Morgoth's Ring (35 page)

Fiercest burned the flame in the eager heart of Feanor, and Melkor laughed in his secrecy; for to that mark above all had his lies been addressed, and Feanor he most hated, lusting all the while for the Silmarils. Yet never could he come nigh them; for though at great feasts Feanor would wear them, blazing upon his brow, at other times they were guarded close, locked in the deep hoards of Tuna. There were no thieves in Valinor, as yet; but Feanor loved the Silmarils with a greedy love, and he began to grudge the sight of them to all save to his sire and to his sons.

$52 High princes were Feanor and Fingolfin, the elder sons of Finwe; but they grew proud and jealous each of his right, and his possessions. And lo! Melkor set new lies abroad, and whispers came to Feanor that Fingolfin and his sons, Fingon and Turgon, were plotting to usurp the leadership of Finwe and of the elder house of Feanor, and to supplant them by leave of the Valar - for the Valar were ill-pleased that the Silmarils lay in Tuna, and were not given to their keeping. Of these lies quarrels were born among the proud children of Finwe, and of these quarrels came the end of the high days of Valinor and the evening of its ancient glory; for Feanor spake words of rebellion against the Valar, crying aloud that he would depart from Valinor back to the world without, and deliver, as he said, the Gnomes from thraldom, if they would follow him. And when Fingolfin sought to restrain him Feanor drew his sword upon him.(3) For the lies of Melkor, though he knew not clearly their source, had taken root in the pride of his heart.

$53 Then the Valar were wroth and dismayed, and (4) Feanor was summoned to answer in the Ring of Doom; and there the lies of Melkor were laid bare for all those to see who had the will. By the judgement of the gods Feanor was banished for twenty years (5) from Tuna, since he had disturbed its peace. But with him went Finwe his father, who loved him more than his other sons, and many other Gnomes also. Northward in Valinor, in the hills near to the halls of Mandos, they built a strong place and a treasury at Formenos;(6) and they gathered there a multitude of gems. But Fingolfin ruled the Noldor in Tuna; and thus Melkor's words seemed justified (though Feanor had wrought their fulfilment by his own deeds), and the bitterness that Melkor had sown endured, even though the lies were revealed, and long afterwards it lived still between the sons of Feanor and Fingolfin.

$54 Straight from the midst of their council the Valar sent Tulkas to lay hands on Melkor and bring him again to judgement, but Melkor hid himself, and none could discover whither he had gone; and the shadows of all standing things seemed to grow longer and darker in that time. It is said that for two years (7) none saw Melkor, until he appeared privily to Feanor, feigning friendship with cunning argument, and urging him to his former thought of flight. But his cunning overreached his aim; for knowing that the jewels held the heart of Feanor in thrall, he said at the last: 'Here is a strong place and well guarded, but think not that the Silmarils will lie safe in any treasury within reach of the Valar!'

Then the fires of the heart of Feanor were kindled, and his eyes blazed, and his sight burned through all the fair-semblance of Melkor to the dark depths of his mind, and perceived there his fierce lust for the Silmarils. Then hate overcame Feanor's fear, and he spoke shamefully to Melkor, saying: 'Get thee gone, gangrel! Thou jail-crow of Mandos!' And he shut the doors of his house upon the mightiest of all the dwellers in Ea, as though he were a beggar.

And Melkor departed in shame, for he was himself in peril, and saw not his time yet for revenge; but his heart was black with anger. And Finwe was filled with dread, and sent messengers in haste to the Valar.

$55 Now the gods were sitting in council before their gates, fearing the lengthening of the shadows, when the messenger came from Finwe, but ere Tulkas could set forth others came that brought tidings from Eldanor. For Melkor had fled through the Kalakirya, and from the hill of Tuna the Elves saw him pass in wrath as a thunder-cloud. Thus Melkor departed, and for a while the Trees shone again unshadowed, and still Valinor was fair; yet as a cloud far off that looms ever higher, borne upon a slow cold wind, a doubt now marred the mirth of all the dwellers in Aman, dreading they knew not what evil might yet come. And the Valar sought ever for news of Melkor, in vain.

