# The Elves of Rivendell



## Starflower (May 13, 2004)

> O! What are you doing,
> And where are you going?
> Your ponies need shoeing!
> The river is flowing!
> ...


 
this is a strange little episode, the Elves in Rivendell are described as silly and frivolous even... as opposed to the Mirkwood Elves who are proud and noble and even fierce. It doesn't really fit in with what Tolkien elsewhere talks about Elves, them being all noble and fair and wise... why this strange episode about silly Elves ?


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## Barliman Butterbur (May 13, 2004)

Starflower said:


> this is a strange little episode, the Elves in Rivendell are described as silly and frivolous even... as opposed to the Mirkwood Elves who are proud and noble and even fierce. It doesn't really fit in with what Tolkien elsewhere talks about Elves, them being all noble and fair and wise... why this strange episode about silly Elves ?



Don't forget that with The Hobbit, Tolkien was writing a book aimed at younger children. He later (in his letters) said that he regretted very much "writing down" to them, and implied that he would have rather written in a much more mature style. If memory serves, he may have been encouraged in this unnatural (for him) writing style by his publishers.

Lotho


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 14, 2004)

Certainly it's one of the few areas in Tolkien's work which you just have to "pass over in silence."


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## Confusticated (May 14, 2004)

Strangely I don't find it too far-fetched that _some_ elves living in Rivendell (not necessily Elrond or Glorfindel) would sing a silly song about the very odd but perfectly harmless company that just showed up during an easy-going time of peace and little worry. Rivendell is home to all types, sad and merry.

Personally, this ridiculously playful image of some elves is a vital part of the way I view the people.


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## Arthur_Vandelay (May 14, 2004)

Stepping into speculative mode just momentarily . . . 

While the minds of the chieftains of Rivendell would have been almost constantly focused upon the activities of Sauron and his servants, the particular episode we are discussing possibly captures the millieu of many of the lesser Elves of Rivendell at that point in the Third Age.

According to the Tale of Years (and somebody else can perhaps setme straight on this), Rivendell had (prior to the assault of the Nazgul upon the Ford in 3018) only been attacked once--c.1400 in the days of Arveleg (the king of Arthedain). Its most recent tragedy had been the poisoning of Celebrian in 2509--well over 400 years before the events of The Hobbit. And in the intervening years, many of the Orcs who had gathered in the Misty Mountains and who posed a threat to Eriador had been annihilated in the War with the Dwarves. With the Orc threat by 2941 greatly diminished, Rivendell--now in an all-but-forgotten corner of the world, must have seemed one of the safest places to be in Middle-earth at that time.

"Tra-la-la-lally" does not seem to me to be the refrain of a people in fear for their safety or their lives. 

What happened between 2941 and 3018? Well, Sauron had been driven from Dol Guldur, only to re-emerge in greater strength in Mordor, which had long been prepared for him. Armies all over the East and South were flocking to his banner. Orcs were multiplying again in the Misty Mountains and in Mirkwood. Worst of all--the Ring had been discovered, and the Nazgul had returned to Eriador to seek it. It must have seemed to the Elves of Rivendell as if the dark days at the end of the Second Age were returning.


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## Confusticated (May 14, 2004)

Yes, when I say "little worry" I do mean relative to the time that Frodo and friends were in Rivendell. Sure Elrond and Erestor and those bigwigs would have been thinking about the Necromancer during the time of _The Hobbit_ but I don't think this was a huge threat to those elves, at least not immediately. 

That they thought the evil of Mirkwood could be driven out in the first place and that after displaced would be harmless for many years to come, seems to indicate there was not a deathly fear of him, at least on the part of Rivendell's elves.

I do agree this Third Age rise of Sauron might have felt just like a return of Second Age trouble with Sauron, but I do not think the elves were doing what I would call "living in fear". Take Gildor Inglorion's company for example. While Gildor knew Sauron was stirring again he did not know about the Ring when he encountered Frodo, and the mood was merry enough as the elves journeyed freely tarrying for a while, that is, until Pippin blurted out about the Black Riders. So I can even imagine some silly songs taking place among some of the more mischevious elves of Rivendell after it was known Sauron was back in Mordor building up, but certainly Frodo's mode of entrance into the valley discourgaed the kind of welcome they had given Bilbo so long ago. But then, who knows how much the average elf knew about the Ring? Was it only those present at the council? Did those who were not aware of the Ring understand just how dangerous the times were?


