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The One Ring Forums:
Tolkien Topics: Reading Room:
Excellent analysis:
Edit Log
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Eldy
Dor-Lomin
Dec 23 2024, 5:43am
Views: 7293
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Great post, noWiz! I think your marcher lord analogy is a good one: obviously, I'm not in Tolkien's head, either, but it fits what we know of the situation from the books. I hesitate to try to make an assessment of Freca's words or temperament (before being the subject of a fat joke) when we're given no description of how he phrased the suggestion of marriage between their houses, though you raise a good point that making this suggestion in public (apparently without sending out feelers to Helm in private beforehand) was, at the very least, reckless.
For what it's worth, and I was only just reminded of this while working on this post, the geographically isolated West-march of Rohan that Freca ruled seems to have become independent as a result of Wulf's rebellion, not being "reconquered" until the time of King Folcwine, Fréaláf's great-great-grandson (LOTR, Appendix A.II), at which he point he "dr[ove] out the Dunlendings that had occupied it, [though] the people that remained were largely of mixed blood, and their loyalty to Edoras was weak: the slaying of their lord, Freca, by King Helm was still remembered. Indeed [during the War of the Ring] they were more disposed to side with Saruman, and many of their warriors had joined Saruman's forces." (UT, The Battles of the Fords of Isen, note 4) I'm inclined to interpret Helm's distrust of Freca as also being in large part racially motivated, especially given his use of "Dunlending" as an insult, but I suppose one could dispute the "large part" bit.
Wulf would have faced an uphill battle trying to win Gondorian approval of his rule in Rohan, since his Dunlendish invasion force was "joined by enemies of Gondor that landed in the mouths of Lefnui and Isen" (Appendix A). Tolkien did not explicitly identify these enemies as the Corsairs of Umbar, but they seem like the obvious candidates, since the Corsairs were at that very moment raiding and invading the sea-coast of Gondor (the River Lefnui, which flowed south into the Bay of Belfalas, was the western border of Gondor; NoMe, p. 385). Given this high level of co-ordination,* I assume there was an Umbari equivalent of Wulf who wanted to rule Gondor, and the two would have recognised each other's authority if the war had gone differently. Given the failure of the amphibious invasion of Gondor, Wulf's fate would have been sealed even if he'd killed Fréaláf. At best he might have held onto his father's lands west of the Gap of Rohan, as some of his followers evidently did, if Gondor and the surviving Rohirrim deemed him too weak to be worth the cost in blood and treasure to pursue, but I doubt it.
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* At least, that's what it looks like to me, but Appendix A doesn't state this and actually makes Wulf's invasion sound like opportunism: "the Dunlendings seeing their chance [because of the Corsairs' attack on Gondor] came over the Isen and down from Isengard. It was soon known that Wulf was their leader." But that seems unlikely since we're told in the very next sentence that they linked up with a landing force that had been sent all the way around the Cape of Andrast to reach the River Isen.
(This post was edited by Eldy on Dec 23 2024, 5:51am)
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Edit Log:
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Post edited by Eldy
(Dor-Lomin) on Dec 23 2024, 5:47am
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Post edited by Eldy
(Dor-Lomin) on Dec 23 2024, 5:51am
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Post edited by Eldy
(Dor-Lomin) on Dec 23 2024, 5:51am
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