THE CONCLUSION OF THE SKETCH OF THE MYTHOLOGY
At Sirion’s mouth Elwing daughter of Dior dwelt, and received the survivors of Gondolin. These become a seafaring folk, building many boats and living far out on the delta, whither the Orcs dare not come.
Ylmir [Ulmo] reproaches the Valar, and bids them rescue the remnants of the Noldoli and the Silmarils in which alone now lives the light of the old days of bliss when the Trees were shining.
The sons of the Valar led by Fionwë Tulkas’ son lead forth a host, in which all the Quendi march, but remembering Swanhaven few of the Teleri go with them. Côr is deserted.
Tuor growing old cannot forbear the call of the sea, and builds Eärámë and sails West with Idril and is heard of no more. Eärendel weds Elwing. The call of the sea is born also in him. He builds Wingelot and wishes to sail in search of his father. Here follow the marvellous adventures of Wingelot in the seas and isles, and of how Eärendel slew Ungoliant in the South. He returned home and found the Waters of Sirion desolate. The sons of Fëanor learning of the dwelling of Elwing and the Nauglafring [on which was set the Silmaril of Beren] had come down on the people of Gondolin. In a battle all the sons of Fëanor save Maidros and Maglor were slain, but the last folk of Gondolin were destroyed or forced to go away and join the people of Maidros. Maglor sat and sang by the sea in repentance. Elwing cast the Nauglafring into the sea and leapt after it, but was changed into a white sea-bird by Ylmir, and flew to seek Eärendel, seeking about all the shores of the world.
Their son Elrond who is part mortal and part elven, a child, was saved however by Maidros. When later the Elves return to the West, bound by his mortal half he elects to stay on earth …
Eärendel learning of these things from Bronweg, who dwelt in a hut, a solitary, at the mouth of Sirion, is overcome with sorrow. With Bronweg he sets sail in Wingelot once more in search of Elwing and of Valinor.
He comes to the magic isles, and to the Lonely Isle, and at last to the Bay of Faërie. He climbs the hill of Kôr, and walks in the deserted ways of Tûn, and his raiment becomes encrusted with the dust of diamonds and of jewels. He dares not go further into Valinor. He builds a tower on an isle in the northern seas, to which all the seabirds of the world repair. He sails by the aid of their wings even over the airs in search of Elwing, but is scorched by the Sun and hunted from the sky by the Moon, and for a long while he wanders the sky as a fugitive star.
The march of Fionwë into the North is then told, and of the Terrible or Last Battle. The Balrogs are all destroyed, and the Orcs destroyed or scattered. Morgoth himself makes a last sally with all his dragons; but they are destroyed, all save two which escape, by the sons of the Valar, and Morgoth is overthrown and bound by the chain Angainor, and his iron crown is made into a collar for his neck. The two Silmarils are rescued. The Northern and Western parts of the world are rent and broken in the struggle, and the fashion of their lands altered.
The Gods and Elves release Men from Hithlum, and march through the lands summoning the remnants of the Gnomes and Ilkorins to join them. All do so except the people of Maidros. Maidros prepares to perform his oath, though now at last weighed down by sorrow because of it. He sends to Fionwë reminding him of the oath and begging for the Silmarils. Fionwë replies that he has lost his right to them because of the evil deeds of Fëanor, and of the slaying of Dior, and of the plundering of Sirion. He must submit, and come back to Valinor; in Valinor only and at the judgement of the Gods shall they be handed over …
On the last march Maglor says to Maidros that there are two sons of Fëanor left, and two Silmarils; one is his. He steals it, and flies, but it burns him so that he knows he no longer has a right to it. He wanders in pain over the earth and casts it into a fiery pit. One Silmaril is now in the sea, and one in the earth. Maglor sings now ever in sorrow by the sea.
The judgement of the Gods takes place. The earth is to be for Men, and the Elves who do not set sail for the Lonely Isle or Valinor shall slowly fade and fail. For a while the last dragons and Orcs shall grieve the earth, but in the end all shall perish by the valour of Men.
Morgoth is thrust through the Door of Night into the outer dark beyond the Walls of the World, and a guard set for ever on that Door. The lies that he sowed in the hearts of Men and Elves do not die and cannot all be slain by the Gods, but live on and bring much evil even to this day. Some say also that secretly Morgoth or his black shadow and spirit in spite of the Valar creeps back over the Walls of the World in the North and East and visits the world, others that this is Thû his great chief who escaped the Last Battle and dwells still in dark places, and perverts Men to his dreadful worship. When the world is much older, and the Gods weary, Morgoth will come back through the Door, and the last battle of all will be fought. Fionwë will fight Morgoth on the plain of Valinor, and the spirit of Túrin shall be beside him; it shall be Túrin who with his black sword will slay Morgoth, and thus the children of Húrin shall be avenged.
In those days the Silmarils shall be recovered from sea and earth and air, and Maidros shall break them and Palúrien with their fire rekindle the Two Trees, and the great light shall come forth again, and the Mountains of Valinor shall be levelled so that it goes out over the world, and Gods and Elves shall grow young again, and all their dead awake. But of Men in that Day the prophecy speaks not.
And thus it was that the last Silmaril came into the air. The Gods adjudged the last Silmaril to Eärendel – ‘until many things shall come to pass’ – because of the deeds of the sons of Fëanor. Maidros is sent to Eärendel and with the aid of the Silmaril Elwing is found and restored. Eärendel’s boat is drawn over Valinor to the Outer Seas, and Eärendel launches it into the outer darkness high above Sun and Moon. There he sails with the Silmaril upon his brow and Elwing at his side, the brightest of all stars, keeping watch upon Morgoth and the Door of Night. So he shall sail until he sees the last battle gathering upon the plains of Valinor. Then he will descend.
And this is the last end of the tales of the days before the days, in the Northern regions of the Western world.
It would take this story very much too far afield to enter into any general discussion of this most complex and obscure part of the history of the ‘First Age’: its end. I will only mention a few aspects of the narrative in the Sketch of the Mythology given here. What little writing on the subject that survives from the earliest period of my father’s work had very largely been abandoned, and the account in the Sketch is effectively the first witness to wholly new features, among which is the emergence of the fate of the Silmarils as a central element in the story of the final war. This is borne out by a question that my father asked himself in a very early, isolated note: ‘What became of the Silmarils after the capture of Melko?’ (Indeed, it may well be said that the very existence of the Silmarils was of far less radical significance in the original conception of the mythology than it was to become.)
In the account in the Sketch Maglor says to Maidros (p.244) that ‘there are two sons of Fëanor left, and two Silmarils; one is his’. The third is lost, because it has been told in the Sketch (p.243) that ‘Elwing cast the Nauglafring into the sea and leapt after it’. That was the Silmaril of Beren and Lúthien. When Maglor cast into a fiery pit the Silmaril from the Iron Crown that he had stolen from the keeping of Fionwë ‘one Silmaril was now in the sea and one in the earth’ (pp.244–5). The third was the other from the Iron Crown; and it was this that the Gods adjudged to Eärendel, who wearing it upon his brow ‘launched it into the outer darkness high above Sun and Moon’.
That it was the Silmaril wrested by Beren and Lúthien from Morgoth in Angband that Eärendel wore and became the Morning and Evening Star had not been achieved at this stage, though when achieved it seems a necessity of the myth.
It is also very striking that Eärendel Half-elven is not as yet the voice that interceded before the Valar on behalf of Men and Elves.