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and they became mighty fairies in the lands about the north of Sirion. Behold now all is ended—and doth it like thee?’ [Then Eriol said that he had not expected to hear such an astonishing story from one such as Vëannë, to which she answered:] ‘Nay, but I fashioned it not with words of myself; but it is dear to me—and indeed all the children know of the deeds that it relates—and I have learned it by heart, reading it in the great books, and I do not comprehend all that is set therein.’ * DURING THE 1920s my father was engaged in the casting of the Lost Tales of Turambar and Tinúviel into verse. The first of these poems, The Lay of the Children of Húrin, in the Old English alliterative metre, was begun in 1918, but when far from completion he abandoned it, very probably when he left the University of Leeds. In the summer of 1925, the year in which he took up his appointment to the professorship of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford, he began ‘the poem of Tinúviel’, called The Lay of Leithian. This he translated ‘Release from Bondage’, but he never explained the title. Remarkably and uncharacteristically he inserted dates at many points. The first of these, at line 557 (in the numbering of the poem as a whole) is 23 August 1925; and the last, 17 September 1931, is written against line 4085. Not far beyond this, at line 4223, the poem was abandoned, at the point in the narrative where ‘the fangs of Carcharoth crashed together like a trap’ on Beren’s hand bearing the Silmaril, as he fled from Angband. For the remainder of the poem that was never written there are prose synopses. In 1926 he sent many of his poems to R.W. Reynolds, who had been his teacher at King Edward’s School in Birmingham. In that year he composed a substantial text with the title Sketch of the mythology with especial reference to The Children of Húrin, and on the envelope containing this manuscript he wrote later that this text was ‘the original Silmarillion’, and that he had written it for Mr Reynolds in order to ‘explain the background of the “alliterative version” of Túrin and the Dragon.’ This Sketch of the Mythology was ‘the original Silmarillion’ because from it there was a direct line of evolution; whereas there is no stylistic continuity with the Lost Tales. The Sketch is what its name implies: it is a synopsis, composed in a terse, present-tense manner. I give here the passage in the text that tells in briefest form the tale of Beren and Lúthien.
A PASSAGE FROM THE ‘SKETCH OF THE MYTHOLOGY’ The power of Morgoth begins to spread once more. One by one he overthrows Men and Elves in the North. Of these a famous chieftain of Men was Barahir, who had been a friend of Celegorm of Nargothrond. Barahir is driven into hiding, his hiding betrayed, and Barahir slain; his son Beren after a life outlawed flees south, crosses the Shadowy Mountains, and after grievous hardships comes to Doriath. Of this and his other adventures is told in The Lay of Leithian. He gains the love of Tinúviel ‘the nightingale’—his own name for Lúthien—the daughter of Thingol. To win her Thingol, in mockery, requires a Silmaril from the crown of Morgoth. Beren sets out to achieve this, is captured, and set in dungeon in Angband, but conceals his real identity and is given as a slave to Thû the hunter. Lúthien is imprisoned by Thingol, but escapes and goes in search of Beren. With the aid of Huan lord of dogs she rescues Beren, and gains entrance to Angband where Morgoth is enchanted and finally wrapped in slumber by her dancing. They get a Silmaril and escape, but are barred at gates of Angband by Carcaras the Wolf-ward. He bites off Beren’s hand which holds the Silmaril, and goes mad with the anguish of its burning within him. They escape and after many wanderings get back to Doriath. Carcaras ravening through the woods bursts into Doriath. There follows the Wolf-hunt of Doriath, in which Carcaras is slain, and Huan is killed in defence of Beren. Beren is however mortally wounded and dies in Lúthien’s arms. Some songs say that Lúthien went even over the Grinding Ice, aided by the power of her divine mother, Melian, to Mandos’ halls and won him back; others that Mandos hearing his tale released him. Certain it is that he alone of mortals came back from Mandos and dwelt with Lúthien and never spoke to Men again, living in the woods of Doriath and in the Hunters’ Wold, west of Nargothrond. It will be seen that there have been great changes in the legend, the most immediately evident being that of Beren’s captor: here we meet Thû ‘the hunter’. At the end of the Sketch it is said of Thû that he was the ‘great chief’ of Morgoth, and that he ‘escaped the Last Battle and dwells still in dark places, and perverts Men to his dreadful worship’. In The Lay of Leithian Thû emerges as the fearful Necromancer, Lord of Wolves, who dwelt in Tol Sirion, the island in the river Sirion with an Elvish watchtower, which came to be Tol-in-Gaurhoth,
