Dragons,Ungoliant, Ents , Eagles and Huan

[Amarie of the Vanyar]

2> Tolkien put them in with perhaps a sub-concious nod to the above, but in 'The Hobbit'-like fashion were part of the story in a way similar to Stone Giants and Beorn, that could not be fully explained within the greater mythology.

Yes Lindil, I agree with you in that this is a possibility. Even though Tolkien abandoned most of his earlier mithology, some part of it could sub-counciously have remained in the later mithology.

And there is also a third possibility that I have just think of now, while writing this post: Tolkien wanted to leave parts of the background of ME unexplained to readers, as he says in his letters. Could it be then that he, deliberately, eliminated these parts of the later Silmarillion, just to leave some misteries to us?

Of course, this is mere speculation, and I can be totally wrong [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]