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News from Bree
spymaster@theonering.net
Apr 6 2014, 8:15am
Post #1 of 5
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Four reasons Thranduil is smarter than your average elf
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 It's not all sparkles, party-time and un-ending barrels of Dorwinion wine in the underground halls of Thranduil's stronghold.
In fact, if one delves a little into Unfinished Tales a number emerge why one should consider Thranduil quite a formidable ruler, especially in relation to some of his elven peers. Here are four of mine (you may have more).
Longevity
 Consider this: the Silvan/Sindarin kingdom of Oropher and Thranduil has out-endured every other Middle-earth realm except the Grey Havens on the ocean side of the Blue Mountains, and, probably, Lorien.
The Tale of Years gives Second Age 1 as the date of the founding of the Havens. It is not known for certain when Oropher and Thranduil travelled eastward to Greenwood the Great (later renamed Mirkwood) out of the ruin of the realms of Beleriand. However, the Tale of Years indicates it occurred before Sauron built Barad-dur, which was completed sometime around S.A. 1000.
Depending on how one interprets Oropher's eagerness to be out from under the influence of the Noldorin Exiles, this migration might have happened immediately (possible), or a few hundred years into the second Age (most likely), or even before the First Age concluded (unlikely, but the text is not clear). For they:
...came from Doriath after its ruin and had no desire to leave Middle-earth, nor to be merged with the other Sindar of Beleriand, dominated by the Noldorin Exiles for whom the folk of Doriath had no great love.
Unfinished Tales, The Sindarin Princes of the Silvan Elves.
In any case, Oropher brought together the scattered Silvan elves of the Greenwood under his leadership, establishing the kingdom that Bilbo is a "guest" of more than 5,400 years later.
Lest you think this is all great PR for Oropher, Thranduil is boss for a good 3,400 of those years. In that time he had to contend with the rise of The Necromancer on his southern borders, and at least one dragon lurking not far to the north. In the meantime, Arnor and its successor states had come and gone, Erebor and Dale likewise, and Eregion had both risen high, and fallen into dust. Khazad-dûm had long been abandoned to Durin's Bane, and the twin dwarf cities of Nogrod and Belegost were but a memory.
Battle smarts
 Unfortunately, Oropher may have too obstinate about remaining separate from the Noldrin influence. It proves his and his people's undoing during the War of the Last Alliance.
...they were independent, and not disposed to place themselves under the supreme command of Gil-galad. Their losses were thus more grievous than they need have been, even in that terrible war... Oropher was slain in the first assault upon Mordor, rushing forward at the head of his most doughty warriors before Gil-galad had given the signal for the advance.
Unfinished Tales, The Sindarin Princes of the Silvan Elves.
Who's left to salvage the remnant of Oropher's forces and ensure they don't all get turned into orcburgers? Thranduil. The losses of the Sindarin elves are still very heavy -- if only because they are more lightly armed and armoured than the Noldor -- but they survive in enough numbers that a large force of orcs that later ambushes Isildur near the Gladden Fields allows them to pass unmolested.
Wisdom
 Thranduil's experience of the Last Alliance was deeply affecting. But not, I think, in the sense that it filled him with the horror of battle, and the desire to avoid it at all costs.
But there was in Thranduil's heart a still deeper shadow. He had seen the horror of Mordor and could not forget it. If ever he looked south its memory dimmed the light of the Sun, and though he knew that it was now broken and deserted and under the vigilance of the Kings of Men, fear spoke in his heart that it was not conquered for ever: it would arise again.
Unfinished Tales, The Sindarin Princes of the Silvan Elves.
Thranduil's great fear is not battle or war in itself, it is the re-emergence of Sauron and the ravishment of Middle-earth which his dominion would bring. I guess that it is this great fear that prompts him to work in the ways that he can to assist the other Free Peoples of Middle-earth. I suspect this is why he aids Gandalf with the matter of Gollum, and why he sends Legolas (not some leser envoy) to Rivendell.
