Lord of the Rings: The Animated Musical | Appendix A, II The Kings of the Mark

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A black, white, and dark blue striped header image with the text Lord of the Rings: The Animated Musical | Appendix A, II The Kings of the Mark

In my last post, I covered the first half of “Appendix A, II The House of Eorl”, so this post will cover the second half, which contained the line of succession for the Kings of Rohan. This list reminded me of the succession charts from “Appendix A, I The Númenórean Kings”, especially “(iii) Eriador, Arnor, and the Heirs of Isildur” and “(iv) Gondor and the Heirs of Anárion”. However, the timeline of Eorlingas rulers covered a shorter period, as their country began in T.A. 2510. Even the Hobbits had a longer recorded history, as the Shire was founded in T.A. 1600. Like in previous sections, this post has everything: explanations of names, motifs from folklore, Ancient European mythology, medieval repayment practices, and etymologies of unusual words appearing in the text.

More Eorlingas Names!

As in past sections of the Appendixes, this segment contained lists of names unfamiliar to modern readers. Many of the names were defined in the aptly named The Lord of the Rings Reader written by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, my main sources for the following definitions. The Rohirrim were not particularly inventive with their naming of boys in the royal family, as names meaning “king”, “prince”, “chief”, or “ruler” were the most popular, including Brego, his sons Baldor and Aldor, Brytta Léofa with an epithet indicating that he was a “prince beloved”, and Brytta’s son Walda. The next segment of names indicated that the kings were friends of the folk or common people, including Folca, Folcwine, and Folcred. The name Fastred was unique, as it meant “firm-counsel”, and was also used among Hobbits. Elanor Gardner Fairbairn, oldest child of Sam and Rose Gamgee, married Fastred of Greenholm (Return of the King, 425), which will receive further explanation in a few weeks during a post on Appendix C.

The princely names return with greedy Fengel and his son Thengel before Thengel’s Gondorian wife, Morwen Steelsheen of Lossarnach changed the naming scheme. Morwen simply meant “girl” and was a Cornish or Welsh name, much like Epplett. Her son Théoden or “people-king”, was called Ednew, meaning “renewed”, since Gandalf revived him after Saruman prematurely aged him; at fifty-eight years old, he had looked like an old man. His youngest sister received the matching name Théodwyn, “people-delight”, as did his only son Théodred, “people-counsel”. The two children of Théodwyn have similarly matching names: Éomer or “horse-fame”, and Éowyn or “horse-delight”. Finally, Merry Brandybuck received his own Eorlingas epithet, as he was called Holdwine, meaning “faithful friend”.

Paths of the Dead

Brego, second ruler in the First Line of the Mark, which lasted from Third Age (T.A.) 2485 to 2759, built the great hall Meduseld as his palace. The Anglo-Saxon name meant “mead hall”, referring to a favorite drink of medieval people created by fermenting honey; this feels like a modern monarch calling their new mansion “Cola Castle”. Brego lived a long and happy life until the death of his oldest son, Baldor, who went to “tread ‘the Paths of the dead’ and did not return” (Return, 384). The concept of paths of the dead is no stranger to mythology and folklore. Stith Thompson’s Motif-Index devoted all of E480 to an “Abode of the dead”. These particular paths of the dead overlap with “Men must enter spirit world armed” (E480.3), a “land of the dead” (E481), and “Abode of dead in mountain” (E481.3).

Other cultural heroes attempted to enter the land of the dead and had varied success in leaving. In Greco-Roman mythology, the underworld was the realm of Hades or Pluto. Back in the day, I learned these stories from D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths created by husband-and-wife team Ingri and Edgar Parin D’Aulaire. My favorite trip into the Underworld was completed during the twelfth labor of Heracles, also called Hercules, who visited his uncle Hades to borrow his three-headed dog, Cerberus (D’Aulaires, 140-143). In contrast, the animated Disney musical Hercules made Hades the bad guy, and Hercules saved the soul of his girlfriend Meg from the River Styx. This was nothing akin to the original myth, but a few of the songs were catchy.

