(Sorry for the delay; I came down with a sudden bout of work.)

The story in “Of the Fifth Battle: Nirnaeth Arnoediad,” Chapter 20 of The Silmarillion, is part of a flurry of activity that follows a long period (400 years) of relative calm between the Third and Fourth Battles.  This structure follows Tolkien’s preferred historical and literary notion of “Great Years,” in which the effects of pieces long-set finally come into play.¹  It allows the Noldorin elves time to establish mighty kingdoms (the better to be brought low).  And it brings men into Beleriand, which is arguably the beginning of the second “half” of The Silmarillion, allowing for characters and personal stories that readers will more easily identify with,² somewhat like the Hobbits in The Lord of the Rings.³  Even in narratives of large-scale warfare, the individual stories (Gwindor’s wrath, the last stands of Fingon and Húrin) receive more attention than larger strategic issues that modern historians might identify as more central to the battle’s outcome⁴ (however, Tolkien has ample precedent for his method⁵).  This raises questions:  What is historical truth?  Why does Tolkien treat nearly all his stories of Middle Earth, within their frame, as history and not fiction?⁶  (Just two of many questions which will not be in answered in this summary.)

For reasons that are unclear, “Of the Fifth Battle” begins with a continuation of the story of Beren and Lúthien.  Thingol’s heart is warmed by the couple’s return, but Melian is overcome by grief and turns away.  She may regret not making more of earlier ages with her daughter⁷ or she may not wish to prolong their inevitable parting.⁸  Lúthien and Beren decamp for an island in Ossiriand, apparently living alone, because of their uniqueness,⁹ holiness,¹⁰ dangerous precedent,¹¹ unnaturalness¹² or merely for romantic effect.¹³  (Their separation is a change from the original Book of Lost Tales version, where they ruled as king and queen over reincarnated elves.)¹⁴  They have a son, Dior.  Beren and Lúthien’s deaths are unobserved, and they apparently did not have graves—perhaps their very bodies are assumed into the hereafter,¹⁵ perhaps their bodies dissipated like Saruman’s,¹⁶ perhaps no one cared to mark them¹⁷ or perhaps this is merely a poetic metaphor.¹⁸

Beren and Lúthien’s success in Angband obtains two results from Maedhros and his brothers.  First, they demand the Silmaril from Thingol—their oath is now turning them against potential allies—with Celegorm and Curufin, as ever, going the extra mile in arrogance.  (Thingol refuses, of course.  The Silmarils apparently have a power of enchantment—was Beren able to freely give it because he was already enchanted, by Lúthien?¹⁹)  Second, Maedhros is inspired to plan an assault on Morgoth.  He possibly betrays condescension towards the abilities of a mere Sindarin elf like Lúthien²⁰ and apparently ignores the roles that stealth and divine assistance played in Beren and Lúthien’s success,²¹ but perhaps, under pressure as his father’s heir,²² he was diverting his brothers’ attention from the Silmaril in Doriath.²³  Nargothrond (also soured on the oath-driven brothers) and Doriath contribute only token forces (hinting at his weakness as a king, Orodreth is unable to restrain Gwindor from leaving against his will, which arguably proves disastrous in the battle) but Maedhros does muster the forces of his brothers, of Fingon, of the dwarves, and of a good number of men, including the lately-arrived Easterners.

Before launching the main battle, Maedhros first clears the enemy from Beleriand and Dorthonion (no details on this campaign are provided) but then unfortunately delays to muster his full forces before attacking Angband, giving Morgoth time to prepare and also to activate his fifth columnist sleeper cells.  Maedhros’ plan, to have two widely-separated armies attacking Morgoth’s forces from opposite sides, though cleverly designed to engage a confident larger force,²⁴ is hard to coordinate²⁵ and easier to undermine with treachery.

For the battle, which begins on Midsummer, Tolkien mostly focuses on Fingon’s forces in the west.  Fingon’s army is heartened by the surprise appearance of Turgon and the Gondolindrim.  Turgon’s reasons for joining the coalition are unclear, as he seems to know that the Noldor can’t defeat Morgoth without aid from the West.  Is it brotherly love or is Turgon thumbing his nose at Morgoth?²⁶  In any case, Morgoth’s army soon appears, making straight for Fingon’s hidden positions, which should perhaps have told him that their secret plans had been betrayed.  The orcs’ taunts lead to disagreement between cooler heads like Húrin, calling for patience and restraint, and the more hot-blooded allies, personified in Gwindor, who charges at the sight of his cruelly-murdered brother, Gelmir—an opposition that will be ironically reversed years later in Nargothrond, when Gwindor councils stealth against Húrin’s son, Túrin’s campaign of open warfare.  (Gelmir’s conveniently-placed execution occurs before Gwindor “by ill chance,” which prompts thoughts of Morgoth’s claim in the Unfinished Tales to be “Master of the fates of Arda,” although we don’t know how the ultimate outcome would differ had Gwindor not attacked²⁷—what of Túrin’s career if Gwindor weren’t taken prisoner, for example?)

