The Truth of the Uruk-hai

[William Cloud Hicklin]

As I said, it's a working hypothesis- one (rough) way to explain the observed data.

There are two datum points which to me are anchors:

1) Saruman did indeed breed human-orc hybrids. This is not merely Treebeard's opinion, but something Tolkien explicitly stated.

2) The Uruk-hai at Helm's Deep declare proudly that the Sun doesn't bother them in the slightest: and the only explanation offered anywhere for such a thing lies in an admixture of Mannish genes.

From these two postulates I think it flows necessarily that Saruman bred some part of his Uruks with human stock. What proportion or which ones is much thornier territory.

(BTW: I'm fully prepared to condider Ghrishnakh and his band 'fully-trained soildier-Orcs', i.e. Uruk-hai. Their running performance is as astounding as Ugluk's, if not more so.)

[littlemanpoet]

Given that there are "squint eyes southerners" and "black Uruk-hai" - quite a range - it would appear that Saruman had been "at it" for at least four generations, if not more.

[Galin]

William Cloud Hicklin wrote: '... and the only explanation offered anywhere for such a thing lies in an admixture of Mannish genes.'

Hmmm, well is this a datum point? as in datum 'a fact or proposition used to draw a conclusion or make a decision', or a postulate? Since I have no problem with the latter, I will only get (admittedly) annoyingly pedantic with the former (if 'fact' is taken as the meaning by some). It gives me a chance to ramble on about my opinions in any case.



To my knowledge JRRT never states that some measure of Mannish blood is needed for Orcs not to mind the Sun. He might state it as a fact in something yet to be published, but obviously that's neither here nor there today. So I assume Treebeard's statement is meant by 'only explanation', which however I contend is not the only explanation that can be gleaned from the texts (though I need not repeat my ideas on training and Uruks).

To the thread in general: if Treebeard is wondering what Saruman has done to Orcs, then one of his 'wonderings' is yet that Saruman has possibly ruined Men -- which is technically doing something to Men not Orcs (or at least this follows from a reasonable interpretation of what he means). So here he is arguably only ruminating that Saruman has possibly ruined Men -- they are then 'orkish', and possibly that is what this is all about ('Orcs' are arguably concerned because of 'orkishness' and because of something he thinks about Orcs that doesn't quite add up here, and because of his next possibility).

OK, and of course his other 'wondering' is that Saruman has actually used Orcs and bred them with Men. And both these possibilities come from his ideas about Orcs and Sunlight of course. At this point Treebeard doesn't know if his second possibility is actually correct, no more than his first.

The Reader might know more later (especially if one has read Morgoth's Ring); indeed the Reader might realize Treebeard's second 'option' is correct, but what he or she also 'finds out' is that there are 'orkish' beings which indeed appear to be hybrids -- beings yet also seemingly distinguished from the Uruk-hai however (Merry's description). And as Rumil already pointed out, the Reader of Unfinished Tales also notes the apparent distinction between Orc-men and Saruman's Uruks.

So what was Treebeard right about (and wrong about) back when speaking to the Hobbits concerning ruined Men or interbreeding? I think we can all agree on that one, but importantly about whom did his correct 'wondering' apply?

I'm using 'wondering' instead of explanation because I think the latter term goes too far in implying a fact -- or if indeed I referred to Ugluk's comment ('half-trained' in connection with running under the Sun) I bet some would object that it's not necessarily an 'explanation'. What they both are, I think I can more safely say, are statements made by characters, not Tolkien, both which imply possibilities about Orcs and the Sun. And of course other factors get mixed in to make a given 'conclusion'.

Littlemanpoet wrote: Given that there are "squint eyes southerners" and "black Uruk-hai" - quite a range - it would appear that Saruman had been "at it" for at least four generations, if not more.

But there are 'black' Uruks from Mordor: 'In the last years of Denethor I the race of Uruks, black Orcs of great strength, first appeared out of Mordor, and in 2475 they swept across Ithilien and took Osgiliath.' The Return of the King Appendices

Or, from draft text: The Heirs of Elendil published (though not by Tolkien himself of course) in The Peoples of Middle-Earth ...

'Denethor I. born 2375 lived 102 years died 2477. Great troubles arose in his day. The Morgul-lords having bred in secret a fell race of black Orcs in Mordor assail Ithilien and over-run it.'

Here's something about timeline...

'The Council seems to have been unaware, since for many years Isengard had been closely guarded, of what went on within its Ring. The use, and possibly special breeding, of Orcs was kept secret, and cannot have begun much before 2990 at earliest. The Orc-troops seem never to have been used beyond the territory of Isengard before the attack on Rohan.' Unfinished Tales