x or 144x longer than a Sun Year because it makes my brain hurt, and I generally go with the logic that elves have important age milestones at ages 50 and 100, but these are all deliberate choices and certainly not the only interpretation of any text.

But what information do we have on this subject? Generally, we know less about Fëanor’s age at Finwë and Indis’ marriage, and more about his age upon Míriel’s death, an event that necessarily precedes the remarriage.

The Shibboleth of Fëanor (in Peoples of Middle-earth) states that Míriel did not die until Fëanor was “full-grown”:

Her weariness she had endured until he was full grown, but she could endure it no longer.

Thus, he would have to be an adult at the time of Finwë’s remarriage, because Finwë certainly did not remarry until after Míriel’s death.

In Laws and Customs among the Eldar (Morgoth’s Ring), the section “On Naming” says that Fëanor never knew Míriel at all:

But the name of insight which his mother Miriel gave to him in the hour of birth was Feanaro 'Spirit of Fire';* and by this name he became known to all, and he is so called in all the histories. (It is said that he also took this name as his chosen name, in honour of his mother, whom he never saw.)

Further down in LaCE, we get the story that the published Silm pulls from most heavily:

At their parting (for a little while as he deemed) Finwe was sad, for it seemed a thing unhappy that the mother should depart and miss the beginning at least of the childhood days of her son.

LaCE also gives an interesting detail about his age at the time of Fingolfin’s birth:

As soon as he might (and he was wellnigh fullgrown ere Nolofinwe was born), he left his father's house and lived apart from them...

I take that to mean that he wasn’t quite an adult, but was close to it, when Fingolfin was born, and that this is the first time he was leaving the house, so it was unlikely that he was already married to Nerdanel at the time.

The Annals of Aman, also in Morgoth’s Ring, give Fëanor’s birth year as YT 1179, which is later changed to 1169. Then we learn that Míriel dies in the year 1170, when Fëanor was 1 year old. The Statue of Finwë and Míriel is decreed in 1172, and Finwë does not marry Indis until 1185, fully 13 years later when Fëanor is 14 years old.

So: it seems to me that while the story differs between drafts, Fëanor is very young when Míriel dies (either a baby or a young adult) and there is some time between her death and Finwë’s remarriage. If you go with the version where he is older, he is still not fully an adult at the time of Fingolfin’s birth, and therefore probably wasn’t married himself - though since all we know about his own marriage is that it occurred “in his early youth,” it’s still a possibility! But since the same text then says that he left his father’s house at the same time, I think it probable that he wasn’t married - perhaps he was moving to apprentice with Mahtan? Which would place his marriage not long afterward.

Basically, we have 3 versions:

1. Shibboleth: Fëanor was full grown when Míriel died. Therefore, he must have been full grown when Finwë married Indis.

2. Laws and Customs: Fëanor was an infant when Míriel died; he never even saw her. We don’t know how old he was when Finwë married Indis, but we do know that he was almost but not quite an adult when Fingolfin was born.

3. Annals of Aman: Fëanor was 1 year old when Míriel died. He is 14 years old when Finwë marries Indis. This is my preferred version, but it’s complicated by questions about how long is a Tree Year, anyway? And how fast do elves grow? Are those two things in harmony with one another? We know numbers here, but not necessarily what those numbers mean.

In conclusion, there is no one true canon, though the story that most resembles the one appearing in the published Silm is the one in LaCE.

Make of this what you will! There are several options, and many interpretations of each, especially when it comes to the interpersonal relationships of Finwë, Míriel, Fëanor, Indis, and Fingolfin. I would advise against claiming any one of these as “more canon” than another - and if you’re going to post about your headcanons, do mention which draft you are building off of!

But overall, you can make up your own mind on how you think this went down. Pick your favorite draft - or pick your favorite details from each draft! The fun thing about the complexity of Silm canon is that we can all make our own decisions and shape our own stories!!!

[diversetolkien]

I have currently been reading up on your perspectives about the racism, sexism and antisemitism in tolkien's works, which I have found really enlightening and helpful for me as a white person to read, and was wondering of your opinions of the way that trauma and people with mental illnesses are handled in his works especially the Silmarillion.

I am so sorry I took so long to answer this! This is a long answer, so bare with me. In general I’d like to discuss more about Tolkien and his handling of mental illness. Consider this answer a brief introduction :)

I think Tolkien’s treatment of trauma in his works was a reflection of the available treatment in his time, which was incredibly harmful to people experiencing mental illness. I’ve talked about it a bit HERE. (Keep in mind I wrote it two years ago and it needs a lot of revisions, but it gets my point across).

