Beorn

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

I've had thoughts similar to the Might's connections with Radagast and his reported mastery of changes of shapes and hues, and they seem to make the most sense to me. Sometimes, though, I wonder if there is any similarity to the notion that Thorondor was a Maia who took the form of an Eagle, and from him the Great Eagles of Middle-earth descended (don't ask me to cite where in the HoME books I read this; I'm recovering from the flu, and it's a marvel my brain is functioning much at all ). If there is precedent for certain unusual but seemingly "normal" creatures in ME having this kind of origin, it's possible that Beorn had a distant ancestor descended from some Maia of Orome or Yavanna who inhabited ME during its early ages and favored the shape of a great bear, whose story we simply have never heard. This may be completely fever dreams, but it might point to a kind of explanation that Tolkien, alas, never got around to actually imagining, or writing.

That aside, I'm with the Radagast connection.

[Pitchwife]

Originally Posted by Ibrîniðilpathânezel

it's possible that Beorn had a distant ancestor descended from some Maia of Orome or Yavanna

Now, whose Maia was Radagast/Aiwendil? Wasn't he Yavanna's (as I seem to remember)?
Were the Istari required to stay celibatary? Probably yes, but how do we know that Radagast (who is described as a failure in almost every other respect) staid true to his orders?
So maybe Beorn's shape-shifting ability was not something learned from Radagast, but inherited from him? And if the fateful mating had taken place far enough back in time (say, a couple of centuries), Beorn wouldn't remember him as his ancestor, but just as a wizard he'd met once or twice upon a time...

[Gordis]

I simply loved this theory, Pitchwife! Ingenious.

It reminds me of the debate on the werewolves: there is an idea that they were all Gorthaur's children/cubs - when he assumed a wolf-form himself and showed his attentions to female wolves.

Not that I believe this to be true...

On the other hand, I don't believe that shape-shifting is simply a spell that can be learned by anyone. Remember, the Maia Sauron lost his own ability to shape-shift after the Downfall. If it were but a simple spell, he would have found it, undoubtedly. But it must have been his own inherent ability as a Maia.

We are not even expressly told that the Istari had this ability themselves. The words that Rhadagast "was a master of shapes and changes of hue" are a bit ambigous and might be part of the earlier conception (see below). Saruman surely could look like Gandalf, if he wished so, but it was more like disguise than true shape-shifting. There is no indication that Gandalf could shape-shift. In fact, I am sure he couldn't - otherwise he wouldn't need Eagles to fly. and Shadowfax to ride.

I believe that in early Tolkien's writings (Lay of Leithian, Tale of Beren and Luthien, the Hobbit, and even the beginning of LOTR), shape-shifting was considered no big deal, a rather simple thing to do. Not only Sauron and Turingwethil could shape-shift, but also Luthien and Finrod, Beren, Beorn and his people, Radagast, the nazgul (who in the drafts assumed the shape of giant vultures). But then, while Tolkien was writing the Return of the King, he greatly restricted the shape-shifting ability, leaving it maybe for only the strongest Maiar and Valar. Nazgul assuredly lost the ability to shape-shift, and I think the Istari and Sauron lost it at this point as well.

Yet as the two first volumes of LOTR were likely already in print, Tolkien failed to edit some remnants of the earlier ideas. I think the words about Radagast are among these. But the worst bug is left in TT:

Gandalf: “For he was a Nazgul, one of the Nine, who ride now upon winged steeds. […]But they have not yet been allowed to cross the River, and Saruman does not know of this new shape in which the Ringwraiths have been clad.

[The Might]

Nice find there, Gordis!

And also in LotR I cannot recall any time when the Beornings are mentioned as shapeshifters, but only as good, valiant Men with high tolls and not very fond of Dwarves, still keeping the High Pass open. Also, several times the connection to the Eotheod, the Bardings and the Woodmen is mentioned, moving thus into the direction of normal descent rather than explanations like Gandalf's in the Hobbit.

