[ Daily Tolkien ] Hobbit Tales, or Never There And Back Again...

Suite 101 ^ | December 10, 1999 | Michael Martinez

[JameRetief]

Hobbit Tales, or Never There And Back Again...

The reason J.R.R. Tolkien wrote The Lord of the Rings was that his readers wanted to read more about hobbits. When first told this by his publishers, Tolkien replied, "I cannot think of anything more to say about hobbits. Mr. Baggins seems to have exhibited so fully both the Took and the Baggins side of their nature" (Tolkien, "The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien", p. 24).

In the end he produced a great epic not only about Hobbits but also about Elves, Dwarves, Ents, and Men. But Tolkien didn't stop there. He wrote so much more which went unpublished for decades. Most of his fans probably still do not know why Gollum could speak of receiving birthday presents when the hobbits of the Shire gave presents on their birthdays (the answer: Gollum's people had different customs from the Shirefolk). And it's doubtful many people know the story of Lalia the Fat, the Tookish matriarch who held on to family power after her husband, Fortibras II, died in S.R. 1380. She ruled the Tooks for 22 years, and her son Ferumbras III -- Thain and leader of the Shire-moot -- lived in a single room at Great Smials, unable to find a wife. Lalia died under mysterious circumstances, and rumors suggested that her niece Pearl Took (sister of Peregrin, Frodo's friend Pippin) pushed Lalia down the hillside, possibly with the family's approval or at least tacit acceptance.

Questions about other Hobbits besides Bilbo and Frodo are occasionally posted on the Tolkien news groups, or the various message boards. These are not easy questions to answer. For example, where did Bilbo's uncle Isengar Took (S.R. 1262-1360) go when he "went to sea in his youth"? How did he get there? Whose ships did he sail on? If we assume he took off around the age of 20, that would have been the year 2882 by Stewards' Reckoning.

In that year Thorin II Oakenshield was living quietly west of the Shire, Durin's Heir and leader of a small but growing community of Longbeard Dwarves in the Ered Luin. Gimli the son of Gloin was about 3 years old. Argonui, great-grandfather of Aragorn, was Chieftain of the Dunedain of the North, and Thorondir died and was succeeded as Ruling Steward of Gondor by his son Turin II. And, what the heck, the last unnamed Lord of Dol Amroth was still ruling in Belfalas (his son was Aglahad, great-grandfather of Prince Imrahil).

Eriador was relatively quiet during Argonui's chieftainship. Tolkien mentions nothing really important from the years 2848-2882. The White Tree of Gondor died in 2852, and Gandalf visited Dol Guldur for the second time in 2851. So an adventurous young Took probably found the lands safe enough to travel. But where did he go? To Mithlond, to sail around the Gulf of Lhun on an Elven ship? I wouldn't say that was impossible, but many people would probably say it was unlikely. Cirdan's folk had to eat just like other Elves. Living by the sea they probably fished for at least some of their sustenance. And Tolkien does say in the Prologue that the Shire Hobbits used to have dealings with the Elves.

Tharbad had once been a great port for Arnor, succeeding the ruined city of Lond Daer Ened at the mouth of the Gwathlo river, but Tharbad had dwindled in importance and population since the days of the Great Plague (S.R. 36). It's doubtful Isengar travelled all the way to Tharbad to find a berth on a ship there. But who knows? Maybe some bold and adventurous Gondorian merchant came north seeking fame and fortune only to find...a hobbit.

Hildifons Took, born in S.R. 1244 (Stewards' Reckoning 2844), was Isengar's older brother. He is said to have gone off on a journey and never returned. Presumably he died somewhere, but Tolkien doesn't tell us where he went or when he left. If he took off in his twenties, it would have been at least 2864 and maybe as late as 2874 when he left the Shire. Since Frodo and company apparently were the first Hobbits to visit Gondor and Lorien, it's doubtful that either Isengar or Hildifons made to those lands. Nor had the Rohirrim heard of Halflings in a long time. I think Denethor would have remembered hearing about a visiting Hobbit when he met Meriadoc and Peregrin, so in all probability the Tooks didn't visit Rohan, either.

