Understanding Tolkien's races

Inderjit S said:

Walter-you know a lot about Germanic, Scandinavian legends etc.

It would be nice if you gave us some ideas on where Tolkien may have obtained the idea of Elves from-or any other race.

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Scio me nihil scire...

'We must be satisfied with the soup that is set before us, and not desire to see the bones of the ox out of which it has been boiled.'

Tolkien sort of quoting Sir George Dasent

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IMO any simple, plain and unambiguous answer to the question where Tolkien may have obtained the idea of Elves from would miss part of the complexity of the issue, since I think Tolkien borrowed from many sources and also Tolkien seems to have changed his mind more than once.

And since I am short of time at the moment I'll just toss in a few ideas:

I think Tolkien started with the diminutive elfs or fairies of British/English and especially Celtic tradition (cf. Cottage of Lost Play). Later this idea shifted and the Elves became more like the Germanic/Nordic âlfar (though in fact little is known of them). The separation in light- and dark- (gray-)elves resembles that of Germanic/Nordic tradition, but their withdrawal to an "Island in the West" resembles more the myths of the Tuatha-de-Danaan and their withdrawal to a netherworld. But parallel to this we have also a development into "superhuman" beings, and here this reminds me of the race of the Golden Age in Greek myths.

But Tolkien in later years seemed to regret his choice of "elves" as a name for this race (as can be gathered from some of his letters) and probably would have preferred for his elves to be an "unpreceded" race, un-paralleled in myths and history...

I hope someone else will fill in the gaps I left and toss in more ideas. Or perhaps some Tolkienologists more learned than I am make this a "project" and develop this to an essay, maybe something like "Sources and Origins of the Races in Tolkien's Legendarium".

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Regarding any comparison of Tolkien's dwarves with (orthodox) Jews, I am tempted to say "Both races had beards and there the resemblance ceases"... but not even that really fits...

(copied from the thread which I mistakenly posted in)

I don't think Tolkien himself used stereotypes, especially as far as the Jew-Dwarf idea is concerned. His perspective of them seems to come very much, if not entirely, from the Norse mythos. I don't think the Norse knew enough about Jews to make stereotypes about them (as in they hadn't ever seen them, and probably wouldn't have recognized them...everyone's the same when you're killing, looting, and pillaging).

Elves apparently describe what humans aspire to be (eternally-alive, strong) but appearances are often deceiving. With eternal life and great strength came apathy and corruption, which can be viewed as an analogy to what would happen to people with this power.

Numenoreans are also, apparently, a view on humans trying to achieve the status of the elves, as well as the downfall of such a path.

If anything, Tolkien used the Hobbits to show that the best way for people to live happily was not to struggle for power, but to live a simple life and keep friends and family close.

Thus, I believe the issue is not so much race as it is culture.

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I have stated that I believe that culture and philosophy were used by Tolkien to be represented in the different races. I will continue with that and say that I believe Dwarves are the representation of xenophobic humans. When a people begins to recede inward, they begin to die despite their effort to do otherwise. Society eventually stagnates, and the population dwindles. Dwarves are similar to Numenoreans in this analyses, in that their greed for power (wealth, in the case of the dwarves; life in the case of Numenoreans) was their ultimate demise. Dwarves were too concerned with wealth to marry in large enough numbers to keep the population up, thus they eventually dwindled to basically nothing.

Just to play devil's advocate.

From a letter to Naomi Mitchison, 8 December 1955.

I do think of the 'Dwarves' like Jews: at once native and alien in their habitations, speaking the languages of the country, but with an accent due to their own private tongue.....

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I found this little quote as I was flicking though Tolkien's letters the other day, it may be pertinent to the discussion, but then again it may not.

I lost track of this thread way back when.

Strange....
I haven't related the Jews to Tolkien's Dwarves .... but maybe there's sth. true in this. Besides, now that Turgon quoted that line from the letters, who can say "no" to such a comparison when Tolkien himself admits it!

