LotR -- Book 6 - Chapter 4 - The Field of Cormallen

[Guinevere]

originally posted by Hilde Bracegirdle
Is this simply a strange turn of phrase or is Gwaihir paying Gandalf back for a favor we are unaware of?

Well , in the Hobbit there is mentioned (after they were rescued from the 5 firtrees):

As a matter of fact Gandalf, who had often been in the mountains, had once rendered a service to the eagles and healed their lord from an arrow-wound.

At least, up to now I had taken it for granted that "the lord of the Eagles" was Gwaihir.
But just now I read Aiwendil's post:

originally posted byAiwendil
Gandalf says to Gwaihir, 'Twice you have borne me'. This must refer to his escape from Orthanc and his journey from Zirak-Zigil after the battle with the Balrog. But this would mean that the "lord of the eagles" from The Hobbit was not in fact Gwaihir.

So now I am confused, too! Somehow it doesn't seem plausible to me that there is a second "lord of the eagles" around with whom Gandalf was friends...
But that rescuing in the Hobbit was quite some time ago (78 years, to be precise)
so it could be that Gandalf is just mentioning the two other incidents in the same year.
But isn't "Thrice shall pay for all" a kind of proverb, as we have in German: "Aller guten Dinge sind drei" ?
And are Gwaihir and Landroval really meant to be the same eagles from the first age? or did Tolkien just re-use the names like he did with Legolas and Glorfindel?

originally posted by davem
The question of why Gandalf takes three eagles with him is difficult to answer. Most probably because he didn’t know the fate of Gollum & thought there would be three survivors awaiting rescue. This would be interesting, showing that even at the end he was concerned for Gollum, & was still hoping for his ‘’salvation’.

Well, that's certainly a fascinating idea!
But I supposed the same as Bergil - that Gandalf was riding the 3rd eagle. I guess the other 2 eagles were carrying Sam and Frodo in their claws, as in the movie (and in the Hobbit)

Of course I do love this whole chapter, too! But after all the great posts here I have nothing else to add.

[davem]

Originally Posted by Hilde

Is this simply a strange turn of phrase or is Gwaihir paying Gandalf back for a favor we are unaware of?

Its a common proverb, apparently:

"If you mean you think it is my job to go into the secret passages first, O Thorin Thrain's son Oakenshield, may your beard grow ever longer,"he said crossly, "say so at once and have done! I might refuse. I have got you out of two messes already, which were hardly in the original bargain, so that I am, I think, already owed some reward. But 'third time pays for all* as my father used to say, and somehow I don't think I shall refuse. Perhaps I have begun to trust my luck more than I used to in the old days" he meant last spring before he left his own house, but it seemed centuries ago"but anyway I think I will go and have a peep at once and get it over. Now who is coming with me?" TH 'On the Doorstep'

Whether it was a specifically Hobbit proverb which Gandalf had picked up, or whether it was a commonplace saying in Middle-earth is another question. If the former we'd expect Gwaihir to respond to Gandalf with a 'Sorry, I don't follow.' Seems we have to go with the latter, which implies a collection of common sayings known by members of many different races. Where did these sayings originate? And why, exactly, does the third time pay for all?

EDIT

Maybe these sayings were part of a collection of lore passed down even among Hobbits:

Pippin was silent again for a while. He heard Gandalf singing softly to himself, murmuring brief snatches of rhyme in many tongues, as the miles ran under them. At last the wizard passed into a song of which the hobbit caught the words: a few lines came clear to his ears through the rushing of the wind:
Tall ships and tall kings
Three times three,
What brought them from the foundered land
Over the flowing sea?
Seven stars and seven stones
And one white tree.
"What are you saying, Gandalf?" asked Pippin.
"I was just running over some of the Rhymes of Lore in my mind," answered the wizard. "Hobbits, I suppose, have forgotten them, even those that they ever knew."
'No, not all," said Pippin. 'And we have many of our own, which wouldn't interest you, perhaps. 'Minas Tirith'

EDIT again:

Hobbits are not quite like ordinary people; and after all if their holes are nice cheery places and properly aired, quite different from the tunnels of the goblins, still they are more used to tunnelling than we are, and they do not easily lose their sense of direction undergroundnot when their heads have recovered from being bumped. Also they can move very quietly, and hide easily, and recover wonderfully from falls and bruises, and they have a fund of wisdom and wise sayings that men have mostly never heard or have forgotten long ago.

Shippey in a talk at Birmingham claims he counted over 70 proverbs in LotR. Gandalf's words to Frodo are interesting:

'I can't believe that Gollum was connected with hobbits, however distantly,' said Frodo with some heat. 'What an abominable notion!'
'It is true all the same,' replied Gandalf. 'About their origins, at any rate, I know more than hobbits do themselves. And even Bilbo's story suggests the kinship. There was a great deal in the background of their minds and memories that was very similar. They understood one another remarkably well, very much better than a hobbit would understand, say, a Dwarf, or an Orc, or even an Elf. Think of the riddles they both knew, for one thing.'