But he passed from Eldanor and (8) came into that region that is called Arvalin, which lies south of the Bay of Elende, and is a narrow land beneath the eastern feet of the Mountains of Aman. There the shadows were deepest and thickest in the World. In that land, secret and unknown, dwelt in spider's form Ungoliante, weaver of dark webs. It is not told whence she came; from the Outer Darkness, maybe, that lies in Ea beyond the walls of the World. In a ravine she lived, and spun her webs in a cleft of the mountains; for she sucked up light and shining things to spin them forth again in black nets of choking gloom and clinging fog. She hungered ever for more food.

$56 Melkor met Ungoliante in Arvalin, and with her he plotted his revenge; but she demanded a great and terrible reward, ere she would dare the perils of Valinor and the power of the gods. Then, when Melkor had vowed to give all that she lusted for, she wove a great darkness about her for their protection, and black ropes she span, and cast from rocky peak to peak; and in this way she scaled at last the highest pinnacle of the mountains, far south of Taniquetil. In that region the vigilance of the Valar was less, because the wild woods of Orome lay in the south of Valinor, and the walls of the mountains looked there eastward upon the untrodden land and I

empty seas; and the gods held guard rather against the North where of old Melkor had delved his fortress and deep throne.

For $$57 - 9 see the end of the commentary on this chapter, p. 193.

NOTES.

1. This passage concerning the gems devised by Feanor (following

'yet this was the least of his works') was a secondary addition (see p. 184). See the commentary on $46c.

2 From this point the virtually continuous newly written text changes to a heavily emended and interpolated treatment of the QS

manuscript (p. 184).

3. 'drew his sword upon him' was changed from 'menaced him with his sword'.

4. 'Then the Valar were wroth and dismayed, and' was a secondary addition.

5. 'twenty years' was changed from 'ten years'.

6. 'at Formenos' was a secondary addition.

7. 'two years' was changed from 'a great while'.

8. From this point the new work on the chapter effectively ceases, and the few differences from QS belong to the earlier layer of emendation that was taken up into LQ 1; but I give the text to the end of $56 in order to take in the majority of these earlier changes.

Commentary on Chapter 6, 'Of the Silmarils

and the Darkening of Valinor'.

A comparison will show that the new writing in LQ stands in close relation to the corresponding part of AAm. New elements in LQ

appear also in AAm, such as Feanor's mother Miriel ($78, p. 92), the devising of letters by Rumil and Feanor ($$80, 83), or the placing of the making of the Silmarils after the release of Melkor (p. 104, $92).

There are constant similarities of wording and many actual identities of phrase (notably in the encounter of Feanor with Melkor at Formenos, LQ $54, AAm $102).

Can precedence be established between the two? It is scarcely possible to demonstrate it one way or the other, for individual details tell in both ways. Thus Feanor's word to Melkor, 'gangrel', was that first written in LQ, whereas in AAm it replaced 'beggarman'; but 'the Valar were wroth and dismayed' is an addition to LQ (note 4), whereas 'the Gods were wroth' in AAm ($99) was not. The change in LQ of 'ten years' to 'twenty years' as the term of Feanor's banishment from Tirion (note 5) is a change also in AAm ($99 and note 10), and the name Formenos is an addition in both. I think in fact that the two texts were closely contemporary. It will be seen that after the revision in LQ has come to an end AAm continues on (from $105) in the same larger and more expansive fashion obviously based structurally on the Quenta tradition: and it may be therefore that the LQ text petered out because the 'Annals' (scarcely 'Annals' any more) had become my father's preference.

How he conceived the relation between the two at this time seems impossible to say. As I have said (p. 102), 'we see the annal form disappearing as a fully-fledged narrative emerges'; and the AAm narrative, while differing in every sentence from the Silmarillion version, is nonetheless very obviously 'the same'. Certainly too similar to it to be regarded as the representation of a separate tradition of learning and memory, or even of the work of a different 'loremaster'.

