#the sketch of the mythology

[ardafanonarch]

Does canon indicate who is older: Elros or Elrond?

Birth Order of Elrond and Elros and Elrond

Good question. My instinct on this was no, canon does not indicate who is older, and indeed further research turned up nothing definitive. (If anyone has evidence to the contrary, please share it!) However, I uncovered a decent hint that Tolkien imagined Elros the elder.

[ETA: Please see this reblog for a revised answer that confirms the Elros theory!]

The fact that they are twins at all is not even in the published Silmarillion or The Lord of the Rings, which introduce them thus:

Bright Eärendil was then lord of the people that dwelt nigh to Sirion’s mouths; and he took to wife Elwing the fair, and she bore to him Elrond and Elros, who are called the Half-elven. The Silmarillion, ‘Of the Voyage of Eärendil and the War of Wrath’ The sons of Eärendil were Elros and Elrond, the Peredhil or Half-elven. The Lord of the Rings, Appendix A

Here, the order in which their names appear does not help us as we get both options.

It’s important to note here that Elros did not even exist from the conception of the mythology of Middle-earth. Elrond son of ‘Eärendel’ does not appear in any of the Lost Tales, but he does show up in the 1926 Sketch of the Mythology, the ‘Earliest’ Silmarillion (one day I’ll make post summarising all these texts, but in the meantime Table 2 at the end of this bio has a lot of them!). Elros does not join him until the next version of the Silmarillion,* the 1930 Quenta Noldorinwa. Here he is added in revisions to the text. In those revisions, his name comes first (‘Elros and Elrond’).

(*When I do not italicise Silmarillion, I am referring to the whole corpus of drafts. Italicised means the published book edited by Christopher Tolkien.)

The same sort of revision is made to Annal 325 of The Later Annals of Beleriand (referred to as AB 2 and written between 1930 and 1937). Christopher Tolkien notes that his father pencilled a note to change the original passage (which only mentions Elrond) to:

The Peringiul, the Half-elven, were born to Elwing wife of Eärendel, while Eärendel was at sea, the twin brethren Elrond and Elros. The History of Middle-earth Vol. 5: The Lost Road, The Later Annals of Beleriand, Commentary on Annal 325.

Important! Christopher then notes, “The order was then inverted to ‘Elros and Elrond’.”

Note that the 1930 Quenta Noldorinwa is the main source for most of the last chapter of the published Silmarillion because Tolkien did not return to a full narrative of this section of the Silmarillion again. However, they are mentioned in the briefly sketched Tale of Years (1951-52), where it is again stated that they were twins and again they appear as ‘Elros and Elrond’.

[Added entry:] 528 [> 532] Elros and Elrond twin sons of Earendil born.* The History of Middle-earth Vol. 11: The War of the Jewels, Tale of Years, Text ‘C’

*[> 532] means this entry was revised to 532, the date you will find in the timeline on Tolkien Gateway (which defaults to the ‘most recent’ revision). Note that The Tale of Years (the published portion of which only covers the 6th century of the First Age) is actually four consecutive drafts: dates are revised and the entries become increasingly detailed, but each draft ends earlier than the last (e.g. Text A goes to FA 600, Text D ends at FA 527). Most of the timelines you find online attempt to consolidate all four drafts — but worth bearing in mind that Tolkien never finalised these dates.

Finally: upon investigating the source text for that one instance, from the published Silmarillion, of Elrond appearing before Elros, I discovered that this was actually an editorial decision. Tolkien himself, as far as I could find, always listed Elros before Elrond.

Now, this is not, as I said, definitive evidence that Elros tumbled out of the womb first. But I’d say it suggests that Elros was the elder, since I can think of no other reason to consistently list them in this order (it’s not alphabetical, for example). And this, indeed, seems to be the fandom’s general consensus.

But, strictly based on canon, you are free to put them in either order. In fact, if you are someone who only takes the published Silmarillion as canon, you don’t even have to make them twins.

[heraxic]

re8 greek mythology design collection

[wolfythewitch]

Odysseus moment

[rustic-space-fiddle]

WIP of Penelope with her forever-unfinished shroud.

[mushyooms]

and nothing bad happened ever

[nuria-keller-arts]

More Hermes because this unhinged guy is somehow curing my burnout

[elianzis]

20 years of waiting

[pink-noah]

Sketch of Poseidon and Charybdis

while I finish coloring other things

[itzitxou]

I want a massive three-headed puppy too.

[kazimir29]

when your wife becomes a winion

[re-kyba]

Canonly accurate Odysseus

[mascotdang]

how things actually go in the Olympus during the Thunder Saga

Sillies

Back to our king.

[wolfythewitch]

The best part of the odyssey is when he said IT'S ODYSSEUS TIME and odysseyd all over those guys

[turquoisemagpie]

Post-modern Olympians.

(Half of the main Olympian 12 done, will include Persephone and Hades too.)

[dork-scribbles]

I can't over the fact that in Greek mythology when Hermes stolen Apollo's cattle he was only ONE DAY OLD! Imagine a f*cking baby stealing over FIFTY COWS in first day on earth.

And gets even better when Apollo discovers this and takes little Hermes to trial on Olympus.

All gods are laughing at the fact the culprit is just a little baby and Apollo is like:

[marzimars]

Achilles sketches because I really like the illustrations from the Grahame Johnstone twins.