12 Of the Flight of the Noldor

[Arvegil145]

As loathe as I am to admit it, I think Elenwe (and her death) have to go.

This comes from 'Maeglin' (c. 1970) in The War of the Jewels (§12, p. 323):

'Turgon ... had no heir; for Elenwë his wife perished in the crossing of the Helcaraxë': here A has 'Turgon ... had no heir: for his wife, Alairë, was of the Vanyar and would not forsake Valinor'. On the page of jottings that concludes the abandoned later 'Tale of Tuor' (see Unfinished Tales p. 56) a note which I did not include says that 'Alairë remained in Aman'.

So, here we have Alaire as the wife of Turgon and the mother of Idril, and she stays in Aman.

However, the text B(ii) changes 'Alairë' to 'Anairë' (confusingly enough):

The typescript B as typed has 'Alairë', but on both A and B(ii), not on B(i), my father corrected (presumptively in 1970) the name to 'Anairë'.

Thus, it would seem that we should change 'Elenwe' to 'Anaire', but given the fact that there's no alternative name for the wife of Fingolfin (also called Anaire), I think we are justified in keeping 'Alaire' instead.


P.S. Keep in my mind though, some of the changes in general that Tolkien made to the Elven family trees and even the most basic staples of the mythology from 1970 onward were wild - and I have my reservations about keeping them.