Posted: January 19, 2000 at 08:55:35: by Martin Read
: : Isn't it possible that Gil-Galad was the son of Fingon not
: : Orodreth. If the title High King was given to the eldest of the
: : house of Fingolfin, like some sort of a patriarchal system.
: : That explains how Turgon became High King after his brother
: : Fingon while he still had a son. If there are anywhere this
: : doesn't fit in please let me know, but I can't think of
: : anywhere. : Christopher Tolkien says in THE PEOPLES OF MIDDLE-EARTH that the notion of Gil-galad being Fingon's son was never more than "an ephemeral idea". It is simply impossible for him to be Fingon's son. He was not always Orodreth's son, but he was almost always a member of the House of Finarfin, originating as Finrod Felagund's son. : On the continuing question of kingship and inheritance (which may never be satisfactorily settled), I found the following entry in "The Etymologies". It is therefore dated information but seems to me to be worth mentioning, as probably having been retained by Tolkien into the 1950s and 1960s. This is a subentry under "TA-, TA3-": :
: *taro king: only used of the legitimate kings of the
: whole tribes, as Ingwe of the Lindar, Finwe of the Noldor
: (and later Fingolfin and Fingon of all exiled Gnomes). The
: word used of a lord or king of a specified region was
: aran (âr), Q haran [see 3AR]. Thus
: Fingolfin taur egledhur 'King of the Exiles' [see LED],
: but Fingolfin aran Chithlum 'King of Hithlum'. Q
: tár (pl. tári). N taur,
: Ilk. tôr, only used of Thingol: Tor Thingol
: = King Thingol.
:
: If I understand the language relationships correctly, "Q" represents "Qenya", the predecessor language for Quenya, spoken only in Aman. "N" represents Noldorin, the predecessor language for Sindarin, spoken by the Exiles, and "Ilk" represents Ilkorin, spoken by the Elves of Beleriand (and perhaps other lands, but mostly Thingol's people and the Danas, who became the Green-elves of Ossiriand). Ilkorin would have become the Doriathian dialect of Sindarin. Interesting that you should find linguistic support for my guess that tribal kingship and geographical kingship might have been distinct. It seems a distinct possibility, then, that the rules governing inheritance might have also been distinct. The way Eldarin kingdoms and lordships were established (or physically moved eg. Turgon's) seems to suggest they were very much the personal property of the Eldarin leader himself. They seem to have had great authority over their followers. This suggests in turn that these leaders could dispose of their kingdom and kingship in any way they chose. Most interesting.
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