Less optimistic was the story of Orpheus and Euridice, (D’Aulaires, 102-105), a newlywed couple separated by death when Euridice was bitten by a poisonous snake. Orpheus used his power of song to convince Hades to release his wife from the Underworld but could only keep her in the land of the living if he did not look back during the journey. This being mythology, he did look back, and Euridice was stuck in the Underworld. As an added bonus, Orpheus was then torn to pieces by crazed wood nymphs, and this was the children’s version of the story. A well-known opera of the tale, Orfeo ed Euridice by Christoph Willibald Gluck, continues to be performed, although Gluck’s original character Amore, deity of love, returned Euridice to life even after Orpheus peeked. The most recent version to my knowledge was the award-winning musical Hadestown by Anaïs Mitchell, which set the story during the Industrial Revolution.

Baldor versus Baldr

The Rohirrim prince Baldor had a similar name to the Norse god Baldur, also spelled Baldr or Balder, and they also had similar early deaths. My favorite website on Norse mythology, Norse Mythology for Smart People hosted by pre-Christian European religion scholar Daniel McCoy, explained that the god’s name likely meant bold, implying a “warlike character” in contrast to the kindness and cheer that he generally evoked. In fact, the Prose Edda compiled by Icelandic medieval scholar Snorri Sturluson treated Baldr as a “passive, innocent sufferer” who died after the trickster god Loki convinced Baldr’s blind brother, Hodr, to shoot the ordinarily invincible god with a mistletoe arrow, his one weakness. This was likely due to Christian influence and a desire to compare Baldr to Jesus. Snorri’s foster father and teacher, Sæmundr fróði, was an Icelandic priest.

The epithet of Sæmundr may look familiar; the Icelandic name meaning “wise” was Anglicized by Tolkien for his protagonist, Frodo. Perhaps the author first learned about Sæmundr during his studies of Ancient European languages, which he researched on this part-historical, part-legendary figure while composing The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún around the 1930s, a book based on the Nibelungenlied. His estate published the book posthumously in 2009 with edits by his son Christopher Tolkien.

Boars in Mythology

Folca son of Walda, a king in the Second Line of the Mark, which lasted from T.A. 2759 to 3019, drove Orcs from Rohan in revenge for the slaying of his father. Not satisfied to retire after this feat, Folca became a boar hunter. He “slew the boar but died of the tusk-wounds that it gave him” (Return, 385). This story contained many motifs: a “giant boar” (B871.1.2) and more specifically a “giant devastating boar” (B16.1.4.1) threatened the people, while Folca went on a “quest for marvelous boar” (H1331.2) and had the “task: measuring (killing) wild boar” (H1154.3.3.1).

Clearly boar myths were popular throughout Ancient and Medieval Europe. In Greco-Roman mythology, Heracles had an encounter with a wild boar during his fourth labor (D’Aulaires, 134-135). He captured the boar alive from Mount Erymanthus and brought it to the court of his cousin Eurystheus, causing the poor guy to hide in a giant urn. Over in Wales, the young warrior Culhwch, a cousin of King Arthur, fell in love with Olwen, daughter of the Chief Giant Ysbaddaden. The only way to win her hand was to complete a series of quests, including catching or killing the boars Ysgithyrwn and Twrch Trwyth — your attempt to pronounce these names is as good as mine — and using their tusks and bristles to give Ysbaddaden a shave and a haircut. Tolkien expert Tom Shippey even noted in his book The Road to Middle Earth, the striking similarity between this myth and The Tale of Beren and Lúthien, where Beren must kill a great wolf to satisfy Lúthien’s father Thingol. On a happier note, the Norse god-siblings Freyr and Freya had their own pet boars, Gullinbursti and Hildesvini, which they could ride like a horse.

