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boldog
Rohan
Oct 22 2014, 10:27am
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The Balrogs, Seven or more?
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There is a lot of speculation as to how many Balrogs there actually was in middle earth. Some notes of Tolkien, i remember say that there may have only been 7 balrogs, but other suggestions, say that they were numerous and not much more difficult to slay then a troll sort of.
I myself much prefer the seven Balrog theory. Two reasons.
1. It shows that only being seven balrogs, means they are very strong, and not so easily killed, as a mere Orc or Troll is, thus making them special for the dark lord.
2. They kind of act like "the nazgul". Sauron had the nine Nazgul as his most faithful servants. So it seems accurate enough to me to let Morgoth have seven most trusted servants, as the Balrogs.
In saying this the Seven Balrogs, as I percieve them are..
1. Gothmog, First lord of the Balrogs, and strongest of them all, slain by Ecthelion in Gondolin.
2. Glorfindels Bane, The Balrog that dueled with Glordindel as the survivors were fleeing Gondolin, and slain by him.
3. Durins Bane, The last surviving Balrog, who killed Durin in the third age, and later was slain by Gandalf.
4. Lungorthin, A Balrog who was mentioned in earlier drafts of the silmarillion. He is said to be the captain of security in Angband, and likely the second in command after Gothmog. He likely would have replaced Gothmog after his death, and Lead the remaining Balrogs in the War of Wrath where he was Slain. Christopher Tolkien, does in fact say that Lungorthin is a separate Balrog, and not an earlier version of Gothmog.
5,6 and 7, were the only ones who I cant work out a title for, but they were all likely slain in the War of Wrath, in which Durins Bane was the only one out of the 5 surviving Balrogs to escape.
Thoughts?
what do you think of the seven Balrog idea?
I believe that Azog and Bolg are possibly the only two orcs who may be an exception to the typical evil nature of an orc. Azog had brought up his son, well enough that he actually acknowledges him as his own son. That is a first for any orc. And Bolg sets out to march upon Erebor in vengeance of his fathers death. How many orcs will Try and avenge another dead orc? Most will just forget about the dead one. This gives me hope that Orcs, have some traits of good in them, even if it is small aspects.
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 22 2014, 1:37pm
Post #2 of 16
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I think the idea of seven Balrogs works well enough -- the actual marginal quote has Tolkien musing that three, or at most seven Balrogs ever existed.
Hence my tantalizing subject line 
sleep aid stuff
The textual situation can be complicated however. For the constructed Silmarillion (published in 1977) it was Christopher Tolkien who revised certain references to very many many Balrogs -- making the number unclear -- although he basically retained the wording from an early-ish description of the War of Wrath.
That's important, because some folks are gonna quote that... I bet 
Generally speaking, Tolkien made a marginal note to a copy of a text called The Annals of Aman (his 3 or at most 7 marginal note), and himself revised a section there that referred to very many Balrogs, so that the number would be unclear...
... noting again that that's basically what Christopher Tolkien did later. I note that JRRT himself did not enter any number into the text itself.
But I think the reason he (Christopher Tolkien) did that was because his father did not alter every reference to reflect this change, and CJRT might have thought that it was best to keep the matter a mystery given the textual scenario he was faced with.
In other words, despite the marginal note and the one revision that goes with it, in Tolkien's own writings, there were still other references to large numbers of Balrogs that were never revised... for whatever reason.
It might be noted that after The Lord of the Rings was written -- thus after the Balrogian encounter with Gandalf was written -- Tolkien still imagined very many Balrogs existing. His Silmarillion drafts reflect this.
And as I say, even after writing the 3 or 7 marginal note (which seemingy cannot be earlier than the later 1950s), for whatever reason Tolkien himself never revised every reference (references already written by this time) to large numbers of Balrogs, if indeed he was going to go with 3 or 7 that is.
Erm... still awake? I'm almost not.
But as I drift off, if I recall correctly the name Lungorthin comes from a fairly early text or texts. If so I'm not sure the name really fits well into the revised linguistic scenario of the 1950s and later... and by that I just really mean that I'm not sure it does or it doesn't... but in general I also wonder if Tolkien himself would have carried this name into the 1950s even if it still worked from a Sindarin perspective...
