Tom’s Stronger Songs and a Few Naked Hobbits (Day 26)

When it seemed darkest, our hobbits were rescued by Tom Bombadil! After a costume change and a bite to eat, they’re off again, but this time Tom is coming with them.

Camera: Ansco Color Clipper
Film: FujiChrome 400D (expired 08/1994) (xpro as C-41)

Thoughts on the Passage – Book I, Chapter 8 (p142 – 146, 50th Anniv. Ed.)
We learn a few new things about Tom Bombadil in this passage. For one, Tom Bombadil is apparently an incredibly powerful being. When Frodo calls upon Tom, he answers, singing that “None has ever caught him yet, for Tom, he is the master: His songs are strong songs, and his feet are faster.”

Tom then enters the barrow where our hobbits are trapped and sings to the Barrow-wight. He tells him to vanish and shrivel and wail away into the land beyond the mountains and to never come here again. But that is not all: “Lost and forgotten be, darker than the darkness, Where gates stand for ever shut, till the world is mended.”

Tom didn’t just banish them from his land, and he didn’t just send them back to Angmar in the north. He banished them to he darkness, the Timeless Void, where Melkor was cast. So apparently Tom Bombadil is so powerful that he can do this. That’s incredibly intense. But why didn’t he do it before? Was he afraid that Sauron would notice? That the Witch-king would invade?

The idea that Tom’s songs are stronger songs is obvious here – his song beat out the Barrow-wight’s song that enchanted Frodo and the others. But it also brings to mind Finrod and Sauron’s battle fought only by singing.

When the hobbits emerge from the tomb, they’re dressed in thin white rags, wearing crowns and trinkets. The wights had dressed them so, probably because this is how the dead were prepared for burial. Anyway, Tom tells them to nude up while he finds their ponies. “Cast off these cold rags! Run naked on the grass, while Tome goes a-hunting!”

Before too horribly long, he returns and has named the five ponies: Sharp-ears, Wise-nose, Swish-tail, Bumpkin, and White-socks. There is a sixth, Fatty Lumpkin, who turns out to be Tom’s. He explains as they’re getting dressed that when they visited Tom’s house, their ponies became friends with Mr. Lumpkin. When they were scared at the barrows, they ran to him.

After a small meal, they’re ready to leave, and Tom decides to accompany them to the border of his land. He seems to have known he would have to do this, as when he arrived, he brought food already prepared. Here is also where the hobbits received swords. Actually, they were Numenorian (Westernesse) knives taken from the tombs. This is a callback to The Hobbit, but it’s also something we’ll have to remember. The knives were made by the same people who were defeated by the Witch-king, who will be, in turn, defeated by one of the knives.

Right before the start, Tom waxes over the remaining descendants of the makers of these knives. “Yet still some go wandering, sons of forgotten kings walking in loneliness, guarding from evil things folk that are heedless.” The hobbits had no idea what he was talking about, but Tom apparently gave them a vision of a line of Men, the last one with a star on his brow.

The one with the star is Aragorn. This tradition was started on Numenor, as explained in one of my favorite stories from Unfinished Tales: “The Mariner’s Wife.” I won’t get into that long and strange story, but basically, she was a Queen of Numenor and rather than a crown or a necklace, she wanted a jewel to be placed in a fitting upon her forehead. From that time on, it became the tradition, and she was known as the “Lady of the Star Brow.” Though she was queen, she was not the ruling queen, being married to the king. Her daughter, however, was the first Ruling Queen of Numenor.

At any rate, though Tom seems aloof from everything, and is in many ways, he’s not completely isolationist. He apparently knew of Aragorn, just as he knew of the history of The Shire, and just as he knew of the Prancing Pony in Bree. He doesn’t get around and seems to never leave his land (anymore?) but he still appears to be in the loop. He’ll have more to share with the hobbits before his borders are reached.

About the Photo
This is a photo of a Native American burial mound in Moundsville, West Virginia. The building is not a tomb, of course, but I think an old visitors center. Though now the mound is sort of revered in this town, that wasn’t always the case. It’s been abused and desecrated. In the early 1900s, there was a bar (for drinking) built on top of it. It’s such a shame we have to ruin so many things with thoughtlessness.

Thoughts on the Exercising
It’s becoming routine. I don’t know if I should push myself or just revel in the normality of this. My time is getting better, so maybe I should just focus upon that. But there will come a time when I’ll have to do more. That might effect the project (or I might simply not care and continue doing five-ish miles per day). We shall see.

• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 120
  • 15 miles to Bree
  • 94 miles to Weathertop
  • 340 miles to Rivendell
  • 1,659 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Moving north toward the East Road (map)

Who Are These Wights on the Barrow-downs (Day 25)

As Frodo and company continue on their way through the Barrow-downs, they believe they see the East Road not too far off. After stopping to rest by a standing stone, they fall asleep. When they awaken, the fog has rolled in and soon they become separated. All have been captured by the Barrow-wights!

Camera: Mamiya C3
Film: Kodak Ektachrome 64 (EPR) (expired 1989 – xpro as C-41)

Thoughts on the Passage – Book I, Chapter 9 (p137-142, 50th Anniv. Ed.)
No matter how strange Tom Bombadil is, I think the Barrow-wights outclass him. But they don’t come upon our hobbits without warning. Before leaving Bombadil’s house, they are cautioned by Tom that when crossing the Barrow-downs, not to stop.

Just to make sure we’re all on the same page here, “barrows” means gravesites, specifically, burial mounds, and “wights” simply means people. It was probably because of Tolkien that “wight” came to be widely known as someone who is undead. But Tolkien was not the first person to use “Barrow-wight” to mean grave-dweller. That honor goes to Andrew Lang in 1891, who described “Barrowwights” as “ghosts that were sentinels over the gold.”

Rather than wildly speculating over their nature, let’s hit the books. The Barrow-wights are first mentioned in the poem “Adventures of Tom Bombadil,” complete with the hill and ring of stone. They threaten Tom, entering his house: “He’s got loose to-night: under the earth he’ll take you/Poor Tom Bombadil, pale and cold he’ll make you!” Tom, of course, casts off the wights with his song.

When Tom warns our hobbits of the wights, he begins by telling them a bit about the green mounds and standing stones. These are fairly common burial ground, really. At least upon first glance. For a further description, there’s Appendix A. Evil spirits from Angmar and Rhudaur entered the deserted mounds, claiming them as their own. If “Angmar” rings a bell, it might be because that’s the residing place of the Witch-king of Angmar, the head Nazgul. Rhudaur was an adjacent kingdom that fell to the Witch-king.

So the people buried in the tombs originally, were not the Barrow-wights. According to the “Tale of Years” (Appendix B), he evil spirits came into them around 1636 of the Third Age (it’s now 3018 of the Third Age), during the Great Plague. The tombs themselves date to much earlier, being built in the First Age “by the forefathers of the Edain (ancestors of the Numanorians / Dunedain), before they crossed the Blue Mountains into Beleriand.” The treasures found within the tombs probably belonged to these kings and queens.

How these evil spirits came to inhabit the burial mounds is another story, recounted in “The Hunt for the Ring” in Unfinished Tales. According to one of the versions, the Witch-king had sent the evil spirits there himself.

In another version, things get more complicated (but that’s why we read Tolkien, no?). The current day in the story is September 28. Six days earlier, the Rangers (sans Stryder) were guarding Sarn Ford. They’re driven away by the Black Riders. They pursue the Rangers, killing some and then making camp near the Barrow-downs. This party included the Witch-king, who visited the Barrow-downs, staying there until late on the 27th (when Frodo and company were with Tom Bombadil).

“This proves a main error,” writes Tolkien in a manuscript, “though in fact it was nearly successful, since the Barrowwights are roused, and all things of evil spirit hostile to Elves and Men are on the watch with malice in the Old Forest and on the Barrowdowns.” That would explain why the Barrow-wight who captured Frodo said, “I am waiting for you.”

This also explains why the Old Forest was even creepier than it had been – the Witch-king was around and stirring up everything that could keep watch for anything not evil. This was fairly clever, as it linked not just the Barrow-wights to Sauron, but the Old Forest as well.

What Tolkien never seems to lay down is the origin of these evil spirits. Any ideas?

About the Photo
The way the standing stones are described, they sound like obelisks. I’ve got quite a few photos of those. This one in particular is in Montana and marks the nearby campground of Lewis & Clark, called Camp Disappointment.

Thoughts on the Exercising
I really pushed it today. I was watching a Kevin Smith show, and that always motivates you to exercise. Anyway, another five miles and I’m thrilled and feel great. Sweaty though. I guess I worked off the Regular Saturday Morning Mighty-Os (Seattle’s own vegan doughnuts!).

• Miles today: 5
• Miles thus far: 115
  • 20 miles to Bree
  • 99 miles to Weathertop
  • 345 miles to Rivendell
  • 1,664 miles to Mt. Doom

Today’s stopping place: Inside the tomb of the Barrow-wight! (map)