[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Bêthberry

Why don't we just imagine that Tom's first wife is kept hidden away in an upstairs room somewhere, unbeknownst to Goldberry?

And of course this gives the opportunity for a fan-fic entitled The Wide Sargasso Withywindle...

The finding of the brooch and what Tom says is one of those small, yet incredibly touching moments in the story - the brooch is in effect a tangible reminder of a dim and distant past, a reminder of mortality and long faded beauty. Having puzzled over who may have owned the brooch and why Tom may have taken it, I have come to the conclusion that what Tom does and says is simply out there by Tolkien as an intensely poetic moment. Maybe it is even a metaphor for story - that many years later a fragment of a life may be found in just a few words and then be taken up and passed on...

Of course, Merry does have his dream while in the Barrow that he was one of the people killed there - at night, a spear in his heart. The Barrow-downs seem to be a place which is liminal, outside normal concepts of time (as is Lothlorien) judging by Merry's experience (and so do all the Hobbits when they fall asleep in the lee of the Megalith), so when Tom finds the brooch he could quite literally be remembering a woman he did just 'see'.

Anyway, onward to the solid topic of hiding out in tombs.

Reading the new Companion and Guide I was delighted to find out that Tolkien did indeed have an interest in archaeology and ancient history. So he wrote with some knowledge and it is true that in reality people did use passage tombs as hideouts and for other purposes such as for hiding loot and storing food. Fogous are quite enigmatic in this respect as evidence of storage has been found in them, however they also appear to have been built for ritual purposes; passage tombs were not just used as sombre burial places, the people would hold feasts on the threshold to honour their ancestors - many cultures are not at all squeamish about sharing living space with the dead, in fact it is an honour (and Gondorians certainly spend a lot of time thinking about tombs and they have them in their city, too, close to them).

Passage Tombs and creeps and the like were also built to exacting standards and were (are) not often damp, nor prone to flooding. And owing to general superstitions surrounding tombs and graves (no matter how old they are, tales linger on) people might assume, rightly or wrongly, that a graveyard would be a perfect place to hide out as their enemies would never consider they would be so desperate as to choose such a frightening and possibly gruesome place to seek refuge.

It's annoying me now, as there is a well known legend of someone hiding out in a passage tomb (as distinct from ordinary Barrows, which do not have open entrances - or do not now, anyway!). That's in addition to all the tales of Arthur and Merlin living in tombs, waiting for the day they are needed again.