Self-discipline
 Thranduil is certainly not without flaw. In The Hobbit, he certainly has a weakness. A love of, and desire for, treasure.
If the elf-king had a weakness it was for treasure, especially for silver and white gems; and though his hoard was rich, he was ever eager for more, since he had not yet as great a treasure as other elf-lords of old.
Greed (coupled with overweening arrogance) in the form of his lust for the Silmaril plays a major role in the demise of Elu Thingol at the hands of the dwarves of Nogrod. For Thingol, the Silmaril becomes all-consuming and he cannot set thought of it aside. Yes, as told in the Quenta Silmarillion, the dwarves who labour for Thingol to re-set Feanor's jewel within the Nauglamir become determined to cheat him (there is no indication Thingol intended to cheat them of payment), but the King of Doriath loses his rationality, and thus his life.
Thranduil immediately realises the import of the death of Smaug: a vast treasure hoard is there for the taking. Yet Thranduil is not single-minded that he fails to pause to assist the folk of Lake-town. His help saves many of the Lake-folk from death due to exposure.
But the king, when he received the prayers of Bard, had pity, for he was the lord of a good and kindly people; so turning his march, which had at first been direct towards the Mountain, he hastened now down the river to the Long Lake. He had not boats or rafts enough for his host, and they were forced to go the slower way by foot; but great store of goods he sent ahead by water.
The Hobbit, Fire and Water.
More, Thranduil gives way to Bard's claim when it emerges that Thorin has survived. And he proves a cooler head than Bard when the dwarves of Dain approach the mountain and demand passage. He is not so in love with the idea of treasure that he is willing to rashly throw lives away in its cause.
But the Elvenking said: "Long will I tarry, ere I begin this war for gold. The dwarves cannot press us, unless we will, or do anything that we cannot mark. Let us hope still for something that will bring reconciliation. Our advantage in numbers will be enough, if in the end it must come to unhappy blows."
The Hobbit, The Clouds Burst.
Smart, successful, disciplined and able to see the bigger picture. That's Thranduil in a nutshell. Under-estimate at your peril.
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Otaku-sempai
Immortal
Apr 6 2014, 4:23pm
Post #2 of 5
(450 views)
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Greed (coupled with overweening arrogance) in the form of his lust for the Silmaril plays a major role in the demise of Elu Thingol at the hands of the dwarves of Nogrod. For Thingol, the Silmaril becomes all-consuming and he cannot set thought of it aside. Yes, as told in the Quenta Silmarillion, the dwarves who labour for Thingol to re-set Feanor's jewel within the Nauglamir become determined to cheat him (there is no indication Thingol intended to cheat them of payment), but the King of Doriath loses his rationality, and thus his life.
I tend to forget that Thingol's betrayal of the Dwarves of Nogrod appears only in drafts of the tale and not in the final form. However, we can view this in terms of history being written by the winners. The Dwarves have their own version of the story, as hinted at in The Hobbit.
'There are older and fouler things than Orcs in the deep places of the world.' - Gandalf the Grey, The Fellowship of the Ring
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Apr 7 2014, 2:09pm
Post #3 of 5
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Yes the Ruin of Doriath was never really written -- within a later phase -- and CJRT and Guy Kay indulged in a bit of invention here. Christopher Tolkien explains the textual history in brief:
'(...) How he [JRRT] would have treated Thingol's behaviour towards the Dwarves is impossible to say. That story was only once told fully, in the Tale of the Nauglafring, in which the conduct of Tinwelint (precursor of Thingol) was wholly at variance with the later conception of the king (see II.245-6). In the Sketch no more is said of the matter than that the Dwarves were 'driven away without payment', while in the Quenta 'Thingol... scanted his promised reward for their labour; and bitter words grew between them, and there was battle in Thingol's halls'. There seems to be no clue or hint in later writing [in The Tale of Years the same bare phrase is used in all the versions: Thingol quarrels with the Dwarves'] unless one is seen in the words quoted from Concerning Galadriel and Celeborn on p. 353: Celeborn in his view of the destruction of Doriath ignored Morgoth's part in it 'and Thingol's own faults'.
