LotR --- Appendix A: II -- The House of Eorl

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Estelyn Telcontar

Are you a fan of the Rohirrim?

. . .

The time table is invaluable for RPers and fan fiction writers, and there are bits of additional information that keep it from being merely a boring list of names and dates.

Did you read this previously? I must admit, I only skimmed it, and was surprised at the details I found when reading it conscienciously this time. Have you made use of the information for writing? What interests you most?

I have always found this part of the Appendices and that on the dwarves interesting for the 'back story' about the Rohirrim and the dwarves. I wonder what effect it would have had on LotR if these two parts had been included with the foreward material "Concerning Hobbits"?

Originally Posted by davem

I think its clear that one of Tolkien’s purposes in this chapter is to ‘echo’ the history of the Anglo-Saxons in the story of Rohan. Perhaps the reason Tolkien went into more depth with the history of the House of Eorl was that Anglo-Saxon history & culture was so close to his heart. Certainly the Rohirrim’s coming into Calenardhon & driving out the Dunlendings is very similar to the Anglo-Saxon’s driving the native Britons west into what is now Wales & Cornwall.

Of course, as Shippey has pointed out, the main difference between the Rohirrim & the Anglo-Saxons was horses - the Anglo-Saxons had few if any cavalry, yet the Rohirrim fight on, travel by & virtually worship, horses. That’s not to say that the Horse wasn’t important to the Saxons.

Very clearly, the tone and tenor of the Rohirrim derive from the Anglo Saxons. Yet for me the horse riding arises from Tolkien's map making.

If we 'follow' his and Christopher's maps--and I believe Tolkien says in one of his letters that Minas Tirith is about at the same longetude and latitude as Venice--then, Rohan might possibly be seen as the country of the steppes, possibly Ukraine but not necessarily so, the borderland country between east and west where territory was always fluid and over which several tribes and nations have held sway, including Vikings from the north.

This is also the land that bred the cossacks (belonging to several nations), fierce warriors astride horses who created in effect para-military units. Cossacks have a 'negative' history for raiding, pillaging, and cruelty, which of course is not part of the Rohirrim history, but I have always imagined, in the grand sweep of the Rohan grasslands, that Tolkien was imagining something of the fearless horsemen of eastern European history.

No evidence for this, naturally, just one of those tantalizing links imagination bodies forth. It is the Appendix which inspires this for me rather than the narrative proper of LotR.