Valinor

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Valinor
The Great Sea, far to the West of Middle-earth

Valinor (

Elves
, who as immortals are permitted to live in Valinor.

Aman is known as "the Undying Lands", but the land itself does not cause mortals to live forever.

Sam Gamgee, who dwell there for a time, and the dwarf Gimli.[T 2][T 3]

Scholars have described the similarity of Tolkien's myth of the attempt of Númenor to capture Aman to the biblical Tower of Babel and the ancient Greek Atlantis, and the resulting destruction in both cases. They note, too, that a mortal's stay in Valinor is only temporary, not conferring immortality, just as, in medieval Christian theology, the Earthly Paradise is only a preparation for the Celestial Paradise that is above.

Others have compared the account of the beautiful Elvish part of the Undying Lands to the

Saint Brendan from the early Middle Ages. The Christian theme of good and light (from Valinor) opposing evil and dark (from Mordor
) has also been discussed.

Geography

Arda

Physical

Valinor lies in Aman, a

Arda's landmasses and seas, show Valinor about 700 miles (1,100 km) wide, west to east (from the Great Sea to the Outer Sea), and about 3,000 miles (4,800 km) long north to south. The continent of Aman extends from the Arctic latitudes of the Helcaraxë to the subpolar southern region of Arda – about 7,000 miles (11,000 km).[1]

Eldamar is "Elvenhome", the "coastal region of Aman, settled by the Elves", wrote Tolkien.

Teleri Elves have timber to build their ships. The city of the Teleri, on the north shore of the Bay is Alqualondë, the Haven of the Swans, whose halls and mansions are made of pearl. The harbour is entered through a natural arch of rock, and the beaches are strewn with gems given by the Noldor Elves.[T 8] In the bay is the island of Tol Eressëa.[T 5]

Calacirya (

Two Trees that streams through the pass into the world beyond) is the pass in the Pelóri mountains where the Elven city Tirion is set. It is close to the Girdle of Arda (the Equator).[1] After the hiding of Valinor, this is the only gap through the mountains of Aman.[T 5]

In the extreme north-east, beyond the Pelóri, is the Helcaraxë, a vast ice sheet that joins the two continents of Aman and Middle-earth before the War of Wrath.[T 9] To prevent anyone from reaching the main part of Valinor's east coast by sea, the Valar create the Shadowy Seas, and within these seas they set a long chain of islands called the Enchanted Isles.[T 10][3]

Political

Main article: Valar

Valinor is the home of the Valar (singular Vala), spirits that often take humanoid form, sometimes called "gods" by the

Maiar, and most of the Elves.[T 12]

Each Vala has his or her own region of the land. The Mansions of Manwë and Varda, two of the most powerful spirits, stands upon the top of Taniquetil.[T 11] Yavanna, the Vala of Earth, Growth, and Harvest, resides in the Pastures of Yavanna in the south of the land, west of the Pelóri. Nearby are the mansions of Yavanna's spouse, Aulë the Smith. Oromë, the Vala of the Hunt, lives in the Woods of Oromë to the north-east of the pastures. Nienna lives in the far west of the island. Just south of Nienna's home, and to the north of the pastures, are the Halls of Mandos; he lives with his spouse Vairë the weaver. To the east of the Halls of Mandos is the Isle of Estë, in the lake of Lórellin[T 11] within the Gardens of Lórien.[1]

In east-central Valinor at the Girdle of Arda is Valmar, the capital of Valinor (also called Valimar, the City of Bells), the residence of the Valar and the Maiar in Valinor. The first house of the Elves, the

Vanyar, settles there as well. The mound of Ezellohar, on which stand the Two Trees, and Máhanaxar, the Ring of Doom, are outside Valmar.[T 12] Farther east is the Calacirya, the only easy pass through the Pelóri, a huge mountain range fencing Valinor on three sides, created to keep Morgoth's forces out. The city of the Noldor (and for a time the Vanyar Elves also) is Tirion, built on the hill of Túna, inside the Calacirya mountain pass; it is just north of Taniquetil, facing both the Two Trees and the starlit seas.[T 5][1]

In the northern inner foothills of the Pelóri, far to the north of Valmar, is Fëanor's city of Formenos, built after his banishment from Tirion.[T 13]

History

Further information:
Cosmology of Middle-earth and History of Arda

Years of the Trees

Valinor in the Years of the Trees, lit by the Two Trees; the rest of Arda, including Middle-earth, lay in darkness. The outlines of the continents are purely schematic.
Further information: Two Trees of Valinor