In general I think it was handled badly—but that’s not Tolkien’s fault. I think Tolkien himself was a victim of the lack of resources.

We see characters working through their trauma in ways not necessarily recommended by professionals, in that they just work through them. There’s no addressing if what they’ve experienced, there’s no in depth familial healing sessions. They pick themselves up and go.

And this can be due to the fact that The Silmarillion is just a very brief account of what has happened, but regardless we don’t go in depth. And this can also be because characters don’t have time to cope (or again, the resources).

I think we can look at Elwing for example? Who despite knowing the Feanorians were coming to sack Sirion, did nothing to evacuate her children or her people and was the sole survivor of the massacre. We can judge her and say that she should have seen it coming to begin with, but she was traumatized, and she never had a chance to fully recover from the trauma because she had to go straight into survival mode for her people. She never had a chance to heal, and naturally panicked when the Feanorians arrived.

Had she been taught proper coping mechanisms, maybe she would have acted differently (as in the case with traumatic experiences). You’re likely to react the same way in a certain situation if you are not given appropriate mechanism. This is why people will have less anxiety attacks when learning how to deal with anxiety, vs. not knowing how to deal with it.

Am I saying she was right for how the situation was handled? Not at all. But I’m also saying there’s levels to why she did what she did, no matter how wrong they were.

There’s also a historical occurrence of people being sent away when they experience mental health crises/illnesses, or being hidden. Asylums were a thing  in English Psychiatric practices. Asylums were not good places for the mentally ill, and around the 1890’s, England’s public opinion was very much against them (for good reason). Nevertheless, they existed isolated from the city.

There were also cases of wrongful confinement.

In certain characters, I see this very similar to Valinor. When they can’t be dealt with due to trauma, they’re sent away. And we know that Valinor isn’t always the best place for healing, even with the Valar dedicated to it. I think this can be seen in the case of Frodo and Celebrian, and to an extent even Miriel who fandom headcanons was experiencing postpartum depression.

Celebrian was assaulted by orcs, and understandably depressed and traumatized by it. While her family helped, their  eventual response was sending her to Valinor where she was never heard of again. Miriel herself already lived in Valinor and still died (which is why I disagree with Valinor being the ‘best place’ for healing), and is practically forgotten about by her husband. In fact he remarries knowing that she still exist and can very well be reembodied. But her problems were too great for him, thus he puts her away and moves on and expects her son not to be angry. We can parallel this to wrongful confinement. It wasn’t unheard of for people to be put away, so that people could move on. This was actually touched up on in Call the Midwife and Jane Erye (the movie), in which there were instances of two men having mentally ill wives, and hiding them/putting them away so they could be remarried.

The assumption is because the family can no loner deal with a problematic family member, they are sent to a place that can’t deal with them either and forgotten. But at least they’re out of the way or out of the narrative.

These practices went well into the 1900’s, and while Tolkien wrote The Silmarillion  later in life we can assume he was influenced by them, especially as a survivor of war.

However, things do change regarding the treatment of the mentally ill to a more community based system in the 1970’s. However, prior to this there was a move to get rid of asylums even after the 1890’s (when the Lunacy Act was passed, that gave patients more rights and asylums more policies they needed to follow).

I also want to add that mental illness was also kept in the family. We can see this in the case of Maedhros. Mental illness for monarchs and how they were treated differed greatly. In some instances monarchs were allowed to remain on the throne, and in other cases monarchs were removed. There’s no “one way” that mental illness was handled with them. We can assume that his family dealt with his trauma as much as they could, but like Elwing he never fully recovered.

Maedhros is stated to have been changed due to his experiences, and never fully got a chance to cope given the position and title he held. Though I think maybe him giving up his throne had a lot to do with his trauma. And of course, he did end up committing suicide.

Some drafts Eol is a thrall. After his experiences he lives isolated away from society.

And I do think one of the biggest examples is Feanor? Losing a parent can be incredibly traumatic, especially if it’s not dealt with at a young age.

 Sources:

The History of Mental Health Services in Modern England: Practitioner Memories and the Direction of Future Research

Surviving the Lunacy Act of 1890: English Psychiatrists and Professional Development during the Early Twentieth Century

From the asylum to community care: learning from experience

 Mental illness in the 16th and 17th centuries

[sweetteaanddragons]

In Perfect Light

Finwe goes to Aman because if there is the slightest chance his people can find safety there, he owes it to them to look, but he spends the whole trip there wary and fearful, sure it’s some sort of trap.

