Narn I Chîn Húrin 1: Túrins Fostering

[Aiwendil]

With the sincerest apologies for my long absence, I offer some comments on the proposed changes. Overall, I think you've done a very nice job of integrating the new information from CoH.

NA-TI-02b <CoH But now the tale returns to Húrin and Huor in the days of their youth. It is said that for a while the sons of Galdor dwelt in Brethil as foster-sons of Haldir their uncle, according to the custom of Men in that time. They often went to battle with the Men of Brethil against the Orcs, who now harried the northern borders of their land; for Húrin, though only seventeen years of age, was strong, and Huor the younger was already as tall as most full-grown men of that people.
On a time Húrin and Huor went with a company of scouts, but they were ambushed by the Orcs and scattered, and the brother were pursued to the ford of Brithiach. There ...

First of all, I must ask you to refresh my memory about something - have we decided to include Hurin's and Huor's sojourn in Gondolin in the 'Childhood of Turin' chapter rather than the 'Ruin of Beleriand' chapter? Apparently we are, but I can't find where we discussed it.

I take it, though, that we decided to keep the account of the Orc attack on Brethil, when Beleg comes to their aid (s. 160 in GA) in the 'Ruin of Beleriand' chapter, thus separating it from the account of Hurin and Huor (is that right?). I now wonder whether this is advisable. Of course, this is done in the 'Narn', but that is in the context of a stand-alone tale, not a chapter in a longer Silmarillion.

The impression I get from the texts, at any rate, is that the attack in which Hurin and Huor were lost always remained identified with the attack GA section 160 - in other words that it remained this 'special' battle with the Orcs - and that the more generalized reference in CoH is made simply to compress this early portion of the work.

NA-EX-25.02: I'm very hesitant to use the alliterative lay here (and subsequently), though I appreciate that you have done a lot of nice work with the verse. This is, after all, one of the relatively few places where we have a late, complete 'long version' by Tolkien, and in such cases I think that generally the policy should be (and has been) not to insert earlier material for the sole purpose of elaboration.

It remains only to mention that in CoH also the paragraph marked here as NA-EX-27.25 is omited. It seems that this paragraph in Sil77 was composed by Christopher Tolkien as an appropirate answer to Thingols question 'What more would Túrin have me do?' For me tha passage look a bit strange without that answer. Do you agree to add this paragraph even so we know now nearly for sure that it is composed by Christopher Tolkien?

Reading the text in CoH, I actually think it works fine without NA-EX-27.25.

NA-TI-15.7 {And because}{Because Beleg}<CoH Moreover Beleg the Archer was great among the people of Doriath; he> was strong and enduring, <CoH and> far-sighted in mind as in eye, <CoH and at need he was valiant in battle, relying not only upon the swift arrows of his long bow, but also upon his great sword Anglachel.> {he}He came to be held in honour among the outlaws{; but the hatred of Mîm}<CoH And ever the more did hatred grow> for the Elf that had come into {Bar-en-Danwedh}[Bar-en-Danweð] {grew ever greater,} <CoH in the heart of Mîm, who hated all Elves, as has been told, and who looked with a jealous eye on the love that Túrin bore to Beleg.> {and}And he sat with Ibun his son in the deepest shadows of his house, speaking to none.

I can't find a source for 'He came to be held in honour among the outlaws' other than QS77 - is this perhaps an editorial addition by CT? I think we must either remove it or reword things slightly:

NA-TI-15.7 {And because}{Because Beleg}<CoH Moreover Beleg the Archer was great among the people of Doriath; he> was strong and enduring, <CoH and> far-sighted in mind as in eye, <CoH and at need he was valiant in battle, relying not only upon the swift arrows of his long bow, but also upon his great sword Anglachel.> , and he came to be held in honour among the outlaws{; but the hatred of Mîm}<CoH {And} But ever the more did hatred grow> for the Elf that had come into {Bar-en-Danwedh}[Bar-en-Danweð] {grew ever greater,} <CoH in the heart of Mîm, who hated all Elves, as has been told, and who looked with a jealous eye on the love that Túrin bore to Beleg.> {and}And he sat with Ibun his son in the deepest shadows of his house, speaking to none.

