The Book of Lost Tales 2

Chapter Twenty-Five

  Citation (xix) on p. 264 does not make the reference clear: Earendel 'returns from the firmament ever and anon with Voronwe to Kor to see if the Magic Sun has been lit and the fairies have come back'; but in the following isolated note the Rekindling of the Magic Sun explicitly means the re-arising of Urwendi: (7) Urwendi imprisoned by Moru (upset out of the boat by Melko and only the Moon has been magic since). The Faring Forth and the Battle of Erumani would release her and rekindle the Magic Sun. This 'upsetting' of the Sun-ship by Melko and the loss of the Sun's 'magic' is referred to also in (4), where it is added that Urwendi fell into the sea and met her 'death'. In the tale of The Theft of Melko it is said (I. 151) that the cavern in which Melko met Ungweliant was the place where the Sun and Moon were imprisoned afterwards, for 'the primeval spirit Moru' was indeed Ungweliant (see I. 261).

  The Battle of Erumani is referred to also in (6), and is possibly to be identified with 'the last fight on the plains of Valinor' prophesied by Gilfanon in (5). But the last part of (5) shows that the Faring Forth came to nothing, and the prophecies were not fulfilled. There are no other references to the dragging of Tol Eressea across the Ocean by Uin the great whale, to the Isle of Iverin, or to the Battle of Ros; but a remarkable writing survives concerning the aftermath of the 'great battle between Men at the Heath of the Sky-roof (now the Withered Heath), about a league from Tavrobel' (end of citation (5)). This is a very hastily pencilled and exceedingly difficult text titled Epilogue. It begins with a short prefatory note: (8) Eriol flees with the fading Elves from the Battle of the High Heath (Ladwen-na-Dhaideloth) and crosses the Gruir and the Afros. The last words of the book of Tales. Written by Eriol at Tavrobel before he sealed the book.

  This represents the development mentioned as desirable in (5), that Eriol should 'himself see the last things and finish the book', but an isolated note in C shows my father still uncertain about this even after the Epilogue was in being: 'Prologue by the writer of Tavrobel [i. e. , such a Prologue is needed] telling how he found Eriol's writings and put them together. His epilogue after the battle of Ladwen Daideloth is written. ' The rivers Gruir and Afros appear also in the passage about the battle at the end of (g). Since it is said there that the Heath was about a league from Tavrobel, the two rivers are clearly those referred to in the Tale of the Sun and Moon: 'the Tower of Tavrobel beside the rivers' (I. 174, and see I. 196 note 2). In scattered notes the battle is also called 'the Battle of the Heaven Roof' and 'the Battle of Dor-na-Dhaideloth'. ~ I give now the text of the Epilogue: And now is the end of the fair times come very nigh, and behold, all the beauty that yet was on earth -- fragments of the unimagined loveliness of Valinor whence came the folk of the Elves long long ago -- now goeth it all up in smoke.

  Here be a few tales, memories ill-told, of all that magic and that wonder twixt here and Eldamar of which I have become acquaint more than any mortal man since first my wandering footsteps came to this sad isle. Of that last battle of the upland heath whose roof is the wide sky -- nor was there any other place beneath the blue folds of Manwe's robe so nigh the heavens or so broadly and so well encanopied -- what grievous things I saw I have told. Already fade the Elves in sorrow and the Faring Forth has come to ruin, and Iluvatar knoweth alone if ever now the Trees shall be relit while the world may last. Behold, I stole by evening from the ruined heath, and my way fled winding down the valley of the Brook of Glass, but the setting of the Sun was blackened with the reek of fires, and the waters of the stream were fouled with the war of men and grime of strife.

