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THE RETURN OF BEREN AND LÚTHIEN ACCORDING TO
THE QUENTA NOLDORINWA
Now Mîm had found the halls and treasure of Nargothrond unguarded; and he took possession of
them, and sat there in joy fingering the gold and gems, and letting them run ever through his hands; and
he bound them to himself with many spells. But the folk of Mîm were few, and the outlaws filled with
the lust of the treasure slew them, though Húrin would have stayed them; and at his death Mîm cursed
the gold.
[Húrin went to Thingol and sought his aid, and the folk of Thingol bore the treasure to the
Thousand Caves; then Húrin departed.]
Then the enchantment of the accursed dragon gold began to fall even upon the king of Doriath, and
long he sat and gazed upon it, and the seed of the love of gold that was in his heart was waked to
growth. Wherefore he summoned the greatest of all craftsmen that now were in the western world,
since Nargothrond was no more (and Gondolin was not known), the Dwarves of Nogrod and
Belegost, that they might fashion the gold and silver and the gems (for much was as yet unwrought)
into countless vessels and fair things; and a marvellous necklace of great beauty they should make,
whereon to hang the Silmaril.*
But the Dwarves coming were stricken at once with the lust and desire of the treasure, and they
plotted treachery. They said one to another: ‘Is not this wealth as much the right of the Dwarves as of
the Elvish king, and was it not wrested evilly from Mîm?’ Yet also they lusted for the Silmaril. And
Thingol, falling deeper into the thraldom of the spell, for his part scanted his promised reward for
their labour; and bitter words grew between them, and there was battle in Thingol’s halls. There
many Elves and Dwarves were slain, and the howe wherein they were lain in Doriath was named
Cûm-nan-Arasaith, the Mound of Avarice. But the remainder of the Dwarves were driven forth
without reward or fee.
Therefore gathering new forces in Nogrod and in Belegost they returned at length, and aided by the
treachery of certain Elves on whom the lust of the accursed treasure had fallen they passed into