Gwindor’s charge inflames the Noldor, who drive through the orcs for four days (in one paragraph!) before being stopped at the very gates of Angband and driven back.  On the fifth evening, Fingon’s army is surrounded, but the sixth morning brings relief from the armies of both Turgon and Maedhros (long-delayed by bad information from treacherous men).  Then Morgoth lets loose his last assault, including dragons, balrogs and wolves.  Simultaneously the treachery of the eastern men is revealed (though their characters and motivations are never examined, nor are those of their eastern companions who remained faithful to the elves) as they turn on Maedhros.  The battle becomes a rout.

The dwarves of Belegost save the sons of Fëanor by holding off Glaurung, with their leader, Azaghâl, giving a hint of Turin’s later strategy.  Fingon is attacked by two balrogs, bound, hewed and ground into the dust, a horrible brutal death, with no honor for his body:  symbolic, perhaps, of what Morgoth is doing to the Noldor as a people.  His death is probably especially hard news for Maedhros, who’s led the person who’d rescued him from Thangorodrim to utter defeat.²⁸  Húrin counsels Turgon to flee the field, and Huor adds, prophetically, that from them a new hope may yet come.  In a possible response by Tolkien to the medieval Battle of Maldon and an attempt to show the heroic northern courage he admired, the men of Húrin and Huor make their last stand at the River Rivil, buying time for Turgon to escape.  Huor, who had told Turgon that he foretold “with the eyes of death,” is ironically killed by a poisoned arrow to the eye (maybe it’s Morgoth’s attempt to poison the future).  Last is Húrin, who earns his later epithet of “mightiest of the warriors of mortal Men” (Ch. 22, “Of the Ruin of Doriath”) by slaying 70 trolls before being overwhelmed “though he still hewed off their arms” (I’m reminded a little of Pippin’s description of the capture of “good old Merry” at Parth Galen in The Lord of the Rings).

After the battle a storm comes from the west. To wash something away?

Was it a close call for Morgoth?  The wrath of Fingon’s army was too much for his first assault.  He trembled when the elves smote upon his doors. Turgon’s 10,000 elves were unexpected.  Glaurung was driven off by Azaghâl.  And yet Morgoth crushed Maedhros’ union.  There are several contributing factors, including, in no particular order:  1. Insufficient forces from Doriath and Nargothrond due to the misdeeds of the sons of Fëanor; 2. Contrarily, Orodreth’s inability to keep hot-headed Gwindor at home; 3. “Ill chance” placing hot-headed Gwindor at the scene of his brother’s execution; 4. Maedhros tipping his hand too early; and 5. The treachery of men, who: a. betrayed Maedhros’ plans; b. delayed Maedhros’ attack; and c. attacked Maedhros from behind.  And Morgoth didn’t even use his rivers-of-fire trick from the Dagor Bragollach (we’re not told if the elves had a plan for that contingency).   Probably he thought that treachery was the best way to create disunion and demoralization, which also were achieved through the sheer brutality of Morgoth’s victory, and the sight of the huge mound of the slain, the Haudh-en-Ndengin.²⁹  However, the mound grows green; this rebirth may hint at Morgoth’s eventual defeat³⁰ but also suggests the futility of the Noldorin war, at least without divine assistance.³¹

Following the battle, Morgoth’s forces move at will through much of Beleriand, and the following year, they destroy the coastal havens, forcing Cirdan’s people to flee to the mouths of Sirion and island of Balar.  Turgon sees that time is running out to make use of Cirdan’s resources³² and sends seven ships in a last appeal to the Valar.  All the ships are lost, but it will prove to be an important act nonetheless.  The Valar make no reply, perhaps because the oath-taking, kin-slaying Noldor have to be fully defeated before they can be saved.  This may not be entirely fair to the Sindar.