  Then was my heart bitter to see the bones of the good earth laid bare with winds where the destroying hands of men had tornthe heather and the fern and burnt them to make sacrifice to Melko and to lust of ruin; and the thronging places of the bees that all day hummed among the whins and whortlebushes long ago bearing rich honey down to Tavrobel -- these were now become fosses and [?mounds] of stark red earth, and nought sang there nor danced but unwholesome airs and flies of pestilence. Now the Sun died and behold, I came to that most magic wood where once the ageless oaks stood firm amid the later growths of beech and slender trees of birch, but all were fallen beneath the ruthless axes of unthinking men. Ah me, here was the path beaten with spells, trodden with musics and enchantment that wound therethrough, and this way were the Elves wont to ride a-hunting. Many a time there have I seen them and Gilfanon has been there, and they rode like kings unto the chase, and the beauty of their faces in the sun was as the new morning, and the wind in their golden hair like to the glory of bright flowers shaken at dawn, and the strong music of their voices like the sea and like trumpets and like the noise of very many viols and of golden harps unnumbered.

  And yet again have I seen the people of Tavrobel beneath the Moon, and they would ride or dance across the valley of the two rivers where the grey bridge leaps the joining waters; and they would fare swiftly as clad in dreams, spangled with gems like to the grey dews amid the grass, and their white robes caught the long radiance of the Moon. . . . . . . . . . . . . . and their spears shivered with silver flames. And now sorrow and. . . . . has come upon the Elves, empty is Tavrobel and all are fled, [?fearing] the enemy that sitteth on the ruined heath, who is not a league away; whose hands are red with the blood of Elves and stained with the lives of his own kin, who has made himself an ally to Melko and the Lord of Hate, who has fought for the Orcs and Gongs and the unwholesome monsters of the world -- blind, and a fool, and destruction alone is his knowledge. The paths of the fairies he has made to dusty roads where thirst [?lags wearily] and no man greeteth another in the way, but passes by in sullenness. So fade the Elves and it shall come to be that because of the encompassing waters of this isle and yet more because of their unquenchable love for it that few shall flee, but as men wax there and grow fat and yet more blind ever shall they fade more and grow less and those of the after days shall scoff, saying Who are the fairies -- lies told to the children by women or foolish men -- who are these fairies? And some few shall answer: Memories faded dim, a wraith of vanishing loveliness in the trees, a rustle of the grass, a glint of dew, some subtle intonation of the wind; and others yet fewer shall say. . . . . '

  Very small and delicate are the fairies now, yet we have eyes to see and ears to hear, and Tavrobel and Kortirion are filled yet with [? this] sweet folk Spring knows them and Summer too and in Winter still are they among us, but in Autumn most of all do they come out, for Autumn is: their season, fallen as they are upon the Autumn of their days. What shall the dreamers of the earth be like when their winter come. Hark 0 my brothers, they shall say, the little trumpets blow; wc, hear a sound of instruments unimagined small. Like strands of wind, like mystic half-transparencies, Gilfanon Lord of Tavrobel rides out tonight amid his folk, and hunts the elfin deer beneath the paling sky. A music of forgotten feet, a gleam of leaves, a sudden bending of the grass," and wistful voices murmuring on the bridge, and they are gone. But behold, Tavrobel shall not know its name, and all the land be changed, and even these written words of mine belike will all be lost; and so I lay down the pen, and so of the fairies cease to tell. Another text that bears on these matters is the prose preface to Kortirion among the Trees (1915), which has been given in Part I 25 -- 6, but which I repeat here: (9) Now on a time the fairies dwelt in the Lonely Isle after the great wars with Melko and the ruin of Gondolin; and they builded a fair city amidmost of that island, and it was girt with trees. Now this city they called Kortirion, both in memory of their ancient dwelling of Kor in Valinor, and because this city stood also upon a hill and had a great tower tall and grey that Ingil son of Inwe their lord let raise.

