[Bêthberry]

Orcs are not the only enemies in LotR. There is one small, very brief use of former enemies (victims?)--"noble foe"--which comes close to this sense of honourable opponent: Ghân-buri-Ghân and the Woses.

As a condition of aiding the battle against the orcs, Ghân-buri-Ghân asks the Rohirrim not to hunt the Wild Men any more as if they were beasts. Certainly the depiction of their language suggests that these people lack the beauty and eloquence (and hence, purity and goodness, as these qualities are most often related in Tolkien) of the elves and Men. Yet there is granted to the Woses a grudging respect because of the aid they deliver in the battle against the Dark Side.

The attitude towards the Woses' language skips along the edge of patronising linguistic patronage superiority--one could almost see similarities between Tolkien's attitude and that most often ascribed to Kipling in his linguistic depictions--but it is rather intriguing that Tolkien works this situation into the larger battle scheme. The Woses are a very small aside but this incident seems to reflect Tolkien's way of making his depiction more complex and less absolute than the larger "big picture" of the battle suggests. It's as if he cedes that the "noble and honourable" side have their own errors, faults and failings while granting to those who have suffered under the terror of Men the dignity and worth and valour which Men and elves are supposed to uphold.