Lord of the Rings: The Animated Musical | Music: Bilbo Was Meant to Find the Ring
While describing the history of the Ring to Frodo, Gandalf explained that Sméagol/Gollum and Bilbo had many similarities, as they were both of hobbit-kind. While this bothers Frodo, he would later realize Gandalf wisely spoke the truth, if in a long-winded way. Because of their shared background, hobbit-kind quickly understood each other, more so than “a dwarf, an orc, or even an elf”. Tolkien viewed this connection as being of the same cynn, an Old English word meaning “family”; it’s also the ancestor of the word “kin”. It’s important to note that Tolkien did not see genetics or “blood” as an indicator of personality, although plenty of people in his day did, and used the concept to suppress others. He believed instead that language was what brought people together. Accordingly, I will take a brief look at linguistic factors that make the speech of hobbit-kind unique, along with how Sméagol’s mental decline changed his speech. After that, I will give an overview of the music theory behind the latest instrumental and share the next music video.
Hobbit-Kind Linguistics
Even though the three hobbits were born many years apart — Frodo in T.A. 2968, Bilbo in T.A. 2890, and Sméagol likely around the T.A. 2430s — their language was mutually intelligible. According to “Appendix B: The Tale of Years“, their ancestors, known as periannath or “Halflings” in many Elvish languages, immigrated west, where they came in contact with men speaking Westron, also known as the Common Speech. Even when Sméagol’s ancestors, the Eastern Stoors, immigrated back east to the Gladden Fields around T.A. 1356, they continued to speak Westron.
Modern linguists would regard this dialect as experiencing a substrate effect, which is when a colonized people adopts the language of the colonizers but retains word choices and grammatical structures from their original language. This effect has been studied in many pidgins and creoles, or speaking systems that have not been elevated to the status of language. Colonizers have traditionally been perceived as speaking the “correct” form of the language. Historically in the Real World, French was considered while Haitian Creole was considered incorrect, and Portuguese was considered correct while Papiamento spoken in Aruba and near Islands was considered incorrect. In Middle-earth, the Hobbitish dialects of Westron were considered “worn down” compared to the dialects spoken in Gondor.
The most cited example of the substrate effect in Hobbitish Westron dialects is the use of “you”, the second person singular pronoun. In Modern English, we use only one form of “you”, the formal “you” or you/ye/your/yours regardless of the subject’s status. In Early Modern English, speakers used an informal “you” or thou/thee/thy/thine. Many early and modern languages retained this divide, known as T/V pronouns. For early languages, Anglo-Norman had tu/vus and Latin had tu/vos. For modern languages, German has du/Sie, Spanish has tu/Usted, Italian has tu/Lei, French has tu/vous, Dutch has jin/U, Swedish has du/ni, Finnish has sinä/te, and Russian has ty/vy. Using the correct form of “you” is considered the basis of being polite in these languages. Inversely, if someone jokingly becomes “formal” in English, they may use “thou” because the word is old and therefore perceived as formal, despite this being the inverse of its original intention.
In “Appendix F, II On Translation”, Tolkien explained that Hobbitish Westron had dropped the formal “you”. Hobbits did show familiarity towards each other regardless of status, and at first glace, this would appear to be the reason for their grammar. However, understanding how hobbit-kind originally learned Westron changes this perspective. They would have learned pronouns by hearing them from native speakers, Dúnedain people. Since hobbit-kind were considered a lower class or caste than Dúnedain, they likely were addressed only with informal “you” and therefore were not aware of formal “you”. Parallels to this phenomenon exist in the Real World. Christians in 15th century Italy referred to Muslim Turks and Jews using the informal “you”. Peasants and servants in 17th century France exclusively used informal “you” among themselves. Even through the 19th century, employers addressed employees with informal “you”. Interestingly, a favorite employee would use informal “you” with the employer unless the two were in conflict.
When Denethor heard Pippin refer to him, the ruler of the most powerful free country of Middle-earth, using informal “you”, he seemed to find it amusing. He may have considered Pippin to be a favorite employee and accordingly permitted this “disrespect”. Equally likely, as he was widely read, Denethor understood that Hobbits had never been taught formal pronouns due to their low ranking status and isolation from the rest of the empire. This was vastly different from the hypothetical reaction of Sméagol upon hearing Bilbo use informal “you” in their conversation. He would have known this was one of his own kind; other peoples of Middle-earth would have used formal “you” when speaking with a stranger.
Among the most difficult aspects of a language shift to study is figuring out how a language was spoken before the influence of the colonial language, especially if the language had no writing system or surviving documentation. This was the case for the original language of the hobbits. While “Appendix F, II On Translation” describes a few words in Hobbitish Westron that appeared to come from Rohirrim, no words of the original language were retained. The “rustic” way of speaking used by Sam Gamgee and other working class hobbits may have been more similar to the grammatical structures of the original Hobbitish language, but there was not enough evidence to confirm or deny this.