  Very beautiful was Kortirion and the fairies loved it, and it became rich in song and poesy and the light of laughter; but on a time the great Faring Forth was made, and the fairies had rekindled once more the Magic Sun of Valinor but for the treason and faint hearts of Men. But so it is that the Magic Sun is dead and the Lonely Isle drawn back unto the confines of the Great Lands, and
the fairies are scattered through all the wide unfriendly path- ways of the world; and now Men dwell even on this faded isle, and care nought or know nought of its ancient days. Yet still there be some of the Eldar and the Noldoli of old who linger in the island, and their songs are heard about the shores of the land that once was the fairest dwelling of the immortal folk. And it seems to the fairies and it seems to me who know that town and have often trodden its disfigured ways that autumn and the falling of the leaf is the season of the year when maybe here or there a heart among Men may be open, and an eye perceive how is the world's estate fallen from the laughter and the loveliness of old.

  Think on Kortirion and be sad -- yet is there not hope? * At this point we may turn to the history of Eriol himself. My father's early conceptions of the mariner who came to Tol Eressea are here again no more than allusive outlines in the pages of the little notebook C, and some of this material cannot be usefully reproduced. Perhaps the earliest is collection of notes headed 'Story of Eriol's Life', which I gave in Vol.

  I. 23 -- 4 but with the omission of some features that were not there relevant. I repeat it here, with the addition of the statements previously omitted. (10) Eriol's original name was Ottor, but he called himself Waefre (Old English: 'restless, wandering') and lived a life on the waters. His father was named Eoh (Old English: 'horse'); and Eoh was slain by his brother Beorn, either 'in the siege' or 'in a great battle'. Ottor Waefre settled on the island of Heligoland in the North Sea, and wedded a woman named Cwen; they had two sons named Hengest and Horsa 'to avenge Eoh'. Then sea-longing gripped Ottor Waefre (he was 'a son of Earendel', born under his beam), and after the death of Cwen he left his young children. Hengest and Horsa avenged Eoh and became great chieftains; but Ottor Waefre set out to seek, and find, Tol Eressea (se uncupa holm, 'the unknown island'). In Tol Eressea he wedded, being made young by limpe (here also called by the Old English word lip), Naimi (Eadgifu), niece of Vaire, and they had a son named Heorrenda.

  It is then said, somewhat inconsequentially (though the matter is in itself of much interest, and recurs nowhere else), that Eriol told the fairies of Woden, punor, Tiw, etc. (these being the Old English names of the Germanic gods who in Old Scandinavian form are Odinn, Porr, Tyr), and they identified them with Manweg, Tulkas, and a third whose name is illegible but is not like that of any of the great Valar. Eriol adopted the name of Angol. Thus it is that through Eriol and his sons the Engle (i. e. the English) have the true tradition of the fairies, of whom the Iras and the Wealas (the Irish and Welsh) tell garbled things. Thus a specifically English fairy-lore is born, and one more true than anything to be found in Celtic lands. The wedding of Eriol in Tol Eressea is never referred to elsewhere; but his son Heorrenda is mentioned (though not called Eriol's son) in the initial link to The Fall of Gondolin (p. 145) as one who afterwards turned a song of Meril's maidens into the language of his people. A little more light will be shed on Heorrenda in the course of this chapter. Associated with these notes is a title-page and a prologue that breaks off after a few lines: (11) The Golden Book of Heorrenda being the book of the Tales of Tavrobel. Heorrenda of Haegwudu.

  This book have I written using those writings that my father Waefre (whom the Gnomes named after the regions of his home Angol) did make in his sojourn in the holy isle in the days of the Elves; and much else have I added of those things which his eyes saw not afterward; yet are such things not yet to tell. For know Here then the Golden Book was compiled from Eriol's writings by his son Heorrenda -- in contrast to (5), where it was compiled by someone unnamed, and in contrast also to the Epilogue (8), where Eriol himself concluded and 'sealed the book'. As I have said earlier (I. 24) Angol refers to the ancient homeland of the 'English' before their migration across the North Sea (for the etymology of Angol/Eriol 'ironcliffs' see I. 24, 252). (12) There is also a genealogical table accompanying the outline (10) md altogether agreeing with it. The table is written out in two forms that are identical save in one point: for Beorn, brother of Eoh, in the one, there stands in the other Hasen of Isenora (Old English: 'iron shore').

