Dragons in Lord of the Rings' Lore - Smaug, Glaurung, Ancalagon, Scatha - Tolkien and LotR Lore 

thank you :P

haha sorry :D I had no good picture (I could use) and thought maybe this will do ^^

But the father of dragons is actually supposed to look very much like that. Something halfway between an iguana and a monitor lizard.

Yes I think it's quite close in theory.

ThePhilosophersGames I have a better picture for you

@@ThePhilosophersGames Perhaps Glaurung was made from a Komodo dragon. Or maybe the Komodo is the diminished descendant of s cold drake.

Agreed :)

Thank you :) I think sometimes the stress is probably a bit off, but I really tried ^^ So it's nice to hear :D

Even when I have my occasional minor quibbles I find the accent rather pleasant and the competent "r" rolling more than compensates. (I'm in the upper Midwest/Great Plains, USA)

@@brovold72 Aye good accent , I'm from Scotland we practically speak celt/nord/gaelic (ancient men) and Dwarven :'D

Some other channels flat out mispronunciate names & places all together and its extremly annoying. Even after they say those same names in the movies and the production staff used middle earth linguists to use proper pronunciation. And yeah...its really annoying!

Agreed, so many good stories in it.

Sauron was Morgoth's highest lieutenant. His most trusted servant and held great power in his own right. The only being more powerful was Morgoth himself. The other high ranking beings were not granted as much command even if they caused more actual devastation in battle. Sauron's absence in fighting the hosts arrayed against his master should in no way diminish his _potential_ power. Gothmog and Glaurung have nothing compared to the reach of Sauron's evil influence upon the world - the power to corrupt, even the elect.

@@jamesaron1967 thanks, couldnt have said it better

@@jamesaron1967 elect

@@jamesaron1967 so sauron was simply like the witchking in his army

Thank you for the compliment ^^

Kullervo was I guess the main inspiration, but Oedipus is the generally more well known (outside of Finland and mythology fans I guess), so I mentioned it (probably a mistake, because I get this hint quite often in the comments). I quote Tolkien himself on this matter (letter 131:): There are other stories almost equally full in treatment, and equally independent and yet linked to the general history. There is the Children of Húrin, the tragic tale of Túrin Turambar and his sister Níniel - of which Turin is the hero: a figure that might be said (by people who like that son of thing, though it is not very useful) to be derived from elements in Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo. Show less

of course Oedipus is more popular but being Tolkien a philologist and quite interested about the Finnish language (which is the base for the construction of Quenya itself) and mythology, the importance of Kullervo as the key-story for the whole creation of Sillmarillion thereafter shouldn´t be ignored, no matter how popular was the other tragedy, Tolkien liked more the Finnish story and even tried to do some independent adaptation from it, as he tried with Beowulf and other similar stories, aside from doing his own mythology. (That adaptation came into some publishing recently as "The Story of Kullervo" from the Tolkien Publishing Press.)

"the importance of Kullervo as the key-story for the whole creation of Sillmarillion thereafter shouldn´t be ignored" You mean the Kalevala in general? But sorry I have to disagree here. Without a doubt the Kalevala was a huge inspiration for Tolkien, but there were more influences than this, like the Edda, the Bible, the Greek mythology, etc. Pretty much everything "western" (and north) Europe had to offer. And all those elements are also often related. Tolkien had without a doubt a lot of interest in the Finish mythology and language, but from the development of the Hobbit to Lord of the Rings to the Silmarillion lies a life time of work, that can't be compressed to primarily Finish influence. A lot of steps lie in between and we clearly see it, when J.R.R. Tolkien says quote: "derived from elements in Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo."

well that´s true too indeed, however still he didn´t get the key-inspiration moment to develop a "Western civilization´s own fully-developed mythology-corpus" until he read the Kalevala (and the most strikling things that fascinated him about it where Kullervo´s tragic story and Vaimanonen skills as a creational-singer, getting there the idea of the Ainulalindale itself), so thereafter, aside the other quite important yet much more common literary sources, he started to develop the Silmarillion´s stories.

Exactly they had to take him out lol 😂

haha that's cool I would have loved to use this www.deviantart.com/jonathanguzi/art/Nargothrond-499955889 but got no permission. So I searched for bridges (public domain fotos) and found it quite fitting ^^

Thank you :) It's fun to make videos, when the feedback is so positive ^^

Thank you, happy you liked it :)

Yes, there is so much, I think if you would flesh it out more (e.g. dialogues) you could get a lot of content out of it. Some of the books tell the stories often only in a very condensed form, like a history book.

@Daniel Rodriguez when will it come out

I would kill to watch 20 seasons of this right now . Hopefully amazon will get rights for the first age and third age . I want see Ancalagon amd Glaurung so badly . I want to see a lot of the dwarves in the third age so they fight them in the Grey mountains . It sounds way to awesome for tv . Smaug was so good in the hobbit trilogy . Best dragon I ever seen on film no questions asked . So intense . Can't imagine see 2 giant ones and an army of smaller ones . Sounds so chaotic . I hope if they do stuff from the first age they make it like 15 to 20 seasons long . There's so many events .

Happy you like them so far ^^ I try to make them very detailed. This one is also one of my older videos, so some parts improve further over time I would say. What was the first video you saw? Was it a suggestion on YT's home page? Always interesting how people found my channel (in most cases it should be suggested videos). And thank you for subscribing :)

ThePhilosophersGames the history of Sauron, it was in my recommended videos and I subscribed because of the excellent quality.

Sorry for the late answer. Yes that is true, he really put everything vicious he could come up with into them. Esp. as you describe: in even when they die they bring misery over their foes. Yes sadly we don't know too much about the ice-drakes. I tried to find more information about them, but with no success. Only a few mentions. The idea of using them to defend spiders also sounds interesting.

