The War of the Jewels (33 page)

In the account of the Mound of the Slain the Narn version names it Haudh-en-Ndengin, subsequently changed to Haudh-en-Nirnaeth.

The Narn text concludes with a remarkable elaboration of the confrontation of Hurin and Morgoth on the basis of GA $$244 - 8

(itself an elaboration of QS $$21-3); this was the only part of the text included in Unfinished Tales (pp. 66 - 8). As the speeches were typed they were set entirely in the second person singular, 'thou wert',

'knowest thou', etc.; but my father went through it changing every

'thou' and 'thee' to 'you', and the equivalent verb-forms - and changing 'Knowest thou' to 'Do you know' rather than 'Know you'

(also 'puissant' to 'mighty'). In this form, of course, the text was printed in Unfinished Tales.

NOTE 3.

A further account of the coming

of Hurin and Huor to Gondolin.

As in the case of the story of the Battle of Unnumbered Tears described in Note 2 above, there is also a version of that of Hurin and Huor in

, Gondolin found as a component of the Narn. This is even more closely based on the story in the Grey Annals $$161 - 6: while there are many small variations in the precise wording, virtually none are of any moment in respect of the narrative, until the end is reached, where a significant difference appears. This story was excluded from the Narn in Unfinished Tales, but its existence noted: p. 146; note 1. Before the end the only point worth mentioning is that Maeglin's words (GA $165) are here much fiercer: 'The king's grace to you is greater than ye know; and some might wonder wherefore the strict law is abated for two knave-children of Men. It would be safer if they had no choice but to abide here as our servants to their life's end.'

According to the story in GA, Hurin and Huor told when they returned to Dor-lomin that 'they had dwelt a while in honour in the halls of King Turgon', even though they would say nothing else.

Against this my father noted on the GA typescript (p. 127, $166):

'They did not reveal Turgon's name'; and in the Narn version they refused altogether to declare even to their father where they had been.

This version was adopted in the published Silmarillion (p. 159), with only a change at the end. Here the Narn text has: Then Galion [> Galdor] questioned them no more; but he and many others guessed at the truth. For both the oath of silence and the Eagles pointed to Turgon, men thought.

The conclusion of the passage in The Silmarillion ('and in time the strange fortune of Hurin and Huor reached the ears of the servants of Morgoth') was taken from the GA version.

On these two (otherwise so closely similar) texts of the story see further p. 314.

PART TWO.

THE LATER

QUENTA SILMARILLION.

THE LATER QUENTA SILMARILLION.

In Part Two I shall trace the development of the Quenta Silmarillion, in the years following the completion of The Lord of the Rings, from the point reached in Vol.X, p. 199; but the history now becomes (for the most part) decidedly simpler: much of the development can be conveyed by recording individually all the significant changes made to QS, and there is no need to divide it into two 'phases', as was done in Vol.X. The basic textual series is QS (so far as it went before its abandonment); the early amanuensis typescript 'LQ 1' of 1951, for which see X.141-3; and the late amanuensis typescript 'LQ 2' of about 1958, for which see X.141-2, 300.

In this latter part of the history the chapter-numbers become rather confusing, but I think that it would be more confusing to have none, and therefore I continue the numbering used in Vol.X, where the last chapter treated, Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor, was given the number 8.

9. OF MEN.

This chapter was numbered 7 in the QS manuscript (for the text see V.245-7, $$81-7). The difference is simply due to the fact that the three 'sub-chapters' in QS numbered in Vol.V 3(a), 3(b), and 3(c) were in Vol.X called 3, 4, and 5 (see X.299). Few changes were made to the QS manuscript in later revision, and those that were made were incorporated in LQ 1. That typescript received no alterations, and is of textual value in only a few respects; the typist of LQ 2 did not use it, but worked directly from the old manuscript.

$81. 'The Valar sat now behind the mountains and feasted' > 'Thus the Valar sat now behind their mountains in peace'.

$82. The placing of Hildorien 'in the uttermost East of Middle-earth that lies beside the eastern sea' was changed to: 'in the midmost parts of Middle-earth beyond the Great River and the Inner Sea, in regions which neither the Eldar nor the Avari have known'.