  But at the end of the table is introduced the cardinal fact of all these earliest materials concerning Eriol and Tol Eressea: Hengest and Horsa, Eriol's sons by Cwen in Heligoland, and Heorrenda, his son by Naimi in Tol Eressea, are bracketed together, and beneath their names is written: conquered feg ('seo unwemmede feg') now called Englaland and there dwell the Angolcynn or Engle. leg is Old English, 'isle', seo unwemmede leg 'the unstained isle'. I have mentioned before (I. 25, footnote) a poem of my father's written at Etaples in June 1916 and called 'The Lonely Isle', addressed to England: this poem bears the Old English title seo Unwemmede leg. (13) There follow in the notebook C some jottings that make precise identifications of places in Tol Eressea with places in England. First the name Kortirion is explained. The element Kor is derived from an earlier Qora, yet earlier Guord; but from Guord was also derived (i. e. in Gnomish) the form Gwar. (This formulation agrees with that in the Gnomish dictionary, see I. 257).

  Thus Kor = Gwar, andKortirion = *Gcvannindon (the asterisk implying a hypothetical, unrecorded form). The name that was actually used in Gnomish had the elements reversed, Mindon-Gwar. (Mindon, like Tirion, meant, and continued always to mean, 'tower'. The meaning of Kor/Gwar is not given here, but both in the tale of The Coming of the Elves (I. 122) and in the Gnomish dictionary (I. 257) the name is explained as referring to the roundness of the hill of Kor. )

  The note continues (using Old English forms): 'In Wielisc Caergwar, in Englisc Warwic. ' Thus the element War- in Warwick is derived from the same Elvish source as Kor- in Kortirion and Gwar in Mindon- Gwar. ~ Lastly, it is said that 'Hengest's capital was Warwick'. Next, Horsa (Hengest's brother) is associated with Oxenaford (Old English: Oxford), which is given the equivalents Q[enya] Taruktarna and Gnomish,* Taruithorn (see the Appendix on Names, p. 347). The third of Eriol's sons, Heorrenda, is said to have had his 'capital' at Great Haywood (the Staffordshire village where my parents lived in 1916 -- 17, see I. 25); and this is given the Qenya equivalents Tavaros(se) and Taurosse, and the Gnomish Tavrobel and Tavrost; also 'Englisc [i. e. Old English) Haegwudu se greata, Greata Haegwudu'. ~ These notes conclude with the statement that 'Heorrenda called Kor or Gwar "Tun". ' In the context of these conceptions, this is obviously the Old English word tun, an enclosed dwelling, from which has developed the modern word town and the place-name ending -ton.

  Tun has appeared several times in the Lost Tales as a later correction, or alternative to Kor, changes no doubt dating from or anticipating the later situation where the city was Tun and the name Kor was restricted to the hill on which it stood. Later still Tun became Tuna, and then when the city of the Elves was named Tirion the hill became Tuna, as it is in The Silmarillion; by then it had ceased to have any connotation of 'dwelling- place' and had cut free from all connection with its actual origin, as we see it here, in Old English tun, Heorrenda's 'town'.

  Can all these materials be brought together to form a coherent narrative? I believe that they can (granting that there are certain irreconcilable differences concerning Eriol's life), and would reconstruct it thus: The Eldar and the rescued Noldoli departed from the Great Lands and came to Tol Eressea. In Tol Eressea they built many towns and villages, and in Alalminore, the central region of the island, Ingil son of Inwe built the town of Koromas, 'the Resting of the Exiles of Kor' ('Exiles', because they could not return to Valinor); and the great tower of Ingil gave the town its name Kortirion. (See I. 16. ) Ottor Waefre came from Heligoland to Tol Eressea and dwelt in the Cottage of Lost Play in Kortirion; the Elves named him Eriol or Angol after the 'iron cliffs' of his home. After a time, and greatly instructed in the ancient history of Gods, Elves, and Men, Eriol went to visit Gilfanon in the village of Tavrobel, and there he wrote down what he had learnt; there also he at last drank limpe.