That tension melts away the moment he sees the light of the Trees. It hits him like a peaceful wave, offering more bliss in one moment than the rest of his life combined.

He remembers his people, of course, remembers Miriel, but they’re a distant concern. They’ll be fine, he’s sure. Everything will be fine.

He’s reluctant to leave, but he tears himself away to go fetch his people.

The memory . . . concerns him a bit, once he’s out of reach of the light. He hadn’t thought anything could make his fierce, protective love of his wife and his people seem distant and small.

He had been overwhelmed, he convinces himself. He just needs to get used to it.

The idea of not going back to that light, of never tasting it again, is absolutely unthinkable.

(“Are we sure we should bring them here?” Ulmo asks. 

“They felt so much less pain here,” Nienna says through her silent tears.

“They’ll be safer,” Orome agrees.

“It’s already decided,” Manwe reminds him. “Do you defy our decision?”

Ulmo sighs. “Of course not. They just seemed to react a little strangely to being here.”

“They’re just not used to being safe,” Orome says. “They’ll get used to it in time.”

“ . . . Of course.”)

Miriel loves their new land as much as he does. Of course she does. Even if sometimes he catches the oddest look on her face, like she’s struggling to remember something and can almost reach it but can’t quite close the distance.

It’s not important.

Then she’s pregnant, and it’s one more quiet pleasure in a sea of many. He doesn’t worry when the pregnancy doesn’t go quite as expected. Everything’s going to be fine.

Feanaro comes into the world screaming. The noise is a shock to his system, and for a moment he’s overwhelmed. This is his son, he has a son, and he’s perfect, absolutely perfect, but suddenly all the healers have been jolted into concern for Miriel, running to her side, and something is wrong, wrong, wrong - 

Feanor calms eventually, and the peace steals back in.

Everything’s going to be fine.

After all, Namo has promised to bring back the dead.

Miriel refuses to come back.

“I’m . . . tired,” she says, shooting a sidelong glance at the Valar. “I’ll heal better here.”

Finwe doesn’t understand. There’s no light in Mandos’s Halls. How could she possibly feel better there?

But there’s no point worrying about it. 

He sees Indis singing and the beauty catches his eye even here in a world full of beauties. It eases some of the unpleasant uncertainty starting to curdle in the back of his mind.

And Feanaro needs a mother. The lack of one has hurt the boy, there’s no doubt about that. There can be no other reason for why now, even after he can speak so eloquently and doesn’t need cries to communicate, he sometimes still weeps.

(“Does this concern you at all?” Ulmo asks Vaire.

“Miriel says she doesn’t object to the remarriage.”

“That’s really not what I meant.”)

Feanaro knows his whole childhood that he is marred.

Everyone else is calm and happy and at peace. Everyone else trusts the Valar implicitly. Everyone else knows everything is fine.

Feanaro gets impatient. Feanaro rages and argues and shouts. Feanaro weeps for the mother that left him behind. 

Feanaro feels very, very alone.

No one else ever starts it. But Feanaro discovers that if he does, sometimes he can drag them into it too. 

If he grits his teeth and asks people nicely to call his mother’s name the way she wished it to be called, they smile vaguely and say, “Of course, if it matters to you.”

(Sometimes Feanaro thinks he’s the only person anything matters to.)

If he’s rude and dismissive and tries very, very, very hard to provoke a fight, sometimes he gets one. Their eyes will spark and their voice will rise, and for just a few moments, they’ll show something real, and he’s not alone.

If he shouts and screams at Indis and calls her every horrible name he can think of, she frowns faintly and asks him if he needs a healer or to sit in the light for a while. All the Vanyar are like that, refusing to be roused, and Feanaro knows it’s wrong to want so badly to touch everyone else with his corruption, but he still hates them for it.

If he shouts at Finwe and tells him he’s a horrible father that only loves Indis, Finwe’s voice will break with true desperation as he begs Feanaro just to tell him how to help him.

Feanaro knows it’s wrong, but somehow those moments convince him that his father really does love him far more than any number of the times Finwe tells him he does, calmly, eyes distant, words rote.

When he’s in his adolescence, he takes his first trip to Tol Eressea, where the light of the Trees is more distant and sometimes hidden in shadow.

For the first time, he sees the stars.

For the first time, he meets people who are already at least half awake.

For the first time, he wonders if maybe the problem isn’t that he’s marred. Maybe the problem is whatever has lured nearly everyone else into this dreamlike state.