... I mean it sounds like a heavy name to carry
(This post was edited by Elthir on Oct 22 2014, 1:47pm)
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Cillendor
Lorien
Oct 22 2014, 5:07pm
Post #3 of 16
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But as I drift off, if I recall correctly the name Lungorthin comes from a fairly early text or texts. If so I'm not sure the name really fits well into the revised linguistic scenario of the 1950s and later... and by that I just really mean that I'm not sure it does or it doesn't... but in general I also wonder if Tolkien himself would have carried this name into the 1950s even if it still worked from a Sindarin perspective... ... I mean it sounds like a heavy name to carry
I see what you did there. 
It seems that a modern Sindarin form of his name would be *Longortheb (*long from N. lhong, Ety/370, X/LH, and gortheb from WJ/415). My guess is that Lungorthin is the Iathric form of his name. I don't know from which dialect he would receive his name, but it may not be unreasonable that it would be from there. If he was known from far enough back then it would make even more sense as Iathric was a very archaic (and now extinct) branch of Sindarin. So perhaps he was given that name before Sindarin really took its various flavors.
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ltnjmy
Rivendell
Oct 22 2014, 5:35pm
Post #4 of 16
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I have always agreed with this analysis
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Not a plentiful amount - seven - which made them all the more lethal. Evil Maiar who were quite difficult to eliminate...
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 22 2014, 6:30pm
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Ahh I hoped someone would notice that...
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... fun with words
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 22 2014, 6:55pm
Post #6 of 16
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Christopher Tolkien's revisions
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So far I've counted 4 surviving references. Here they are -- followed by the alterations made to The Silmarillion by Christopher Tolkien. So, the darker blue first references are how JRRT himself left these passages -- the lighter blue are the editorial changes in the 1977 Silmarillion made by Christopher Tolkien:
1: 'Wherefore each embassy came with greater force than was agreed, but Morgoth sent the greater, and they were Balrogs. Maidros was ambushed...' Of The Siege of Angband (Quenta Silmarillion) [] '... but Morgoth sent the more, and there were Balrogs.' Of The Return of the Noldor (The Silmarillion)
2: 'Sauron came against Orodreth, the warden of the tower, with a host of Balrogs.' Of the Ruin of Beleriand And the Fall of Fingolfin (Quenta Silmarillion) [] '... named Gorthaur, came against Orodreth, the warden of the tower upon Tol Sirion.' Of The Ruin Of Beleriand (The Silmarillion)
3: 'There came wolves and serpents, and there came Balrogs one thousand,...' Of the Fourth Battle: Nírnaith Arnediad (Quenta Silmarillion) [] 'There came wolves and wolfriders, and there came Balrogs, and dragons...' Of The Fifth Battle (The Silmarillion)
Notes
1 This description (from the QS tradition) survived into LQS despite a number of other post Lord of the Rings revisions to this chapter.
2 The second example (Orodreth and etc) also was not revised -- with Tolkien even altering §143** of the chapter, but not the 'host' of Balrogs passage.
3 The third example 'survived' too, but noting CJRT's description under The Last Chapters Of The Quenta Silmarillion, it looks like JRRT never really got around to truly revising this chapter in any case.
4 The Grey Annals contains 'Balrogs a thousand' §230, but nothing is noted as to any changes in the later 1950s.
Of course, as I say, in The Annals of Aman JRRT himself did revise 'a host of Balrogs, the last of his servants that remained' revised to 'his Balrogs, the last of his servants that remained faithful to him.'
a note to the notes (really?)
** LQS (later 1950s) the earlier changes were taken up into this later series of copies, thus, as I read things anyway, Tolkien is not merely looking at the note now, but looking at the changes made and put back into context with what he had written in the 1930s. And in the later 1950s Tolkien changes section 143 again: 'Now Sauron, whom the Noldor call Gorthu' is revised to 'Now Sauron, whom the Sindar call Gorthaur.' And at this time JRRT also struck out the sentence: 'In Valinor he had dwelt...'
And again, the sentence before 'Now Sauron...' still included the very same word Tolkien either had corrected, or would correct, in Annals of Aman... host.
A host of Balrogs.
So if this is correct, a 'host' of Balrogs was not corrected by JRRT himself, in (at least possibly) the same general time period as the revision to Annals of Aman did change 'host' of Balrogs! And since JRRT did revise a few lines very near the LQS description, one wonders why he left a host of Balrogs in one text, but not the other.
Or I do anyway.
Did JRRT just miss it? Did he look over LQS before AAm, if still both in the later 1950s? Was he sure he wanted to reduce Balrog numbers even at this point?