Page 3 and 4: First U.S. Edition All texts and ma
Page 5 and 6: Contents Cover Title Page Copyright
Page 7 and 8: PREFACE After the publication of Th
Page 9 and 10: Lastly, I will cite another of my p
Page 11 and 12: NOTES ON THE ELDER DAYS The depth i
Page 13 and 14: That country came afterwards to be
Page 15 and 16: BEREN AND LÚTHIEN
Page 17 and 18: The Tale of Tinúviel in its rewrit
Page 19 and 20: of the white moths that flew in the
Page 21 and 22: Valinor. Melian was a fay. In the g
Page 23 and 24: Iron Mountains until he reached the
Page 25 and 26: quest, and indeed there was little,
Page 27 and 28: Now Gwendeling laughed not, for in
Page 29 and 30: towards Palisor, and there plays su
Page 31 and 32: Tinúviel was robed in her robe of
Page 33 and 34: ears, for they twitch already.’ B
Page 35 and 36: for Tevildo’s wrath was terrible,
Page 37 and 38: and Melko gazed on enchanted, but h
Page 39 and 40: him, saying it would be folly to be
Page 41: to cutting it open, but Huan licks
Page 45 and 46: A PASSAGE EXTRACTED FROM THE LAY OF
Page 47 and 48: he found the servants of the king a
Page 49 and 50: traitor betrayed, now stands! Nor f
Page 51 and 52: Yet seldom well an outlaw ends, and
Page 53: THE QUENTA NOLDORINWA After the Ske
Page 56 and 57: that burning, and the fumes of it w
Page 58 and 59: A SECOND EXTRACT FROM THE LAY OF LE
Page 60 and 61: An everlasting watch they hold, the
Page 62 and 63: that to Beren son of Barahir mercy
Page 64 and 65: is now our fate, but not to lose th
Page 66 and 67: they took; and loathing each him cl
Page 68 and 69: Foreboding evil weights their mind,
Page 70 and 71: Death to light, to law, to love! Cu
Page 72 and 73: and blood flowing they would smell.
Page 74 and 75: any who could capture her. Each wol
Page 76 and 77: Doriath. Then the heart of Thingol
Page 78 and 79: as arrow from a bow of yew; their v
Page 80 and 81: Curufin spake: ‘Good brother mine
Page 82 and 83: The perfume of her flower-twined ha
Page 84 and 85: her eager questions. Out of mind, i
Page 86 and 87: The others lived no more, but bare
Page 88 and 89: slim fingers flute and viol seize b
Page 90 and 91: and each was seized, and there were
Page 92 and 93:
and vanquished betrayed his master
Page 94 and 95:
and there there lie the white bones
Page 96 and 97:
‘For never more to Doriath can Be
Page 98 and 99:
There Curufin had left his life, ha
Page 100 and 101:
long years had sung in those sad li
Page 102 and 103:
eneath the beech and oak we stand,
Page 104 and 105:
and dream thee back in Valinor, whe
Page 106 and 107:
would Huan make, of flowing pace: t
Page 108 and 109:
singing until the midnight hour. Sw
Page 110 and 111:
Fingolfin there: ‘Come, open wide
Page 112 and 113:
Thus Bauglir earned the furrowed sc
Page 114 and 115:
and ever wild their voices rolled i
Page 116 and 117:
eyes shining grim with evil mood, u
Page 118 and 119:
at every turn they silent loomed in
Page 120 and 121:
‘A lawful errand here me brought;
Page 122 and 123:
In slothful gardens many a flower l
Page 124 and 125:
in ecstasy enchanted borne. All eye
Page 126 and 127:
in sleep uneasy Balrogs stirred, an
Page 128 and 129:
No moon is there, no voice, no soun
Page 130 and 131:
my father’s consignment contained
Page 132 and 133:
twenty years from the original Tale
Page 134 and 135:
time return. But the sons of Men di
Page 136 and 137:
THE RETURN OF BEREN AND LÚTHIEN AC
Page 138 and 139:
[In a text somewhat later than the
Page 140 and 141:
tree and boulder do the brown Elves
Page 142 and 143:
She wandered in the woods, and of t
Page 144 and 145:
THE MORNING AND EVENING STAR Great
Page 146:
silver-grey. And at times, when Eä
Page 149 and 150:
of slender birches silver-grey stoo
Page 151 and 152:
to him of Eilinel his wife. ‘Woul
Page 153 and 154:
As Beren went, still like a knell r
Page 155 and 156:
aped from dead bodies. One a ring h
Page 157 and 158:
than all the world has since in son
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FOOTNOTES Preface * ‘The Lost Tal
Page 161 and 162:
Beleg Elf of Doriath, a great arche
Page 163 and 164:
Ginglith River flowing into the Nar
Page 165 and 166:
Nan Dumgorthin ‘The land of the d
Page 167 and 168:
Valmar, Valimar City of the Valar i
Page 169 and 170:
like please, 88 (in doth it like th
Page 171 and 172:
Read More from J.R.R. Tolkien Visit
Page 173:
ABOUT THE AUTHOR AND EDITOR J.R.R.
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