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## Iluvatar (May 14, 2004)

Y'know, I actually like the way the elves are portrayed in _The Hobbit_. It makes them more real. I love the fact that even even elves can get smashed stealing the king's wine. After all, even in Rivendell, there's still going to be someone who cleans the privies. They can't all be lords and ladies.

As for the singing elves, they probably weren't the nobility of Rivendell, and were in fact just Joe and John Elf, having a good time on a nice night, probably with the aid of a few libations. Given that my understanding of elvish culture includes a love of song, I certainly don't find it beneath the dignity of Joe and John Elf deliberately tweaking (but harmlessly so) a group of wandering dwarves, even though they be escorted by someone so illustrious as Mithrandir.


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## baragund (May 15, 2004)

Iluvatar raises an interesting topic so I wonder if we can digress a little.

What about the commoner elves? The ones who clean out the privies, take out the trash, cook the meals and muck out the stables. These people could potentially be stuck on these bottom rungs of elven society for centuries or even millenia. After all, elves don't retire from their jobs so there isn't a whole lot of opportunity for upward mobility in ones career.

How do these elves maintain some sense of contentment when they are stuck with some menial job? What keeps them from going out of their minds with boredom or discontent?


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## Starflower (May 17, 2004)

now that is an interesting... we tend to forget that for centuries Elves were the only living people so they must have had a working structure of society... so a household like Rivendell must have quite a large staff below-stairs to run a household like that.... never thought of it before.


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## GuardianRanger (May 17, 2004)

I haven't read any of HOME, so forgive me if this is explicitly mentioned.

Is elven society detailed in HOME? Do we know that there was a class structure, or some "job system" set up? Or, was it a case of everyone did everything? When dinner was ready to be prepared, someone, or a bunch just stepped up and made it. Different elves cleared the tables. And another bunch washed up. The next night, roles might have changed based on who wanted to do what. But, all elves knew there was some duty, so at some point everyone just helped out.

I'm just speculating....I think of Rivendell as kind of a eutopian (sp?) society, kind of the best of everything. So I couldn't imagine a "lower class" elf, or a janitor elf.


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## Starflower (May 17, 2004)

hmmm... this could be a start for a whole new discussion.... but as Rivendell is described as being a centre for learning and wisdom, somehow i wouldn't imagine there having been a separate serving class... everyone would stick in, but in Mirkwood it would have been different as it was a King's house, so servant's would not be out of place there


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## baragund (May 17, 2004)

I don't know, Starflower and GuardianRanger, about everybody chipping in to do the menial tasks in elven society. Can you imagine Elrond taking a turn scrubbing pots in the kitchens, Finrod doing laundry or Feanor cleaning the bathroom?  

This is pure conjecture on my part, and I'd love to hear some of the resident gurus of the HOME series weigh in on the matter, but I'd like to think that in elven society, each person is truly content with their respective station in life. This ties into the Utopian nature of the elves and the notion of harmony with the world in which they live. So when an elven child grows up, he or she either finds on their own or is guided by parents / community leaders to that position which best suits the needs of the community, based on that individuals' talents. If that position is, say, a stable hand, then that elf is content with being a stable hand for his/her entire "career" unless the needs of the community pointed him elsewhere.

Of course this is Utopian thinking and absolutely unrealistic in human society but an elven society is, by nature, in harmony with it's environment so there cannot be much change or struggle among individuals for a higher position.

What do you think?


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## GuardianRanger (May 17, 2004)

Baragund, you're probably right, Elrond, Finrod, Glorfindel probably didn't scrub pots. But, at their age, maybe they've earned the privledge of not actually doing some of the more menial tasks.

How about the military? Was everyone trained to be in it?


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## Confusticated (May 17, 2004)

Here's a pssage from _Laws and Customs_ in HOME 10.

neri are the males, nissi the females.


