Leaving the Barrow Downs

[Deleted member 12094]

The dark line they had seen was not a line of trees but a line of bushes growing on the edge of a deep dike with a steep wall on the further side. Tom said that it had once been the boundary of a kingdom, but a very long time ago. He seemed to remember something sad about it, and would not say much.​

What could Tom Bombadil have remembered, that was so sad?
As it was the old border of Cardolan, I could think of 2 possibilities: the invasion from Angmar in 1409 or the Great Plague in 1636.

Or could this refer to something else?

 

[Olorgando]

The dark line they had seen was not a line of trees but a line of bushes growing on the edge of a deep dike with a steep wall on the further side. Tom said that it had once been the boundary of a kingdom, but a very long time ago. He seemed to remember something sad about it, and would not say much.​

What could Tom Bombadil have remembered, that was so sad?
As it was the old border of Cardolan, I could think of 2 possibilities: the invasion from Angmar in 1409 or the Great Plague in 1636.

Or could this refer to something else?

As Tom would have been looking north from his home at the time, I would place my bets with the invasion from Angmar in 1409. The Great Plage entered Eriador from the south (and borders are pretty irrelevant for such natural disasters …)

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

Especially in light of his earlier remark about the brooch: "Fair was she. . ."

 

[Alcuin]

There’s a note in Appendix A (in square brackets in my copy) that indicates the barrow in which Frodo and his companions were imprisoned belonged to the last Prince of Cardolan. He died in 1409 in the invasion of Cardolan by Angmar. It stands to reason that the woman buried with him was his wife or daughter, or perhaps both his wife and daughter: it sounds as if the slab on which the Hobbits lay might have been wide enough for two or three bodies of Men.

That also implies that the corpse the barrow-wight had animated was that of the Prince of Cardolan. The Witch-king infested the barrows with evil spirits – possibly rebellious Elves from the First Age that had refused the summons of Mandos – during the Great Plague of 1636 in order to prevent the Dúnedain from using the barrows as defensive positions, as they had done during his invasion in 1409.

I noticed something unusual when I reviewed Appendix A just now. The text reads,

​

A remnant of the faithful among the Dúnedain of Cardolan also held out in Tyrn Gorthad (the Barrowdowns), or took refuge in the [Old] Forest behind.​

​

What strikes me is that phrase, “the faithful among the Dúnedain of Cardolan”. I am reminded of what Faramir told Frodo at Henneth Annûn,

​

It is not said that evil arts were ever practiced in Gondor, or that the Nameless One was ever named in honor there…​

​

While it’s clear that the Third Age is included in this statement (excluding Queen Berúthiel, who was divorced by her husband Tarannon Falastur and sent home because of her Sauronic practices), it isn’t clear whether Faramir means the Third Age exclusively: that is, it seems to me he might be implying that Sauron was worshipped, or at least his practices were followed, in the North, in Rhudaur or Cardolan. Otherwise, why would the text read, “the faithful among the Dúnedain of Cardolan”, rather than just, “the Dúnedain of Cardolan”? After all, we know that Rhudaur fell into evil and was overrun by Hillmen in league with Angmar.

Just a thought…

───◊───

Ah, the ditch, the ditch! It was the border of a kingdom, correct? And north of that border was Arthedain. It was the border between Arthedain, which apparently controlled the Old [Dwarf] Road, and Cardolan. The Dúnedain of Arthedain, Cardolan, and Rhudaur fought one another for control of Amon Sûl, Weathertop, and its palantír, which was the Chief Palantír of Middle-earth and could “eavesdrop” on every other communication via palantíri in Middle-earth. (The palantír of Osgiliath could do this only for the palantíri in Gondor.) This palantír was, I believe, the object of the Witch-king’s wars against Arnor: he either somehow arranged for the kingdoms to split up, or else took advantage of it. But as soon as Arnor collapsed and his goal – Sauron’s goal – of achieving a palantír from the Dúnedain of the North was confounded, he moved to the South and overran Minas Ithil, obtaining its palantír for his dark master.

Bombadil remembered with sadness the internecine warfare of the Dúnedain of Arnor, a sad recollection compounded by his memory of a beautiful Princess of Cardolan whose brooch he discovered.

 

[Olorgando]

...
Ah, the ditch, the ditch! It was the border of a kingdom, correct? And north of that border was Arthedain. It was the border between Arthedain, which apparently controlled the Old [Dwarf] Road, and Cardolan.
...