Many phrases have been used of the site of Hildorien. In the

'Annals' tradition it was 'in the East of the world' (IV.269, V.118, 125), but this was changed on the manuscript of AV 2 to 'in the midmost regions of the world' (V.120, note 13). In the Quenta it was 'in the East of East' (IV.99), and in QS, as cited above, 'in the uttermost East of Middle-earth': in my commentary on QS (V.248) I suggested that this last was not in contradiction with the changed reading of AV 2: 'Hildorien was in the furthest east of Middle-earth, but it was in the middle regions of the world; see Ambarkanta map IV, on which Hildorien is marked (IV.249).'

In the texts of the post-Lord of the Rings period there is the statement in the Grey Annals (GA) $57 that it was 'in the midmost regions of the world', as in the emended reading of AV 2; and there is the new phrase in the revision of QS, 'in the midmost parts of Middle-earth beyond the Great River and the Inner Sea' (with loss of the mention in the original text of 'the eastern sea'). This last shows unambiguously that a change had taken place, but it is very hard to say what it was. It cannot be made to agree with the old Ambarkanta maps: one might indeed doubt that those maps carried much validity for the eastern regions by this time, and wonder whether by 'the Inner Sea' my father was referring to 'the Inland Sea of Rhun' (see The Treason of Isengard pp. 307, 333) - but on the other hand, in the Annals of Aman (X.72, 82) from this same period the Great Journey of the Elves from Kuivienen ('a bay in the Inland Sea of Helkar') is described in terms that suggest that the old conception was still fully present. Can the Sea of Rhun be identified with the Sea of Helkar, vastly shrunken? - Nor is it easy to understand how Hildorien 'in the midmost parts of Middle-earth'

could be 'in regions which neither the Eldar nor the Avari have known'.

In LQ 2 most of the revised passage is absent, and the text reads simply: 'in the land of Hildorien in the midmost parts of Middle-earth; for measured time had come upon Earth ...' If this is significant, it must depend on a verbal direction from my father. On the other hand, the revision was written on the manuscript in two parts: 'in the midmost parts' in the margin and the remainder on another part of the page, where it would be possible to miss it; and I think this much the likeliest explanation.

$83. The opening of the footnote (V.245) was changed from 'The Eldar called them Hildi to Atani they were called in Valinor, but the Eldar called them also Hildi'; and 'the birth of the Hildi' was changed to the arising of the Hildi . For Atani see GA $57 and commentary. As frequently before, the typist of LQ 1 placed the footnote in the body of the text, where my father left it to stand; but it reappears as a footnote to LQ 2 - a first indication that the typescript was taken from the QS manuscript.

After 'those fathers of Men' (in which the f should not have been capitalised) was added 'the Atanatardi'. Here LQ 1 has Atanatarni, which was not corrected; while LQ 2 - based not on LQ 1 but on the manuscript - has Atanatardi. But the form Atanatarni occurs in the Narn text given in Note 2 to Part One: there Fingon before the beginning of the Battle of Unnumbered Tears cries Aiya Eldalie ar Atanatarni (p. 166). In GA $87, in a different passage, the form is Atanatari (which was adopted in The Silmarillion); cf. also Atanatarion, X.373.

$85. The sentence 'Only in the realm of Doriath, whose queen Melian was of divine race, did the Ilkorins come near to match the Elves of Kor' was changed to: 'whose queen Melian was of the kindred of the [gods >] Valar, did the [Ekelli >] Sindar come near to match the [Elves of Tuna >] Kalaquendi of the Blessed Realm.' On the term Ekelli 'the Forsaken' and its replacement by Sindar see X.169-70.

Eruman > Araman (cf. X.123, 194).

'the ancient wisdom of their race' > '... of their folk'.

$86. 'What befell their spirits after death' > 'What may befall...'

'beside the Western Sea' > 'beside the Outer Sea' (see V.248, $86).

$87. 'vanished from the earth' > 'vanished from the Middle-earth'.

