📊Poll: Do Balrogs have wings?

[Elwing the White]

but you’ll come back to it

It seems that many of the people on TTF are stubborn– I mean, persistent in that way

 

[Radaghast]

This is a debate that once you’re sucked in, you can never escape. Might take a year, maybe five but you’ll come back to it like we all do 😬

I doubt it, but I'll take this as my cue to post this:

 

[Radaghast]

I see two more have joined the legions of the deluded...

🫤

 

[Erestor Arcamen]

I added the option “Maybe (Wing Agnostic)” since maybe it’s not 100% either way and people may lean both ways depending on how they read the text

 

[Radaghast]

My dear @Radaghast - I am ever so certain your succinct dispatch of the subject suffices to draw a final conclusion.

For you.

However, I recommend you hold your conclusion loosely, and be not surprised, when you discover... yet again... there are those who do not agree. Will not agree. Cannot agree. All 3 of these in different measures, by different people - though for entirely the same reasons.

Be firm in your conclusion.
Just be not insistent in its adoption by others.

LOL, how am I insisting anything? You're giving me far too much credit. People will believe what they believe, I can't help that, nor do I wish to; it's not going to change what's actually in the text (or how I read it, if you prefer). But I'm also inviting those who believe Tolkien meant for Balrogs to have wings (let alone that they can fly) to present their evidence. I have yet to see anything compelling and don't see any hint of a controversy here.

 

[Radaghast]

I added the option “Maybe (Wing Agnostic)”

😆

 

[Elthir]

What's a few more pages to a twenty year old debate?

It is nothing. It is everything.

Balrogs pre-Moria encounter:

"The Balrogs are "demons of power" (p.181); they are capable of pain and fear (p. 194); they are attired in iron armour (pp. 181, 194), and they have whips of flame (a character they never lost) and claws of steel (pp. 169, 179)." Christopher Tolkien, commentary, The Fall of Gondolin, The Book of Lost Tales II

Thus The Death of Glorfindel — by Patrick H. Wynne

Balrogs post-Moria encounter:

" . . . their hearts were of fire, but they were cloaked in darkness, and terror went before them; they had whips of flame. Balrogs they were named." JRRT, The Later Quenta Silmarillion

Thus. . .

. . . wait no no no!

Thus. . .

. . . ah, again, no no no!

Try a third time. . . that usually does it. . .

O now you're not even trying!

Forget it.

How 'bout something like wings instead.

You're welcome.

🐾

 

[Ent]

LOL, how am I insisting anything?

You're not.
I was just presenting a loving encouragement to continue on your current course.

People will believe what they believe, I can't help that,

And this is why. 😄

 

[TrackerOrc]

For clarity: what's your idea of the shadow before the spread "like wings" statement? Especially considering your "cast" a wing-like shadow here

For example, when the Balrog came to the edge of the fire the "light faded as if a cloud had bent over it." Then we have a dark figure steaming with fire racing toward the company, but when Boromir sounded his horn, for a moment "the fiery shadow halted"

There's no spreading yet. Okay, then the shadow about it reaches out like two vast wings. It had vast wings, or "potentially" vast wing, the whole time? And still again, the fire in it seemed to die, but the "darkness" grew, and then it reaches up to a great height and its "wings" (as easily understood as its shadow as are the wings understood as "sails" in Tal-Emar", see below for a fuller version) spread from wall to wall.

And when it falls, the Balrog fell forward and "its shadow plunged down and vanished."

Again, I'm just wondering about you interpretation considering other statements in the passage.

And indeed, as noted, when the "new" Balrogs emerge in the later Silmarillion, we have: " . . . their hearts were of fire, but they were cloaked in darkness, and terror went before them; they had whips of flame. Balrogs they were named." JRRT, The Later Quenta Silmarillion

I know this wasn't published in The Hobbit, The Lord of The Rings, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and The Road Goes Ever On, but it still hooks in perfectly with the simile reading.




You've granted that we can have a simile here, and the general meaning of simile is: a figure of speech that compares two unlike things with "like" or "as."

Writers use 'em all the time. Readers recognize 'em all the time. Similes are like acorns on oaks!

Or something else



Both passages are simple enough to my mind. Moria passage: simile to "word understood in light of simile" -- Durin's Folk passage: flying for fleeing.

And both passages are exampled not only in "writing in general" but in Tolkien's writing.



Well, as the Balrog escaped Thangorodrim. . .

