Northmen

[Elianna]

We have maybe three paragraphs about the Northmen in Appen. A. Do we know any more about them than what can be gleaned from those paragraphs?

If the Rohirrim were based on some Germanic tribe, what were the Northmen based on? Mongols, Tatars, Cossacks? The Northmen were vaguely related to the Rohirrim, so maybe the Eorlingas were the Visigoths, and the Northmen Ostrogoths. I of course understand that Tolkien wrote no allegory, but it is supposed to be a sort of British history.

[Lathriel]

Northmen? I have never heard about them or if I did I have forgotten it. I would have no idea but if they are related to the Rohirrim maybe they were the first ones who started breeding horses.

[Lachwen]

You mean the Forodwaith who live by the Ice Bay of Forochel? (Why do I know that?!) Personally, I've always believed they were based on the Vikings.

[Lathriel]

Now I remember them I knew they would be buried somewhere in my mind. I also thought they were kinda like vikings.

[Elianna]

No, no, no, not them. Not the Forodwaith. The ones that lived in Rhovanion. One, Vidugavia, called himself their leader, but was actually only the ruler of the largest tribe. His daughter Vidumavi married Eldacar, the crown Prince of Gondor.

I don't know, the Forodwaith more readily bring to mind the Inuits, with their ice-skates and igloos, but maybe the Vikings had these too, and I'm just being an American...

[Guinevere]

These Northmen were in fact the ancestors of the Rohirrim !
After the invasion of the Wainriders and the wars which involved Gondor and their allies, the Northmen, for nearly 100 years, some of them fled to Dale and merged with the people there, some took refuge in Gondor, and the rest (under Marhwini, a descendant of Vidugavia) passed north and settled in the Vales of Anduin. This was the beginning of the Éothéod.

This is stated in Unfinished Tales "Cirion and Eorl"

In the Notes to that Chapter, Christopher Tolkien writes about the origin of their names:

It is an interesting fact (...) that the names of the early kings and princes of the Northmen and the Éothéod are Gothic in form, not Old English (Anglo-Saxon) as in the case of Léod, Éorl, and the later Rohirrim. Vidugavia is latinized in spelling representing Gothic Widugauja (wood-dweller) , a recorded Gothic name, and similarly Vidumavi Gothic Widumawi (Woodmaiden). Marhwini and Marhari contain the Gothic word marh (horse), corresponding to Old English mearh plural mearasthe word used in LotR for the horses of Rohan.(.........)

Since, as is explained in Appendix F (II), the language of Rohan was "made to resemble ancient English" the names of the ancestors of the Rohirrim are cast into the forms of the earliest recorded Germanic language.

I hope this answers you question, Elianna. As you see, you were right with your guess about the Goths! However, its not the people, only the languages that Tolkien took for a model!