# The origins of the Men of Rohan/Bree/Dale.



## Link 2 (May 3, 2004)

I think it says in the Silmarillion "Of the Coming of Men into the West" that Bereg (son of Beregund of Beor I think?) led a host of men, who tired of and disliked the power of the Elves in Beleriand, into Eriador never to be seen again. Coudl these be the men who would later come to found Bree and other small settlements, and be the forerunners of the Rohirric and Dale cultures?

I'll answer the later of my own question.

The ancestors of the Rohirrim and Bardings (I'd rather call them "Dale Folk") were not of these people. I presume that they may have been the remnant of the People of Haleth of the First Age, ones that were forsaken and remained in Beleriand after the Dunedain left for Numenor. They then migrated southwards into northwestern Rhovanion, becoming who they are today.


But who where the men of Bree?

I'll talk later, time to get to class....


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## Inderjit S (May 3, 2004)

The Breemen, Dunlendings and Dead-Men were descendants of the pre-Haladin (i.e. the Halethians who did not enter Beleriand). The oldest race of men in Eriador were the Borrim (relations of 'Bor' the Easterling) and there were also some Marachians (men from Marach/Hador's tribe who did not enter Beleriand.) The men of Rhovanion were descendants of the Marachians tribe. They allied themselves with the Dwarves of Moria in the S.A but that alliance was cut short after Sauron sacked Ost-in-Edhil. The Rohirrim are descendants of these Northmen. There were some Bëorians in Eriador too, and it was Bereg grandson of Bëor who led the tribe of Bëorians back to Eriador.

So Men of Bree, Dunland and Dead-Men of Dunharrow-Haladin (Or 'Gwathuirim') 

Men of Rohan, Dale and Rhovanion-Marachians i.e. tribe of Hador

Bëorians and Borrim-scattered around Eriador.

A lot of the mannish communities in Eriador did not exist at the time of the WoTR.


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## Link 2 (May 3, 2004)

Well, I guess that ends that conversation......


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## Inderjit S (May 3, 2004)

Unless somebody has anything else to ask. It's a pretty broad topic area.


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 4, 2004)

Inderjit S said:


> Unless somebody has anything else to ask. It's a pretty broad topic area.



First: did you get that info from the HoME? (If so, which book(s)?) 

Second: what happened to the Beorrim and Borrim of Eriador? Were they assimilated into the populations of Arnor? Were the Borrim the ancestors of the Hillmen of Rhudaur?

Third: What did the Beorrim and Borrim look like? The Haladin are described somewhere as "swarthier" than the other Edain.


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## Inderjit S (May 4, 2004)

My info is from 'Of Dwarves and Men' HoME 12 and 'Of Galadriel and Celeborn' U.T.

The Haladin are in the P.S a white-skinned tribe, like the others. Tolkien later changed this. C.T did not put these changes in the P.S because he preferred using Tolkien's Silmarillion work rather then his contradicting essays to work on the Silmarillion. 

Since the Haladin 's relations in M-E were dark skinned, we can presume that they were dark-skinned too. Some of the Beorians were said to be dark skinned too.

HoME 11 tells us the Borrim set up agrarian communities in Eirador. They may have been destroyed after Sauron's was with the Elves. If there were Borrim survivors when Elendil came then they may have been poarized, some joining Elendil and some not. Those who did not may have been the ancestors of the Hill men of Rhuduar.

The Borrim were swarthy.


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 4, 2004)

I remember reading somewhere that Marachians were in Eriador at some point, too.

Would there have been some remnants of the Beorians (or Marachians) among the folk of Arnor?


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## Inderjit S (May 4, 2004)

I think any Bëorians or Marachians would have joined the Númenóreans recognising them as their "kin". A lot of the indigenous mannish population of Eriador was either driven away or killed or went to a safe-haven (i.e. Rivendell) and one can conclude that they repopulated and formed the core of the pre-Elendil Eriadorian population and they were integrated into Elendil's kingdom because they recognised him as "kin".

The pre-Haladin elements in Eriador were, of course, hostile towards the Númenóreans because of their rampant tree felling.


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 5, 2004)

Does the term "pre-Haladin" appear in Tolkien's works?


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## Inderjit S (May 5, 2004)

Off the top of my head....I don't know. I don't think it really matter anyway. It's just a description of the Haladin tribes before they went into Beleriand and their relatives in Middle-Earth. 'Gwathuirim' is a word used by Tolkien to describe them.


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 5, 2004)

Inderjit S said:


> Off the top of my head....I don't know. I don't think it really matter anyway. It's just a description of the Haladin tribes before they went into Beleriand and their relatives in Middle-Earth. 'Gwathuirim' is a word used by Tolkien to describe them.



I was just curious because I've seen the term used on other sites: _Lalaith's Middle-earth Science Pages_ uses it; Michael Martinez uses it. I was hesitant about using it in my TolkienWiki entries because I wasn't certain if it's a term used by Tolkien. In retrospect, I really should have used 'Gwathuirim.'


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## Inderjit S (May 5, 2004)

O.K. The name 'Gwathuirim' means gwath (shadow) rim (people) the 'shadow people.' 

Maybe pre-Haladin would be a safer bet when referring to the Haladin elements in Middle-Earth. Upon re-reading the quote, I have realised that Gwathuirim was simply the Sindarin name for the Dunlendings. 