He experiments. Is it the Valar? The food? The water?

The light?

(“Feanaro,” Ulmo says to Manwe. He doesn’t really have to say anything else.

“Aule says he’s very talented,” Manwe says stubbornly.

“Aule also says Feanaro threw a prototype at the wall of his workshop yesterday.”

“Aule does that sometimes.”

“Oh, yes,” Ulmo agrees. “My concern isn’t that he did it. It’s that all the rest of the Firstborn don’t.”)

Most art Feanaro sees is pretty and only that. There is something lifeless about it. Dull. 

Nerdanel’s statues are full of repressed passion, emotion that even she doesn’t quite seem to understand.

He can almost reach her. He can stir her up more easily than he can anyone else save his father, and he keeps thinking he can wake her up for good if only he says just the right thing.

It doesn’t work, but he keeps trying.

Maitimo’s temper is not half so short as his own, but his spirit burns intensely nonetheless. Of all his children, Maitimo is the closest to being fully, completely awake.

Makalaure is the closest to being entirely subsumed by the pleasant peace of the light. He’s too wound up in the music of the world, and the music here is a heady thing, ready to drown his second son in its delightful depths. The music Makalaure makes is beautiful, but sometimes it scarcely sounds like him at all. It sounds instead like he is only a conduit that the music is rushing through. It sounds like he is being hollowed out until he’s nothing but a vessel for its notes.

He drags the whole family out into the starlight and away from the Trees as often as he can, but he’s always especially sure to take Makalaure. He’ll shiver, away from the Trees’ warmth, complain and ache, and have mood shifts like lightning, but he’s there. He’s real. He’s not being born away somewhere where Feanaro can’t save him.

Nerdanel grows to hate the trips more and more. Her hands shake when she’s away from the light, and she snaps at him more and more frequently. 

“Why do you keep doing this?” she finally demands.

“The Trees - “

“Why are you so determined not to be happy? And even if you are, why do you keep dragging our children into it?”

“Because that’s not living!” he shouts. “It’s not real. Not like it is out here.”

“I’m going home,” she tells him flatly.

Weeks later, when Feanaro returns, she smiles and says it’s good to see him. She doesn’t seem concerned by their argument at all.

He had tried to rouse his first half-brother a half-dozen times, but it had never worked. His half-brother is as pleasant and blissful and empty as ever.

He never bothers with Arafinwe. He already knows how it will go.

(“Tyelkormo hunts with you, doesn’t he, Orome?”

“Yes,” Orome says warily. He thinks he knows where Ulmo’s going with this.

“Tell me, do you notice a difference in him the further you get into the Outer Lands?”’

Orome doesn’t want to admit it, but eventually he yields. “Yes,” he says. “I do.”)

Feanaro tries drawing the light of the Trees into gemstones. Maybe if he can capture it, he can study it. Change it.

Concentrated in the gem, it glows for him like never before, overwhelming even the fire within that so quickly burns it out otherwise. 

For three days, he sits unmoving, caught up in wordless ecstasy.

He only dimly hears the banging on his workshop door. His sons’ cries when they finally break it down. They way they go silent.

He turns, absently, and sees them frozen, faces slack.

He has one moment of half-clarity. It’s enough.

He throws a cloak over the Silmarils and breaks the spell.

He never goes near the gems after that without precautions. He quickly learns it’s best not to let anyone else near them even with those.

He understands for the first time why everyone else loves the light so much. He tells himself he still doesn’t want it. He drags his sons further and further away from its terrible peace.

He can’t help coming back to the gems, though, however carefully, for just one more taste of how it feels to be so completely without pain.

They have to leave. It’s the only option. All his studies have failed, and he’s losing Makalaure. Losing the twins. Losing Nerdanel. It’s the only way.

He stirs up a fight because it’s the only way to get anyone else to pay attention. He holds a sword on his half-brother and wonders, Would you even care if I pressed down? Would your wife? Would your children?

Or would they all keep thinking that everything is fine even as you bled out on our father’s floor?

The Valar care, apparently, even though he never goes through on the threat. 

Nolofinwe, on the other hand, speaks for Feanaro at his trial.

“There was no harm done,” he says lightly. “How could there be? Everything’s fine. I see no reason for Feanaro to have to go anywhere, particularly if it would upset him to.”

Feanaro wonders if it’s just his imagination that Manwe looks vaguely concerned. 

Apparently he’s not the only one stirring up trouble. 

Melkor destroys the Trees.

Feanaro would thank him for that if it weren’t for the rest of what Melkor does.

The world goes dark, and everyone else seems to go mad as terror crashes down on them after countless long years of really even feeling vague apprehension.

Feanaro stands in a ring of the Valar and listens as they try to tell him that the Trees should be repaired.

It’s chaos in the dark, but it’s real.

Feanaro laughs in their faces.

He does not laugh when the rest of the news comes.

(“I did say something was wrong,��� Ulmo reminds Manwe.

“You did,” Manwe concedes. “But do you honestly think this is better?”)

His father is dead. His father is dead, just when he finally would have had the chance to really feel something.

When Feanaro gains control of himself at long last - and perhaps the Trees had affected him after all, because he feels wilder than ever before - he goes back to Tirion.

He gives him a speech about justice and revenge, about freedom and embracing this chance, about building anew. Some of the faces light up.

Most just look up at him with unfulfilled need.

Faces sallow and already sunken. Hands shaking. Minds cringing back from all this pain.

He feels it too, a bit. He knows.

So he says what he knows will grab them all. 

“The light still lives!” he cries. “It shines in my Silmarils! We go to get them back!”

The crowd roars with desperate approval.

He swears an Oath to retrieve that beautiful, terrible light.

He doesn’t know what he’ll do when he’s fulfilled it. He hopes that by then the Noldor will know that life without it is better. Hopes they’ll no longer need it, crave it, wrap every dream around regaining it.

Hopes his own need for one more glimpse will have faded away.

(“See how quickly they turn on each other without the light?” Namo says.

“They’ve forgotten how to deal with real emotion,” Ulmo says. “Of course they’re lashing out at each other. They’ve forgotten what pain is, and that other people can feel it.”

“We can’t let them go to Middle Earth like that,” Manwe says. “They’re not prepared.”

“Of course,” Ulmo says, and he lets Osse stir up a storm of rage. It is right, for Ulmo too weeps for the Teleri lost in that frantic lashing out.

He also makes sure the storm winds blow due east, back to the lands they never should have left.)

[fantasychica37]

Today in Middle-earth:

“My lord and my friend,” said Ulmo, “please, listen to me. He has not changed. You cannot know evil. I can.”

i“And do you think locking someone away is going to magically fix them?” shouted a random Elf from the crowd.

Manwe closed his eyes and turned away. “I am ill-suited to make this decision, am I not?” he asked softly.

***

“May I speak?” asked Nienna.

All heads turned to her.

“We are wiser than the Elves, yes,” she said, “but the one thing they know that we do not is the mind of an Elf. Finwe, High King of the Noldor, how would you who know Feanaro and Nolofinwe intimately, desiring to ensure this situation gets better and not worse, respond to your son’s violence?”

And so at a feast many years later, Finwe was in attendance.

***

“No,” said Maedhros.

Feanor sputtered.

“Father,” said Maedhros, “this is folly. An unbreakable oath to defeat a god?”

***

“Tell me what is going on,” Nolofinwe demanded of the nearest important Noldo he saw.

“The unfaithful Teleri have refused us our ships!” responded the elf.

“You are murdering your own kindred for ships?” Nolofinwe screamed, actually screamed. “My people! We will not join them!”

***

“I will think about it,” said Miriel.

Before she had finished thinking, her son arrived in the Halls.

She stayed with him, and so finally Feanor had had what he had always wanted.

***

Looking upon Morgoth’s slumbering form, Beren realized he had a chance to win more than his beloved.

Swift as the wind, he slashed Morgoth’s throat.

“Luthien!” he whispered. “The crown!”

***

“Send him his troops,” said Orodreth wearily.

***

“Send him his troops,” insisted Melian, “else we shall eventually be beset by more enemies than I can keep out.”

***

“Ulfang! I had a dream that... I do not wish to side with Melkor any longer.”

***

“Your father loves you,” pleaded Beleg. “Please, Turin, come home.”

“Very well,” said Turin wearily.

***

“Niniel!” called Turin, leading a haggard woman into camp. “Come and meet my mother, who has been found!”

“Nienor? ...Turin, why does she not know me?”

“We found her wandering the woods devoid of any memory... this is my sister?” stammered Turin, hating himself fiercely for the way he was starting to feel about her.

And they lived.

***

“That bird that flew away with the Silmaril... it cannot have just appeared in the water...”

“Makalaure, are you saying you think...”

“It would be kinder for the boys to believe, anyway, even if it is false. But that, to me, seems the most probable explanation.”