  In Tol Eressea Eriol was wedded and had a son named Heorrenda (Half-elven!). (According to (5) Eriol died at Tavrobel, co
nsumed with longing for 'the black cliffs of his shores', but according to (8), certainly later, he lived to see the Battle of the Heath of the Sky-roof. ) The Lost Elves of the Great Lands rose against the dominion of the servants of Melko; and the untimely Faring Forth took place, at which time Tol Eressea was drawn east back across the Ocean and anchored off the coasts of the Great Lands. The western half broke off when Osse tried to drag the island back, and it became the Isle of Iverin (= Ireland). Tol Eressea was now in the geographical position of England. The great battle of Ros ended in the defeat of the Elves, who retreated into hiding in Tol Eressea. Evil men entered Tol Eressea, accompanied by Orcs and other hostile beings. The Battle of the Heath of the Sky-roof took place not far from Tavrobel, and (according to (8)) was witnessed by Eriol, who com- pleted the Golden Book. The Elves faded and became invisible to the eyes of almost all Men. The sons of Eriol, Hengest, Horsa, and Heorrenda, conquered the island and it became 'England'.

  They were not hostile to the Elves, and from them the English have 'the true tradition of the fairies'. Kortirion, ancient dwelling of the fairies, came to be known in the tongue of the English as Warwick; Hengest dwelt there, while Horsa dwelt at Taruithorn (Oxford) and Heorrenda at Tavrobel (Great Haywood). (According to (11) Heorrenda completed the Golden Book. ) This reconstruction may not be 'correct' in all its parts: indeed, it may be that any such attempt is artificial, treating all the notes and jottings as of equal weight and all the ideas as strictly contemporaneous and relatable to each other. Nonetheless I believe that it shows rightly in essentials how my father was thinking of ordering the narrative in which the Lost Tales were to be set; and I believe also that this was the conception that still underlay the Tales as they are extant and have been given in these books. For convenience later I shall refer to this narrative as 'the Eriol story'. Its most remarkable features, in contrast to the later story, are the transformation of Tol Eressea into England, and the early appearance of the mariner (in relation to the whole history) and his importance. In fact, my father was exploring (before he decided on a radical transformation of the whole conception) ideas whereby his importance would be greatly increased.

  (14) From very rough jottings it can be made out that Eriol was to be so tormented with home longing that he set sail from Tol Eressea with his son Heorrenda, against the command of Meril-i-Turinqi (see the passage cited on p. 284 from The Chaining of Melko); but his purpose in doing so was also 'to hasten the Faring Forth', which he 'preached' in the lands of the East. Tol Eressea was drawn back to the confines of the Great Lands, but at once hostile peoples named the Guidlin and the Brithonin (and in one of these notes also the Rumhoth, Romans) invaded the island. Eriol died, but his sons Hengest and Horsa conquered the Guio1in. But because of Eriol's disobedience to the command of Meril, in going back before the time for the Faring Forth was ripe, 'all was cursed'; and the Elves faded before the noise and evil of war. An isolated sentence refers to 'a strange prophecy that a man of good will, yet through longing after the things of Men, may bring the Faring Forth to nought . Thus the part of Eriol was to become cardinal in the history of the Elves; but there is no sign that these ideas ever got beyond this exploratory stage. I have said that I think that the reconstruction given above ('the Eriol story') is in essentials the conception underlying the framework of the Last Tales. This is both for positive and negative reasons: positive, because he is there still named Eriol (see p. 300), and also because Gilfanon, who enters (replacing Ailios) late in the development of the Tales, appears also in citation (5) above, which is one of the main contributors to this reconstruction; negative, because there is really nothing to contradict what is much the easiest assumption.