Wergilds

While Folcwine son of Folca reconquered “the west-march (between Adorn and Isen)” from the Dunlendings in T.A. 2885 (Return, 385), his twenty-seven year old twin sons Folcred and Fastred went to aid Gondor against the Haradrim, perhaps fitting the motif “twin adventurers” (T685.1). They died together in battle in Ithilien and were buried in the same barrow. Túrin II of Gondor gave Folcwine “a rich weregild of gold”.

Also spelled wergild, and literally meaning “man payment” in Old English, these were used as a compensation for a death in the family, especially that of a king. The price of the wergild was codified throughout Germanic and Frankish culture during the early medieval period. The rank of the deceased person determined the price of the wergild with higher ranking nobles and members of the clergy being worth more. Interestingly, the wergild for women was generally equal to or greater than those of men. The two explanations I have deduced for this discrepancy was that women were rarely permitted to act as combatants in war and therefore considered innocent bystanders with little means of self-defense, along with the high infant mortality rate making the availability of women of child-bearing age more crucial to maintaining a stable population.

Wergilds showed up in our favorite Anglo-Saxon poem, Beowulf. Using a version translated by Francis B. Gummere into somewhat early Modern English, the king Hrothgar “the price bade pay / in gold for him whom Grendel erst / murdered…”, Grendel being the monster who lived in Hrothgar’s kingdom. Like in the case of the twins, although the king was not personally responsible for the deaths, he was considered responsible for the safety of people within his kingdom and therefore culpable.

Marshal of the Mark

Éomund of Eastfold was the chief Marshal of the Mark and married Théodwyn, the youngest sister of Théoden King by fifteen years. The high position of Éomund within the kingdom made him the perfect match for Théodwyn. According to Etymonline, the word “marshal” entered English in the mid-13th century to mean a “high officer of the royal court”, especially in charge of commanding the army. The word came from Old French and was previously derived from a collection of Frankish and Germanic words literally meaning “horse-servant”, which perfectly suited the Rohirrim. The synonym “constable”, meaning “chief household officer”, has existed in English since the early 13th century and also came from Old French. However, the origin of this word was the Late Latin phrase comes stabuli meaning “count of the stable”. Tolkien was highly selective when allowing words with Latin roots into his work, and constable did not make the cut.

Conclusion

The material in this section would be tricky to incorporate into the hypothetical animated musical. Some kings of Rohan were referenced during the dialogue in quick succession by an unnamed minstrel, but outside of the main characters, few of these names appear again. While I might add a scene where Éowyn would relate stories of her ancestors to Merry, this would not significantly add to the plot.

The most helpful contributions of this section for my purposes were the indications of character design, such as the explanation on why Éowyn did not look exactly like the other Eorlingas: “Éomer was like his fathers before him; but Éowyn was slender and tall” because of their Gondorian ancestry from Morwen Steelsheen. This explained in part why Éowyn passed as a young man at the Battle of the Fields of Pelannor. She was taller than the average Rohirrim woman, perhaps even as tall as men, and had a slim but athletic build unlike her stockier brother. Additionally, the term “slender and tall” was used throughout the Legendarium as descriptions of Elves, rather than Men. Coupled with Aragorn repeatedly emphasizing that she was fair with golden hair, Éowyn seemed to have a uniquely androgenous appearance similar to the Vanyar Elves.

A few lines in this section sounded like prose poetry, and I might turn them into songs. “The people increased. and their horses multiplied.” (Return, 387) sounded like an Eorlingas blessing, but instead might be spoken as “May your people increase, and may your horses multiply.” The line could be paired with the concept of “the White Tree could grow in peace… the White Horse upon Green flew in many winds” (Return, 387) showing the ongoing partnership between the countries of Gondor and Rohan. I have already written a leitmotif for Gondor and the White Tree, so my leitmotif for Rohan and the White Horse would act as a counterpoint or harmony when the two would be sung together.


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