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In the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, Glorfindel is an Elf, a Noldo who appears in the tales of Middle-earth. The character and his name (Glor + findel "golden-haired") are among the oldest in the legendarium, going back to the original version of the Fall of Gondolin of 1916-17. Glorfindel was blond, as his very name says. Among the Noldor, blond hair was generally only found among the descendants of Indis the Vanya, the second wife of their High King Finwë — namely in the Golden House of Finarfin, his third son, which included Galadriel. Therefore Glorfindel may have been a member of the royal house which somehow Tolkien never accounted for, related through maybe Irimë (daughter of Finwë and Indis), Fingolfin's wife Anairë, Turgon's wife Elenwë, or a combination. Otherwise, somewhere in his family line there is Vanyarin blood, such as through his mother (which would account for his being blond and still allow him to be counted among the Noldor). Both the Vanyar and Noldor kindreds lived in the fair city Tirion upon the hill of Túna in Valinor for a time, and in other parts of the royal family tree it has been shown that other Vanyar married in, so it is conceivable that the two sects mingled in more than just the royal line.
Hero of the First Age Glorfindel first comes into the legendarium during the Fall of Gondolin and is especially prominent in the account of the escape of Tuor, Idril, Eärendil and many others from the destruction of that city in the First Age. He is Lord of the House of the Golden Flower, known as one of King Turgon's chief lieutenants and one of the most beloved Elves in all Gondolin. When Morgoth's forces first invade his home, Glorfindel leads his men out to flank the enemy and cut through their ranks. When they themselves are flanked, his men suffer heavy losses. Sending for help, Turgon orders Talagand to take the House of the Harp and assist Glorfindel. Talagand, being in allegiance with Maeglin the Traitor, does not relay the message and instead directs his men to the other side of the city and to safety. Thus Glorfindel has few men left of his house when he meets up with the princess, her husband, and their half-elven child. The survivors escape through the Encircling Mountains above Gondolin, and make it to the Eagles' Cleft. When the escapees are ambushed by a company of Orcs led by a terrible Balrog, Glorfindel leaps at the demon with all his might and battles him atop a rocky pinnacle. The duel rages as the rest can only watch in horror. Fiercely defending the women and children who are being led out of the hills, Glorfindel drives the Balrog back, hewing off its whip-wielding arm at the elbow. Just when it seems the struggle is about to be won, the beast grabs Glorfindel's golden hair from under his helm, and both fall off the peak. As they plummet, Glorfindel strikes a final blow by stabbing the demon in its stomach with a knife. The great Eagles see what is happening now in the Cleft near their eyries and come to the aid of their Elven friends, swooping down on the Orcs and making it possible for the refugees to escape. Glorfindel's body is recovered from the crags by none other than Thorondor, Lord of Eagles himself, and the Elves lay the lord to rest in a mound of stones, where afterwards green grass and yellow Elanor flowers appear. Ever after, when a battle of surpassing skill and courage was witnessed, Elves were heard to say "Ai! 'Tis Glorfindel and the Balrog!" in remembrance of his heroism. Resurrection and return Re-embodied in Valinor, Glorfindel spends hundreds of years there and finally wishes to return to Middle-earth. He is granted permission by the Valar for his self-sacrifice in order to keep Eärendil alive and for helping to fullfill the designs of the Powers. Glorfindel departs the Undying Lands sometime in the middle of the Second Age (circa 1600, when Barad-dûr was completed and Sauron forged the One Ring, and while Númenor was still friendly with the Elves under Tar-Minastir) and sails back by Númenórean ship. The Valar hope that, with the powers he has gained through his self-sacrifice, re-embodiment, and divine tutelage, he can help Gil-galad and Elrond oppose the new Dark Lord. Only afterwards do the Valar realize that it is necessary to send their own kind in the guise of wizards to repel this threat (although some evidence exists that Glorfindel and the Blue Wizards may have come to Middle-earth together, see below). Though none of this was told within the published narratives, it appears in essay form in his posthumous works (cf. The Peoples of Middle-earth, ed. Christopher Tolkien). Hero of the Third Age Glorfindel reappears during the Third Age, leading the Elvish forces of Rivendell, the Grey Havens, and Lothlórien at the Battle of Fornost. There he fights alongside Eärnur, leading the Gondorian troops and the remnants of the Arnorians. When the Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgûl rides out to defend his ruling seat at the captured Fornost, his presence spooks Eärnur's horse and sends the prince backwards, and the Lord of the Nazgûl mocks him for this. Glorfindel returns the favour by confronting the Witch-king, who sees the mighty Elf-lord and flees into the night. Eärnur wishes to pursue the Morgul Lord, but Glorfindel bids him not go after the enemy and speaks his prophecy. Later he is sent by Elrond to help Frodo reach Rivendell, as told in The Fellowship of the Ring. He sets Frodo on his horse, Asfaloth, and Frodo rides ahead to the other side of the Ford of Bruinen, where he defies his Nazgûl pursuers. He is nearly captured, but Glorfindel, Strider and the other hobbits come up from behind and drive the Black Riders into the water, where they are swept away by a wave of water resembling charging horses (an enchantment of Elrond and Gandalf's). Strider and the hobbits bear torches, but Glorfindel reveals himself as a mighty Elf-lord terrible in his wrath; Frodo sees him as a shining figure. Later, when Frodo asks about the safety of Imladris from Sauron's forces, Gandalf explains: In Rivendell there live still some of his chief foes: the Elven-wise, lords of the Eldar from beyond the furthest seas. They do not fear the Ringwraiths, for those who have dwelt in the Blessed Realm live at once in both worlds, and against both the Seen and the Unseen they have great power.Gandalf points to Glorfindel as one of these, saying he is "one of the mighty of the Firstborn," "an Elf-lord of a house of princes." While enjoying the hospitality of the Elves, Frodo enters the Hall of Fire and finds that his Wizard friend spoke true: Frodo looked