Follow Up to the Blue Mountains Question - Gundabad

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Elemmakil

A good reason. And not just dragons - I suspect in the aftermath of the breaking of Angband many of the survivors of Morgoth's legions took refuge up there in the far north, making Gundabad an untenable option for the dwarves.

Yet neither those minions nor any remaining dragons (after Smaug had staked his claim on Erebor) apparently gave any assistance to the Orcs at Gundabad, or any other place the Dwarves attacked.

Smaug was said to have been the "greatest of the dragons of his day", implying there were others; however, their inaction as regards helping fellow evildoers is curious.

[Elmo]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

Yet neither those minions nor any remaining dragons (after Smaug had staked his claim on Erebor) apparently gave any assistance to the Orcs at Gundabad, or any other place the Dwarves attacked.

Smaug was said to have been the "greatest of the dragons of his day", implying there were others; however, their inaction as regards helping fellow evildoers is curious.

Like any self-respecting clever evil-doer, why would a great dragon help a bunch of weakling orcs, unless he was forced to by Sauron or someone? Evil doers are selfish by definition. If I was a dragon I'd let the dwarves take Gundabad, wait a while for them to amass a bunch of gold and cool armour, then swoop in and take it all! Tis a fail-safe plan.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Elmo

If I was a dragon I'd let the dwarves take Gundabad, wait a while for them to amass a bunch of gold and cool armour, then swoop in and take it all! Tis a fail-safe plan.

If there were dragons capable and/or willing to do that, why wasn't the dwarven settlement in the Iron Hills ever attacked by them?

[Elmo]

The Iron Hills doesn't seem that wealthy a settlement, maybe the dragons thought it wasn't worth the effort. If the Iron Hills were amazing, surely the dwarves wouldn't have been so keen to move back to Erebor.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Inziladun

If there were dragons capable and/or willing to do that, why wasn't the dwarven settlement in the Iron Hills ever attacked by them?

Now now, surely you must know, Inzil? The Dragons had been plaguing all the Dwarven settlements in the North for ages, and especially those close to Withered Heath. Iron Hills was still relatively south (I know it sounds ridiculous if you look at the M-E map, but yes, in the relative sense - in relation to the Dragons - it still was South, and we can presume that most of the Dwarven settlements plundered by the Dragons were further to the north than that - simply judging from what we are told in The Hobbit: the Lonely Mountain was really very, very, very far south for the Dragons and considered safe and it took the biggest and bravest dragon of that age - i.e. Smaug - to come there), I think we can also conclude that Iron Hills was too strongly populated, defended, you name it - to be worth the trouble. Iron Hills: too far East for the mountain Orcs to threaten it, too far South (and possibly East, too) and seemingly really all too well defended for the Dragons to dare it. That's my conclusion, and I think it is rather evident (also because it is the only logical explanation anyway).

EDIT: x-ed with Elmo. I think that is also true, partially: it is clear the Iron Hills were in no way such a treasure-filled place as Erebor was, but also there still remains the idea about too many Dwarves being present (or maybe just the entrances were too small, who knows what kind of "holes" Iron Hill settlement really was?). So you could say even: yes, the effort/gain ration did not probably seem to be very inviting.

[Inziladun]

Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc

The Dragons had been plaguing all the Dwarven settlements in the North for ages, and especially those close to Withered Heath. Iron Hills was still relatively south (I know it sounds ridiculous if you look at the M-E map, but yes, in the relative sense - in relation to the Dragons - it still was South, and we can presume that most of the Dwarven settlements plundered by the Dragons were further to the north than that - simply judging from what we are told in The Hobbit: the Lonely Mountain was really very, very, very far south for the Dragons and considered safe and it took the biggest and bravest dragon of that age - i.e. Smaug - to come there), I think we can also conclude that Iron Hills was too strongly populated, defended, you name it - to be worth the trouble. Iron Hills: too far East for the mountain Orcs to threaten it, too far South (and possibly East, too) and seemingly really all too well defended for the Dragons to dare it. That's my conclusion, and I think it is rather evident (also because it is the only logical explanation anyway).

However, both Erebor and the Iron Hills would appear, judging from the maps, to be as near to the Withered Heath as Gundabad.

And if the Iron Hills was not considered a wealthy enough target, why would dragons have bothered a newly resettled Gundabad, which would presumably have taken very many years to repopulate and enrich?

[Elmo]

The dragons weren't just in the Withered Heath, that's just 'whence came the Great Worms'. Seems to be their original home in those mountains. The dwarves must have had settlements all around the Grey Mountains that were destroyed by the great beasts. Gundabad is only a stone's throw (or a dragons breath) away from the western edge of the Grey Mountains.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Elmo

The dragons weren't just in the Withered Heath, that's just 'whence came the Great Worms'. Seems to be their original home in those mountains. The dwarves must have had settlements all around the Grey Mountains that were destroyed by the great beasts. Gundabad is only a stone's throw (or a dragons breath) away from the western edge of the Grey Mountains.

That's true. Scatha, after all, was the Dragon who threatened Éothéod - and that was by the northern end of Anduin.

Originally Posted by Inziladun

And if the Iron Hills was not considered a wealthy enough target, why would dragons have bothered a newly resettled Gundabad, which would presumably have taken very many years to repopulate and enrich?

But we are talking about the reason why Dwarves had not resettled Gundabad. The idea of Dragons coming to Gundabad is purely hypothetical (or at least that's how I perceive this discussion). But if I am a Dwarf, and I am judging whether to resettle Gundabad or not, I am not going to say: "Let's go there, because Dragons won't come there after we resettle it at least for a couple of years before we gather some hoard there, and look at Iron Hills for comparison..." but I am rather going to say "Hey, people, you sure you want to resettle Gundabad? Even if we manage to get rid of the Orcs in there, which will certainly weaken us, what if a Dragon comes there once it hears we are back there again, and weakened?" I think the Dwarves are very practical in this, unless there is really great zeal about it, but we don't know about Gundabad holding any Arkenstone so that it would make the Dwarves' hearts blazing with fire just in order to see it.