The pre-Haladin were of course polarized into several different groups, such as the Breemen, the Dunlendings (who themselves may have been split up, some for example mixed with the Rohirrim) and the dead-Men who had several tribes who may have been integrated into Gondor or one of her fiefs. 

If erudite Tolkienoligists like Mr. Martinez use 'pre-Haladin' then it is a pretty safe bet.


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## Confusticated (May 5, 2004)

Ahhh... I thought you were mistaken in that pre-Haladin = Gwathuirim. I was away looking it up in PoME before posting... but anyhow I looked for pre-Haladin while I was at it. I do not remember seeing that term before, but in my opinion it isn't especially memorable like cool words such as Etyangoldi. 



Inder said:


> If erudite Tolkienoligists like Mr. Martinez use 'pre-Haladin' then it is a pretty safe bet.


Hmm... I'm skeptic. While JRRT may very well have used the term, I would not be surprised for any Tolkienologist to invent a perfectly reasonable term for something that JRRT did not give a name for. But on the other hand, I don't see as how it really m atters if he used the term or not. That is, I see no problem with someone using the term if JRRT did not. I think it would be about the same as terming Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin as _fellowship-hobbits_.  That is, so long as pre-Haladin is not presented as the actual name of the people... and it's unlikely anyone would confuse the term for that, considering the prefix pre. hehe.


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## Inderjit S (May 5, 2004)

> Etyangoldi.



Etyañgoldi is the coolest term ever for the coolest people ever. Plus it is esoteric so few people know what it means.  



> While JRRT may very well have used the term, I would not be surprised for any Tolkienologist to invent a perfectly reasonable term for something that JRRT did not give a name for. But on the other hand, I don't see as how it really m atters if he used the term or not. That is, I see no problem with someone using the term if JRRT did not. I think it would be about the same as terming Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin as fellowship-hobbits



Indeed. People can often "make up" words to either a) help condense a descirption of a charatcer/race or b) give a new name to a race which Tolkien never "named", thus creating another labour saving device.


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## MichaelMartinez (Sep 27, 2004)

I don't recall ever using "pre-Haladin" but it is not an unreasonable expression.

"Gwathuirim", in its _correct_ usage, should be applied only to the people of the Second Age whom the Numenoreans found living along the banks of the Gwathlo river. The name is used by Tolkien in an essay published in _Unfinished Tales_.

I, and perhaps others following my lead or duplicating my reasoning, have extended the name as a matter of convenience to refer to all the peoples historically related to the Gwathuirim in Tolkien's writings: the Folk of Haleth (sometimes called _Haladin_, but Tolkien eventually decided that name should only be applied to the family of the chieftains), the Men of Bree, the Men of Eryn Vorn, the Dunlendings, the Men of the White Mountains (including the Dead Men of Dunharrow), and whomever their collective ancestors were.

_Marachians_ is correctly applied only to those Edain who followed Marach into Beleriand, and their descendants (in Beleriand). I believe Tolkien used that name in one or two places, but I cannot offer any citations. The Marachians had relatives in Eriador and the lands beyond the Misty Mountains (mostly in the lands beyond Greenwood the Great), according to "Dwarves and Men" in _The Peoples of Middle-earth_. Some of the Marachians fled back to Eriador after the Dagor Bragollach (those who survived at Estolad).

_Beorians_, like _Marachians_, is properly only applied to those Edain who followed Balan (Beor) into Beleriand and their descendants. However, like the Marachians and the Folk of Haleth, the Beorians had relatives living in Eriador, and like the Marachians the Beorians also had relatives living in the lands beyond the Misty Mountains (mostly in the Vales of Anduin and Greenwood the Great).

Tolkien wrote that each wave of migration established new homes, and successive generations produced migrations which left behind larger peoples than the groups going forward. So, the Edain who entered Beleriand (about 10,000 families in all) represented only a small fraction of their entire peoples.

Now, I have never come across the term "Borrim" before, but it is a suitable translation of "Folk of Bor" (I think -- I am really no linguist). The Folk of Bor, according to a footnote, had relatives in northern Eriador who became the oldest group of Men in northern Eriador _in the Second Age_. They were not the oldest group of Men in Eriador by any means.

The Rohirrim, the Men of Dale, the Men of the Long Lake, and possibly other groups of Northmen living along or near the Celduin, were descended from the Marachians' relatives who stayed in the lands east of Greenwood the Great. Before _The Peoples of Middle-earth_ was published, I used to speculate that the Edain who fled back to Eriador from Beleriand might have been the remote ancestors of the Northmen of the Third Age, but there appears to be no support for that speculation in any of the Tolkien texts.

Nonetheless, the kinship between Marach's people and the ancestors of the Northmen is well attested in "Dwarves and Men".

The Beornings and the Woodmen, and perhaps other groups of Northmen living in the Vales of Anduin and the Forest, were descended from those peoples who were akin to the Beorians who had remained in the Vales of Anduin and Greenwood the Great.

These peoples all intermingled a little bit, and the Northmen sent several waves of settlers to Gondor during the Third Age. So, the Numenoreans and their Edainic cousins more than likely intermarried in both Arnor and Gondor acorss the millennia.


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## Inderjit S (Sep 28, 2004)

> Now, I have never come across the term "Borrim" before, but it is a suitable translation of "Folk of Bor"



It is simply the adjectival form of reference for those who came from who were akin to the Folk of Bor. 

Good points, though.


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