NA-TI-16 <Sil77 Who knows now the counsels of Morgoth? Who can measure the reach of his thought, who had been Melkor, mighty among the Ainur of the Great Song, and sat now, a dark lord upon a dark throne in the North, weighing in his malice all the tidings that came to him, <CoH whether by spy or by traitor, seeing in the eyes of his mind and understanding> {and perceiving} more of the deeds and purposes of his enemies than even the wisest of them feared, save only Melian the Queen{?}.

If Tolkien used a period rather than a question mark there, surely it was a mere mistake. I think we should use the question mark.

I must give the whole matter of Androg some thought before I comment on the changes and proposals relating to him.

[Findegil]

NA-TI-02b: Since we did as yet not start the discussion of Of the Ruin of Beleriand, we did not decide as a group if that battle will be included in that chapter. But I included it in my proposal for that chapter.
In our earlier version based only on Narn and Sil we included this battle, without any big discussion. In Posting #3 you commented on an inclusion of clearification which battle was meant (NA-EX-05). The text of CoH offered an other way to deal with that issue: To leave it open if Húrin and Hour got lost in the "main" battle between the forces of Angband coming down Sirion and Brethil and Doriath or in a smaller scirmish which took place at that time. Since that seemed better to me than the back reference, I used the text of Coh as I did.

NA-EX-25.02: Aiwendil worte:

This is, after all, one of the relatively few places where we have a late, complete 'long version' by Tolkien, and in such cases I think that generally the policy should be (and has been) not to insert earlier material for the sole purpose of elaboration.

Do you refer to CoH in general as a late long version? If so, that would mean a terible lose in my oppinion. Such things as the wolf shooting of Beleg and the entrance into Nargothrond. These are details not anywere else to be found. Is it not the goal to compile a most detailed version?
Or do you refer to the opening part of the Narn only, which Tolkien finished himself to a high degree? I thought that the inclusion of parts of the poem in the earlier parts of the Narn would help to make the, in my view inascapable, changes between poesy and prosa in the later part more bearable. And I only included parts were the poem has some points of detail to add to the text of CoH and/or Narn.

NA-EX-27.25: What is strange to me in that paragrph in CoH is that the reader does not know that beleg will return to Túrin until halfe a page later. Even to the contary: just a view sentences before ion the same page Beleg answeres Túrin that it might be best if that parting would be thier last. So what was the reason for Melain to give him the lembas? to use them in his fight at the north marches? All the passage becomes much more natural if Beleg tells that he will go back to Túrin.

NA-TI-15.7: Your rewording is good, but didn't you argue to remove it? I could find any other source either, so porbably we should realy skip it because it is an Christopher Tolkien addition to Sil77. But then, it could also be part of an alternativ Narn fragment.

NA-TI-16: In Sill77 it was a questionmark, in CoH it is a fullstop. I agree that a question mark is gramaticaly correct and should be restored.

Respectfuly
Findegil

[Aiwendil]

NA-TI-02b: Okay, thanks for reminding me about this. I think the latest version is good.

Do you refer to CoH in general as a late long version? If so, that would mean a terible lose in my oppinion. Such things as the wolf shooting of Beleg and the entrance into Nargothrond. These are details not anywere else to be found. Is it not the goal to compile a most detailed version?
Or do you refer to the opening part of the Narn only, which Tolkien finished himself to a high degree? I thought that the inclusion of parts of the poem in the earlier parts of the Narn would help to make the, in my view inascapable, changes between poesy and prosa in the later part more bearable. And I only included parts were the poem has some points of detail to add to the text of CoH and/or Narn.

I'm referring only to the opening part of the Narn (sorry I wasn't clear) - I agree entirely that the CoH version of the middle portions must be considered quite incomplete, and I agree with using the alliterative lay there. But the portion up to the meeting with Mim is surely to be regarded as a full, authoritative and more or less complete text. I believe we treated the late 'Tuor' the same way, and avoided adding earlier material to it for the sole purpose of elaboration. You do make a fair point that introducing excerpts from the lay early on could soften the transition to verse in the middle section. However, if we are entertaining concerns of an aesthetic nature, one could just as easily argue that adding the verse excerpts breaks the tone, rhythm, and balance of a text that Tolkien was, apparently, satisfied with from a literary standpoint.

