Tolkien's final First Age timeline

[Arvegil145]

Originally Posted by Huinesoron

EDIT: I went through and calculated it out how the Final Timeline would look with faster aging, and to my amazement it actually... fits together?



Crucially, the two methods of calculating Finrod & Turgon's birth give the same value. Only one event moves around, and I don't see "Finarfin was married only after Fingon was born" as a crucial point in Tolkien's mind.

The ages given by the AAm timeline / aging system look very deliberate: both Finarfin and Turgon were begotten almost exactly when their older siblings reached full growth (meaning that blisteringly short gap between Feanor and Fingolfin hits even harder). I would actually quite like to use this.

But... is it too much? Am I mind-reading Tolkien too far? Is this really justified as "simple calculations" when I'm moving entire blocks of the timeline around?

hS

Some issues I have (not sure if they're actual issues, or just me feeling incredulous):

1) it says in the table that Feanor was only 2 (regular) years old when Miriel died, but can't be the case according to 'Shibboleth' (or even the AAm)

2) why is the time difference between the begetting of Finrod and Finarfin & Earwen's marriage 105 years, while the time difference between the begetting of Fingolfin and Finwe & Indis' marriage is less than 30 years - besides, Findis is said to have been Fingolfin's older sister, which makes this matter even worse! I think this needs some consultation from the text on 'Finwe and Miriel' in MR

3) I still think maybe the best course is to simply keep the relative spacing between the dates in AAm (unless otherwise stated)

4) (unrelated to the above) - I've been re-reading PoME, and have my doubts about the whole 'Sauron corrupting Men' business...Anyway, in both Of Dwarves and Men and in a note to the Problem of Ros, it is Melkor who is consistently mentioned as the instigator of the original Fall of Men - for example:

The Atani and their kin were the descendants of peoples who in the Dark Ages had resisted Morgoth or had renounced him, and had wandered ever westward from their homes far away in the East seeking the Great Sea...

- PoME, 'Of Dwarves and Men', p. 306

and

When their vanguards at last reached Beleriand and the Western Shores they were dismayed. For they could go no further, but they had not found peace, only lands engaged in war with Morgoth himself, who had fled back to Middle-earth. "Through ages forgotten," they said, "we have wandered, seeking to escape from the Dominions of the Dark Lord and his Shadow, only to find him here before us."

- PoME, 'Of Dwarves and Men', p. 306

+

Their tongues had already diverged, with the swiftness of the speeches of Men in the 'Unwritten Days', and continued to do so; though they remained friends of acknowledged kinship, bound by their hatred and fear of the Dark Lord (Morgoth), against whom they had rebelled.

- PoME, 'The Problem of Ros', note 13, p. 373


All these things considered, I think we should push back the Awaking of Men even earlier - maybe we should adopt the (of course) modified and adjusted date of VY 1075 from VI.(Text A)?

Then again, though, one could always interpret the above quotes as being done in the name of Melkor/Morgoth and not literally by him in person. I'm not sure - you know the NoME texts much better than I do.


P.S. Maybe you could also add this in your timeline:

The Elvish loremasters were of opinion that both languages [Hadorian and Beorian] were descended from one that had diverged (owing to some division of the people who had spoken it) in the course of, maybe, a thousand years of the slower change in the First Age. Though the time might well have been less, and change quickened by a mingling of peoples; for the language of Hador was apparently less changed and more uniform in style, whereas the language of Beor contained many elements that were alien in character. This contrast in speech was probably connected with the observable physical differences between the two peoples.

- PoME, 'Of Dwarves and Men', p. 308

+ this quote (which I gave an excerpt of above)

It was not until they had developed a craft of boat-building that the people afterwards known as the Folk of Hador discovered that a part of their host from whom they had become separated had reached the same sea before them, and dwelt at the feet of the high hills to the south-west, whereas they [the Folk of Hador] lived in the north-east, in the woods that there came near to the shores. They were thus some two hundred miles apart, going by water; and they did not often meet and exchange tidings. Their tongues had already diverged, with the swiftness of the speeches of Men in the 'Unwritten Days', and continued to do so; though they remained friends of acknowledged kinship, bound by their hatred and fear of the Dark Lord (Morgoth), against whom they had rebelled. Nonetheless they did not know that the Lesser Folk had fled from the threat of the Servants of the Dark and gone on westward, while they had lain hidden in their woods, and so under their leader Beor reached Beleriand at last many years before they did.

- PoME, note 13 to The Problem of Ros, p. 373


By the way, does the last sentence imply that Beor was living by the Sea of Rhun at some point in his life, or am I misinterpreting the quote?




P.S. Do you have any plans of forming an ultimate timeline?