at them in wonder, for he had never before seen Elrond, of whom so many tales spoke; and as they sat upon his right hand and his left, Glorfindel, and even Gandalf, whom he thought he knew so well, were revealed as lords of dignity and power... Glorfindel was tall and straight; his hair was of shining gold, his face fair and young and fearless and full of joy; his eyes were bright and keen, and his voice like music; on his brow sat wisdom, and in his hand was strength. Original plans In the very first draft of the Council of Elrond, there was a crucial difference in the members of the Fellowship. The Nine Walkers were to be comprised of Frodo, Gandalf, Trotter (later Strider/Aragorn), Glorfindel, Durin son of Balin (who became Gimli son of Glóin), Sam, Merry, and earlier versions of Pippin and Fatty Bolger. Boromir and Legolas did not come in till much later (cf. The Return of the Shadow, ed. Christopher Tolkien). Legolas replaced the Elf-lord as the representation of the Elven people in later drafts, but this did not take away from the power that Tolkien attributed to Glorfindel. He sits in honour next to Elrond and Gandalf in the Hall of Fire in Rivendell, and is one of the few Elves of Imladris who was known to be strong enough to stand against the Ringwraiths and be sent out to guide Frodo to safety from them. Glorfindel is the strongest of these few, as he is sent in the direction that the Nazgûl are most likely to be in, and even holds the Bridge of Mitheithel against some of the Nazgûl single-handedly. Lord Glorfindel is noted for his great power and strength, so much so that Gandalf references him in relation to the difficulty of the task of destroying the Ring, though in a rather unusual way. When Elrond seeks to fill the last two spots in the Fellowship with folk of his own house, Gandalf supports Merry Brandybuck and Pippin Took by saying: I think, Elrond, that in this matter it would be well to trust rather to their friendship than to great wisdom. Even if you chose for us an elf-lord, such as Glorfindel, he could not storm the Dark Tower, nor open the road to the Fire by the power that is in him. (Fellowship of the Ring) Glorfindels prophecy Glorfindel was the one who made the prophecy about the Witch-king, stating that "Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man will he fall." Made at the Battle of Fornost in the year 1975 of the Third Age, it was fulfilled in the year 3019, when Meriadoc Brandybuck (a Hobbit) helped Éowyn (a woman) kill the Morgul Lord at the Battle of Pelennor Fields. Merry was male, but he was a Hobbit (though Tolkien does say that Hobbits were strictly a sub-group of Men rather than a distinct species or race), and Éowyn is a woman, not a man. Prior to this event, the prophecy had been interpreted to mean mankind in general, not a man in the sense of individual. And the two became one It is highly unusual (though not impossible) for an Elf to return from the Halls of Mandos to Middle-earth, and in the case of Glorfindel it seems to possibly have been unintentional. In Return of the Shadow, Christopher Tolkien states that some time after the publication of The Lord of the Rings, his father "gave a great deal of thought to the matter of Glorfindel" (p. 214), and decided that it was a "somewhat random use" of a name from The Silmarillion that would probably have been changed, had it been noticed sooner. Tolkien had a well-documented (and confusing) habit of inventing and changing character names while writing drafts, so this is not too surprising. On the other hand, early notes for the Council of Elrond state "Glorfindel tells of his ancestry in Gondolin", indicating that the character was early on already intended to be the same elf. This may be reconciled by the fact that Tolkien was known for being unorganized, misplacing his notes and having to work from memory alone on several occasions. Nevertheless, seeing that the reintroduction of the name had been made, and that it would require some explanation, Tolkien devised a solution. He would, at the end of his life, devote his last writings to the issue of Glorfindel and some related topics, eventually rectifying the loose-ends as included in the synopsis above, as detailed in The Peoples of Middle-earth. Glorfindel was sent back to Middle-earth by the Valar during the Second Age as a kind of predecessor to the Istari, or in a different version, together with the Blue Wizards. At one point he was even considered as a possibility for the identity of one of them, though this was immediately rejected since the Eldar were not initially conceived as possibilities for the Wizards, and he had come to the conclusion that they were only Maiar. Tolkien developed the Blue Wizards in a story told in Unfinished Tales, where he identifies them as Maiar of Oromë and names them Alatar/Morinehtar and Pallando/Roméstamó. Conceivably the problem of Glorfindel's resurrection could easily have been resolved by changing the name of Glorfindel of Gondolin to another name, but Tolkien was unwilling to do this, as he now associated the name with the character. In adaptations Glorfindel is not prominently featured in film versions of The Lord of the Rings. In Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated version, his role and lines are given to Legolas, who is apparently not a Wood-elf here. In Peter Jackson's live-action The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), his role is given to Arwen, who even takes Frodo herself to the Ford and summons the horses of water through an incantation, which is not present in the book. However, in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003), there are some blond Elf background extras present at Aragorn's coronation at Minas Tirith. One of them is identified in promotional material as Glorfindel; he is played by Jarl Benzon *. Other media Glorfindel, as depicted by Benzon, appears in the flesh in The Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game, based on the Jackson films. He also is a playable hero unit in the real-time strategy game, The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II, also based on the Jackson films, where his hair is silver (as opposed to his eponymous colour blond) (see ). The game explains Arwen's pre-empting of Glorfindel's role in the Jackson films by having him away fighting in the northern front of the War of the Ring at the time — namely, in the Misty Mountains. Glorfindel and Glóin fight Drogoth the Dragon King (an invented character) and his forces. In the ensuing battles, he gets scorched in the leg, and only he and the Dwarf survive. | ||||||||
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