  There is no explicit statement anywhere in the Lost Tales that Eriol came from England. At the beginning (I. 13) he is only 'a traveller from far countries'; and the fact that the story he told to Veanne of his earlier life (pp. 4 -- 7) agrees well with other accounts where his home is explicitly in England does no more than show that the story remained while the geography altered -- just as the 'black coasts' of his home survived in later writing to become the western coasts of Britain, whereas the earliest reference to them is the etymology of Angol 'iron cliffs' (his own name, = Eriol, from the land 'between the seas', Angeln in the Danish peninsula, whence he came: see I. 252). There is in fact a very early, rejected, sketch of Eriol's life in which essential features of the same story are outlined -- the attack on his father's dwelling (in this case the destruction of Eoh's castle by his brother Beorn, see citation (10)), Eriol's captivity and escape -- and in this note it is said that Eriol afterwards 'wandered over the wilds of the Central Lands to the Inland Sea, Wendelsae[Old English, the Mediterranean], and hence to the shores of the Western Sea', whence his father had originally come.

  The mention in the typescript text of the Link to the Tale of Tinuviel (p. 6) of wild men out of the Mountains of the East, which the duke could see fromhis tower, seems likewise to imply that at this time Eriol's original home was placed in some 'continental' region. The only suggestion, so far as I can see, that this view might not be correct is found in an early poem with a complex history, texts of which I give here. The earliest rough drafts of this poem are extant; the original title was 'The Wanderer's Allegiance', and it is not clear that it was at first conceived as a poem in three parts. My father subsequently wrote in subtitles on these drafts, dividing the poem into three: Prelude, The Inland City, and The Sorrowful City, with (apparently) an overall title The Sorrowful City; and added a date, March 16 -- 18, 1916. In the only later copy of the whole poem that is extant the overall title is The Town of Dreams and the City of Present Sorrow, with the three parts titled: Prelude (Old English Foresang), The Town of Dreams (Old English pat Slaepende Tun), and The City of Present Sorrow (Old English Seo Wepende Burg).

  This text gives the dates 'March 1916, Oxford and Warwick; rewritten Birmingham November 1916'. 'The Town of [ Dreams' is Warwick, on the River Avon, and 'The City of Present Sorrow' is Oxford, on the Thames, during the First War; there is no evident association of any kind with Eriol or the Lost Tales. Prelude In unknown days my fathers' sires Came, and from son to son took root Among the orchards and the river-meads And the long grasses of the fragrant plain: Many a summer saw they kindle yellow fires Of iris in the bowing reeds, And many a sea of blossom turn to golden fruit In walled gardens of the great champain. * There daffodils among the ordered trees Did nod in spring, and men laughed deep and long Singing as they laboured happy lays And lighting even with a drinking-song.

  There sleep came easy for the drone of bees Thronging about cottage gardens heaped with flowers; In love of sunlit goodliness of days There richly flowed their lives in settled hours -- But that was long ago, And now no more they sing, nor reap, nor sow, And I perforce in many a town about this isle Unsettled wanderer have dwelt awhile. * The Town of Dreams. Here many days once gently past me crept In this dear town of old forgetfulness; Here all entwined in dreams once long I slept And heard no echo of the world's distress Come through the rustle of the elms' rich leaves, While Avon gurgling over shallows wove Unending melody, and morns and eves Slipped down her waters till the Autumn came, (Like the gold leaves that drip and flutter then, Till the dark river gleams with jets of flame That slowly float far down beyond our ken. ) For here the castle and the mighty tower, More lofty than the tiered elms, More grey than long November rain, Sleep, and nor sunlit moment nor triumphal hour, Nor passing of the seasons or the Sun Wakes their old lords too long in slumber lain.

  No watchfulness disturbs their splendid dream, Though laughing radiance dance down the stream; And be they clad in snow or lashed by windy rains, Or may March whirl the dust about the winding lanes, The Elm robe and disrobe her of a million leaves Like moments clustered in a crowded year, Still their old heart unmoved nor weeps nor grieves, Uncomprehending of this evil tide, Today's great sadness, or Tomorrow's fear: Faint echoes fade within their drowsy halls Like ghosts; the daylight creeps across the
ir walls.