There remains the story of Húrin’s captivity, which might better fit in Turin’s tale, but like Beren and Lúthien’s coda appears here.  Morgoth wants Húrin to lead him to Turgon (who is now the high king, due to either an authorial-editorial oversight or a really convoluted inheritance arrangement³³)  but cannot successfully entice or threaten him.  Húrin, in fact, dares to mock Morgoth, which may be engaging Morgoth on his own turf,³⁴ and may show Húrin’s ignorance that Morgoth can do worse than kill him (and Morgoth may be frustratingly aware of the ultimate futility in killing his victims). ³⁵  So Húrin is cursed with the ability to see and hear what Morgoth does, with special attention to the travails of his own family.

The structure of this chapter is a bit awkward.  The story has always been placed between the tales of Beren and Lúthien and the tale of Túrin, and the presence of parts of those tales in the published Silmarillion version of the Fifth Battle appear to represent an attempt at creating transitions between separate tales.³⁶  Perhaps Tolkien would have further developed these continuity bridges had he brought the work to completion, though this might not have worked to the tale’s advantage.³⁷  The central event, the actual Battle of Unnumbered Tears, has been present in Tolkien’s mythology from almost the beginning, though he was slow to expand upon it, and in fact repeatedly has characters in his Lost Tales state that the story was too sad to be told in full.³⁸   From the earliest, the salient feature seems to have been a thorough defeat of the elves by Morgoth; to this defeat was added the persisting concept of the betrayal of the elves by men.  I submit that the story was meant to strengthen Tolkien’s concepts of the dwindling of the elves and their sundering from mankind.

There are also questions about the narrator of this story.  The story is told in a limited third-person omniscient perspective,³⁹ but with touches that suggest a source, or patchwork of sources.  Who’s responsible for calling Uldor “the accursed?  For having Fingon refer to the people of Dor-lómin as “Fathers of Men” (or was that a bit of foresight that presages Legolas’ cryptic conversation with Gimli in Minas Tirith?⁴⁰)  How were the details of Húrin’s last stand passed on—via Melian perhaps?⁴¹  Would elves be concerned with the stories even of men as great as Húrin and Beren?⁴²  A man, Dirhavel, is credited in The War of the Jewels with the “Narn in Hin Húrin,”⁴³ but did he actually have access to sources?  Would Tolkien eventually have resolved the provenance of The Silmarillion?

Further analysis of this chapter could proceed in several directions.  For example, there are some interesting parallels to events in The Lord of the Rings, notably to the Battle of the Pelennor Fields (the lighting of a beacon to unite two forces, the meeting of friends amidst the tumult, a mighty captain brought down after being attacked from behind) and to the parley at the Black Gate (the Mouth of Sauron feigns to have the prisoner that Morgoth’s captain actually presents at Barad Eithel).

The extensive use in this chapter of images of day, night, light, darkness, and fire also deserves scrutiny; these are often commonplace metaphors for describing battles, but they are used very frequently in the 20 paragraphs that narrate the six days of fighting.  Fingon’s forces begin their fight at dawn on the longest day of the year,⁴⁴ are surrounded during the fifth night, are succored at the next dawn, and wither as the sun falls.  Fingon and his host shout, “The day has come!  The night is passing!” at the first dawn, and Húrin shouts, “Day shall come again!” as he fights alone at the final sunset.  (These lines have analogues in lines spoken by Frodo and Sam in The Lord of the Rings.⁴⁵)  Turgon’s army has “bright mail,” upon whose appearance, “the shadow passed,” from Fingon’s heart; later “their ranks shone like a river of steel in the sun.”  Angband is covered by a “dark cloud” and Morgoth’s hosts wear a “dun raiment.”  The Noldor have “hot” hearts and Gwindor’s wrath is “kindled.”  His deeds set the Noldor “on fire.”  “The light of the drawing of the swords of the Noldor was like a fire in a field of reeds” (this may be a poetic response to Morgoth’s rivers of fire in the Dagor Bragollach⁴⁶).  A “white flame [springs] up from the helm of Fingon” when he is killed.  And Huor says to Turgon, “From you and from me a new star shall arise.”  Hideously, the severed heads of the men of Dor-lómin are like “a mound of gold in the sunset.”  And in the end, “night fell in Hithlum,” and not just literally, as the houses of Fingon and Hador that ruled there have fallen too.

Notes
I encourage anyone who’s not led a chapter discussion before to sign up on the next list—both times I’ve done it, I’ve learned a lot I didn't know before, both by having to come up with questions and from the responses.  Seemingly simple material can lead in unexpected directions.  My thanks to everyone who participated in this week’s discussion.  Most of you are cited below; my apologies to owlyross, JediFonger and bigidiot, whose comments I couldn’t work into this summary.  All direct quotation in the summary is from “Of the Fifth Battle,” Ch. 20 in The Silmarillion, unless otherwise noted above.