That leaves Bree, Tharbad, Rivendell, and Wilderland as possible lands of adventure for hearty young Tooks. If Isengar went sailing around the Gulf of Lhun with the Elves then he probably was never really exposed to much peril. But what if Hildifons took it into his head to visit the vaguely remembered Vales of Anduin? Would Gandalf have gone with him? If so, what could Gandalf have had in mind? Clearly there was no trip to Erebor or Esgaroth. Maybe Hildifons went seeking adventure in Mirkwood, which was a dangerous place. One can imagine a Hobbit showing up on Radagast's doorstep in Rhosgobel with a letter from Gandalf: "Dear Radagast, please take care of my young friend and see he gets six meals a day. G."

Or he needn't have gone quite so far. Maybe he only made it to the Trollshaws and turned north for some reason. A daring Hobbit could also have turned north at Bree and gone up the Greenway to the ruins of Fornost Erain. What terrible creatures might he have encountered there? It had been only a little more than 100 years since his uncle Bandobras Took had defeated Golfimbul's Orcs at the Battle of Greenfields in the northern Shire. The War of the Dwarves and Orcs had ended in 2799 and many Orcs fled the Misty Mountains. Perhaps some found homes in Eriador.

Alternatively, Hildifons could have ventured into the Old Forest. I don't know if he had any Brandybuck blood in him (his mother was a Chubb, and I don't know where that family came from) or if he would have heard much about the Old Forest. If Old Man Willow and the vicious trees didn't catch Hildifons, he might have run into Tom Bombadil, or perhaps found his way to the Barrow-downs and met one of the local wights. It's entirely possible, too, that he simply argued with his family and moved to Bree, changed his name to Banks, and settled down. But that's not much of an adventure, is it?

I sometimes wonder about when the Brandybucks took on the Old Forest. We don't really know anything specific, but Meriadoc says the trees of the forest came and planted themselves beside the hedge between Buckland and the Forest and leaned over it. Hobbits then cut down the trees and burned a wide swathe of land along the hedge's eastern side. In one of his last letters, Tolkien wrote: "In all my works I take the part of trees as against all their enemies. Lothlorien is beautiful because there the trees were loved; elsewhere forests are represented as awakening to consciousness of themselves. The Old Forest was hostile to two legged creatures because of the memory of many injuries." (Tolkien, "Letters", p. 419)

The "memory of many injuries" is a curious item. It must refer to a long history of injuries inflicted upon the woods, and perhaps that history extends all the way back to the Second Age, when the Numenoreans and Sauron destroyed most of the woodlands of Eriador. But Merry says the trees "became very unfriendly" after the Brandybucks fought with the Old Forest, so they must not have been all that unfriendly prior to the battle. What were they doing by the hedge, then?

The Brandybucks settled in the Buckland in S.R. 740 (Stewards' Reckoning 2340). By the time of S.R. 1418, the year Frodo and his companions left the Shire, nearly 700 years had passed since the Buckland had been colonized. When would the hedge have been planted? Perhaps the Buckland was carved directly from the Old Forest itself. Tolkien notes in "A Conspiracy Unmasked" that "[the Buckland] was originally unprotected from the East; but on that side they had built a hedge: the High Hay. It had been planted many generations ago, and was now thick and tall, for it was constantly tended."

Evil things began to stir again in Eriador in S.R. 1140 (Stewards' Reckoning 2740). That's less than 300 years before the War of the Ring, but it might be a reasonable time in which the Brandybucks could have planted the High Hay. Bandobras "Bullroarer" Took fought the Battle of Greenfields in S.R. 1147, so the Shire and the Buckland certainly came under threat at that time. The Bucklanders may have decided to take some precautions, or maybe Orcs actually came out of the forest itself. This could explain the stories Fatty Bolger's nurse had told him as a child, which Merry dismissed out of hand. Since Orcs were not native to the Forest, they would not have been part of Merry's direct experience there, but Celeborn could have told him that "oft it may chance that old wives keep in memory word of things that once were needful for the wise to know" (as he indeed said to Boromir, who scoffed at the old stories concerning Fangorn).

A Hob Hayward was stationed at the Brandywine Bridge when Frodo and his companions returned to the Shire. Merry knew him and said he used to work on the Hay Gate. I don't know where that was, but clearly it was something associated with the High Hay. Hob's family was probably one of many which tended the High Hay and kept it in repair, as well as looked after things and warned the Buckland if anything untoward developed.

Unfortunately we don't know much about the Brandybucks and their predecessors the Oldbucks. The first Thain of the Shire was Bucca of the Marish, and the Oldbucks were his descendants. Tolkien says the Thainship only changed families once, when Gorhendad Oldbuck gave it up to colonize the Buckland. Tolkien says the Hobbits chose the first Thain from among their chiefs in S.R. 379, five years after the kingdom of Arnor was destroyed and the Shire itself overrun by the forces of Angmar.

