~ Legolas - of Gondolin? ~
by lorienelwyn
I e-mailed Michael Martinez,who is a pretty off-beat but great Tolkien scholar, on the Galdor/Legolas in Gondolin thing. [sic] Here's what he said, for what it's worth.
To paraphrase Tolkien's reaction to a comparison of the One Ring with
Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung, "Both characters were named Legolas, and
there the resemblance ends".
"The Fall of Gondolin" was written 20 years prior to the time Tolkien
commenced work on THE LORD OF THE RINGS. It was set in a completely
different mythology and Tolkien felt no compunction about reusing Elvish
names from mythology to mythology. The Legolas in "Fall of Gondolin" was a
Gnome, and the role of the Gnomes was taken over by the Noldor in the later
mythologies. The Legolas in THE LORD OF THE RINGS is a Sinda whose family
has adopted the Silvan Elf culture. He is not the same character. Period.
by ErinRua
Perhaps what Mr. Martinez was saying is that Legolas in the Gondolin tale could not be the same as in LOTR, because the first Legolas was a Gnome/Noldor, and Gondolin is a Noldor story. Legolas of LOTR, however, is Sindarin, and thus would not have been there with the Noldor. (In fact, I think Tolkien even said that The Sindarin Elves were not particularly fond of the Noldor.)
by TessJ10
My POINT was that Tolkien could very well have simply used the same same twice but the two Legoli were the same CHARACTER. The experiences of the one in Gondolin jived with the one in LOTR.
Mr. Martinez says the names are the same and 'there the resemblance ends.' That simply is not true.
1. Each character was especially renowned for keen eyesight and that's why they were chosen for their jobs.
2. Each character could see in the dark.
3. The actions of L#2 are psychologically consistent with L#1. Again, that was the POINT---how interesting that a writer coincidentally using the same name for 2 different characters written 50 years apart made them subconsciously consistent. I said more than once that was what interested me, that intentional or not, the experiences of #1 were woven into the character of #2 and I loved that. THAT was the point.
4. Mr. Martinez doesn't even mention Christopher Tolkien's published statement that his father brought the same character back from TFOG to LOTR. Well, take your choice, believe either MM or CT. The footnotes CT wrote are so persnickety that he would have said 'the reappearance of the same name' and not 'Legolas Greenleaf reappears.' He was careful to make the distinction in Glorfindel's case.
by ErinRua
Thinking on it further, even if we take into account "our" Legolas's reaction to the Balrog, it does not require *personal* experience that he would panic upon meeting one. Knowledge of what a Balrog was is quite enough.
by IdrilCelebrindal
Aren't Balrogs known as "elf-bane"?
by ErinRua
It's probably safe to say that all Elves knew well the story of Glorfindel's death in battle with a Balrog, and Legolas would naturally feel that if a powerful High-Elven hero like Glorfindel could not prevail over one and live, he himself sure as heck had not even a snowball's chance.
I read the Lost Tales reference to the Fall of Gondolin in full since these postings started. I do think Tolkien was toying around with the character of a keen-sighted elf named Legolas for a long time. He even fooled around with the name, using Legolast at one point, where "last" mean sharp-eyed.
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