Do Balrogs Have Wings?

[Boromir88]

Fordim, which is exactly why the argument that 'If the Balrog had wings why didn't it fly' doesn't work. However, what does work is this argument, which should totally disprove of a wing theory:

His enemy halted again, facing him, and the shadow about it reached out like two vast wings.~Bridge of Khazad-dum

There is no other meaning or interpreation of this sentence except the fact that it is a simile. Tolkien is comparing the shadow of the balrog as being like wings. Also note, it doesn't say here that the Shadow of the balrog looked like wings, but that the shadow had reaches out like something had wings would unfold their wings.

Picture a bird again When it's just sitting still it's wings are folded up, however when it goes to 'fly' the wings reach out and unfold. That's the comparison here that's being made.

So, Tolkien is comparing the shadow of the balrog to wings. But it's not in the sense that the shadow had took the form of wings, and looked like wings, but the way it 'reaches' out was like two vast wings.

Then a little bit further down we have this quote:

It stepped forward slowly onto the bridge, and suddenly it drew itself up to a great height, and its wings were spread from wall to wall.~ibid

Here there is no 'like' or 'as' but it's still a metaphor, more specifically it's an extended metaphor. It is pretty bad writing technique to use the word like or as to want to compare two different things. So, what authors like to do is use extended metaphors and this is most similar in poetry (where entire stanza or poems could just be long extended metaphors). The poet/author doesn't want to use the word like/as to draw a comparison everytime so they set up the comparison (using like or as) and keep the comparison going longer, keep it on, hence the name 'extended metaphor.'

What we have here is Tolkien clearly sets up that the shadow of the balrog were like wings, and he keeps that comparison going in the second quote.

Let's say you don't even believe me and you want to deny the common literary devices of writing. Let's think about it from a logical stance as well. We quite clearly know the height of a balrog. The most Tolkien ever conceived a balrog as being was twice the size of Glorfindel...however these are Tolkien's earliest drafts and by LOTR it's quite clear that Balrogs were roughly man-size, maybe a little more, maybe a little less.

This would put the Balrog at around 6-7 feet. Now what we have here in Moria is a chasm, a chasm is an area that is wider than it is long. That would mean the Balrog would have to have absolutely humorgous wings if he actually had literal wings that spread out from wall to wall. This would be extremely inproportianate. Something that was man-size and man-shape, as we are told, it just can't be possible for the Balrog to have a wingspan of say 70 feet (a conservative guess).

You also bring up mobility issues, the Balrog was quite agile, it 'leaped' it 'jumped' and I just can't see a 6-7 foot creature, with wings that when full spread would be over 10 times the size of his body, to be able to move around the mines as Durin's Bane is able to.

There you have it. If you don't believe in common writing devices authors use (similes, metaphors, extended metaphors...etc)...it's still not even logically possible for a Balrog to literally have wings. As if it did, the wings would not be proportionate to his body, and it would be terribly hard for him to be mobile in the mines carrying around wings at least 10 times the size of his body.