To one or other copies of the LQ 2 typescript my father made a few changes. The chapter, typed without a number, was now numbered

'XI'. 'Gnomes' was changed to 'Noldor' at each occurrence, and in the first sentence of $85 'Dark-elves' to 'Sindar'. Against $82 he wrote:

'This depends upon an old version in which the Sun was first made after the death of the Trees (described in a chapter omitted).' I have already noticed this in X.299-300, and explained why he numbered the present chapter 'XI'. He also bracketed in pencil three passages in the account of the mortality of the Elves in $85: 'Yet their bodies were of the stuff of earth... consumeth them from within in the courses of time'; 'days or years, even a thousand'; 'and their deserts'.

10. OF THE SIEGE OF ANGBAND.

This chapter was numbered 8 in the QS manuscript, and the text is given in V.248-55, $$88-104. As in the preceding chapter, all post-Lord of the Rings revision was carried out on the QS manuscript: that is to say, no further revisions were made to the typescript LQ 1; and here again the late typescript LQ 2 was derived from the manuscript, not from LQ 1. In this chapter, on the other hand, by no means all the revisions made to the manuscript are found in LQ 1; and in the account that follows I notice all such cases. I do not notice the changes Eruman > Araman; Tun > Tuna; Gnomes > Noldor; Thorndor > Thorondor; Bladorion > Ard-galen (see p. 113, $44).

$88. The opening passage of the chapter in QS was rewritten on a slip attached to the manuscript - this slip being the reverse of a letter to my father dated 14 November 1951: but it was not incorporated into LQ 1. The introduction of this rider led the typist of LQ 2 to ignore the fact that a new chapter begins at this point, and to type Of the Siege of Angband as all of a piece with Of Men; subsequently my father inserted a new heading Of the Siege of Angband with the number 'XII' (on which see p. 175). The new opening reads: As was before told Feanor and his sons came first of the Exiles to Middle-earth, and they landed in the waste of Lammoth upon the outer shores of the Firth of Drengist. Now that region was so named, for it lay between the Sea and the walls of the echoing mountains of the Eryd Lomin. And even as the Noldor set foot upon the strand their cries were taken up into the hills and multiplied, so that a great clamour as of countless mighty voices filled all the coasts of the North; and it is said that the noise of the burning of the ships at Losgar went down the winds of the Sea as a tumult of great wrath, and far away all that heard that sound were filled with wonder.

Under the cold stars before the rising of the Moon Feanor and his folk marched eastward, and they passed the Eryd Lomin, and came into the great land of Hithlum, and crossing the country of Dor-lomin they came at length to the long lake of Mithrim, and upon its north-shore they made their first camp in that region which was called by the like name.

There a host of the Orcs, aroused by the tumult of Lammoth, and the light of the burning at Losgar, came down upon them; and beside the waters of Mithrim was fought the first battle upon Middle-earth...

This is the story of Lammoth told (at about this same time) in the later Tale of Tuor (Unfinished Tales p. 23):

Tuor was now come to the Echoing Mountains of Lammoth about the Firth of Drengist. There once long ago Feanor had landed from the sea, and the voices of his host were swelled to a mighty clamour upon the coasts of the North ere the rising of the Moon.

On the much later and apparently distinct story that Lammoth was so called because the echoes of Morgoth's cry were awakened by

'any who cried aloud in that land' see X.296, $17 and commentary, and Unfinished Tales p. 52. Both 'traditions' were incorporated in the published Silmarillion, pp. 80-1, 106.

At the end of this paragraph my father pencilled on the manuscript: 'He [Feanor] gives the green stone to Maidros', but then noted that this was not in fact to be inserted; see under $97 below.

$90. 'and they were unwilling to depart, whatever he might do' >

'... whatever he might do, being held by their oath.' This addition is not present in LQ 1; while the typist of LQ 2, unable to read the first word, put 'They held by their oath', and this was allowed to stand.

Cf. GA $50.

$91. 'the Sun rose flaming in the West' > 'the Sun rose flaming above the shadows' (not in LQ 1).

'and good was made of evil, as happens still' removed.

$93. 'the bright airs of those earliest of mornings' > 'the bright airs in the first mornings of the world.'