# The Dwarves



## Kahmûl (Jan 20, 2004)

> : and he made first the seven fathers of the Dwarves in a hall under the mountains in Middle-earth.


If Aulë only made male dwarves then how were more dwarves meant to come into the world without any females?


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## Gil-Galad (Jan 20, 2004)

This quotes concerns the first dwarves which were created,not that only the 7 fathers were created.Aule probaby made some female dwarves,but after the 7.Nobody is said that he created *only* the 7 Fathers.


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## The Tall Hobbit (Jan 20, 2004)

According to _The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien_ (Letter #212), Aule actually made 13 Dwarves: 7 male and 6 female.


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## Dáin Ironfoot I (Jan 21, 2004)

> If Aulë only made male dwarves then how were more dwarves meant to come into the world without any females?


Well since they were so alike in appearance and skill... who's saying that some of those Dwarvish fathers weren't really mothers? Durin the Deathless, ha! More like... Durin the Drag-queen!


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## NazgulOfAngmar (Jan 25, 2004)

*The Tall Hobbit was right*

In the The Silmarillion account of the making of the Dwarves, only the Seven Fathers are mentioned. In Letter no. 212 (p 287), however, Tolkien speaks of thirteen dwarves being initially created:

"One, the eldest, alone, and six more with six mates."


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## Baruk Khazad! (Jan 29, 2004)

The Seven Fathers were created and Six Fathers were laid to rest with six mates, except for Durin, who indeed did walk alone.


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## Ithrynluin (Feb 4, 2004)

An interesting question arises: How then did Dúrin reproduce? An obvious answer would be that he took to wife a dwarf woman from another 'house', but that strikes me as somewhat strange, seeing how all the other races are more or less concerned that they 'mingle' with their own 'class'. 

What was the purpose of Durin being alone in the first place?


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## Aulë (Feb 5, 2004)

Note 25 of 'Of Dwarves and Men' (HoME12):



> He alone had no companions; cf. 'he slept alone' (III.352). [The reference is to the beginning of Appendix A, III. The passage in the text is difficult to interpret. My father refers here to four places of awakening of the Seven Ancestors of the Dwarves: those of 'the ancestors of the Firebeards and the Broadbeams', 'the ancestor of the Longbeards', 'the Ironfists and Stiffbeards', and 'the Blacklocks and Stonefoots'. (None of these names of the other six kindreds of the Dwarves has ever been given before. Since the ancestors of the Firebeards and the Broadbeams awoke in the Ered Lindon, these kindreds must be presumed to be the Dwarves of Nogrod and Belegost.) It seems that he was here referring to Durin's having 'slept alone' in contrast to the other kindreds, whose Fathers were laid to sleep in pairs. If this is so, it is a different conception from that cited in XI.213, where Ilúvatar 'commanded Aulë to lay the fathers of the Dwarves severally in deep places, each with his mate, save Durin the eldest who had none.' On the subject of the 'mates' of the Fathers of the Dwarves see XI.211-13. - *In the margin of the typescript my father wrote later (against the present note): 'He wandered widely after awakening: his people were Dwarves that joined him from other kindreds west and east'; and at the head of the page he suggested that the legend of the Making of the Dwarves should be altered (indeed very radically altered) to a form in which other Dwarves were laid to sleep near to the Fathers.*]



So Tolkien originally meant for Durin to wander alone for some time until he was joined by some Dwarves from the other six kindreds. But later on, he changed his mind- saying that the Fathers weren't the only Dwarves laid to sleep, but they were accompanied by many other 'normal' Dwarves.


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