Quote:
Originally Posted by littlemanpoet
...I do find it interesting and somehow informative (of what, I'm not sure yet) that Gandalf is an unfallen Maiar whereas Merlin is a demon-spawn: Tolkien has scrubbed his wizard clean of all the nasty origin.
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I suspect that Merlin, taken as an archetype, was the victim of 'bad press'. The conquering Romans could not defeat them so they demonised them. What we have are stories told by the victors in the battle for Europe south of the Rhine.
Germania was the name given to peoples North of the Rhine, regardless of actual language or alliances. They did not call themselves Germans/Germanic.
The defining difference between Celtic (aka Keltoi, or Gaulish, Galician, Galatian...)and Germanic societies was the degree of Romanisation.
The name-calling cuts both ways. Some of those 'Germanic' peoples had names for Romanised peoples too, such as 'wealas'. This is a term that came to be associated with oath breaking (to 'welsch' on a deal) and with those tribes driven into Western Britain (Wales and Cornwealas). These people did not call themselves Welsh, we gave them that name.
It seems logical to suppose that
apparent differences in their Wise men (I could say women too, but I am getting to Gandalf's roots rather than Galadriel's) were more the result of the changing agendas of their respective societies. The Romans kept meeting resistance to their rule across Europe. Someone or some group of people kept uniting forces against them on both sides of the Rhine. What better way to tackle these elusive tale-tellers and king-makers than to demonise them in new tales?
My point is that Norman tales calling Merlin "demon spawn", or your saying he has a "nasty origin", seems to me the same as calling Gandalf "Storm-crow" or "Lathspel"/"Ill-news". Ill news for who?