***

“What was Valinor like?” asked Celebrimbor, fascinated by Annatar. “I remember so little.”

Annatar launched into a very vague description that didn’t resemble anything Celebrimbor did remember.

Very perplexing.

And concerning, given that Aule was infamous for having Maiar who had turned to serve the enemy, and Celebrimbor didn’t doubt Annatar had served Aule, at one point.

***

“Isildur!” cried Elrond, drawing a dagger. He tackled Isildur to the ground and sliced off his hand.

If I am put to death, so be it. My uncle survived, and so will my nephew.

***

Bilbo narrowly avoided the blow that would have knocked him out.

There was an orc heading for Thorin! In a panic, he threw Sting and managed to hit some part of him that made him stumble and miss.

***

“Wait,” said Aragorn. “Let us not just run off in different directions. We will all be separated and killed.”

***

“Smeagol,” said Frodo, “The Men have captured us and will kill you if you do not go along with us. I promise I will get us out, somehow.”

Smeagol’s eyes widened and he followed Frodo without another word.

***

Today in Middle-earth: Happy April Fool’s Day!

[garden-ghoul]

I can’t believe it’s not the Shibboleth of Fëanor

“starting early out of fear that another farcical thing will prevent me from reading the shibboleth”

Chris’ notes on the shibboleth begin by saying that he has left out a huge number of phonology notes, which I sort of resent although I wouldn’t have read them anyway. Look Chris, if someone has made it here they’re probably enough of a linguistics nerd that they could get SOMETHING out of those. Don’t be a wimp.

Wait, did the exiled Noldor all speak Sindarin while they were in Beleriand? Like all of them? Maybe this shibboleth essay will clarify what the difference actually is between Quenya and Sindarin--I was under the impression that the latter was a language specifically invented and spoken by the green elves in Ossiriand, although I don’t know whether I ever had a reason for thinking that. “In any case, it is impossible to believe that any of the Noldor ever became unfamiliar with the sound þ,” Tolkien assures us. He then goes on to imply that this is ONLY because the Vanyar and Teleri still remembered what þ was. 

Anyway, let’s look at how it went down. Feanor was one of the chief linguistic loremasters (!) at the time. This guy is such an obnoxious polymath. He really does have a tiny hammer for the metaphors. Tolkien mentions that his mom Miriel has Very Good Enunciation and is also ridiculously good at embroidery. I’m not sure whether that second one will be relevant, but she is very adamant on continuing to use þ rather than s because that’s how it was when she was a kid. And she makes her whole family use þ too, at the very least when pronouncing her name (Þerinde, or needlewoman)

Feanor loved his mother dearly, though except in obstinacy their characters were widely different.

Ugh. I’m 100% sold on Feanor and Miriel now. This is the cutest shit. I also want to register how glad I am that elves have milk names. I’m wondering what culture Tolkien got that from, because he only really seemed to be into Germanic and Celtic cultures and I haven’t heard anything about that there? omg here’s an even better quote about them:

While she lived she did much with gentle counsel to soften and restrain Feanor. Her death was a lasting grief to him, and both directly and by its further consequences a main cause of his later disastrous influence on the history of the Noldor.

Word of the author says if Miriel had been around Feanor wouldn’t have done so much stupid shit. Should have! thought about what his mom would say! instead of killing hundreds of people at Alqualonde huh!!

Miriel cites the birth of Feanor as the cause of the weariness that made her want to be dead. She assures him that it’s because he’s just too great, but that’s still got to hurt. Having your mom publicly acknowledge that she invented death because she was so tired of you she wanted to die. Holy fuck!

The Valar are ultra dismayed by this, because they keep asking her when she’ll come back to her body and she keeps going “leave me alone!!” and Not Actually Wanting To Be Alive is the one and only disease they can’t heal! Also Finwe is depressed now. The Valar panic. While Finwe is just walking all over Aman because he’s too depressed to stay in one place he walks into Indis, a local(ish) Vanya, and realizes she has had a crush on him for centuries. The process of deciding that they want to get married is handwaved in 5 words, and they go ask the Valar if it’s actually okay. The Valar think leaving Finwe to mourn forever is cruel and letting him get married again is illegal. Y’all. who made the laws. Who made them? Was it you, Manwe?