Which would have place Tom's home just outside (by a few miles) of Arthedain territory - and disputed border territory at that. He certainly didn't get involved in a way that left memories with friend and foe. Probably with his singing, he could erect something like - and possibly much more powerful, though much smaller than - the Girdle of Melian around Doriath. A "lullaby" from Tom could have made whole armies fall flat on their face and take a serious nap; or turn them into functional zombies and then boomerang them right back where they came from (I'm assuming he, being on the good side, would not use his power to kill any Eruhini, as he might have been able to do easily; considering how he treated the barrow-wight, I would hesitate to give similar "guarantees" about Orcs and the like).
So any (I'd guess Angmar) troops sent there would come back swearing there was "nothing there". They actually never made it "there", I would imagine. And possibly the Witch-king did sense something of this. Maybe at least that every single expedition that he had sent "there" had never been "there", due to some power that remained a mystery to him - except that he himself going there might be an extremely bad idea. I could very well envision Tom treating the W-k like he did the wight - stomping on him like on some annoying spider. Tom's power was aboriginal. The W-k's utterly derivative - and from a master who could very well have failed going against Tom "in person".

 

[Alcuin]

The Old Forest and Barrowdowns were certainly part of Cardolan, which stretched from the Baranduin to the Greyflood and Hoarwell south of the Great East-West Road. Certainly the last Prince of Cardolan knew Bombadil, and from what Strider told Frodo and his friends, Aragorn did, too. But the Witch-king was either unaware of him or had forgotten him. And this might not be an unique oversight: Hobbits had been living in the royal demesne of Arnor for almost 400 years when Fornost fell, yet the Witch-king did not know the location of the land of the Halflings: they were simply too unimportant: as Gandalf put it, “[H]itherto … [Sauron] has entirely overlooked the existence of hobbits,” and that apparently included the attentions of the Witch-king, fortunately. Even Elrond and his counselors, including Círdan’s messenger Galdor, who all knew Iarwain Ben Adar from earlier encounters, forgot about Bombadil.

I don’t think Bombadil interfered in the civil wars of the Dúnedain, though I cannot imagine that he approved of them. His interactions with Frodo and his companions were driven first by Gildor’s messages; then by the Hobbits’ encounter with Old Man Willow, whom Bombadil apparently regarded as an often disagreeable “local” within his little domain; and finally he taught the Hobbits a song to sing to summon him if perchance they fell into difficulties before they reached the Road, which they did. In the case of Frodo, Bombadil’s actions cannot be considered neutral by any means: he and Goldberry lent active assistance to Frodo. But in that case, they may have been acting under the instruction or influence of Eru, who is never encountered in the tale and to whom only the most indirect references are made (such as Gandalf’s return), but whose power and guidance are never far off: consider what Gandalf told Frodo at the very beginning,

​

[T]here was something else at work, beyond any design of the Ring-maker. I can put it no plainer than by saying that Bilbo was meant to find the Ring, and not by its maker. In which case you also were meant to have it. And that may be an encouraging thought.​

​

Bombadil, along this line of reasoning, was meant to help Frodo avoid the Ringwraiths.

 

[Olorgando]

...
Bombadil, along this line of reasoning, was meant to help Frodo avoid the Ringwraiths.

Possibly. But I would caution against reading too much into this one statement of JRRT's. He has stated repeatedly in letters that he deliberately eliminated any overt references to religion (that may have existed in earlier drafts), which is, I firmly believe, one of the reasons for LoTR's unmatched appeal across all sorts of cultural divides. While firmly rooted in his (Roman) Catholicism, JRRT is dealing in human universals here.

There is another thread dealing with the Faramir / Boromir dreams bit, and what would have been if Faramir ...
By all (back-written) accounts, Faramir was "meant" to go to Rivendell, being the first and repeated "recipient" of that dream before Boromir also "received" it - once only?
In the hindsight that is almost always 20/20 vision, "of course" Boromir not getting his hands on the One Ring, instead repenting and dying a "good death" (from the viewpoint of a "pure warrior") was better than his heading down the horrible path of becoming the tenth Ring-wraith. Leaving the far wiser Faramir to be at Henneth Annûn, the second (and final) "homely house" for the Fellowship, here its decisive element, after Lothlórien, a temporary but vital sanctuary.
OK, but who was then sending those dreams to Faramir, "meaning" him to go to Rivendell? And who finally "gave up" and sent the same dream to Boromir, contradicting the first "sender", as one could surmise? Eru changing his mind? Erm ...
The old, unsolvable predestination vs. free will paradox that has (and will continue to) vexed countless generations of theologians, producing huge libraries of writing. A specialist version of the immovable object vs. irresistible force paradox.

 

[Alcuin]

Bombadil, along this line of reasoning, was meant to help Frodo avoid the Ringwraiths.

