Hobbits and the Valar (or The Forgotten People)

[LadyBrooke]

Originally Posted by Galadriel55

I think the "problem" lies in the fact that hobbits were never recorded in the great histories of ME before the War, even if they were known to exist. Faramir, who spent lots of time in the library, never heard of a hobbit until he met Frodo. I think it's safe to say that most Men of Gondor did not know of hobbits. A "perian" is literally "halfling" in elvish (or, at least, I think it is), and wouldn't that be the natural thing to call a race that is half your size? I think that that name did not exist before Pippin was brought to Gondor, unless it was in some "old wives' tale" taken from the Rohirrim.

Faramir had however heard of halflings, for he says, "For this is not the first halfling that I have seen walking [b]out of northern legends into the Southlands"[b/]- and from the way Gandalf speaks to Ingold when entering Gondor with Pippin, it seems that halfling, without any other descriptive words, is a good enough answer to the question what is a hobbit. And to quote Beregond, "For never before have we seen a halfling in this land and though we have hear rumour of them,, little is said of them in any tale that we know."

So they had been heard of in Gondor at least, and not only by the learned. Though, they seem to have been thought of as legends - much like fairies would be thought of today...

To address the fact that the Haradrim and such had never heard of Hobbits. To me, this adds a sense of realism to the books. In our recent history, prior to the invention of the airplane and such, many cultures were unknown due to lack of ways to reach the outskirts and such to see them, except by those who lived near them...For Sauron, well, evil has a way of being shortsighted, and causing its own defeat....

Edited to add: Puddleglum has a good point - the Ents seem to be rather insular. They don't know much about anything outside their lands, that isn't ancient history it seems like. And, even if the elves were updating the lists - who's going to make the trip to tell Treebeard? Celeborn doesn't seem too fond of the idea of traveling through Fangorn, judging by his comment to Boromir, Elrond isn't going to pop over the mountains, nor would Cirdan, and Thranduil had more concerns then finding an Ent to tell them the news that halflings were discovered...