A question about Pengolodh

[oikeroi]

hello everybody, I am honoured to join this forum.
In one of the threads (the one about the greatest noldor) the name Pengolodh appears.
Who is it this noldor?

 

[Confusticated]

Hi oikeroi!

Pengolodh is not mentioned in The Silmarillion, but is mentioned throughout many of the History of Middle-earth books. He is a loremaster who survived the fall of Gondolin and sailed to Eressea in the Second Age. He was especially into languages and was suppose to be the source of a lot of Tolkien's writings on the languages. He was a leading member of the Lambengolmor,a group of linguists started by Feanor.

In addition to this he was also suppose to be a major source of Beleriand history being passed eventually into what was 'The Silmarillion'. He is said to have a "prodigius" memory, thanks to which much of the Elder Days are remembered.

Hmm... the texual history of exactly what role Pengolodh played as the source of these tales is tricky. At one point he was actually credited with writing the Quenta Silmarillion that was then translated by Eriol, a man who went to Eressea and brought it back.

Pengolodh (Quenya: Quengoldo) is said to have been born in Nervast, and is a mix of Sindar and Noldor ancestory and he even has a name Thingodhel (which I'm pretty sure means 'Grey Noldo' in Sindarin - also 'golodh' is Noldo in Sindarin).

He is one of my very favorite elves. Don't hesitate if you have more questions.

 

[Inderjit S]

I suppose whether or not you decide to take Pengoloð and Ælfwine’s conversations as "canon" is upto you and your view of canon. C.T rightly left him out the C.T though, as he gave it a narrative style and the introduction of Pengoloð etc. may have over-complicated it.

Tolkien seems to have settled on the Silmarillion being a Númenórean tale though. Pengoloð also lived in Ost-en-Edhil in the S.A until the invasion of Sauron and the sack of that city. He was the head of the Lambengolor. He also learned Khuzdul and possibly some Avarin. (Realises that he is backing up some of the details from Nom's excellent account there, just with a little more detail.)

I would put Pengoloð third in a list of greatest loremaster, behind Fëanor and Rúmil.

 

[Confusticated]

The fella hasn't read about Pengolodh yet. How will he begin to decide about "canon".

Can we read somewhere that Pengolodh lived in Ost-in-Edhil or do you write that as a safe bet?

I wonder: What part did he play in the battle of the fall of Gondolin? I bet he was wounded pretty badly and in the right place at the right time and got out. Or maybe not.

Did he have any interest in learning about the tongues of orcs...morbid curiosity sort of thing? If he were ever travelling through forest and heard a company of orcs growing nearer, would he climb into a tree and hide quietly with his heart pounding in fear and eyes wide with fright? Or would his heart race in antipication of catching a decent bit of orcish?

Is he still living in Eressea? Does he sit in gardens near water falls reading and writing, or has he passed on to Mandos in weariness?

 

[Beleg]

I would warrant a guess that he is still tarrying in Eressa, hoping for an occasional fated indivdual to grace the Lonely Isle...
One can hope that.

If he were ever travelling through forest and heard a company of orcs growing nearer, would he climb into a tree and hide quietly with his heart pounding in fear and eyes wide with fright?

A bit difficult for me to imagine a Gondoldrim becoming sooo scared of mere orcs.

Or would his heart race in antipication of catching a decent bit of orcish?

Question is how will he be able dechiper the basic laws of the Orcish language, certainly not by picking some chance quotes here and there.

Will he have tried mastering Valarin?

Dont mind Nom and Inderjit, they can argue for hours about the relatively minor aspects of the tricksy canon and still not reach a conclusion.
Welcome.

 

[Confusticated]

A bit difficult for me to imagine a Gondoldrim becoming sooo scared of mere orcs.

Not even Pengolodh who survived the fall of the city and who high-tailed it to Eressea when Sauron attacked the Noldor in the second age?

And whatcha mean "mere orcs" anyhow? One scholarly language-geek Noldo vs a company of them?

Question is how will he be able dechiper the basic laws of the Orcish language, certainly not by picking some chance quotes here and there.

Well he might have fun theorizing off of chance quotes. Or maybe he learned some off the thralls of Angband. Sure any elves would find the languages of the orcs unpleasant, but might some be too curious to resist? There's always Rumil from Lost Tales.

PS: Didn't mean to sound like I was arguing! I would like to know if it is written he lived in Ost-in-Edhil. Was not challenging the statement.

 

[Inderjit S]

The canonical juxtaposition of Pengoloð and other such quaint remarks

A bit difficult for me to imagine a Gondoldrim becoming sooo scared of mere orcs.

Well he had lived in isolation in Gondolin, where the scariest thing you could ever encounter was one of Turgon's striptease's ("one for the ladies", of course, and that golden-haired temptress, descendant of a house of mysterious princes, and rider of white horses Glorfindel) either that or witness the incestuous going on's in the house of a certain Turukano Finwëion ....well I see your point.

I wonder: What part did he play in the battle of the fall of Gondolin? I bet he was wounded pretty badly and in the right place at the right time and got out.