Possibly. But I would caution against reading too much into this one statement of JRRT's.

Mere speculation on my part.

[Frodo said, ]“Did you hear me calling, Master, or was it just chance that brought you at that moment?”

Tom stirred… “Eh, what?” said he. “Did I hear you calling? Nay, I did not hear: I was busy singing. Just chance brought me then, if chance you call it. It was no plan of mine…”
​

[W]ho was then sending those dreams to Faramir, "meaning" him to go to Rivendell? And who finally "gave up" and sent the same dream to Boromir, contradicting the first "sender", as one could surmise?

Elbereth sent the dreams, I believe, and the voice the brothers heard in the dream was hers:

…in the West a pale light lingered, and out of it I heard a voice, remote but clear…
​

The old, unsolvable predestination vs. free will paradox that has (and will continue to) vexed countless generations of theologians, producing huge libraries of writing. A specialist version of the immovable object vs. irresistible force paradox.

The problem, I think, is that we temporal creatures, passing through what seems to us linear time as if it were an arrow launched in one direction, are confounded by what appears to us a paradox: a Being that is outside Time, to Whom all is visible at once, for Whom all is present, and for Whom there is no past, no future, only Now without beginning and without end. This is completely outside our ken, and its contemplation throws us out of all reckoning, for it is literally beyond our imagination. Foreknowledge of outcome by One does not preclude freedom of choice by another. Arguing that it does has tied many a man into uncomfortably knotted philosophical underwear.

 

[Olorgando]

...
The problem, I think, is that we temporal creatures, passing through what seems to us linear time as if it were an arrow launched in one direction, are confounded by what appears to us a paradox: a Being that is outside Time, to Whom all is visible at once, for Whom all is present, and for Whom there is no past, no future, only Now without beginning and without end. This is completely outside our ken, and its contemplation throws us out of all reckoning, for it is literally beyond our imagination. Foreknowledge of outcome by One does not preclude freedom of choice by another. Arguing that it does has tied many a man into uncomfortably knotted philosophical underwear.

But we have (theoretically) the ability to theorize about times beyond our temporal being. At least if we're not politicians or managers (as per their official pronouncements). This babbling of theirs about things "envisioned" for perhaps 2050 (common) or even recently 2060 just makes me want to 🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮. Most of them will be dead by then (and the rest lying like mad). Why then drive us crazy with what appear to us to be paradoxes? Does "He" (the usual patriarchal garbage assumption) enjoy watching us bang our heads against the walls? Are all comedians with by "orthodox" thinking scurrilous humor his true (if unwitting) disciples?

 

[Alcuin]

“Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt.” − Herbert Hoover

It’s always easy to promise other people’s money. The folk making and implementing these promises never use their own money, and they are careful to take a slice for themselves: a handling fee. What does Saruman say to Gandalf,

We can bide our time, we can keep our thoughts in our hearts, deploring maybe evils done by the way, but approving the high and ultimate purpose: Knowledge, Rule, Order…
​

Of course, Saruman was called to account for his mistakes. In the real world, miscreants are only occasionally called to account in this life.

We are along way from the Barrowdowns. Have we reached the Prancing Pony yet? I need a stiff drink…

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

We are along way from the Barrowdowns.

Definitely. So a question: is there any textual source for the idea that the barrow-wights reanimated corpses? I don't recall any.

 

[Olorgando]

...
We are along way from the Barrowdowns. Have we reached the Prancing Pony yet? I need a stiff drink…

I only have beer, if German beer … oh, none currently within grasping range - heading for he fridge in the kitchen … *burp*

Definitely. So a question: is there any textual source for the idea that the barrow-wights reanimated corpses? I don't recall any.

Nor me. And as much as I fondly recall that viewing about 45 years ago of the 1968 C-film (or lower?) "Night of the Living Dead" by George Romero (by now rightly in the Library of Congress), I can't quite imagine fitting it into the "Fellowship" film; hey, did I just crack a code?!? That might have been PJ's problem too! He might have wanted to, but Fran and Philippa asked him "are you totally daft?!?" and so the whole Tom Bombadil sequence got sent to the can.

 

[Alcuin]

[I]s there any textual source for the idea that the barrow-wights reanimated corpses? I don't recall any.

By implication, yes. The Barrow-wights were “evil spirits” invoked by the Witch-king during the Great Plague to infest the burials. The barrow in which the Hobbits were trapped was the burial of the last Prince of Cardolan, who by the time the Barrow-wight entered it had been dead almost 230 years. After all, as a spirit, the Barrow-wight did not come equipped with its own body: the dead buried in the tomb provided that. (Pretty gross, eh?)