> Among the Noldor it may be seen that the making of bread is done mostly by women; and the making of the lembas is by ancient law reserved to them. Yet the cooking and preparing of other food is generally a task and pleasure of men. The nissi are more often skilled in the tending of fields and gardens, in playing upon instruments of music, and in the spinning, weaving, fashioning, and adornment of all threads and cloths; and in matters of lore they love most the histories of the Eldar and of the houses of the Noldor; and all matters of kinship and descent are held by them in memory. But the neri are more skilled as smiths and wrights, as carvers of wood and stone, and as jewellers. It is they for the most part who compose musics and make the instruments, or devise new ones; they are the chief poets and students of languages and inventors of words. Many of them delight in forestry and in the lore of the wild, seeking the friendship of all things that grow or live there in freedom. But all these things, and other matters of labour and play, or of deeper knowledge concerning being and the life of the World, may at different times be pursued by any among the Noldor, be they neri or nissi.


Of course keep in mind that this is just the Noldor. Sindar, Green elves, and even Avari might have been _extremely different_. Even the other elves of Aman, the Vanyar, might have been drasticly different due to the fact that the main things Noldor males were into, were apparantly not practised as much by the Vanyar. Smith work for example. 

There is a little more information in this chapter too. For one, it is stated the men did more fighting and women more healing. It also gives the interesting fact that so far as I know does not appear elsewhere: Eldar believed that the taking of life diminished ones healing powers. We also learn the male and female are pretty equal in potential and such, but do have different inclinations.

I have done a lot of thinking on this, different cultures and daily life... very interesting stuff to wonder about.


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## Barliman Butterbur (May 17, 2004)

baragund said:


> I don't know, Starflower and GuardianRanger, about everybody chipping in to do the menial tasks in elven society. Can you imagine Elrond taking a turn scrubbing pots in the kitchens, Finrod doing laundry or Feanor cleaning the bathroom?



Well, it's all just too simple: it's all done by elvish magic! All that stuff takes care of itself! All the pots are always clean, as are all the rooms. The beds are always made, the sheets always fresh. Everything puts itself in order. Nobody has body odor, and all bodily waste products simply _evaporate way_ before it becomes necessary to even _think_ about using a loo! Get with the program, people!

Lotho


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## baragund (May 18, 2004)

You know, Lotho makes an excellent observation. Of course all the unpleasant work is done by elven magic! Haven't we all had an experience where something good happened that was unexpected. Say, a mess is cleaned up or a lost item is found and we say "Well, the faeries did it".  

But seriously folks, I guess the basic issue that I wonder about is how the elves deal with _eternal life._ Many of our elven heroes and heroines are _thousands_ of years old. How could someone live so long and not be bored to tears or unbearably restless? It seems to me that the basic psychological makeup of elves would have to be completely different from humans. As we all know, it is human nature to strive for a better existence than what we have at the moment, to try new and different things, to be challenged by new experiences. Put that human nature in an elven society where everything is either static or progress at a relatively glacial pace, they would go crazy!

Elves would have to have a completely different psychology from humans if they were to survive, let alone thrive, in an immortal society. When you think of the silly elves of Rivendell singing in the trees, or Thranduil's people getting blotto in Mirkwood, keep in mind they had probably been doing that for _millenia._ I don't know about you but I'd get pretty of tired of that after, oh, a decade or so.


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## Barliman Butterbur (May 18, 2004)

baragund said:


> You know, Lotho makes an excellent observation. Of course all the unpleasant work is done by elven magic! Haven't we all had an experience where something good happened that was unexpected. Say, a mess is cleaned up or a lost item is found and we say "Well, the faeries did it".
> 
> But seriously folks, I guess the basic issue that I wonder about is how the elves deal with _eternal life._...



Seriously then — _Tolkien's_ elves at any rate, are in a sense all tragic figures. They have foresight and they know that their lives in Middle-earth are going to be spent, as JRR has Galadriel put it, in fighting "the long defeat." They know how it's all going to come out. They know that their powers will be tremendously diminished, and they will need to go back into the West to recover. So that's why there's such a melancholy behind their gaiety. 

And as for the Mirkwood elves getting shikker, don't forget, Tolkien wasn't writing as seriously in those passages as he did in Sil or LOTR. (Besides, it was an important plot point: had the elves not passed out on the job, Bilbo would never have been able to engineer the escape.)

Lotho


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## Confusticated (May 18, 2004)

About elves:


> *Letter 131*
> They became sad, and their art (shall we say) antiquarian, and their efforts all really a kind of embalming - even though they also retained the old motive of their kind, the adornment of earth, and the healing of its hurts.





