An interesting connection just occured to me regarding Frodo's cry as he holds up the Star-glass:
Quote:
Frodo gazed in wonder at this marvellous gift that he had so long carried, not guessing its full worth and potency. Seldom had he remembered it on the road, until they came to Morgul Vale, and never had he used it for fear of its revealing light. Aiya Earendil Elenion Ancalima! he cried, and knew not what he had spoken; for it seemed that another voice spoke through his, clear, untroubled by the foul air of the pit.
But other potencies there are in Middle-earth, powers of night, and they are old and strong. And She that walked in the darkness had heard the Elves cry that cry far back in the deeps of time, and she had not heeded it, and it did not daunt her now.
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In Letter 297 Tolkien explains:
Quote:
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Before 1914 I wrote a 'poem' on Earendil who launched his ship like a bright spark from the Havens of the Sun. I adopted him into my mythology, in which he became a prime figure as a mariner, & eventually as a herald star, a sign of hope to men. Aiya Earendil Elenion Ancalima 'Hail Earendil brightest of stars' is derived at long remove from Eala Earendel engla beorhtast but the name could not be adopted just like that: it had to be accomodated to the Elvish linguistic situation...
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In other words it is the Elvish 'equivalent' of a line from the Anglo-saxon poem that was the 'spark' of the whole Legendarium, the
Crist of Cynewulf, that Frodo utters in the darkness of Shelob's Lair! I find this fascinating. Its also interesting that Tolkien tells us that the Elves had cried that cry far back in the deeps of time. So in other words, Tolkien is saying that the
origin of those words was not Cynewulf, but the
Elves! Those words, it seems, had been passed down through the ages, starting out as an Elvish invocation of Light in the darkness & ending up in a poem about Christ.
Frodo speaks the words that would, millenia later & in another language, inspire Tolkien himself to 'rediscover' England's lost mythology! I don't know if this was another 'consciously so in the revision' moment, but certainly the connection between the 'light' which sprang into being in Tolkien's mind at his discovery of those words & the Light which sprang from the Starglass in Frodo's hand is both interesting &, to me, quite moving.