Since this has nothing whatsoever to do with linguistics anyway I’m going to interject my own thing about the Athrabeth. Andreth made the point that if the fea and hroa aren’t united by love, the body is like a chain. Obviously Miriel’s fea and hroa are not united, and she perceives her son as a chain of duty keeping her on Arda! She has the depression, just like every human, but everyone is super confused by this because depression was supposed to be invented for humans a long time from now. That is--the Eldar were not supposed to be able to “get tired of things.” This is addressed by Andreth’s “grown-up children” comment; elf psychology is fundamentally different from human psychology. What this means is that Miriel invented being mentally ill, I guess. “Just try yoga!” everyone told her, but she insisted on staying dead. Truly a hero of our time.

While I was sidetracked, the Valar made a ruling that Miriel can never ever return to her body now, even if she gets un-depressed. This is another one of those bewildering Catholic things, I guess, where it seems more just to condemn someone to death than to allow a divorce. Or like, their godly DNA was just written too Catholic for them to be able to understand the concept. Anyway Feanor blames Indis for taking his mother away Forever, even though he should really be blaming Manwe, and instantiates a Grudge against her and her children.

Into the strife and confusion of loyalties in that time this seemingly trivial matter, the change of þ to s, was caught up to its embitterment, and to lasting detriment to the Quenya tongue. Had peace been maintained there can be no doubt that the advice of Feanor, with which all the other loremasters privately or openly agreed, would have prevailed. But an opinion in which he was certainly right was rejected because of the follies and evil deeds into which he was later led. He made it a personal matter: he and his sons adhered to þ, and they demanded that all those who were sincere in their support should do the same. Therefore those who resented his arrogance, and still more those whose support later turned to hatred, rejected his shibboleth.

This is really funny to me? Like he was such an asshole that everyone started using s just to spite him. Even Indis of the Vanyar (a þ people if there ever was one) started using s!! It’s like she was trying to aggravate him! No, actually, literally all the Noldor were using s at this point, and Indis just wanted Finwe to like her. When in Rome, et c. Feanor not only thought this was a personal slight toward his mother, he also thought it was a PLOT of the Valar, inspired by ‘fear of his powers’ to ‘oust him from leadership of the Noldor.’ Holy fuck, man, I don’t even know what to do with you. Nobody would care if you didn’t make such a big deal out of it. This is some curse of the Uchiha bullshit right here, he’s just making up reaþons to be mad bc of Loþt Love.

So Feanor tells all his kids that they are better than everyone elþe because they use þ. Now I have to wonder about Nerdanel and how that courtship went. Preþumably he told her she had to þtart uþing hiþ shibboleth or elþe they couldn’t get married.

Oh, look! A bit about Galadriel! She is considered the greatest of the Noldor, which is pretty great, and also understandable considering she is the only one who didn’t get herself killed for a stupid reason. She is the tallest person, like, ever and “a match for both the loremasters and the athletes of the Eldar.” Also her hair was so messy that the light of Telperion and Laurelin got caught in it, unfortunate. Feanor was so astonished by the idea of being able to catch the light of the Trees that he kept bothering her for “a tress” (isn’t that like, a lot of hair?). No sorry he must have asked for a treþþ.

From her earliest years she had a marvellous gift of insight into the minds of others, but judged them with mercy and understanding, and she withheld her goodwill from none save only Feanor.

She ended up following Feanor to Beleriand primarily so she could thwart him at every turn, I love her. She is also too proud to ever renounce her exile and return to Valinor... for like seven thousand years. By the end of the Third Age she was wise enough, finally, to go back. We jump back to when she was just a baby to note that even though her father Finarfin used þ since he hung out with the Teleri all the time and she was therefore raised in a þ household, Galadriel hated Feanor so much that she used s anyway.

After this there are some notes on  names! Answers a question that always made me roll my eyes, “why does everyone’s names sound the same??” Elda kids were given a father name at birth that sounded like their dad’s name, and later were given a mother name that described their character because all moms are prophets. What the fuck. They might also get an after name that describes some characteristic or accomplishment, as well as potentially a self name if they just want something cooler (stares at Turin).

The 'true names' remained the first two, but in later song and history any of the four might become the name generally used and recognized. The true names were not however forgotten by the scribes and loremasters or the poets, and they might often be introduced without comment. To this difficulty - as it proved to those who in later days tried to use and adapt Elvish traditions of the First Age as a background to the legends of their own heroes of that time and their descendants - was added the alteration of the Quenya names of the Noldor, after their settlement in Beleriand and adoption of the Sindarin tongue.

I know this difficulty well, as a guy who has read some fanfiction. Introduced  without comment indeed.