> *Letter 153*
> But I kept him in, and as he was, because he represents certain things otherwise left out. I do not mean him to be an allegory - or I should not have given him so particular, individual, and ridiculous a name - but 'allegory' is the only mode of exhibiting certain functions: he is then an 'allegory', or an exemplar, a particular embodying of pure (real) natural science: the spirit that desires knowledge of other things, their history and nature, because they are 'other' and wholly independent of the enquiring mind, a spirit coeval with the rational mind, and entirely unconcerned with 'doing' anything with the knowledge: Zoology and Botany not Cattle-breeding or Agriculture . Even the Elves hardly show this : they are primarily artists.


Underlined by me.


> *Letter 181*
> In this mythological world the Elves and Men are in their incarnate forms kindred, but in the relation of their 'spirits' to the world in time represent different 'experiments', each of which has its own natural trend, and weakness. The Elves represent, as it were, the artistic, aesthetic, and purely scientific aspects of the Humane nature raised to a higher level than is actually seen in Men. That is: they have a devoted love of the physical world, and a desire to observe and understand it for its own sake and as 'other' – sc. as a reality derived from God in the same degree as themselves – not as a material for use or as a power-platform. They also possess a 'subcreational' or artistic faculty of great excellence.



On Men:


> *Letter 256*I did begin a story placed about 100 years after the Downfall [of Mordor], but it proved both sinister and depressing. Since we are dealing with Men it is inevitable that we should be concerned with the most regrettable feature of their nature: their quick satiety with good. So that the people of Gondor in times of peace, justice and prosperity, would become discontented and restless – while the dynasts descended from Aragorn would become just kings and governors – like Denethor or worse.


And letter 338 "...owing to the (it seems) inevitable boredom of Men with the good..."



> *131*
> _The Downfall_ is partly the result of an inner weakness in Men – consequent, if you will, upon the first Fall (unrecorded in these tales), repented but not finally healed.




Look what Pengolodh (an elf) says about men.
From Dangweth Pengolodh (HoME 12):



> And some answer that the minds of Men are half asleep: by which they mean not that the part whereof Men are unaware and can give no account slumbers, but the other part. Others perceiving that in nothing do Men, and namely those of the West, so nearly resemble the Eldar as in speech, answer that the teaching which Men had of the Elves in their youth works on still as a seed in the dark. But in all this maybe they err, Ælfwine, for despite all their lore least of all things do they know the minds of Men or understand them.



Here is bit from a conversation between Finrod and a mortal woman. It is from From _Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth_ (HoME 10):


> 'Can you deny it? Now we Eldar do not deny that ye love Arda and all that is therein (in so far as ye are free from the Shadow) maybe even as greatly as do we. Yet otherwise. Each of our kindreds perceives Arda differently, and appraises its beauties in different mode and degree. How shall I say it? To me the difference seems like that between one who visits a strange country, and abides there a while (but need not), and one who has lived in that land always (and must). To the former all things that he sees are new and strange, and in that degree lovable. To the other all things are familiar, the only things that are, his own, and in that degree precious.'
> 'If you mean that Men are the guests,' said Andreth.
> 'You have said the word,' said Finrod: 'that name we have given to you.'
> 'Lordly as ever,' said Andreth. 'But even if we be but guests in a land where all is your own, my lords, as you say, tell me what other land or things do we know?'
> ...


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## baragund (May 18, 2004)

Thanks, Nom! Letter 181 and the passage you quoted from the conversation between Finrod and Andreth really captured what I was wondering about. They also seemed to reinforce my thought that the elves were truly content with the world as it was and, by extension, their respective places in that world while Men are by nature restless and alway looking for something more or different.

One small question: Who was JRRT talking about in Letter 153?


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## Confusticated (May 18, 2004)

*Whoops!*

Tom Bombadil


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## Wolfshead (May 27, 2004)

On a slightly lighter note for a moment (and digressing back to the beginning...) does anyone else picture those elves singing the song as being about 3 foot tall? Because I can't imagine the serious elves we know (mainly from their characteristics in the films) doing that kind of thing. So I always see those singers being the stereotypical non-Tolkien elves.


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