The Truth of the Uruk-hai

[Galin]

Littlemanpoet wrote: 'Also, eating man-flesh is no distinguisher of orcishness; cannibals eat man-flesh and they're men.'

Quite true but note also the seemingly derisive remark later: 'It's orc-flesh they eat, I'll warrant'. I'm not even close to being an expert on this but I think some forms of cannibalism are based on warfare and 'eating the enemy'. In this light at least, the Uruk-hai claim that they eat Men -- they eat the 'others' (or in the Primary World the 'other tribe' who are not 'us' but foes) -- and the scoffing comment could be something like (in my opinion): 'ha, you really eat 'us' (Orcs)'.

But however one interprets this, it's only a small part of the puzzle in any case.

William Cloud Hicklin wrote: 'I would propose, as a working hypothesis, that Uruks of all types can be *trained* to tolerate the Sun, although it is still detrimental to purebreed Orcs.'

OK but are you already interpreting here that there are Uruks ('Orcs') who are hybrid? My interpretation is that Uruks and Uruk-hai are Orcs, selectively or specially bred Orcs, trained and disciplined. Uruks were bred in Mordor (with no Men involved) and later, 'many' joined Saruman.

Would Saruman's Uruks be that much different from the large Uruks in Moria, and the huge, swart chieftain? Maybe, maybe not. Many compare the Isengarders to Grishnakh and Company, or to the Orcs at Cirith Ungol later, but the huge chieftain need not be the sole example in all of Mordor of such a formidable Orc.

'In the Pelennor fields, it's interesting that from sunrise and the great Charge onwards the only effective enemies mentioned are various types of Men, until with Aragorn's arrival Imrahil drives various Southrons and "orcs that hated the sunlight;" and *men* fly before Eomer's face. The latter part of the battle, "hard fighting and long labour", again has Southrons and Easterlings as the only named enemies. It would appear as if once the Darkness breaks the Mordor-Orcs have become non-factors in the battle;* although they can function in sunlight, their effectiveness as warriors appears to be enormously compromised.

I'm not sure I would agree that this characterization (enormously compromised by the Sun) appears to be so.

My interpretation: the initial charge of the Rohirrim was the great cause of sending Orcs fleeing towards the River 'like herds before the hunters'. Highly trained mounted warriors were very effective here (as expected), but on the 'further half of the plain were other hosts still unfought' -- the main force of the Haradrim for one -- and with respect to those horsemen who next charged the Rohirrim, note that 'fewer were they [the Rohirrim] but they clove through the Southrons like a fire-bolt in a forest'. Indeed the Southron cavalry that was left alive turned and fled as well, so these fared little better than the Orcs, despite being horsed.

Of course there were more Haradrim, and ultimately the Rohirrim are in trouble; and Gothmog sends Easterlings, Variags, Southrons and men 'like half-trolls' into the fray. The Sun is shining but are all the Orcs gone? I think not but Tolkien merely generalizes with the 'hosts of Mordor' being 'enheartened, and filled with a new lust and fury' (because they thought the Corsairs had arrived of course). Then the 'hosts of Mordor' realize their mistake, and it is then that the knights of Dol Amroth drive the enemy before them: troll-men and Variags (repeating these forces from earlier in the text) and 'Orcs that hated the Sunlight' -- so to my mind there were still Orcs in the host (though simply unmentioned earlier), and now they are dealing with more cavalry!

And indeed as noted, there was yet more work to be done. But note too that the Southrons were described as 'fierce in despair', and the Easterlings asked for no quarter. I imagine however that if many Orcs still lived on the field they would arguably be looking for a way out, fleeing instead of rallying, and the text notes that there were those (in general) who fled to die, or drowned in the River. The Southrons and Easterling were arguably tougher to deal with due to size alone, not to mention they appear to have refused to flee once the tide had turned. Once one had decided it's 'to the death' (instead of 'for victory') that can heighten the effectiveness of already hardened warriors. They become the 'notable' opposition left yes, to someone writing about this great battle, but in short, the lack of mention of effective Orcs at this point need have nothing to do with the Sun -- or at least it need not mean their effectiveness was enormously (a strong word) compromised by it.

Did the Sun help? Probably not. Were the Mordorian Orcs as well trained to endure the Sun as Saruman's Uruks? Probably not in general but (back to earlier in the tale) the boasting of the Uruk-hai might tend to mispresent the actual measure of their 'dominance' in this -- indeed they are clearly better than most of the Northerners, yes, but that is not really under question here.

By contrast, the creatures of Saruman's breeding, including those sufficiently Orkish to consider themselves Uruks, simply don't mind the sun at all. This is what Treebeard observes of them, and what they say of themselves: and one would be forced to conclude that Saruman's Uruks did have sufficient admixture of human genes to tolerate sunlight; therefore, that all of Saruman's Uruk-hai and his non-Dunlending "Men" were hybrids, although his trackers and wolfriders were not necessarily so.'

However it is not clearly established (or agreed upon by all) that Treebeard has observed the Uruk-hai and only them -- and if indeed he has, he can be right that Saruman has mixed Orcs with Men (which is but one of his 'wonderings' of course, in any case), but still can be wrong if he thinks this applies to the Uruk-hai. Treebeard is working on a general principle here, and arguably needs more experience with the Orcs of the Third Age (and now that I think of it, I have yet to investigate if every pre-Third Age battle that included Orcs was always conducted under Darkness).

Within this hypothesis I note 'stepping stones' -- interpretations that help lead one down a certain path. Not necessarily 'wrong' ideas or unreasonable; if fact perfectly understandable and possible in my opinion, but not necessarily the only reasonable possibilities either. And so one is not really forced to conclude that Saruman's Uruks did have sufficient admixture of human genes to tolerate sunlight (and etc.), rather this conclusion is but a conclusion, not necessarily 'the' conclusion.

My theory includes different stepping stones of course, leading down a different path to a variant outcome.