Maybe he was just a big fraud? I'm sure our honourable paragon of humility would waffle on about how he nearly got hammered with the old "harp in the back" Elvish by a jealous Gondolinian scholar or how he was stabbed in the leg with Eärendil’s flute because he would not allow the women and children enter Idril's tunnel, and being jealous of a certain couple he decided to run around Gondolin like a headless chicken, bribing, running and bribe-running before chucking mr.loverboy off a cliff *cue sentimental Celine Deol number* (ha! she how HER career has gone downhill!) and fast-forward 80 years later when the woman whose husband he slew(eth) (as our fastidious scholar would put it) returns on some kind of expedition and recites her lamentable story to all and sundry, who proceed to chuck that silly woman off the cliff and be done with her sentimental nonsense about some floppy haired, baby-faced twit who had a fetish for painting in the nude and asking her if she was on the "top of the world" when in fact they were dancing on Fingolfin's cairn (fake, but THATS another tale full of harps and eagles and other such clichés of heroic tales of valour and feeble-minded idiocy) and making rude gestures to the Eagles of Manwë Súlimo, who one feels, with all that sitting down, counselling and feasting must now be a figure of some heft.

Did he have any interest in learning about the tongues of orcs...morbid curiosity sort of thing?

Let's not get into his morbid fetishes, but I don't think Ork-talk was one of them, as, with usual pomp, he would berate anything he couldn't understand as "base" and "unlovely" and we all now that Mr. Renowned Scholar of Gondolin would not condescend to such vernaculars.

If he were ever travelling through forest and heard a company of orcs growing nearer, would he climb into a tree and hide quietly with his heart pounding in fear and eyes wide with fright

Sounds like the story from 'Arabian Night's the one about the forty thieves.

or has he passed on to Mandos in weariness?

Something, no doubt we all pray for. No, people like Pengoloð stick around for a long time. I fancy he does like Norah Jones though. It's a hunch.

Will he have tried mastering Valarin?

Doubt it, Elves don't really take to the over-complicated language. And what's the point? Unless you want to swear in Valarin that is and I'm sure that delightful tongue is full of such beautiful words and brilliant syntax.

Not even Pengolodh who survived the fall of the city and who high-tailed it to Eressea when Sauron attacked the Noldor in the second age?

Maybe he dressed up as a beautiful Elven princess and was able to escape to wherever he wanted to go due to the fulfilment of various promiscuous acts. Or maybe he was the one who threw the rock at Celebrimbor when he was having a manly game of naked Roman-Greco wrestling with Sauron or maybe it was he who drove the pole through poor Celebrimbor’s body. If he was thereth thateth iseth.

There's always Rumil from Lost Tales.

Dude, the guy was obv. a drunk, I mean he was swearing and arguing with a bird, telling it go to the halls of Mandos--has the man lost all his knowledge on Valarin tradition? DUDE!

Dont mind Nom and Inderjit, they can argue for hours about the relatively minor aspects of the tricksy canon and still not reach a conclusion.

What's wrong with being pedants?

 

[Elthir]

A bit difficult for me to imagine a Gondoldrim becoming sooo scared of mere orcs.

Tolkien himself noted the following about the loremasters, like the great Pengoloð.

"Nor were the "loremasters" a separate guild of gentle scribes, soon burned by the Orks of Angband upon pyres of books. They were mostly even as Feanor, the greatest, kings, princes and warriors, such as the valiant captains of Gondolin, or Finrod of Nargothrond and Arothir his kinsman and steward". JRRT, The Shibboleth of Feanor, Author's note, note 23, The Peoples of Middle-Earth

Will he have tried mastering Valarin?

It appears that by Pengoloð's time, the language of the Valar itself had become of matter of old lore: "But without argument we know that they did so [the Valar spoke a language of their own]; for there are references to the Lambe Valarinwa in old lore and histories, though these are few and scattered. Most of these references appear to be derived, by tradition of mouth, from "the Sayings of Rúmil" . . . " JRRT, Quendi and Eldar, The War of the Jewels

Pengoloð makes the point that few of the Eldar ever learned to speak Valarin, even haltingly, and further, that among the people as a whole only a small number of words or names became widely know. It was said that Feanor learned more of Valarin "than any others before his time" but what he knew he kept to himself and refused to transmit that knowledge even to the Lambengolmor because of his quarrel with the Valar.

Also, surprise but maybe not -- the "true" history of Pengoloð may not 🐝 what some think it is!

Later text [later than Quendi and Eldar] published in Vinyar Tengwar 48 (2005), gives us a "new"
Pengoloð: here he's a Noldorin Exile [not an Elf of mixed descent born in Nevrast], and here he's said to have learned something of Dwarvish "in its archaic form as used in the habitations of the Dwarves of Ered Lindon" (Nogrod, Belegost) -- whereas Quendi and Eldar had him gain his knowledge of Dwarvish from the Dwarves of Moria in the Second Age.

Both connections to Dwarvish are not impossible in-story; but the idea of both being internally true isn't necessarily. . . ahh. . . true either!

So (I ask me), did "this" Pengoloð ever go to Moria, and thus sail to Eressea "when the shadow of Sauron fell upon Eriador"?

I'd say unknown. In general, the later text in VT does not record the same history as Quendi and Eldar, and it is indeed interesting, in any case, to see this "new" connection to Dwarvish.

These things said: I realize that the above account about Valarin is from Quendi and Eldar. . .

. . . but whatyagonnado? Hey, I'm just a cat in a coat!

🐾

 

[Ent]

(The Ent prepares an entry for Pengoloð in the Great Halls of Speculation, when their rebuild is completed.)

Also, 3 cheers for necromancy!! Well done @Elthir. Neither good ole topics, or good ole threads, should die.

(p.s. - note the use of the word "good". Now I suppose we'll need to define what "good" means in this context.)