BIBLICAL PARALLELS TO MIDDLE-EARTH X. THE TALE OF GONDOLIN'S FALL

(SPOILER ALERT! This blog summarizes the chapterS "Of Maeglin" and "Of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin" from The Silmarillion.)

The Story

After Huor, Hurin's brother, died in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears, Huor's wife bore a son, Tuor. Although he was a Man, he was reared by fugitive Elves. He became an outlaw fighting against Morgoth.

In time Ulmo, the Power of the sea, called Tuor by secret ways to the old halls where King Turgon of Gondolin had lived before he built the Hidden City. In the old halls Tuor found a suit of armor that Ulmo had bidden Turgon hide there. The armor was a sign that whoever wore it was Ulmo's messenger.

Ulmo, appearing to Tuor in a storm by the sea, bade him find Gondolin. When the storm ended, Tuor found on the shore an Elf, the sole survivor of a ship that Turgon had sent as an embassy to the Valar in Valinor. The Elf, learning of Tuor's mission, led him to the Hidden City.

Taken prisoner by its guards, Tuor was led before King Turgon. Before his throne Tuor was recognized as Ulmo's messenger. Tuor told Turgon that the Curse of Mandos would destroy him and his people if they stayed in Gondolin, and bade Turgon lead all of his people to the sea.

Turgon, proud of his city's strength and beauty, spurned Ulmo's warning. Nonetheless, Turgon, from respect for Ulmo and admiration of Tuor's courage and fair appearance, welcomed the Man to his city. In time the king's daughter, Idril, fell in love with Tuor.

Idril's love for the Man awoke the jealousy of Maeglin, the king's heir. Maeglin was the son of the king's sister. She, wandering once from the Hidden City, had been taken prisoner by the Dark Elf Eol and made his wife. Escaping with her son to Gondolin, the king's sister had been tracked down and killed by Eol, whom Turgon had killed in turn. Nonetheless, Turgon had accepted Maeglin for his mother's sake. Maeglin had much of his father's dark nature and longed to marry his cousin, Idril, though the Elves banned marriages of relatives of near degree.

Tuor and Idril married and had a son, Earendil. Tuor and Idril, amid their happiness, did not forget Ulmo's warning. On Idril's advice Tuor's followers built a secret way of escape from Gondolin.

Morgoth, having learned from Hurin Gondolin's general location, had been seeking it with spies. One day these captured Maeglin and took him to Angband for questioning. There, Morgoth bought Maeglin's treason against the Hidden City with the promise of Gondolin's rule and Idril's hand. Maeglin told Morgoth all of Gondolin's secrets, then returned to the Hidden City to open its gates to Morgoth's armies.

On a night of festival, as the Gondolindrim were watching the east for the sunrise, a red dawn rose in the north as Dragons led a host of Balrogs, Orcs, and wolves against the Hidden City. In Morgoth's assault, Maeglin seized Idril, but Tuor fought Maeglin and slew him. Tuor wanted to stay to protect the city, but Idril convinced him of its being lost and of his need to guide her, her son, and their followers to safety.

Thus, as Turgon and his warriors died nobly, but terribly, in the fire of Dragons and Balrogs, Tuor led his family and followers along Idril's way of escape. In the hills around Gondolin, though, a company of Orcs led by a Balrog caught Tuor's party. Only the heroism of an Elf named Glorfindel, who died killing the Balrog, let the party escape.

With much suffering it reached Middle-Earth's shores. There Tuor's party of survivors of Gondolin mingled with survivors of Doriath, led by Elwing, the daughter of Dior, the son of Luthien and Beren. There, too, came the Sea-Elves led by Cirdan the Shipwright, and other Elves that had fled from the North.

The refugees awaited Morgoth's attacking them anew. Tuor and Idril, though, sad at all that they had lost in Middle-Earth, set sail in a ship for the West. Whether they reached Valinor, no tale tells.

The Parallels

"The Fall of Gondolin" was Tolkien's first story, written during World War One in the trenches of France. The story holds many motifs familiar to readers of Greek mythology and Tolkien.

The armor by which Turgon recognizes Tuor recalls the armor that Aegeus, King of Athens, left under a stone for his son, Theseus. The armor is equivalent to the sword Excalibur, which revealed Arthur as England's rightful king by his ability to pull it from a stone.

Tolkien recycled three elements of "The Fall of Gondolin" in The Lord of the Rings. Morgoth's seduction of Maeglin to treason with Gondolin's throne and Idril's hand turns into Saruman's seduction of Wormtongue to treason with Rohan's throne and Eowyn's hand. Glorfindel's saving of Tuor's party from a Balrog at the cost of Glorfindel's life becomes Gandalf's saving of Frodo's party from a Balrog at the cost of Gandalf's life. The siege of Gondolin becomes the siege of Minas Tirith.

(In the book version of The Lord of the Rings, an Elf named Glorfindel, not Arwen, carries Frodo on horseback to Rivendell. Given the fate of Elves in Middle-Earth, the Glorfindel who saved Frodo may well have been the reincarnation of the Glorfindel who saved Earendil. Tolkien never clearly answered the question what relation the second Glorfindel had to the first.)

Little, if anything, in The Tale of Gondolin's Fall is specifically Biblical in origin. Still, as both the the tale and the Bible address universal themes, there are parallels between the two works. The general story of a doomed holy city recalls the destruction of Jerusalem in a siege by the Babylonians (II Kings 25:1-12). Maeglin, as a traitor, can stand for Judas Iscariot in the betrayal of Christ (Matthew 26:14-16, 21-25, 46-50; 27:3-10). (Note, though, that Maeglin receives judgment at the hands of the man whom he has betrayed, whereas Judas Iscariot judges himself.) Finally, Maeglin's motive for treason, forbidden desire for a female relative, parallels Amnon's lust for his sister Tamar (II Samuel 13:1-29).

In the next story, The Voyage of Earendil, Biblical themes will again come to the fore.