Tolkien's final First Age timeline

[Huinesoron]

Originally Posted by Arvegil145

I'm aware that the table dates from the end of 1959, but I could've sworn that there's another place which dates the Elmo-Galadhon-Celeborn family tree to the late '60s, but my brain isn't cooperating...

So would I, but I can't find any reference to it. I am a bit worried by the whole "Celeborn of Alqualonde" story; my gut feeling is that it's later and therefore I should be using it, but it's so weird that I don't want to. The most salvagable version of it would be "Celeborn grandson of Elmo of Alqualonde", but I'm not sure Tolkien ever considered that (and what do we do about Nimloth???).

Originally Posted by Arvegil145

In regards to the Ingwe/Ilwen gap, perhaps you're right, but I still lean towards the more conservative side of just keeping the gap as written, and keep speculation to a minimum. Not that it really matters that much, but since we're splitting hairs...

Perhaps you're right. The discussion on marriage ages appears to be from an earlier text, and at age 108 Ingwe would be 24 and a quarter, so it doesn't work anyway. I'll switch it back.

Originally Posted by Arvegil145

And yeah, BTW, you referred to Idril as Ingwe's granddaughter

I was trying to refer to Indis as Ilion's granddaughter. Look, I learnt the names of the Finweans, I didn't know there were gonna be a bunch of I-names to pick up as well!

Originally Posted by Arvegil145

If I were you, I would just anchor all the YT Beleriand dates to the YT 1133, which Tolkien did in regards to Feanor's conception and birth in the NoME.

Or even better, I would just put the AAm and GA YT side by side in a spreadsheet (including your calculated dates) and make that the basis.

The latter falls down because I've moved the Finwean dates and the Valinorean History dates relative to each other. The former falls down because we specifically have an explanation for what Luthien's birthday means. Sooo instead, spreadsheets!



This version moves the fall of Utumno to after the March, as VI.B strongly implies should be the case. We lose the corruption of Men by Sauron (or at least any specific date for it), but get to retain the devastation of Beleriand in the fall of Angband as a justification for why the Valar wanted the Elves well out of the way. Melkor has ample time to sneak around corrupting Men while the Valar are staring at his gates, in line with the later comments you mentioned earlier.

I've largely followed the GA spacing after that. One date I'm not sure of is 1330 for Orcs entering Beleriand: NoME 1.XXII makes this 1320, but I think GA postdates that. It's hard to tell, but the notes to GA mention a 1320 date on the (earlier) AAm proper.

I think this works; as with all of these, the "time of peace" ends up being compressed, but the relative dating hangs together.

hS