In contrast to the disappearance of the original Hobbitish language, Westron had been stable for centuries. This was similar to the relatively isolated Real World language Icelandic, part of the Nordic language family. While Icelandic researcher Hreinn Benediktsson regarded the pop linguistics concept of Icelandic being completely unchanged to be “a well-known cliché” and “an exaggeration”, he does agree that “[c]ompared with its cognate neighbors in the same period, Icelandic has, during its history of about one thousand years, undergone little change”. The aggression of Dúnedain people towards its enemies, their insistence that its colonies speak Westron, and their ability to switch to the Dúnedain dialect of Sindarin all may have contributed to the “stability” of the language.
Finally, Gollum’s specific way of talking does not align to how other hobbit-kind speak. He uses a fractured idiolect, or a way with words indicating his mental decline. His tendency to use silly-sounding verbs, doubled plural nouns like “hobbitses”, and address himself in the third person indicate what child psychologist Jean Piaget called egocentric speech. Children between the ages of five and seven may talk this way when they become frustrated, demanding the nearest adult to help them regardless of what the adult may be doing at that moment. Their speech appears to regress because their brains become overwhelmed by their frustration. For poor Gollum, his mind is almost, but never totally, subsumed by the Ring.
Instrumental
The entire song is in A major, 4/4 time, and 120 BPM. It begins with “The Shire Theme”, which first appeared during “The Introduction Song” as an ostinato underneath the patter song performed by the Gaffer. As usual, the most common instruments in the Shire — strings, woodwinds, tin whistle, and bass drum — play the theme. Joining these instruments are the harp to symbolize Frodo, the contrabassoon to symbolize Gandalf, and timpani as the “Drums of Doom”, which first appeared during “After Breakfast”. The flute and tin whistle carry a descant played as a round. The harp plays a variation of the descant with a different rhythm. While the rhythm in the flute and tin whistle is two quarter notes and one half note, the rhythm in the harp is four eighth notes and one half note. The harp sounds frantic or upset, echoing Frodo’s growing agitation as he begins to understand Gandalf.
The melody repeats the second time with no change except for measure 25. As Gandalf mentions “a Dwarf, or an Orc, or even an Elf”, the two beats underneath the name of each “race” changes to their own musical style. The Dwarf Style features chords on the clarinet and violin similar to those first heard in “The Adventure Song”. The Orc Style mimics the dissonance of “Sauron Theme” first heard in “the Story of the Ring”. The Elf Style uses perfects fourths, also originally heard in “The Adventure Song”.
The melody repeats a third time with the first violins doubling up an octave. In measure 37, the “Stoors Claves” enter at mezzo piano (mp) and crescendo until the end of the repeat. Meanwhile, the woodwinds, tin whistle, and strings decrescendo to pianissimo. The percussion stays at the same volume. However, the bass drum changes its rhythm from a whole note to the rhythm complimenting the “Stoors Claves” as heard in “The Death of Déagol” and “Sméagol Is Turned Out”. When the melody ends, the percussion plays alone for four measures.
A new set of chords appear in the woodwinds and strings, and “The Road Goes Ever On” melody enters on trumpet, Bilbo’s instrument. The melody plays through once, and then the chords shift to minor as the “corrupted” minor key version of the melody plays on marimba, last heard in “Sméagol Is Turned Out”. This melody repeats up an octave before returning to “The Shire Theme”. As the fourth repeat, the only difference from the previous iteration is the contrabassoon mirroring the tin whistle with the descant, except playing three octaves below, to show Gandalf’s agency in gathering information and sharing it with Frodo.
Once the melody ends, Gandalf describes how “a Ring of Power looks after itself”. Several themes collide in a complex rhythm. The bass drum and chives continue the Stoors rhythm while the timpani plays the “Drums of Doom”. The flute plays the “One Ring” motif first heard in “The Epigraph”. The trumpet places the short phrase at the beginning of “The Road Goes Ever On”, while the marimba places the “corrupted” version opposite the trumpet. Initially, trumpet and marimba play their respective motifs with two beats of rest in between, but by the end of the section, the notes overlap. By measure 116, trumpet and marimba drop out, leaving the flute to play the “One Ring” motif over the percussion on its own.
In measure 122, “The Shire Theme” returns for the fifth repeat. This theme continues for the end of the piece. The horn enters for the first time playing the counter melody, which originated during “After Breakfast”. During the sixth repeat, the theme doubles up an octave in the first violins. In measure 142, the percussion crescendos and the bass drum follows the same half note rhythm as the timpani, once again reminding the listener of the “Drums of Doom”. During the seventh and ultimately incomplete repeat, the Stoors claves return, indicating that the story of Gollum is far from over.
Watch the music video here: