Halfling
Halfling | |
---|---|
Genre | Fantasy |
Other name(s) | Hobbit |
Halflings are a fictional
Description
The members of the fictional halfling
Etymology
Halfling is a word used in Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Northern England for a boy or girl who is not yet fully grown; a youth, an adolescent, and formerly sometimes a boy or young man employed in a junior role in domestic, agricultural, or industrial work.[1] Halflin derives from the Scot word hauflin, which was used before both The Hobbit and Dungeons & Dragons[2] and has the synonyms hobbledehoy and hobby.[2]
Usage in fantasy fiction
Haflings are found in some fantasy novels and games. In The Lord of the Rings, J. R. R. Tolkien occasionally used the term "halfling" to describe hobbits, since they are beings that are half the height of men. For instance, when the hobbit Pippin Took appears in a royal guard's uniform in Minas Tirith, the people of that city call him the "Prince of Halflings".[3] The term has since been used in other fiction works as an alternate name for hobbit-like peoples inspired by Tolkien's legendarium.[4]
Halflings have long been one of the playable humanoid races in Dungeons & Dragons (D&D),[2] starting with the original 1974 Men & Magic,[5] where the term hobbit was used.[2] Later editions of the original D&D box set began using the name halfling as an alternative to hobbit[6] for legal reasons.[7] Besides licensed D&D novels, halfling characters have appeared in various tabletop and video games.
Some fantasy stories use the term halfling to describe a person born of a human parent and a parent of another race, often a female human and a male
Examples
An example of a noteworthy halfling character featured in a series of novels based on the Forgotten Realms, a D&D campaign setting, is Regis, a halfling rogue member of the Companions of the Hall led by Drizzt Do'Urden. While he behaves in the stereotypical manner of Tolkien's hobbits, Bricken from io9 noted that Regis "set himself apart a bit by carrying a crystal pendant he can use to charm people", though he also finds himself into dangerous situations and ends up saving the day in the final battle of The Crystal Shard (1988) in a manner not unlike Bilbo Baggins.[10]
References
- ^ Oxford English Dictionary. July 2023. halfling, n. & adj.
- ^ ISBN 978-0786460090
- ^ Tolkien, J. R. R. (1955) The Return of the King, book 5, ch. 1 "Minas Tirith"
- ISBN 978-1466866454.
- OCLC 152411087.
- ISBN 978-1409425625.
- ISBN 1930997787.
- ISBN 9780312198695.
- ISBN 0-586-06027-8.
- ^ Bricken, Rob (June 26, 2020). "Dungeons & Dragons & Novels: Revisiting The Crystal Shard". io9. Retrieved 2020-12-28.