"Greater than great houses are the ships of the Go-hilleg, and they bear store of men and goods, and yet are wafted by the winds; for the Sea-men spread great cloths like wings to catch the airs, and bind them to tall poles like trees of the forest. Thus they will come to the shore, where there is shelter, or as nigh as they may; and then they will send forth smaller boats laden with goods, and strange things both beautiful and useful such as our folk covet. These they will sell to us for small price, or give as gifts, feigning friendship, and pity for our need; and they will dwell a while, and spy out the land and the numbers of the folk, and then go. And if they do not return, men should be thankful. For if they come again it is in another guise. In greater numbers they come then: two ships or more together, stuffed with Men and not goods, and ever one of the accursed ships hath black wings. For that is the Ship of the Dark, and in it they bear away evil booty, captives packed like beasts, the fairest women and children, or young men unblemished, and that is their end. Some say they are eaten for meat; and others that they are slain with torment on the black stones in the worship of the Dark. Both maybe are true. The foul wings of the Sea-men have not been seen in these waters for many a year. . ." A Certain Author

To me there's nothing complicated here.

And reading the Moria encounter in the same (un)light. . .

Well for clarity I think the Balrog was surrounded by shadow. Being conciliatory by nature, as all Orcs are, I'm happy for people to believe that the Balrog can actually manipulate this shadow as he pleases. This just makes an already awesome creature just that little bit more awesome - he can cast magic shadows, what's not to love?

But within the shadow is a corporeal creature who I believe has wings.

I'm again happy for the first sentence to be regarded as a simile (good gravy, we Orcs are just quite the diplomats aren't we?).

The second sentence, however, is not a simile or a metaphor or anything other than a simple statement of fact - the Balrog stands up straight and spreads his (astonishingly impressive) wings. Simplest explanation, best explanation.

Your simple passages involve simile to word, fleeing for flying; my simple(st) passages involve the bare words on the page, meaning exactly what they say.

 

[Elthir]

my simple(st) passages involve the bare words on the page, meaning exactly what they say.

Hm. Then simply apply this to the famous
Tal-Elmar passage. I triple dog dare ya.

 

[Ent]

involve the bare words on the page, meaning exactly what they say.

Not wanting to open up a can of worms here, the business of "reading bare word and interpreting them to mean exactly what they say" can sometimes be problematic.

Example: Gandalf says to the Company: "Fly, you fools!"

Now reading and accepting these words to mean exactly what they say presents significant problems, for me at least, as it seems In that moment, Gandalf had lost his mind or had an attack of dementia, believing the men, hobbits, elves and dwarves involved all had wings, and could fly. In the event, since they could not meet his stated criteria, they simply turned and ran.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

What he meant:

 

[Erestor Arcamen]

Not wanting to open up a can of worms here, the business of "reading bare word and interpreting them to mean exactly what they say" can sometimes be problematic.

Example: Gandalf says to the Company: "Fly, you fools!"

Now reading and accepting these words to mean exactly what they say presents significant problems, for me at least, as it seems In that moment, Gandalf had lost his mind or had an attack of dementia, believing the men, hobbits, elves and dwarves involved all had wings, and could fly. In the event, since they could not meet his stated criteria, they simply turned and ran.

He wanted them to get their Hermes sandals on and fly out

 

[Ent]

I read somewhere that Tolkien mapped out the phases of the moon so they fell into place with the story.

You read correctly, and Tolkien made several changes in revision to make it consistent.

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

What he meant:
View attachment 38628

He wanted them to get their Hermes sandals on and fly out

Little known fact, but the Sons of Fëanor can fly too!

Then through the throng came the sons of Fëanor, flying from the North, and they bore new tidings of evil.

~Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion

Too bad Fingon can't also fly. Would have made a certain rescue a whole lot easier.

 

[Server Room Gremlin]

Little known fact, but the Sons of Fëanor can fly too!

~Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion

Curufin: *is preening his sleek black feathery wings with a wide-toothed comb*
*sensing the reader's confused stare, he turns around*
🤷 ...What?!

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

Curufin: *is preening his sleek black feathery wings with a wide-toothed comb*
*sensing the reader's confused stare, he turns around*
🤷 ...What?!

Maitimo: *stretching his coppery wings to their incredibly long span* I have no idea what they're all so concerned about, brother.

 

[Server Room Gremlin]

I have the sudden temptation to create another poll: 'Do the sons of Fëanor have wings?'

 

[Maedhros_Nelyafinwë]

I have the sudden temptation to create another poll: 'Do the sons of Fëanor have wings?'

Cringey fanfic writers: YES.

 

[Deimos]

Could it have been April 1st, and he was calling them April fools.
I read somewhere that Tolkien mapped out the phases of the moon so they fell into place with the story.

He did that with a number of "celestial" descriptions; i.e. ensured they were correct/ accurate for the time of year during which the [narrative] events were happening.