What qualities did Bucca possess that his fellow chiefs would select him as their leader and successor of the King at Fornost (within the Shire)? Although the Hobbits were not warlike they had sent archers to help defend Fornost against Angmar, and had also sent more archers to help defeat the Witch-king's army when help arrived from Gondor. But the Hobbits must also have tried to defend their homeland before fleeing into hiding. Was Bucca a local hero, someone who had led a resistance against the Orcs and other evil creatures of Angmar? Or was he perhaps an "elder stateman" among the Hobbits, a senior chieftain in years and therefore respected because of his age and experience?

Eleven Oldbucks succeeded Bucca as Thain, and it seems probable that Gorhendad served as Thain for some time before moving across the Baranduin. Comparing birthdates of the Brandybucks and Tooks, it seems they were not experiencing generations "evenly". The leaders of one family were usually older than the leaders of the other. But the lengths of their generations were approximately similar. The Oldbucks thus held the Thainship for 361 years. The Masters of Buckland in Merry's family tree held their titles for anywhere from 30 to 50 years, so it seems reasonable to infer the Oldbuck Thains had similarly long "reigns", with an occasional shortened one. Gorhendad's would have been short and perhaps also Bucca's, if he was old when he was elected.

The Shire's most famous Hobbit, however, was probably Tobold Hornblower, the resourceful gardener from Southfarthing who imported Pipeweed and began growing it. When I say "gardener" I don't mean he was a menial laborer like Sam Gamgee. He was more of an herbalist, a gentleman botanist as it were. Meriadoc says that Toby didn't travel much but he did visit Bree several times. It appears that only the wealthier Hobbits really left the Shire, and those who travelled to Bree seem to have done so for business purposes more than anything else. Toby's purposes are not recorded, but he certainly revolutionized Shire economics by starting the Pipeweed craze. Southfarthing plant was preferred even in Bree, where they could grow their own pipeweed.

Toby acquired the pipeweed around S.R. 1070 (Stewards' Reckoning 2770). This was the year Smaug devastated Dale and Erebor and sent Durin's Folk scattering across the lands. Not much else happened in those days, though the War of the Dwarves and Orcs began a little more than twenty years later. Saruman had already settled in Isengard (2759, the year after the Long Winter). The Shire folk had a long period of prosperity ahead of them, for both the Battle of Greenfields and the Long Winter were behind them.

Well, that just scratches the surface, really. Tolkien's Hobbit-lore covered many families, many individuals. He probably could have written several more enchanting tales about Hobbit adventures, but doubtless felt such stories would pale beside Bilbo's encounter with Smaug and Frodo's quest to destroy the One Ring. They may have seemed like little more than cheap adventure stories to him. The chief wonder about Tolkien's fairy tales, really, is that each one is unique in some way, and he truly exceeded his own self-imposed limitations when he produced a second story about Hobbits. He did not, even then, say all he had to say about Hobbits, but he did not return to the well except for an occasional sip.

Author: Michael Martinez
Published on: December 10, 1999
Michael Martinez is the author of Visualizing Middle-earth

[JameRetief]

The Daily Tolkien articles by various authors	The Tolkien Virgin articles by Mark-Edmond
ARTICLES 1-10	1) Pre-amble and The Ainulindalë
ARTICLES 11-20	2) Ainulindalë/Valaquenta
ARTICLES 21-30	3) Of Aule and Yavanna
31) Model Languages: On Tolkien	4) Of The Coming of Elves and the Captivity of Melkor
32) Beyond The Movie: Author and History	5) Of Thingol and Melian
33) Beyond The Movie: Language and Culture	6) Of Eldamar and the Princes of the Eldalie
34) Beyond The Movie: Myth and Storytelling	7) Of Feanor and the Unchaining of Melkor
35) Who were the real heroes of Middle-earth?	8) Of the Silmarils and the Unrest of the Noldor
36) The Undefinable Shadowland	9) Of the Darkening of Valinor
37) Strange as news from Bree...
38) Hobbit Tales, or Never There And Back Again...

[JameRetief]

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[2Jedismom]

Very interesting! I wonder where he got some of this info, especially the part about Pippin's sisiter?! Is that only the second Hobbit murder??