NA-EX-27.25: I suppose you're right - Melian's gift of lembas makes little sense if Beleg is simply returning to the north-marches, but in CoH there's no suggestion he's going to join Turin.

NA-TI-15.7: Yes, I agree we should probably just drop the sentence.

[Findegil]

NA-EX-25.02, Na-EX-25.06 to Na-EX-25.12 und Na-EX-27.04 to NA-EX-27.06 (the material from the Lay added in the first part of the Narn): So what we discuss about are 4 passages from the Lay. The first is the treatment of Húrin before the talk with Morgoth. The second is the journey to Doriath and the song of Lúthien, the third is the guided entrance to Doriath with the rest at Belegs lodge and the fourth is the praising of Turins powers in the warfare at the marches.
The list is just to make clear for all what we are talking about. It also shows that the aesthetic argument was only a faint support argument and not the reason to add these parts. In each part information are given that are not in the text of the Narn. Some of course are only minor details. But especially the first two seem more substantial to me.

I must say that I was not around when the principals of editing the early Tuor were discussed. So I did not recognise that principal at all. But it is a sound one and it worked very well in the Tour text. And I remember that such an argument was brought up before.
What I was think about when I added this parts of the poem was the last sentence of our general principles: “A corallary is that we may not disregard any text or note, old idea or projected change, by JRRT unless it is invalidated by one of the above principles, explicitly or implicitly; that is, we must have a REASON for rejecting something.”
This does of course open a wide field of argumentation, since it contradicts in part the meaning of principles 2 made clear by the statement at the beginning of principal 3:
“2. Secondary priority is given to the latest ideas found among Tolkien's unpublished texts and letters, except where they:
a. violate the published canon without specifically correcting an error or
b. are proposed changes that do not clearly indicate the exact details that must be changed and how they are to be changed.
3. If no sources that fall under number 2 can be used to form the actual narrative of a section, …”

Respectfully
Findegil

[Aiwendil]

2. Secondary priority is given to the latest ideas found among Tolkien's unpublished texts and letters, except where they:
a. violate the published canon without specifically correcting an error or
b. are proposed changes that do not clearly indicate the exact details that must be changed and how they are to be changed.

A corollary is that we may not disregard any text or note, old idea or projected change, by JRRT unless it is invalidated by one of the above principles, explicitly or implicitly; that is, we must have a REASON for rejecting something.

Well, I suppose I’d argue that the alliterative ‘Turin’ is (in these sections) invalidated by principle 2, as it does not represent Tolkien’s ‘latest ideas’. I do understand where you’re coming from, though, and I suppose one could argue from your side that as long as the earlier material (the lay in this case) does not contradict the later material, it is not invalidated by principle 2, even if the later material contains a full account of Tolkien’s latest ideas.

But I think a reasonable counter-argument would be that the relevant portions of the lay are contradicted, implicitly, by the Narn. In many cases we must make the difficult judgement of whether a certain detail that appears in an early source but not in a late one was rejected by Tolkien or merely omitted. When the late text we’re dealing with is the Quenta Silmarillion or the Annals, it’s often easy to argue that the detail in question was merely omitted due to compression of the narrative (hence, our retention of the mechanical dragons for example). But here, the late text is the full ‘Narn i Chin Hurin’, the long version of the longest tale of the Elder Days and intended, as we may suppose from ‘Aelfwine and Dirhaval’, as a prose translation of the same primary source that the old lay was supposed to be verse translation of. It seems, then, very reasonable to me to think that when Tolkien omitted a detail that was found in the alliterative lay, it was because he had rejected it.

Despite this argument, I’m still of two minds about this and, to be honest, there are some lovely details in the passages of the lay you excerpt. Maybe we need a third opinion on this (Maedhros, if you happen by here, perhaps you could give us your thoughts?)

I plan to have a look at all the Androg-related material this evening and will post on that as soon as I’ve looked over it.