Valinor is established on the western continent

awakening of the Elves in Middle-earth, where Melkor is unopposed. They propose to bring the Elves to the safety of Valinor, but to do that, they need to get Melkor out of the way. A war is fought, and Melkor's stronghold Utumno is destroyed. Then, many Elves come to Valinor, and establish their cities Tirion and Alqualondë, beginning Valinor's age of glory. Melkor comes back to Valinor as a prisoner, and after three Ages is brought before the Valar; he sues for pardon, vowing to assist the Valar and make amends for the hurts he has done. Manwë grants him pardon, but confines him within Valmar to remain under watch.[T 9] After his release, Melkor starts planting seeds of dissent in the minds of the Elves, including between Fëanor and his brothers Fingolfin and Finarfin. Fëanor uses some of the light of the Two Trees to forge the three Silmarils, beautiful and irreplaceable jewels.[T 13]

The Darkening of Valinor

Belatedly, the Valar learn what

Finwë, kills him and steals the Silmarils. He then destroys the Two Trees with the help of Ungoliant, plunging Valinor into darkness, the Long Night, relieved only by stars. Melkor and Ungoliant flee to Middle-earth.[T 15]

The Hiding of Valinor

The Downfall of Númenor and the Changing of the World.[4] The outlines of the continents are purely schematic.

The Valar manage to save one last luminous flower from one of the Two Trees, Telperion, and one last luminous fruit from the other, Laurelin. These become the Moon and the Sun. The Valar carry out further titanic labours to improve the defences of Valinor. They raise the Pelóri mountains to even greater and sheerer heights. Off the coast, eastwards of Tol Eressëa, they create the Shadowy Seas and their Enchanted Isles; both the Seas and the Isles present numerous perils to anyone attempting to get to Valinor by sea.[T 10]

Later history

For centuries, Valinor take no part in the struggles between the Noldor and Morgoth in Middle-earth. But near the end of the

Angband, and cast Morgoth into the void.[T 16]

During the

Straight Road and in ships capable of passing out of the spheres of the earth.[T 17][4]

Analysis

Paradise

Further information: Death and immortality in Middle-earth and Cosmology of Tolkien's legendarium
Earthly Paradise: Eldamar has been compared to the place dreamed of in the Middle English poem Pearl.[5] Miniature from Cotton Nero A.x
shows the Dreamer on the other side of the stream from the Pearl-maiden.

Keith Kelly and Michael Livingston, writing in

Istari or Wizards. However, Aman is not, they write, exactly paradise. Firstly, being there does not confer immortality, contrary to what the Númenóreans supposed. Secondly, those mortals like Frodo who are allowed to go there will eventually choose to die. They note that in another of Tolkien's writings, "Leaf by Niggle", understood to be a journey through Purgatory (the Catholic precursor stage to paradise), Tolkien avoids describing paradise at all. They suggest that to the Catholic Tolkien, it is impossible to describe Heaven, and it might be sacrilege to make the attempt.[6] The Tolkien scholar Michael D. C. Drout comments that Tolkien's accounts of Eldamar "give us a good idea of his conceptions of absolute beauty".[5] He notes that these resemble the paradise described in the Middle English poem Pearl.[5]

Cosmogonies of Tolkien, Catholicism, and Medieval poetry[5][6]
Tolkien
Catholicism
 Pearl, Dante's Paradiso
"that which is beyond Elvenhome and will ever be"[T 18] Heaven Celestial Paradise, "beyond"
Undying lands of Aman, Elvenhome in Valinor Purgatory
Earthly Paradise, Garden of Eden
Middle-earth Earth Earth

The Tolkien scholar

Dante's Paradiso.[6] Matthew Dickerson notes that Valinor resembles the Garden of Eden in having two trees.[7]

Earthly Paradise, though just being in the place does not confer immortality.[8][5][6]
Men are mortal, and when they die they go beyond the circles of the world, even the Elves not knowing where that might be.

Good against evil

Further information: Christianity in Middle-earth § Light

The scholar of English literature

Catholic, and that the "female principle, embodied in Varda of Valinor and Galadriel of Middle-earth, most clearly represents the charitable Christian heart."[9]

Original sin

Notre Dame de Paris

The scholar of literature Richard Z. Gallant comments that while Tolkien made use of pagan Germanic heroism in his legendarium, and admired its Northern courage, he disliked its emphasis on "overmastering pride". This created a conflict in his writing. The pride of the Elves in Valinor resulted in a fall, analogous to the biblical fall of man. Tolkien described this by saying "The first fruit of their fall was in Paradise [Valinor], the slaying of Elves by Elves"; Gallant interprets this as an allusion to the fruit of the biblical tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the resulting exit from the Garden of Eden.[T 19][10] The leading prideful elf is Fëanor, whose actions, Gallant writes, set off the whole dark narrative of strife among the Elves described in The Silmarillion; the Elves fight and leave Valinor for Middle-earth.[10]