I dunno
(This post was edited by Elthir on Oct 22 2014, 7:03pm)
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Voronwë_the_Faithful
Valinor
Oct 22 2014, 8:47pm
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So far as I recall, the only text in which this name appears is the Lay of the Children of Hurin, in HoME 3. While Christopher does note that he thinks that it is a different character than Gothmog, I'm not entirely sure that it is not just an alternate name.
In any event, I think your list of Christopher's revisions is complete. As for why JRRT didn't make the changes himself, my best guess is that he just didn't catch it. The later Quenta (and associated Annals and other documents) revisions range from meticulous to haphazard, and it is difficult to reach conclusions about his intentions from them. My personal feeling is that the idea of there being far fewer Balrogs arose in his mind either over the course of the writing of LOTR or as a result of it, and that it was pretty firmly implanted in his mind from that point on, despite his failure to make all of the changes necessary in the texts.
'But very bright were the stars upon the margin of the world, when at times the clouds about the West were drawn aside.'
The Hall of Fire
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 22 2014, 9:59pm
Post #8 of 16
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I must admit I lean that way too -- that JRRT probably meant to alter all the necessary passages, but missed or never got around to revising them all. The last person I chatted with about this seemed to hold that it was certain Tolkien had revised the number (and thus the matter wasn't complicated), and it's probably that that makes me want to leave the door slightly open here.
I wonder too about a middle road option: 'many' Balrogs (early on) before the Valar attack Utumno -- this battle leaves only 3 or at most 7 to trouble the Children of Eru however.
Although I don't think there's any textual basis for that idea... it just popped into my head one day.
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ElendilTheShort
Gondor
Oct 22 2014, 11:59pm
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how do you collate your informaton Elthir or do you have a photographic memory
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whenever I try to source some distant remembered text I have read it takes me a long time to find even one of them usually let alone numerous ones as you seem to do so quickly.
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Magradhaid
The Shire
Oct 23 2014, 12:03am
Post #10 of 16
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Regarding a modern form, I think Lung- could still work, given that we have Mablung and lungumaite (VT47:19) in 1968. Perhaps Tolkien had (in Quenya) juggled between a form lunga (from adjectival -â) and *lungo (lungu- repeating the sundóma), like he did with ringa and ringë? Though "Mablung" is Doriathrin and we see Tolkien's split between lung and Noldorin lhong in Etym., I wonder if the later form with lungu- indicates that Tolkien had reconsidered whether Doriath's archaic Sindarin showed a-affection (and therefore changed the underlying form to preserve Mablung and not have **Mablong)? Or, Doriath's Sindarin was still unaffected by a-affection (so the switch from lunga to lungu- was not made on behalf of the name) and the switch would merely be from ever-changing lámatyáve.
Additionally, we still find -in in Thurin, celebrin, etc. so Lungorthin might be feasible unchanged in later Sindarin.
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 23 2014, 12:25pm
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if I recall correctly, my memory isn't that great
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Anyway on Balrog numbers I did the work some time ago and saved it somewhere, although after referring to it a few times over the years, this time I did remember some things before referring back to my notes.
And that said, for things Tolkien (as opposed to an appointment I'm supposed to keep next week for example), I seem to remember some fairly obscure things, like what some Elvish word means according to Etymologies for my bit of fun with 'heavy' earlier...
... but there too I figured if I remembered wrongly then no one would even know it was supposed to be 'linguistic joke' in any case! So basically I cheated with that!
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CuriousG
Half-elven
Oct 23 2014, 12:39pm
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A belated Welcome to the Reading Room, Magrad! //
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Magradhaid
The Shire
Oct 23 2014, 6:03pm
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Are edit buttons not universal? I shouldn't have included celeb-rin (though that still displays the coexisting -ren/-rin and -en/-in) ...
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Elthir
Grey Havens
Oct 23 2014, 7:10pm
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I think edit buttons 'vanish' after so many minutes?
For me they do anyway
Welcome!
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CuriousG
Half-elven
Oct 23 2014, 8:17pm
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"Edit" disappears after 5 minutes, I think.
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Maybe 10 minutes. Usually too soon, alas.
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Darkstone
Immortal
Oct 23 2014, 8:18pm
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They've recently increased it to 15 minutes.
******************************************
I met a Balrog on the stair.
He had some wings that weren't there.
They weren't there again today.
I wish he would just fly away.
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