Do Balrogs Have Wings?

[narfforc]

Yes and why in all creation have wings that are of no use. it does not fit into the way Tolkien told stories. If they had wings, he would have given them flight. Like the dragons.

[Nilpaurion Felagund]

How does "I won't answer" answer the question? (narfforc)

How come Tolkien left Bombadil ambiguous?

If [Balrogs] had wings, he would have given them flight. Like the dragons. (narfforc)

Well, what if they were bereft of their power to fly, then stuck in a winged incarnate form? Like the Three Elven Rings losing potency at the fall of the One.

[narfforc]

Sorry I do not go for the "What ifs", I only read what is. Show me where Tolkien says anything like that and I will conceed to your point, where does it ever say in the published (during his lifetime) works, that they ever flew. The only person who bereft them of the power of flight was Tolkien, by excluding it. This thread has a lot of suppositions in it. The only man that knew the Truth was Tolkien, and his are the only words that count. I can forgive our desire for more, I do it all the time. Our wish that this great piece of work could somehow have told us everything, but did`nt. So when discussing the written word of Tolkien, we must stick to what is plainly written and not let our imagination go too far. When I cast off this mortal coil, I like many of you will seek out The Prof, and ask him a multitude of questions. I assure you somewhere near the top will be the words Wings and Balrogs.

[HerenIstarion]

Originally Posted by narfforc

This thread has a lot of suppositions in it

Aye . That what makes discussion fun . If all were given and explained, what would be the point of us here? Why would we gather at all, typing heatedly? Whoever discusses things like 'Sun is hot' or 'Water is wet'? It would all come down to 'Tolkien rules!' confirmed by chorus of 'yes-es'. End of the board, everybody can go home now.

So, even most 'outrageous' blunderings sometimes made during the process should not be taken as personal offense never ever ever never. Still more suppositions are not meant to be offenses.


peace

[narfforc]

I agree, it is nice to discuss possibilities, to go beyond the written word, as long as we keep our feet on the ground. I am just not a big fan of "What If", especially when there is no basis for them. How can we get from the description of,

and the SHADOW about it reached out LIKE two vast wings.

to discussing whether the were bereft of flight in the dim past we know nothing about. The sentence does not say.

and its two vast wings reached out like shadows.

The important word here is LIKE. This translates into english as.

1. Resembling, similar to
2. Having characterisics of.

These are the words that Tolkien wrote, and as a Professor of English he would have known what LIKE meant

[HerenIstarion]

Originally Posted by narfforc

The sentence does not say.

and its two vast wings reached out like shadows

Good . Being an inveterate no-winger myself, can not agree more.

Yet my previous post just meant what it meant. It is not good to be involved on such a personal level

To repeat myself from a little bit earlier on, after all, the message I see the balrog bearing on (besides linguistic Vala+Rauko musings and derivatives, besides plot and tension purposes) is that even the most noble and radiant creature may fall, and the higher it originally stood, the lower its fall would be. Repetition of Morgoth/Sauron theme on a slightly minor scale. In this respect, it does not even matter (though may still cause a lot of interest) that much whether it had wings, six teeth or a floating kidney

cheers

[Aiwendil]

narfforc wrote:

The sentence does not say.

You are right. I think there are two distinct types of "factual" questions about Middle-earth. There are those that have relatively certain answers (even if those answers are difficult to find) and those that do not. The question of Balrog wings falls into the latter category, I think. I am a pro-winger if divisions must be drawn - but I do not think that there is anything like a forcing argument for either side. This is in contrast to questions such as, for example, "is Ingwe the same person as Imin from the Cuivienyarna?", in which case I think there is a compelling argument for the answer "no", even though others may disagree.

That, I think, is why the Balrog wing question, the Elvish ears question, and the Tom Bombadil question are so notorious - not because they're any more interesting than other questions, but because they are simply not answerable, in any kind of satisfactory way.

HerenIstarion wrote:

But my statement above stands as it is - hosts of balrogs indeed marched on feet, otherwise, why should 'boarding' Gondolin walls have been such a problem?

I would just like to remind those who are not so familiar with HoMe that this argument is not quite as forcing as it might at first sound, since the Fall of Gondolin was written in the 1910s, at which time there can be little doubt that they were wingless.