¹drogo drogo “History and points of convergence” 11/08/04 17:29.  ²Curious, “The long peace lets Men come on stage” 11/09/04 5:09.  ³drogo drogo, “They are the ‘hobbits’ of the Sil,” 11/09/04 9:10.  ⁴Curious, “The long peace lets Men come on stage” 11/09/04 9:10.  ⁵squire, “Tolkien is following his sources,” 11/09/04 9:30.  ⁶Curious, “Modern histories, then,” 11/09/04 13:56.  ⁷Kimi, “Some thoughts,” 11/08/04 17:21.  ⁸erather, “The separation of Lúthien from her parents,” 11/09/04 21:30.  ⁹drogo drogo, “Beren and Lúthien are now forever sundered from Arda,” 11/08/04 17:46.  ¹⁰Kimi, “Some thoughts,” 11/08/04 17:21.  ¹¹Menelwyn, “more thoughts on Beren and Lúthien,” 11/08/04 19:49.  ¹²linkinparkelf, “bad precedent,” 11/08/04 23:02.  ¹³Lúthien Rising, “chapter structure, etc.,” 11/08/04 20:09.  ¹⁴Beren IV, “I have been away, so…,” 11/12/04 17:14.  ¹⁵Kimi, “Some thoughts,” 11/08/04 17:21.  ¹⁶Curious, “None saw Melian’s body either,” 11/09/04 4:57.  ¹⁷linkinparkelf, “bad precedent,” 11/08/04 23:02.  ¹⁸drogo drogo, “Beren and Lúthien are now forever sundered from Arda,” 11/08/04 17:46.  ¹⁹Chip of Dale, “That dang oath,” 11/10/04 13:17.  ²⁰Beren IV, “One more note (sorry) about Lú,” 11/13/04 1:40.  ²¹erather, “Maedhros missed the point,” 11/10/04 15:35.  ²²Chip of Dale, “Poor guy,” 11/10/04 21:53.  ²³Curious, “Maedhros was desperate,” 11/10/04 17:31.  ²⁴Ceorl, “Morgoth vs Maedhros,” 11/10/04 11:10.  ²⁵Arquen, “Ball pien hammer or rubber mallet?” 11/10/04 0:51.  ²⁶Entwife Wandlimb, “Turgon’s motives,” 11/10/04 18:43.  ²⁷Finding Frodo, “Ill chance, bad luck, and what if,” 11/10/04 22:57.  ²⁸Chip of Dale, “It’s a bitter death, I think,” 11/12/04 9:00.  ²⁹drogo drogo, “Morgoth wants to demoralize the opposition,” 11/10/04 6:59.  ²⁹Ibid.  ³⁰drogo drogo, “Hallowed ground undoes the taint of Morgoth,” 11/12/04 17:22.  ³¹nerdanel 50, “Grass and rust,” 11/14/04 17:41.  ³²Arquen, “#6 –Havens destroyed,” 11/13/04 12:17.  ³³Menelwyn, “thanks, and if you insist,” 11/13/04 9:57.  ³⁴squire, “I think it's pretty clear in the context of the entire chapter,” 07/26/04 11:59.  ³⁵Menelwyn, “coming in from typing next week’s discussions,” 11/12/04 18:05.  ³⁶drogo drogo, “Beren and Lúthien are now forever sundered from Arda,” 11/08/04 17:46.  ³⁷Lúthien_Rising, “and here’s the answer to my question :-)” 11/08/04 20:11.  ³⁸dna, “the Battle, not the Chapter,” 11/12/04 19:09.  ³⁹Curious, “Of course they are tales, but,” 11/13/04 9:35.  ⁴⁰PhantomS, “These are indeed the Fathers of Men,” 11/13/04 10:00.  ⁴¹dna, “either,” 11/1/04 19:22.  ⁴²squire, “Tolkien is following his sources,” 11/09/04 9:03.  ⁴³dna, “I’ll buy that,” 11/12/04 7:05.  ⁴⁴drogo drogo, “Some answers on  the battle preparations,” 11/10/04 16:37.  ⁴⁵Curious, “Stirring indeed!” 11/12/04 12:12.  ⁴⁶drogo drogo, “‘A fire in a field of reeds,’” 11/11/04 11:41.