Lost home

Further information: Decline and fall in Middle-earth

Phillip Joe Fitzsimmons compares The Silmarillion's faraway Valinor, forbidden to Men and lost to the Elves, though it constantly calls to them to return, to Tolkien's fellow-Inkling, Owen Barfield's "lost home". Barfield writes of the loss of "an Edenic relationship with nature", part of his theory that man's purpose is to serve as "the Earth's self-consciousness".[11] Barfield argued that rationalism creates individualism, "unhappy isolation ... [and] the loss of a mutual relationship with nature."[11] Further, Barfield believed that ancient civilisations, as recorded in their languages, had a connection to and inner experience of nature, so that the modern situation represents a loss of that state of grace. Fitzsimmons states that the lost home motif recurs throughout Tolkien's writings. He does not suggest that Barfield influenced Tolkien, but that the ideas of the two men grew from "the same time, place, and even social circle".[11]

Atlantis, Babel

Further information: Tolkien and the classical world

Kelly and Livingston state that while Aman could be home to Elves as well as Valar, the same was not true of mortal Men. The "prideful"

ancient Greek myth of Atlantis, the greatest human civilisation lost beneath the sea; and the resemblance to the biblical tale of the Tower of Babel, the hubristic and "sacrilegious" attempt by mortal men to climb up into God's realm.[6]

Saint Brendan sails the seas looking for the Land of Promise. Gautier de Metz
, c. 1304

Celtic influence

Further information: Tolkien and the Celtic

The scholar of English literature

Saint Brendan sailed the seas looking for the "Land of Promise". He notes that it is certain that Tolkien knew these stories, since in 1955 he wrote a poem, entitled Imram, about Brendan's voyage.[12][4]

See also

References

Primary

  1. ^ Carpenter 2023, #156 to Father R. Murray, SJ, November 1954
  2. ^ Tolkien 1955, "The Grey Havens", and Appendix B, entry for S.R. 1482 and 1541.
  3. ^ Carpenter 2023, #249 to Michael Tolkien, October 1963
  4. ^ Tolkien 1994, "Quendi and Eldar"
  5. ^ a b c d Tolkien 1977, ch. 5 "Of Eldamar and the Princes of the Eldalië"
  6. Parma Eldalamberon
    , 17.
  7. Parma Eldalamberon
    , 17, p. 106.
  8. ^ Tolkien 1977, ch. 9 "Of the Flight of the Noldor"
  9. ^ a b Tolkien 1977, ch. 3 "Of the Coming of the Elves and the Captivity of Melkor"
  10. ^ a b Tolkien 1977, ch. 11 "Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor"
  11. ^ a b c Tolkien 1977, "Valaquenta"
  12. ^ a b c d e f Tolkien 1977, ch. 1 "Of the Beginning of Days"
  13. ^ a b Tolkien 1977, ch. 7 "Of the Silmarils and the Unrest of the Noldor"
  14. ^ Tolkien 1977, ch. 2 "Of Aulë and Yavanna"
  15. ^ Tolkien 1977, ch. 8 "Of the Darkening of Valinor"
  16. ^ Tolkien 1977, ch. 24 "Of the Voyage of Eärendil and the War of Wrath"
  17. ^ Tolkien 1977, "Akallabêth"
  18. ^ Tolkien 1955, book 6, ch. 4 "The Field of Cormallen"
  19. ^ a b Carpenter 2023, #131 to Milton Waldman, late 1951

Secondary

  1. ^ a b c d Fonstad 1991, pp. 1–4 Aman, 6–7 Valinor.
  2. ^ Tyler 2002, pp. 307–308.
  3. ^ Fonstad 1991, p. 38.
  4. ^ a b c d Shippey 2005, pp. 324–328.
  5. ^ a b c d e Drout 2007.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Kelly & Livingston 2009.
  7. ^ Dickerson 2007.
  8. ^ Shippey 2005, pp. 269–272.
  9. ^ a b c Burns 2005, pp. 152–154.
  10. ^ a b c Gallant 2014, pp. 109–129.
  11. ^ a b c Fitzsimmons 2016, pp. 1–8.
  12. ^ a b c Kocher 1974.

Sources

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  • Fitzsimmons, Phillip Joe (2016). "Glimpses of lost home in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and Owen Barfield". Faculty Articles & Research (3).
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  • Gallant, Richard Z. (2014). "Original Sin in Heorot and Valinor".
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  • Kelly, A. Keith; Livingston, Michael (2009). "'A Far Green Country: Tolkien, Paradise, and the End of All Things in Medieval Literature". Mythlore. 27 (3).
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