[Aran e-Godhellim]

If I may make a suggestion here, I don't think that the two forms of "Aelfwine and Dirhavel" are mutually exclusive. I think it might be best to keep A as a "Translator's Note" and to keep B as the "Preface," since those are essentially their roles. They cannot strictly be two versions of the same note, as one professes to be Tolkien's work, and the other Aelfwine's.

Also, the phrase "Minlamad thent / estent" should probably be dropped, as it doesn't seem to fit the linguistic situation perfectly. You could just say "the form of Elvish verse that was of old particular to the Narn," as that is how Tolkien described it.

[Aiwendil]

Aran - Interesting idea. However, I'm hesitant to do this because so much material is repeated in both A and B. Certainly, it's possible for there to be some redundancy between a 'Translator's Note' and a 'Preface', but I think that in this case it seems clear that Tolkien intended B to replace A rather than stand alongside it.

Can you explain your reservations about the name 'minlamad thent/estent'? I'm not aware of any problems with it, though I'm no Sindarin scholar.

On Andróg: Well, Findegil, I think you’ve come up with some very intriguing ideas here! Personally, I rather like the idea of Andróg as a member of Hurin’s band. Unfortunately (and I think you predicted I would say this), I fear it goes a bit too far and entails too much supposition to be justifiable within this project. Perhaps if I lay out the inferences and revisions inolved in your proposal I can better make my point:

1. We have to interpret “In this way also the matter of Mîm and his later dealings with Húrin were made clear” to assert that Andróg was a member of Hurin’s band at Nargothrond.

2. We change the ‘Narn’ so that Andróg does not die at Amon Rudh.

3. We move Beleg’s healing of Andróg from the place where it stands in the ‘Narn’ to after the battle.

4. We add to our ‘Ruin of Doriath’ text mention of Andróg being one of Hurin’s band.

5. We change the slayer of Mîm from Hurin to Andróg.

6. We assume (implicitly) that Andróg is killed by an arrow at some future point.

When I look at all that’s involved, it seems clear to me that this solution, as nice as it is, is too speculative for us. First of all, I don’t think that point 1 is at all clear-cut. It is certainly a very fascinating statement by Tolkien, and I’m grateful to you for pointing out it’s possible implications. But is Andróg as a member of Hurin’s band really the only way to read it? ‘In this way’ could, I think, be read as referring more generally to what was said before – i.e., that Dirhavel ‘gathered all the tidings and lore that he could of the House of Hador, whether among Men or Elves, remnants and fugitives of Dorlómin, of Nargothrond, or of Doriath.’ Or one could read it as implying that Andvír, rather than Andróg, was with Hurin.

Moreover, even if there were no ambiguity in point 1, the implementation of that change in points 2-6 might involve more speculation than we are allowed. In other words, even if we accept that Tolkien decided Andróg was one of Hurin’s followers, I think a good argument could be made that this falls under 2b in our principles:

. . . proposed changes that do not clearly indicate the exact details that must be changed and how they are to be changed.

Indeed, I’m still not completely convinced that even the statement that Andróg survived the battle doesn’t fall into that category.

You also make an interesting observation about the recurrence of the motif of the traitor to Turin being killed by an arrow. But, though I think this too is an astute observation, what then do we make of the alternative form of Andróg’s curse (‘May he lack a bow at need ere his end’)? Also, there is no suggestion anywhere that Andróg himself is the one who kills the Dwarf, even if we consider Andróg’s curse a ‘source text’ for the death of Mîm (which is a bit of a stretch).

So in the end, I think that while your idea itself is great, it is not suitable for our project. On the smaller matter of whether Andróg survives Amon Rudh at all, I think we are in safer territory. I am still not entirely convinced on this point, though. What bothers me is that when it was written, Mîm’s curse was clearly supposed to be fulfilled during the attack on Amon Rudh. Having Andróg survive that battle doesn’t contradict the letter of the curse, but it does retroactively change the import of the curse from what it was when that part of the narrative was written. That’s not necessarily sufficient reason to reject Andróg’s survival, but it at least ought to be considered.

If I had to make a decision, I suppose I would vote against the revision that incorporates Andróg into Hurin’s company but for the less drastic revision that has him survive Amon Rudh (in spite of my reservations).