into the world in the time of the Shadow of Morgoth, and they fell swiftly under his dominion; for he sent his emissaries among them, and they listened to his evil and cunning words, and they worshipped the Darkness and yet feared it’ (p. 259). But some Men repented and assisted the Elves against Morgoth, and were rewarded by the Valar with the island of Númenor.
Although details of Man’s first Fall were hidden in the past, in the story of Númenor the second Fall is dealt with at centre stage and, as with the story of Eden, involves the breaking of a Ban. In a letter to *Milton Waldman in ?late 1951 Tolkien said that this second Fall was ‘partly the result of an inner weakness in Men – consequent … upon the first Fall …, repented but not finally healed’. Their reward of an extended life ‘is their undoing – or the means of their temptation. Their long life aids their achievements in art and wisdom, but breeds a possessive attitude to these things, and desire awakes for more time for their enjoyment.’ He describes ‘three phases in their fall from grace. First acquiescence, obedience that is free and willing, though without complete understanding. Then for long they obey unwillingly, murmuring more and more openly. Finally they rebel …’ (Letters, pp. 154–5). In a draft letter to Peter Hastings in September 1954 Tolkien wrote that his ‘legendarium, especially the “Downfall of Númenor” … is based on my view: that Men are essentially mortal and must not try to become “immortal” in the flesh’ (Letters, p. 189).
CRITICISM
Randel Helms devotes an entire chapter to the Akallabêth in Tolkien and the Silmarils (1981). He notes that the work involves Tolkien in ‘one of his favorite literary tricks, the creation of the “real” source or origin of a famous tale’ (p. 64). But it is also ‘Tolkien’s first full-scale brief epic of men as opposed to elves, presenting his deepest thinking about death, the Gift of Men’. He had prepared for it in the Quenta Silmarillion, where it is said ‘that the hearts of Men should seek beyond the world and should find no rest therein’, but they would be able to ‘shape their life’. The price they pay ‘for this freedom of will and ability to yearn toward Ilúvatar’ is that ‘though their longings be immortal, their bodies are not’.
Here … Tolkien sets a major theme of Akallabêth, showing as well his grasp of human psychology. Always to yearn for what we do not have, to seek beyond the confines of our world, is our destiny, and one resulting directly from our freedom. Because of this combination of desire and liberty, unique in the mortal creatures of Arda, man is peculiarly susceptible to temptation, and men long for what they can never have, immortality in the flesh.
Tolkien thus uses Plato’s story of Atlantis, but deepens its themes. The Atlanteans desired conquest and empire …. The Númenóreans desired not merely conquest – though that was indeed one of their aims – they wanted an attribute of divinity itself, eternity. They wanted to be as gods – knowing not good and evil only, but endlessness – for Tolkien has blended Plato’s legend of Atlantis with the Bible’s story of the Fall of Man, to produce a tale of great resonance. [pp. 66–7]
David Harvey in The Song of Middle-earth: J.R.R. Tolkien’s Themes, Symbols and Myths (1985) likewise relates the fall of the Númenóreans to ‘a Fall in the theological sense. The actions of Ar-Pharazôn are in direct opposition to a stated Ban imposed by superhuman powers and derived from the authority and decree of the One’ (p. 41).
In ‘Aspects of the Fall in The Silmarillion’, in Proceedings of the J.R.R. Tolkien Centenary Conference 1992, ed. Patricia Reynolds and Glen H. GoodKnight (1995), Eric Schweicher points out that in Tolkien’s legendarium Man’s mortality is ‘neither a punishment nor a direct consequence of their [first] Fall. The condition of Man … was determined long before the world was created, in the Great Music of the Ainur …. Yet there is a fear of death on Middle-earth, which is paradoxical if one considers death as a gift.’ Therefore he suggests that ‘the Fall must have had an influence on the attitude of Man towards death, and there one must see Melkor’s influence, which lures Men into believing that what they had been given as a gift is but a bitter fruit’ (p. 169). Thus the desire of the Númenóreans for immortality, and Ar-Pharazôn’s attempt to gain it by conquest, are directly related to the first Fall.
Anne C. Petty, in Tolkien in the Land of the Heroes: Discovering the Human Spirit (2003), thinks that
the passage in the ‘Akallabêth’ that describes the coming of the first Númenóreans to their new land contains some of Tolkien’s most inspired saga-style language, conjuring images of dragon ships and seascapes straight out of such Old English poems as The Seafarer. He balances this vision of wonder with an equally stark vision of horror that concludes the account. This is something Tolkien does better than anyone: he presents the reader with a vision of incredible beauty, and then allows it to be ruined to equally incredible depths, making the end result all the more poignant and devastating. [p. 82]
Númenórean Linear Measures. Series of notes from various manuscripts, published as an appendix to *The Disaster of the Gladden Fields in *Unfinished Tales (1980), pp. 285–7, under a collective title devised by *Christopher Tolkien. These concern the relationship of Númenórean measurements to British units (leagues, yards, feet), and the stature of Númenóreans (especially Elendil), the Eldar (especially Galadriel), the Rohirrim (with a note on Morwen, wife of Thengel), the Hobbits, and the Dúnedain.
Of … such titles are entered by the first significant word following ‘Of’
Ofer Widne Garsecg see Songs for the Philologists
Official Name List. List of names in early Elvish languages (*Languages, Invented) which appear in The Fall of Gondolin in *The Book of Lost Tales, published as part of ‘Early Noldorin Fragments’ in Parma Eldalamberon 13 (2001), pp. 100–5, edited with commentary by Christopher Gilson, Bill Welden, Carl F. Hostetter, and Patrick Wynne.
The work is arranged with Eldarissa (Qenya) names on the left and Noldorissa (Gnomish, later Sindarin) names on the right. A few names are translated into English. The names come from the original manuscript of The Fall of Gondolin as revised by Tolkien, but before *Edith Tolkien made a fair copy. This list was written in the same note-book as the *Poetic and Mythologic Words of Eldarissa; the *‘Name-list to The Fall of Gondolin’ was derived from the Official Name List. A short table of abbreviations indicates that Tolkien probably intended to list names from all of the ‘Lost Tales’.
Oilima Markirya see The Last Ark
The Old English Apollonius of Tyre. Edition of the Old English version of Apollonius (Corpus Christi College, Cambridge MS 201) prepared by Peter Goolden, published by Oxford University Press in November 1958 with a brief prefatory note by Tolkien. See further, Descriptive Bibliography B24.
Goolden was admitted as a B.Litt. student in English at *Oxford in May 1950 and received his degree in 1953; his thesis, The Old English Version of the Story of Apollonius of Tyre, was supervised by *C.L. Wrenn. In 1954 Goolden submitted the work to Oxford University Press and was informed that although the Press would not publish it independently (it was not judged to be a mature work of learning), it might be suitable for publication in the series *Oxford English Monographs, of which Tolkien was then chief among three general editors (with *F.P. Wilson and *Helen Gardner). Tolkien received a copy of Goolden’s thesis in February 1954 but could not consider it until later in the year. It was approved for inclusion in the series, pending revision.
At the beginning of March 1956 Goolden lost the manuscript of his work in