The Númenóreans were practiced embalmers: Tolkien compares them in this regard to the ancient Egyptians. We know from his description of the Stewards’ tomb in Minas Tirith that they were quite good at this art in Gondor: their forefathers brought it with them from Númenor. We should expect that the Dúnedain of Arnor were likewise quite experienced. So the body had not decayed as it would otherwise. (I recall to mind cadavers in Ireland, Bohemia, and other places that remain mostly intact even after several centuries, not to mention various corpses of saints purported to have remained intact.)

Consider also the texts in Morgoth’s Ring about warnings against necromancy and dealings with spirits of the dead or with unhoused Elves, who might seek to overthrow the “rightful” inhabitant of a body to seize control of it: these were all Sauronic practices.

Finally, there is the encounter between Éowyn and the Witch-king. Her initial challenge to the wraith is telling:

Begone, foul dwimmerlaik, lord of carrion! Leave the dead in peace!
​

She thinks her uncle Théoden is dead, and seems to believe the Nazgûl has come to take his corpse for some nefarious purpose. Animating a corpse is no doubt problematic, even for a Nazgûl, but horrifying and terrifying the Rohirrim and folk of Gondor with it, not to mention the wicked pleasure derived from defiling it, would make it worth the Witch-king’s effort.

I only have beer, if German beer … oh, none currently within grasping range - heading for he fridge in the kitchen … *burp*

Ale for me, please; Belgian sour ale if you have it! or a little red wine...

 

[Olorgando]

Ale for me, please; Belgian sour ale if you have it! or a little red wine...

Whaaaaat????? I thought the Belgians were among the (second) best beer brewers in Europe, but they sell a sour anything for consumption???
That can get you lockup-time here in Germany.
Though my father, never a big beer-drinker, once got a hold of one of my wheat "Weizen" beer bottles, the kind where you leave a bit of liquid at the bottom of the bottle to shake the yeast at the bottom of it into suspension, and then pour it into the specialized Weizen glass. He asked me if my beer had gone bad, passed its "drink by" date seriously. Ah, nope.
For red wine, I'd have to ask my wife. As I'm not keen on her calling the medics, I think I'll refrain … 🥴

 

[Alcuin]

Ach! Sour ale is awesome! I discovered it first at Monk’s in Philadelphia almost 10 years ago. Northern European brewers discovered it centuries ago, including your Berliner Weisse.

 

[Olorgando]

… Northern European brewers discovered it centuries ago, including your Berliner Weisse.

Bad argument. "Berliner Weisse" must be very borderline as being accepted as beer anyplace outside of Berlin.
Though then again, it may have been avant-garde by decades to the scourge of cross-polluting beer and other beverages (craft beer being a tributary to this, in parts).

 

[Alcuin]

No one else has to live with German beer laws. 🙃

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

You may well be right, Alcuin -- in fact, quite likely are right -- about the wights as "reanimators"; it would certainly be the "demonic parody" of the resurrection of the dead, in traditional Christian doctrine, and so would be anathema to Tolkien. I'll just say it wasn't my impression, on reading of the "long arm" that came around the corner of the passage in the barrow; I pictured a larger entity. Perhaps it assembled several skeletons into one big one?

As for "instruction or influence", we could ascribe it to Eru, but then, we could do the same for any action in Middle Earth, or indeed for Arda as a whole, beginning with the Music;

'And thou, Melkor, shall see that no theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined'.

The logical result would be to reduce the characters to puppets, dancing to the master manipulator. I doubt this is what either Tolkien or you had in mind, but there's a danger of over-determination, of assigning to an outside force ever smaller actions or coincidences, which we might call patterns we don't know what to do with.

Of course, the manipulation is usually ascribed to the author, who supposedly pulls all the strings, but this is a naive view; we have the testimony of far too many authors about characters saying and doing things their creators never intended, or plots taking unexpected or unwanted turns, to accept such a simple idea. The LOTR drafts give plenty of examples.

The real reason is that the story demands it; the hero will meet who he needs to meet (or, in a tragic or ironic mode, not meet -- or meet who he should not -- Turin comes to mind). This will happen whether the author wants it or not; I'm reminded of a quote from Northrop Frye: "the poet makes a revision, not because he likes it better, but because it is better".

This is all "outside the story", I admit, so I'll just say that, within the story, LOTR adheres closely to its romance form, in which the gods of the mythic mode have retreated to the sky, or other inaccessible place, and no longer intervene directly in the affairs of mortals, but where natural laws are slightly suspended, a hint of magical enchantment tinges the air, and there's always the possibility of "a chance meeting, as we say in Middle Earth".

