Of Elvenhome

I was going to do a post on vernacular hymns in the Liturgy (a subject that is more important in terms of the sequence and fluency of the Liturgy than perhaps some people care to think) but since many of my readers are members of the parish (indeed long-standing members) I thought that this was a post better omitted. My only moan (at least the only one that I shall post about!) is that it is a novelty - and something that you can thank the Jesuits for...

Anyway, it has been a while since I posted about Middle-earth and so I shall do so now. As we have seen, the Eldar have reached the Western shores of Beleriand and the Vanyar and Noldor have indeed passed over the Sea to Valinor. The Sindar, or Eglath, have of course remained - some out of love for the starlit lands of Middle-earth, wide and wild, and yet under the Sleep of Yavanna, some because they are still in search of their lord Elwë (who was lost in the fastness of Nan Elmoth). After some time, the Teleri (those who had passed onto the coasts) in their turn were also ferried over the Sea and dwelt on the isle of Tol Eressëa.

Now when the Eldar were brought to the land of Valinor, they were welcomed to its bliss. Tolkien writes that a gap was made in the walls of the Pelóri for the purposes of allowing the Eldar to ''breathe the outer airs,'' to see the stars, and to feel the winds that blow from the Outer Lands - but he fails to account for how the Eldar passed over those mountains (raised by the Valar as a defence against Melkor - to keep him out I expect). They were not impassable - as they were not yet raised to ''sheer and dreadful heights'' as they were later, but I tend to think that the gap (called later the Calacirya, the Pass of Light) already existed - even if just from a practicle perspective. Imagine you're an Elf - you're tired after a long looooooooong journey (several thousands of miles over Middle-earth, through thick woods - even through Greenwood the Great! - across rivers, over mountains etc, and even over the Sea - even if you were ferried over on an island) and you look at more mountains, stretching north and south as far as the eye can see. I think that I would be on the point of despair by then...

But that is ''neither here nor there'' as my mother is wont to say. A small detail that means little or nothing at all to most of my readers I expect. In the Calacirya, the Eldar raised a green hill called Túna, upon which the light of the Two Trees shone on the western side, and on the east was ever in shadow - looking towards Tol Eressëa and the Bay of Eldamar. A small beautiful detail is that upon the western shores of Tol Eressëa, there bloomed the first flowers that ever were East of the Mountains of Aman. Upon the crown of Túna, the Elves (Vanyar and Noldor) built their city - Tirion the fair. The highest of it's many towers was the Tower of Ingwë (High King of all the Elves), Mindon Eldaliéva, whose silver lamp shone far out to Sea. In that great and fair city, the Vanyar and Noldor dwelt in fellowship, and the Valar gave them many things in gift (among them, an image of the White Tree, called Galathilion in the Sindarin tongue - another strange fact that is unexplained anywhere: why Sindarin and not Quenya? The Sindar never saw Galathilion (not even Elwë - that is, in those days) and it would have had a High-Elven name. My supposition is that, like the names of the Princes of the Eldalië as recorded in the Annals of Aman and The Silmarillion, the form was taken in the Sindarin tongue because it was the form that they took in Beleriand in after years. This would make sense, but it doesn't account for the absence of a Quenya form. I have looked this up in The History of Middle-earth, but can't find it anywhere - perhaps this is a small detail that Tolkien overlooked, although that is unlike him.

I have side-tracked, again! Anyway, the Eldar in Valinor grew in grace, wisdom and beauty, and received much in gift from the Valar. Indeed, they prospered in Valinor, and had they not come, their history would have been diminished. Beloved of Manwë and Varda were the Vanyar, the fair Elves. Seldom have mortal Men spoken with them. But beloved of Aulë and his people were the Noldor, the wisest of the Elves (arguably at any rate), and by their labours they enriched all of that fair kingdom. The masons of the Noldor first discovered the earth gems, and brought them forth in great and wonderful myriads; they were changeful in speech and ever they devised words more fitting for the things that they knew or imagined.

In time, the Teleri of Tol Eressëa desired to come at last to the last western shore, and so at the bidding of Ulmo, Ossë came to them and taught them the craft of ship-building. As his parting gift, he gave to them beautiful and strong-winged swans which guided the ships to Valinor. In the Bay of Eldamar, they built a haven, Alqualondë, lit with many lamps (in this labour, they had also the aid and counsel of the Noldor); and there Olwë was lord of the Teleri of Aman. The Teleri were ancestrally lovers of the Sea, and in Eldamar they became the fairest singers, and wrought the fairest ships.

This is merely a rough and clumsy sketch of that vast and wonderful history of the Eldar in the Blessed Realm over the Sea; I shall devote a second passage to a more detailed elucidation of its history and of its princes.

The above image depicts the voyage of the newly-wrought Telerin ships to Eldamar. Notice the swans. The painting is by Ted Nasmith.