[narfforc]

Just to add to what LMP says earlier, this is what Tolkien has to say. In the introduction of my 1979 Pearl by Tolkien and the 1970 copy of Pearl by E.V. Gordon appeared these exact same words:

A clear distinction between 'allegory' and 'symbolism' may be difficult to maintain, but it is proper, or at least useful, to limit allegory to narrative, to an account (however short) of events; and symbolism to the use of visible signs or things to represent other things or ideas. Pearls were a symbol of purity that especially appealed to the imagination of the Middle Ages (and notably of the fourteenth century); but this does not make a person who wears pearls, or even one who is called Pearl, or Margaret into a allegorical figure. To be an 'allegory' a poem must as a whole, and with fair consistency, describe in other terms some event or process: its entire narrative and all its significant details should cohere and work together to this end.

Tolkien states on more than one occasion that LotR is not an allegory. Aragorn or Gandalf are the sum total of all of Tolkiens vast knowledge of myth, legends and religion, both concious and unconcious, they are nothing of one origin only.