Edit: I feel I should at least nod towards Merroe's OP, so here's a thought: I wonder if, in creating the Three Kingdoms, Tolkien was using as a model the three kingdoms of the Franks after Clovis? They were united and separated several times, ultimately being brought together under Charlemagne, who, significantly, was declared "Roman Emperor" by the Pope. That attempt to restore the Roman Empire didn't work out so well; maybe the Return of the King was Tolkien's way of coming to a more desirable end?

 

[Olorgando]

No one else has to live with German beer laws. 🙃

OT, but I just can't resist this one.
The most famous one, certainly in Bavaria where I live, is the one adopted here in 1516.
Big celebrations on the 500th anniversary three years ago, as you might be able to imagine.
Does make one wonder if there was any correlation to what an Augustinian monk named Martin did a year later at Wittenberg, or rather the consequences of that.
Too many people in a bad mood from headaches caused by drinking the beer equivalent of plonk ...
As has been a tradition going back to the oldest dynasties of Egypt, China, Mesepotamia etc. when people get annoyed they point a finger (if not more) at "the authorities".
I wonder if there has ever been a specialist study by historians about how many battles, wars, revolts etc. were caused by someone in "leadership" (rulers, generals - no, wait, colonels are far more dangerous …) having been on a bender and thus in a seriously bad mood in a situation needing rather a fine diplomatic touch.
Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (the US equivalent of Monty Python) had a brilliant sketch take on that, though the origin of the bad mood was different.

... here's a thought: I wonder if, in creating the Three Kingdoms, Tolkien was using as a model the three kingdoms of the Franks after Clovis? They were united and separated several times, ultimately being brought together under Charlemagne, who, significantly, was declared "Roman Emperor" by the Pope. That attempt to restore the Roman Empire didn't work out so well; maybe the Return of the King was Tolkien's way of coming to a more desirable end?

A fascinating thought. Arnor correlating to the Carolingian empire, which would make Gondor Byzantium (and Osgiliath Constantinople), the latter a parallel that has repeatedly been drawn. It does break down for several reasons, historical a well as confessional.

Closer to Arnor's beginning unified and then becoming divided in three would be the post-Charlemagne division of his empire under his three grandsons. But here two of the following "entities" became much more powerful than either Byzantium or (the for a long time politically insignificant) "old" Rome as the hypothetical equivalent of Gondor. France, as the westernmost and first to consolidate, would bear a superficial resemblance to Arthedain. Ironically, it was ruled by Charles ΙΙ the Bald, youngest of Charlemagne's three grandsons. Even more ironically, the middle third, ruled by Charlemagne's oldest grandson Lothair I (the eastern third, to become Germany, by the middle grandson Louis the German), was destined to be rather overwhelmed by the two other Frankish realms and their successor entities, millstone-like, to survive as a remnant in the French region of Lorraine.

Confessionally , Byzantium, being Eastern Orthodox territory, might not have held that much appeal to the devout Roman Catholic JRRT. Geographically, it was also a bit too far east. And transferred to Middle-earth this would have amounted to Gondor being overrun and overthrown by Easterlings, and the two powerful parts of Arnor the major opposition to them (with some help from that strange island off the west coast that had an extremely convoluted history in HoMe … )

Which would leave as most likely candidate that rather odd construct, the Holy Roman Empire, becoming even odder after being expanded by a suffix, the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation (some have commented that it was "none of the three" respectively "none of the four", with some salient arguments). The reunited kingdom under Aragorn as a might-have-been. There is a recent thread in "The Halls of Tolkienology", "J.R.R. Tolkien: the creator of Middle-earth", titled "Did Tolkien Ever Read Erik von Kuehnelt- Leddihn ...". The latter, an Austrian, had been in England from 1935, moving to the US in 1937 to teach at several colleges, returning to Austria in 1947. He apparently actually espoused a reestablishment of the "Holy Roman Empire of the German nation", as per the German Wiki article on him (not mentioned in the English Wiki article). I doubt that JRRT would have gone so far, but as a somewhat romantic if impractical notion, it could have appealed to him.

 

[Squint-eyed Southerner]

I'm certainly not suggesting a one-to-one parallel, or one of the map-overlay models; as I said, the dividing and reuniting occurred several times, over the course of centuries. I don't think Tolkien would follow such a rigid pattern; after all, as I've mentioned elsewhere, the Battle of the Pelennor Fields was modeled on the description of the Battle of the Catalonian Fields found in Jordanes -- and that took place in Gaul, not Byzantium.

In fact, we could also suggest the various little kingdoms in "Dark Age" Britain as models.

Interesting that one of the Merovingians was named "Cardoman" though.