But maybe it isn't all that strange! Elves of ME "came" from the Germanic tales, and from the few 'glimpses' into those myths, ME-Dwarves - too.
Could those Germanic Dwarves[/i] in fact be a reflection of some general conception of the old Germanic peoples to the peoples from the South-East - peoples, who came with high culture, knowledge, wealth and ... unwilling to 'share' it too easily with the 'barbarians' from the North, but rather 'sell' it to them - just so normal for the worlds they had come from where trade and payment had been developed long before; peoples - looking very different from the Northern race (and if I'm not mistaken - much shorter in stature); peoples who, out of respect rather than anything else, didn't show off the exotic beauty of their women >> hence the myht they had no women ... or if there were any - those should've been very ugly to look upon ...
Basically, the Dwarves from the germanic tales and from there - into ME, to me seem as the 'picture' the Northern peoples had in ancient times about the peoples from the South-East.

But Tolkien, IMO, added to that 'picture, by endowing all the races of his fantasy worlds with a lot of .... in fact , all most human features.

He used those different creatures in two ways, as I see it: one - to make the world he created a truly fantastic place as any mythical world should be; and two - to project onto these races what we - humans, are in all the diversity of the human character.

Based on this, I personally think I can understand his choice of the Germanic Elves instead of the little mischivous English fairies.

Lhunithiliel said:

Strange....
I haven't related the Jews to Tolkien's Dwarves .... but maybe there's sth. true in this. Besides, now that Turgon quoted that line from the letters, who can say "no" to such a comparison when Tolkien himself admits it!

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Yeah I remember that, now.

The less appealing side of the Dwarves' nature -- their lust for gold and especially, in the First Age, the Nauglamir containing the Silmaril -- is also particularly close to the character of Alberich in Wagner's Nibelungleid (sp?). IIRC Alberich was widely considered to represent Wagner's distasteful concept of Jewish character.

Didn't Tolkien also say that the Dwarves' secret language of Khuzdul was (was intended to sound?) vaguely Hebraic?
I believe the tri-consonantal pattern -- e.g. KZD for words to do with dwarves themselves -- is also based on Hebrew. No doubt people here can confirm or correct that... ;_
But then ISTR that Adunaic, the language of Numenor best known to us in the names of the later Kings, was also intended to sound Semitic if not specifically Hebraic.

Lhunithiliel said:

[...] his choice of the Germanic Elves instead of the little mischievous English fairies.

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I'm sure this is what you meant, but to be clear: Tolkien did believe the Elves of Faerie were like the Irish Sidhe: (the Tuatha de Danaan) and the Mediaeval Germanic conception of the Light Elves. He not only didn't choose to follow, but cordially disliked and deliberately chose to correct the later Victorian English drift towards depicting the Fair Folk as diminutive winged fairies.

I believe the small size and addition of wings is a misconception derived from the association with beings of the spirit world which are so elusive they can never be seen or touched. It's a bit like the way pointy ears were a carry-over from animal masks representing other spirits. Practically everything otherworldly is glommed together in the concept of the 'historical' Elves.

Cheers,
--Os.

Osric said:

The less appealing side of the Dwarves' nature -- their lust for gold and especially, in the First Age, the Nauglamir containing the Silmaril -- is also particularly close to the character of Alberich in Wagner's Nibelungleid (sp?). IIRC Alberich was widely considered to represent Wagner's distasteful concept of Jewish character.

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Well .... some Elves demonstrated no less greed than the Dwarves! Not to mention Men! Or ... Dragons!
This is why I so much believe and ... sort of feel comfortable with the thought that the races of ME - all are we, only - each part of this 'us' being presented separately.

I'm sure this is what you meant, but to be clear: Tolkien did believe the Elves of Faerie were like the Irish Sidhe: (the Tuatha de Danaan) and the Mediaeval Germanic conception of the Light Elves. He not only didn't choose to follow, but cordially disliked and deliberately chose to correct the later Victorian English drift towards depicting the Fair Folk as diminutive winged fairies.

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Granted!
I don't know too much about Tuatha de Danaan ... Maybe one day I shall come to those tales as well.