Who knows? Maybe we won't find out what Tolkien really thought of the Beornings, for as he says in letter 187:

... while many like you demand maps, others wish for geological indications rather than places; many want Elvish grammars, phonol*ogies, and specimens; some want metrics and prosodies.... Musicians want tunes, and musical notation; archaeologists want ce*ramics and metallurgy; botanists want a more accurate description of the mallorn, of elanor, niphredil, alfirin, mallos, and symbelmynë, historians want more details about the social and political structure of Gondor; general enquirers want information about the Wainriders, the Harad, Dwarvish origins, the Dead Men, the Beornings, and the missing two wizards (out of five).

And as he had said in the letter 160:

I am not now at all sure that the tendency to treat the whole thing as a kind of vast game is really good – certainly not for me who find that kind of thing only too fatally attractive. It is, I sup*pose, a tribute to the curious effect that a story has, when based on very elaborate and detailed workings, of geography, chronology, and language, that so many should clamour for sheer "information," or "lore."

He didn't necessarily set out to explain everything with a lot of details, and I believe in some other place he says that secrets and unexplainable things belong to this fantastic age his stories take place in.

But, a clear tendency towards simple men, related to other groups in the area and without any great powers, can be noticed.


As for your idea Pitchwife, it is a nice idea but somehow seems fairly unlikely especially considering Radagast's peculiar habits. He loved birds and beasts and the only thing he could maybe fall in love with was a Goldberry-like nature spirit, a spirit rather symbolising animals than plants. I just can't seem him having a romance with a simple woman of the mountains.

[Gordis]

Hmm... I thought Pitchwife was suggesting Radagast's romance with a she-bear, not a comely woman of the mountains....

[The Might]

Wait... what?
No, I thought with some woman.
Maia + Bear = Magician ?!

[Ibrîniðilpathânezel]

The possibility of the Beornings being descended of Radagast... now, that's an interesting thought. I'm still too flu muddled to want to go digging out and digging through the HoME books to find the reference, but I believe that somewhere in it is the statement that the longer the Ainur remained in a specific hroa, and the more they followed the ways of the hroa -- eating, drinking, and especially reproducing -- the more they became bound to flesh and could not easily return to their original state, or shift to another shape. That was part of Melkor's problem, and it would also appear to be part of why Melian was never the same after she left her body when Thingol died. The Istari are something of an unusual situation, since the particular bodily state in which they existed in the Third Age was imposed on them as a condition of their mission, and were real bodies, not the self-incarnate bodies a Maia would make to appear to and interact with the Eruhini. I would expect that the effects of being in that kind of hroa would not be quite the same as the effects of being in a self-incarnate fana/hroa, and thus would have different limitations. Some, we know, were quite profound, specifically designed and intended to limit their powers so that they would not be tempted to dominate and force the wills of the Children by their own might revealed. But I suppose it might be possible that Radagast/Aiwendil (who was indeed a Maia of Yavanna) had found ways to use the abilities of changing shape and hue early on in their mission, was good at it, and thus got a reputation. If he, as a shape-shifter (also early on), wandering the woods and wilds as a bear, had met a human woman with whom he had... er... relations (as a human, not as a bear), they might have had a child to whom he was able to teach the way of shape-shifting. It often seems as if Tolkien felt that when mortals and immortals had offspring, they would, unless other grace was granted, be mortal rather than immortal. Elwing was not considered an immortal Elf, nor was Earendil until they were granted the grace to choose. I don't know that there's any specific statement as to whether or not Dior and his other children would have been counted as mortal or immortal. In any case, if the son of Aiwendil and Unnamed Mortal Woman had children with anorther mortal woman, and his son or daughter did, etc. the line would eventually become rather like the Dunedain in the Third Age, longer lived than other men, with certain unusual gifts (like Aragorn's healing), but mortal Men nonetheless. A scenario like this could also explain why Radagast fell away from his mission, became enamored of Middle-earth, and apparently dwindled to the point that his heart was there, and he lost the yearning to return to Valinor. By having a child, he tied himself to that physical, limited, mortal world, and there he would stay.

It's another thought, anyway.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by The Might

Wait... what?
No, I thought with some woman.
Maia + Bear = Magician ?!

Maia+bear=werebear.
Maia+wolf=werewolf
Maia+worm=wereworm


Ibrin - great post - and quite sound reasoning.