There are only the most minor variations in the two narratives (for example, in LQ the messengers came to Valinor telling that Melkor had fled through the Kalakirya before Tulkas had set out in pursuit ($55), whereas in AAm the messengers came 'ere Orome and Tulkas had ridden far' ($104)); and there is constant echoing of vocabulary and phrasing. See further on this topic pp. 289 - 91.

$46b Byrde Miriel (in the footnote to the text): cf. AAm $7S (p. 92), where Feanor's mother (in a replacement entry) is given, rather oddly, the Old English 'surname' Byrde, not Serende, in the text itself and without reference to AElfwine.

$46c The passage in AAm $83 (p. 92 and note 5) concerning Feanor's study of the making of gems by skill was an addition, as was that in the present text (note 1 above); the idea is associated with the change from the devising of gems by the Noldor to their obtaining them from the ground of Aman (see LQ $40 and commentary).

With the mention of the 'crystals ... wherein things far away could be seen small but clear' (not referred to in AAm) cf.

Gandalf's words in The Two Towers (III.11): 'The palantiri came from beyond Westernesse, from Eldamar. The Noldor made them. Feanor himself, maybe, wrought them, in days so long ago that the time cannot be measured in years.'

$49a Cf. AAm $123 (p. 108): 'Then Feanor rose up and cursed Melkor, naming him Morgoth'. In AAm Melkor is used throughout until the time when Feanor named him Morgoth (p. 123, $123); so also in the revision of QS the use of Morgoth before this point in the narrative was changed to Melkor.

$49b The passage concerning the Silmarils corresponds in content to the latter part of QS $46; for, as in AAm, the making of the Silmarils now comes after the release of Melkor.

$50 The passage on the arming of the Elves is no longer given as a footnote, and is moved to a different place from that in QS

($49); but it is enclosed within brackets and attributed to Pengolod. The text is at this point in any case extremely disordered, since it consists partly of new writing and partly of passages retained from the original QS text. The old note was largely written out afresh, though it was not greatly changed from the earlier form: the chief difference being that whereas it was said in QS that the Elves had previously possessed 'weapons of the chase, spears and bows and arrows' it is now told (as in AAm, p. 96, $97) that they had no weapons before this time. See further p. 281.

$52 On Feanor's drawing his sword on Fingolfin see p. 104, $98. - It is curious that (despite $46b 'in Tirion upon the crown of Tuna') here 'the Silmarils lay in Tuna', and again in $53

Fingolfin ruled the Noldor ir Tuna'. The same is found in AAm (p. 90, $67), and much later (see p. 282).

$55 The words 'in Ea', not found in LQ 1, belong with the later work on the QS manuscript as presented in the text given above (see note 8). On the words 'the Outer Darkness... that lies in Ea beyond the walls of the World' see pp. 62 - 4.

$$51-9 In the last paragraphs of the chapter, not given in the text (p. 191), changes made to QS were:

$57: Morgoth > Melkor, and at all subsequent occurrences.

$58: Tun > Tuna; the shores of Elvenhome > the shores of Eldamar; Silpion > Telperion; protected by fate omitted; With his black spear > Suddenly with his black spear; leaf and branch and root > root and leaf and bough; and at the end of the paragraph (after she swelled to monstrous form) was added: but still she was athirst. She drank therefore also of the vats of Varda, and drained them utterly.

559: their feet > the feet of the hunters; escaped the hunt > escaped them.

I have noticed earlier (p.142) that much later (after the publication of The Lord of the Rings) my father turned to new narrative writing wit hin the body of the Quenta Silmarillion: beginning with Chapter 1, which became the Valaquenta, and then jumping to the present chapter, 6. A new story of ramifying implications, that of the death of Feanor's mother Miriel and Finwe's second marriage to Indis of the Vanyar, had now entered; but this further and final development is here postponed (see pp. 205 ff.).

7 OF THE FLIGHT OF THE NOLDOR.

The textual history of this chapter is relatively simple (for the late rewriting just referred to, which extends some little way into it, see f