These common riddles are obviously very ancient & come from before the settling of the Shire. What's interesting is the way they have survived down to Bilbo's time. Shippey pointed out that Gollum's riddles have their roots in Anglo-Saxon riddles (as found in the Exeter Book for example) while Bilbo's seem to be recent creations (ie invented by Tolkien) so the process of inventing riddles seems to have gone on. Bilbo therefore has an advantage over Gollum - he knows the old ones but has access to new ones whereas Gollum only has the ones he learnt 500 years previously. So we seem to have ancient lore (& riddles) handed down & new ones invented - as with Bilbo's 'Out of the frying pan, into the fire' & 'Never laugh at live dragons.' So we get a collection of lore building up over the years, some of it the common property of all races, some of it unique to each race (as with Butterbur's: 'But there's no accounting for East and West as we say in Bree' & Pippin's ironic response "'Handsome is as handsome does' as we say in the Shire)

[Child of the 7th Age]

Where did these sayings originate? And why, exactly, does the third time pay for all?

Regarding why the third time pays for all....

"Three" has a special meaning in fairy tales. For example, the hero is usually given three trials. He fails the first two and succeeds at the third. Thus, "three" is the path of wisdom. The number three is found in so many tales, and the third person or try often represents wisdom:

• 3 billy goats gruff: it is the third goat who bests the troll
• Goldilocks and the 3 bears--it is the third and littlest bear who finds Goldilocks
• 3 little pigs -- it's the third pig whose house prevails
• 3 sisters in the Cinderella story and the third daughter is "blessed" with looks and wisdom
• 3 sons in Puss in Boots and, of course, it's the third one who shows his wisdom by getting the cat

There are also three Graces (Greece), three Norns (past, present, future) of Norse myth, and, of course, the Trinity, all of these representing enlightenment. I known that some point to the mother/father/child triad as the origin of this usage with the child pointing to the path of wisdom.

I think Tolkien is using three in its traditional sense, as a tip of the hat to the Gaffer's experience or wisdom, which his son acknowleges. I do know you can google the phrase "third time pays for all" and come up with several modern instances of the phrase. But as to how this specific saying originates in the context of Middle-earth (or of our earth), I am not sure at all.

________________________

P.S. I didn't see your edit till now. Very interesting. Notice also the use of three times three.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Child of the 7th Age

I think Tolkien is using three in its traditional sense, as a tip of the hat to the Gaffer's experience or wisdom, which his son acknowleges. I do know you can google the phrase "third time pays for all" and come up with several modern instances of the phrase. But as to how this specific saying originates in the context of Middle-earth (or of our earth), I am not sure at all.

There are at least a couple of instances, other than the "three times three" instance where three could be seen as a significant number to the peoples of Middle-Earth.

There are three original kindreds of Elves: Minyar, Tatyar, Nelyar (Vanyar, Noldor, Teleri).

There are three kindreds of Edain: Beorians, Halethrim, Hadorian.

There are three kindreds of Hobbits: Harfoots, Stoors, and Fallohides.

There were three Great Lights: Pillars, Trees, Sun and Moon.

There were three Silmarils.

There were "three Rings for the Elvenkings".

There were three realms of divided Arnor: Arthedain, Cardolan, and Rhuduar.

There were Three Ages, as of the Lord of the Rings.

And I'm sure there are more.

Now, admittedly, some of these would seem to be more coincidental than incidental, the three realms of Arnor, in particular. But several of these would be highly significant, such as the original kindreds and the Silmarils.

Of course, one can't say whether, in Middle-Earth, they had any connection to the saying "third time pays for all". A possibility for a fanfic, perhaps?

[Guinevere]

Shippey in a talk at Birmingham claims he counted over 70 proverbs in LotR.

I've found 80, so far. I have been collecting them for nearly 3 years now, since first I joined this game in "quotable quotes" and became intrigued by all those timeless wisdoms. I think Tolkien is quite unique in this respect!
In UT there are also a lot of proverbs (I found 20 so far, many said by Sador Labadal!)
See also Esty's game The Gaffer's mixed-up proverbs on the BD Homepage

Since English isn't my mothertongue I don't always know which of them are genuine traditional proverbs and which ones are made up by Tolkien - they all sound authentic!

[Child of the 7th Age]

Formendacil,

Excellent list!

Also, the quest to dispose of the Ring could not be accomplished by two. Frodo and Sam needed the help of Gollum. Surely, this is one of the most pivotal trios in the book.

LotR itself, in its conception, was a "double three", representing the original six books.

[Formendacil]

It's fascinating to reread this thread with its high praise for this chapter and mentions of it being personal favourites--because the thing that struck me most while I was rereading "The Field of Cormallen" was how... unreal it was.

Not in a bad sense! But the biggest moment that hit me in the chapter was the shift from Mordor to Ithilien, from the fumes of Orodruin to the herbs of Cormallen. And two weeks pass! Frodo waking in the House of Elrond was but the prefigurement of this moment.

Part of the reason for my sense of unreality is no doubt that we are here seeing the story at its most heightened: not just the words, but the events themselves, are like something out of a legend or medieval epic. Sam's bewilderment, wondering if somehow all bad things are veing undone, describes the whiplash of this chapter, coming on the heels of the starvation, exhaustion, desperation, and injury of the previous chapter.