A Question of Loyalty

[Morwen]

Originally Posted by Eönwë

But why would Morgoth want to make his orcs weaker by making giving them "sun-pain"? It seems to me to be a side-effect of the orc-making process rather than one of the features. Or maybe being deep underground made them mutate to having low levels of melanin in their skin in order to create as much vitamin D as possible, and then when they finally got out into the sun, it was too much.

Or am I totally wrong here...?

I think that the Morgorth's first orcs may have been created before the first rising of the sun in ME. It is suggested in the published Silmarillon where the "orc from elves" theory is in play, that his first orc breeding experiments were with the Dark Elves who refused the summons to Valinor and this would be before the first ME sunrise. Treebeard, while discussing orcs with Merry and Pippin, also indicates that it was a trait of things bred in the Great Darkness that they could not abide the sun. So it would seem that at the time the first orcs were bred there was no sun and therefore resistance to sunlight was not something that was contemplated.