We ALSO get an answer to the Finwe/Olwe/Ingwe/Elwe question! That suffix derives from ewe, meaning person. So they were Hair Person, ??? Person, Top/Chief Person, and Star person. Except no those are just speculations, and probably the Eldar didn’t all have to have “meaningful” names, which I like. aaahahahaha also the reason they came up with Sindarin names for everyone is because they were Sensitive To Aesthetics and felt really weird saying a Quenya name when speaking Sindarin. Elves!!

It turns out we’ve been using Feanor’s Sindarin name this whole time! Partially Sindarinized. Whatever. Now I understand about Feanaro I guess. On to his half-siblings: Findis was just a portmanteau baby, UNFORTUNATE. It also turns out the Finwe just straight up named EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HIS SONS FINWE. And later added something when it became clear what they were good at; Feanor got kuru- (craft?), Fingolfin got nolo- (wisdom), and Finarfin got ara- (nobility, bc he was nice). The reason Feanor’s name sounds different from his half-siblings is that he Sindarinized his mother name and they their father names. Like of course he only wanted to be known by his mother name. THAT GUY.

No sorry I got this wrong, this is awful; Finwe (father name) Nolofinwe (mother name) --> Fin Golfin --> Fingolfin in Sindarin.

Fingolfin had prefixed the name Finwe to Nolofinwe before the Exiles reached Middle-earth. This was in pursuance of his claim to be the chieftain of all the Noldor after the death of Finwe, and so enraged Feanor that it was no doubt one of the reasons for his treachery in abandoning Fingolfin and stealing away with all the ships.

SCREAMS. THIS IS SO DUMB. FEANOR NEVER STOPS GETTING MAD ABOUT HOW PEOPLE PRONOUNCE WORDS. Finarfin only prefixed his name after his brother’s death meant that he was supposed to be the next king, so I guess there was a long period where you had Fingolfin and Arfin. All Fingolfin’s sons got -kano suffixes, meaning ‘minor commander,’ transliterated into Sindarin as -gon. And HERE we find the information that Fingon “wore his long dark hair in great plaits braided with gold.” And I feel Triumph, because I have discovered a valid origin for another fandom Thing I kind of thought was totally arbitrary. SO much is made by this fandom of one-sentence throwaways, but I guess that’s what you have to do when nine out of ten sentences are about linguistics.

There’s some stuff about Arafinwean names I don’t care about too much, except for Aegnor--this was his mother name, Aikanaro, meaning ‘fell fire.’ Partially because he had Fire In His Eyes (indicating he loved to fight) and also his hair was stiff and stood up on his head like fire. Holy shit I love this he has gone up the to-draw list by like 5 places.

Ooh and it says Turgon reestablished Quenya as Gondolin’s lingua franca, that’s just so Turgon. 

Lastly (I hope) let’s take a look at some Curufinwean names. Recorded largely for my own future reference because I’m assuming the two people reading this already know. [Maedhros] Nelyafinwe (’the third Finwe’ since his father and grandfather were also named Finwe) Maitimo (’hottie’) Russandol (’copper-top’ for his red hair; grandpa Mahtan had the nickname ‘fox’). also notes that he wore a copper circlet. [Maglor] Kanafinwe (’strong-voiced Finwe’) Makalaure (’a metaphor about harps’) [Celegorm] Turkafinwe (’no one’s neck’s as incredibly thick as Finwe’) Tyelkormo/Tyelko (’hasty’) Curufin is just Kurufinwe, his dad’s own name bc he’s the favorite child and also pretty good at crafting I guess. Mother name is Atarinke (’little father,’ because his only characteristic is how much he is just like Feanor) [Caranthir] Morifinwe (’dark Finwe’ because he has black hair) Carnistir (’aww he’s blushing’) (don’t you mean Carniþtir?) [Amras] Pityafinwe (’little Finwe’ awww) Ambarussa (indicating that he and his twin also have red hair, which I am enormously smug about predicting, still) [Amrod] Telufinwe (’last Finwe’; when Feanor said NO MORE KIDS)  Ambarto

So basically they all used their mother names except Curufin. Veeeery interesting.

The story is that Nerdanel named the twins BOTH the name Ambarussa and when Feanor begged her to at least give them different names (’look! I made minimum effort! you do it too!’) she said “I will change one of their names to Ambarto, by lottery.” Later she prophecies that one of them will not set foot on Middle Earth and he... names the dead twin with her extra name when he gets burned alive with the ships. Also of significance here, I think, is that Curufin is the one he recruited to help him burn the ships, because he only trusts himself. Fucked up.