In The Tale of Years my father seems not to have considered the problem of the passage of the Dwarvish host into Doriath despite the Girdle of Melian, but in writing the word 'cannot' against the D version (p. 352) he showed that he regarded the story he had outlined as impossible, for that reason. In another place he sketched a possible solution (ibid.): 'Somehow it must be contrived that Thingol is lured outside or induced to go to war beyond his borders and is there slain by the Dwarves. Then Melian departs, and the girdle being removed Doriath is ravaged by the Dwarves.'
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MirielCelebel
Rivendell
Apr 7 2014, 7:39pm
Post #4 of 5
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and it makes me appreciate Thranduil. He is not a character, on the surface at least, to be well-liked but when you understand his history, you begin to understand why is the way he is. I had several people ask me about Peter Jackson's "sketchy" portrayal of him in DOS and this article sums up my responses. His history with war and watching his father die in battle scarred him for life and it was the reason he chose to isolate his people. I always questioned his choice to accept Gollum from Aragorn and Gandalf. "Why would a man who wanted to remained underground accept such a prisoner which could bring the outside world come crashing around him?" For the same reason-wanting to avoid Sauron's rise to power again. Brilliant article on one of my already favorite characters. Thank you!
"The Road goes ever on..."
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Apr 8 2014, 12:09pm
Post #5 of 5
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I had several people ask me about Peter Jackson's "sketchy" portrayal of him in DOS and this article sums up my responses. His history with war and watching his father die in battle scarred him for life and it was the reason he chose to isolate his people.
Yet this article, as it is about Tolkien's Thranduil, does not actually say that the reason Thranduil chose to isolate his people is because of some internal scarring due to a former war, including the Last Alliance.
That idea was put forward in a fan's post [here] of film-Thranduil, itself based on something Lee Pace said about Thranduil and the Fisher King [at least that's where I first read this]. Tolkien however, gives his own motives for isolation: well before the Last Alliance Oropher withdrew northward beyond the Gladden Fields...
'This he did to be free from the power and encroachment of the Dwarves of moria (...) and also he resented the intrusions of Celeborn and Galadriel (...) Despite the desire of the Silvan Elves to meddle as little as might be in the affairs of the Noldor and Sindar, or of any other peoples...' The History of Galadriel And Celeborn, Appendix B, The Sindarin Princes of The Silvan Elves
[a variant Oropherian history here hails from a note in The Disater of The Gladden Fields, where before The Last Alliance Oropher leaves his dwelling about Amon Lanc, being disturbed by rumours of the rising power of Sauron]
So it seems to me that there's already an established desire to be isolated [although in the Third Age, various Elven Realms could be described with 'isolated' in any case]. After Oropher is killed [I'm not sure it is ever said that Thranduil actually watched his father die, although of course it's a possibility], in time Thranduil ultimately retreats from the Shadow of Mirkwood and makes an underground fortress -- okay but that's normal enough, and even in this text JRRT looks back in history to explain the 'isolation' of those Sindar who came with Oropher and merged with the Silvan Elves, who of course later become Thranduil's folk...
'Oropher had come among them with only a handful of Sindar, and they were soon merged with the Silvan Elves, adopting their language and taking names in Silvan form and style. This they did deliberately; for they (...) came from Doriath after its ruin and had no desire to leave Middle-earth, nor to be merged with the other Sindar of Beleriand, dominated by the Noldorin Exiles...' The History of Galadriel And Celeborn, Appendix A, The Silvan Elves and their Speech
Even the Sindar who came among the Silvan Elves desired to be isolated for their own reasons. Yes we know the Last Alliance had its effect on Thranduil, as it aruably must have had for plenty of Elves and Men, but to date I see nothing to necessarily support the suggestion I quoted [from your post], nor does it flow very well, in my opinion, with the easy suggestion from the author...
... who imparted his motives to these same Elves even before the Last Alliance, for example.
(This post was edited by Elthir on Apr 8 2014, 12:24pm)
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