the Darkening of Valinor: texts and discussion

[Findegil]

This is a good find!

I would like to take up even a bit more and not lose the connection with Indis:

... At once he returned to Túna, and before the term of seven days that was set, he gathered his goods and his treasures and left the city and went far away. With him went his sons, and Finwë his father, who would not be parted from him, in fault or guiltless, and some others also of the Noldor. But Nerdanel would not go with him, DoV-UN-00.8b <Shibboleth for after long endeavouring to change his mood, she became estranged. (Her kin were devoted to Aule, who counselled her father to take no part in the rebellion. 'It will in the end only lead Fëanor and all your children to death.')>{, and she}She asked leave to <Shibboleth {retired}retire to her father's house>; thus she abide with Indis, whom she had ever esteemed, though this had been little to the liking of Fëanor. ...

Respectfully
Findegil

[Elvellon]

Glad you agree! And I'd like to keep more of that too, but I wasn't sure it fits there. It's too early for Aulë to call it a rebellion, isn't it? As of yet it's just a fight between two brothers. But it occurs to me you could swap "rebellion" for "unrest", since it is said a few paragraphs earlier that "The unrest of the Noldor was not indeed hidden from the Valar". This would also reflect back to the earlier statement that Sarmo "bitterly rued the day" he taught Fëanor all he learned from Aulë.

... DoV-UN-00.8b <Shibboleth for after long endeavouring to change his mood, she became estranged. (Her kin were devoted to Aulë, who counselled her father to take no part in the {rebellion}unrest. 'It will in the end only lead Fëanor and all your children to death.')> ...

I had considered placing this in Chapter 12 with Nerdanel's plea to leave the twins behind (and then "rebellion" could remain), but it seems odd to have Aulë's warning about all her children dying so close to her asking Fëanor to leave her just two of them.

Originally Posted by Findegil

I would like to take up even a bit more and not lose the connection with Indis

I don't think Nerdanel can "retire to her father's house" and also "abide with Indis". Both of those phrases mean she went to live there, so it would have to be one or the other.

[Findegil]

"rebellion": I think we can allow some freenes here:
- On the one hand, a strife in a rather over peacefull setting is a kind of rebellion and
- since Aulë is allready using his "forsight" to predict the death of Nerdanel's children, we have to grant him as well the pre-knowledge that the unrest will grow into a real rebellion (of a kind) and
- we are allways have texts written (long) after the fact and it would not be the only part in which a knowledge of later events coulours the speech of earlier events.

I think the warning to Nerdanel's father fits here better than in chapter 12. I would assume that what trigger her plea in chapter 12, is the forsight of Nerdanel herself, that generated the name Umberto that made her feel that the death of her youngest will follow very swiftly.

About "abide with Indis": In the original context "abide" could not mean that Indis and Nerdanel shared one house. We are told already that Fëanor left his father's house as soon as he could, and I very much doubt that he returned to it when he married Nerdanel. So in the original sense it would mean both Indis and Nerdanel stayed in Tiriron, while both husbands moved to Formenos. For me this is fully compatible with Nerdanel leafing the (now empty) house of Fëanor and moving back into the house of her father Sarmo. Beside that it is for us an easy way of telling that Indis stayed in Tirion as well.

Respectfully
Findegil

[Findegil]

"rebellion": I think we can allow some freenes here:
- On the one hand, a strife in a rather over peacefull setting is a kind of rebellion and
- since Aulë is allready using his "forsight" to predict the death of Nerdanel's children, we have to grant him as well the pre-knowledge that the unrest will grow into a real rebellion (of a kind) and
- we are allways have texts written (long) after the fact and it would not be the only part in which a knowledge of later events coulours the speech of earlier events.

I think the warning to Nerdanel's father fits here better than in chapter 12. I would assume that what trigger her plea in chapter 12, is the forsight of Nerdanel herself, that generated the name Umberto that made her feel that the death of her youngest will follow very swiftly.

About "abide with Indis": In the original context "abide" could not mean that Indis and Nerdanel shared one house. We are told already that Fëanor left his father's house as soon as he could, and I very much doubt that he returned to it when he married Nerdanel. So in the original sense it would mean both Indis and Nerdanel stayed in Tirion, while both husbands moved to Formenos. For me this is fully compatible with Nerdanel leafing the (now empty) house of Fëanor and moving back into the house of her father Sarmo. Beside that it is for us an easy way of telling that Indis stayed in Tirion as well.

Respectfully
Findegil

[Elvellon]

I see your point about rebellion, and I agree completely. Plus, I was forgetting that earlier in the chapter (§52c), it says: "For Fëanor now began openly to speak words of rebellion against the Valar". That cinches it, for me.

Originally Posted by Findegil

About "abide with Indis": In the original context "abide" could not mean that Indis and Nerdanel shared one house. We are told already that Fëanor left his father's house as soon as he could, and I very much doubt that he returned to it when he married Nerdanel. So in the original sense it would mean both Indis and Nerdanel stayed in Tirion, while both husbands moved to Formenos. For me this is fully compatible with Nerdanel leafing the (now empty) house of Fëanor and moving back into the house of her father Sarmo. Beside that it is for us an easy way of telling that Indis stayed in Tirion as well.

Ah, ok. I get it. I was reading "abide" with the meaning "to reside, dwell" (i.e. Nerdanel asked leave to reside with Indis). You're reading it as meaning "to remain without going away, to stay" (i.e. Nerdanel asked leave to remain in Tirion along with Indis). I think you're right, that's most likely how Tolkien intended it to be understood.

In that case, I think the following works better, what do you think?

... But Nerdanel would not go with him, DoV-UN-00.8c <Shibboleth for after long endeavouring to change his mood, she became estranged. (Her kin were devoted to Aule, who counselled her father to take no part in the rebellion. 'It will in the end only lead Fëanor and all your children to death.')>{, and} And she asked leave to abide with Indis, whom she had ever esteemed, though this had been little to the liking of Fëanor. ...

And then a simple change to Chapter 12 by starting that Shibboleth insert a few words earlier:

FoN-EX-06b <Shibboleth Nerdanel had retired to her father's house; but when it became clear that Fëanor and his sons would leave Valinor for ever, she came to him before the host started on its northward march, and begged that Fëanor should leave her the two youngest, the twins, or one at least of them. He replied: ‘Were you a true wife, as you had been till cozened by Aulë, you would keep all of them, for you would come with us. If you desert me, you desert also all of our children. For they are determined to go with their father.’ Then Nerdanel was angry and she answered: ‘You will not keep all of them. One at least will never set foot on Middle-earth.’ ‘Take your evil omens to the Valar who will delight in them,’ said Fëanor. ‘I defy them’. So they parted.>

If you want to keep what you have, you at least need to change the tense of "thus she abide with Indis" to one of these:

• thus did she abide with Indis
• thus she abode with Indis
• thus she abided with Indis

[Findegil]

DoV-UN-00.8c; FoN-EX-06b: That is a much better editing! I like that it does not fragment the pices we insert as much as my edditing did. If no body speaks against it, we will take it!

Respectfully
Findegil