Thanks for the compliment, happy you enjoyed it :) I really try to go into detail with almost all videos I do (if possible), especially my lore videos. So it's really nice to hear, that it worked out :D

Thank you again. Happy you like it :)

Thank you :) Nice to hear, that you like my content ^^ Next lore video will take some time, but I have already some good ideas. I plan to cover Shadow of War next month, so maybe that counts too :D

ThePhilosophersGames Your welcome and I don't mind the wait can't wait for the Shadow of War vids!!! :-)

:D yes probably, but I found this one and thought it would be funny. It was also allowed to use this picture even commercially ^^

Thank you for sticking around and commenting :) Sadly this month will be light on content. My Internet connection (+ phone) has some technical issue and doesn't work. As expected it takes the ISP ages to fix it =/ So I have to do all my stuff over my mobile phone connection. It works, but it's a bit annoying. At least I got some free extra data volume :D In addition I'm working on a a bit more complex video, but it's not working out the way I want plus technical issues with recording. This month is definitely plagued with technical issues for me =/

Hey well we all love it when you stick to it even though life makes it hard. You're one of the few RU-vidrs I've found that actually explains things very well, so I can't wait for your next video! :)

Thanks :) I definitely can't complain. A lot of views are coming in and the feedback is very positive, so I'm quite happy despite some problems :D Yes, if there is one thing I'm relatively good at, it's explaining things, I guess.

No problem :) Thank you for watching ^^

Thank you, happy you like it :) There will be more lore videos :D

GOOORREEEE GOTH

You're French, aren't you?

No from Germany :D

Ist echt noch Freiraum nach oben, aber inhaltlich echt gut

Thank you. I thought it was fitting, but also funny :D

haha happy to hear ^^ Voice is quite important in videos like these. Even though I got used to hearing my own voice, I'm still surprised people like it. I'm not the hugest fan of it, but that's normal I guess.

Thank you :) I will definitely continue

thank you, I thought it was funny too ^^

Some people found it funny and he has some resemblance :D The reason is a bit of laziness, because I would have to find out, who made the fan art and ask him, if I can use it. Sure I could just use them, as many other people do, but I would ask for permission in this case ( the pictures from the movies are already a gray area). And ofc that can delay my video production and since the feedback is very positive so far (without it), I'm not sure, if it's worth the effort. Maybe in the future I'll contact a bunch of artists and ask them.

For humor

John Montag funny and cheapest/fastest production with no consequences, I found it funny and it’s the lore explanation that should be the main focus anyways ❤️

Elves aren't human.

ThePhilosophersGames I would have preferred the iguana because it made me laugh

P.s. Also Scatha is pronounced "SCAY THE" not "CHA SA"

No problem. Thank you for watching and commenting :) Yes, I think it's an interesting topic, too. The name is Old English and should be pronounced Sha - tha (a like in father). Sc is pronounced Sh in Old English (eg. in German we have sch for sh). For some reason I keep saying Chatha, which is wrong too. Unconsciously I always put a t at the start, don't know why. It's related to the modern english word "scathe" and if you check its Old English form sceaþa, it is also pronounced: /ˈʃæɑðɑ/ almost the same. en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sceaþa#Old_English

@ThePhilosophersGames Oh ok I did not know that. Thanks again.

I didn't know either, when I first red the name (research for the History of Rohan video) :D

Thanks :) The reason why I say his father is Orodreth is complicated. Tolkien originally planned him not to be Orodreth's or Fingon's son. He was related to Fëanor. But he changed it and for early versions of Lord of the Rings he is a son of Finrod, but Tolkien wanted Finrod to be childless, because he left is wife in Aman and went to exile. So he changed it to Fingon - as you state correctly. But Christopher Tolkien admitted, that he had not found out about his father's last decision on the topic at the time he published the Silmarillion. So Fingon is stated to be Gil-galad's father, which makes partially sense. Quote from The Peoples of Middle-Earth (one of the History of Middle-earth books): The words that I cannot read contain apparently a preposition and a proper name, and this latter could be Faroth (the High Faroth west of the river Narog). - In the last of the genealogical tables Artanaro (Rodnor) called Gil-galad appears, with the note that 'he escaped and dwelt at Sirion's Mouth'. The only further change was the rejection of the name Artaresto and its replacement by Artaher, Sindarin Arothir; and thus in the excursus (note 23) Arothir [Orodreth] is named as Finrod's 'kinsman and steward', and (note 47) Gil-galad is 'the son of Arothir, nephew of Finrod'. The final genealogy was: Angrod (brother of Finrod Felagund) -> Artaher/Arothir [Orodreth] -> Artanaro/Rodnor/Gil-galad Since Finduilas remained without correction in the last of the genealogies as the daughter of Arothir [Orodreth], she became the sister of Gilgalad. There can be no doubt that this was my father's last word on the subject; but nothing of this late and radically altered conception ever touched the existing narratives, and it was obviously impossible to introduce it into the published Silmarillion. It would nonetheless have been very much better to have left Gil-galad's parentage obscure. The High King of the Noldor is the (I guess) male head of the House of Finwë in exile. Before the Hing King title, Finwë was King of the Noldor. After Finwë's death, Fëanor did not became King, but his younger half brother Fingolfin and they went to exile. And then Fingolfin's sons Fingon first and after Fingon's death Turgon became king. But he died too. Turgon had no male heir and no brother alive. So the title goes over to Fingolfin's younger brother Finarfin, but he lives in Aman and not in the exile (he came only to fight in the War of Wrath). So we have Finrod, but he died before Turgon died. Same with Finrod's brother Angrod and Angrod's son Orodreth, but Orodreth still had an heir and that is Gil-Galad in the History of Middle-earth version. After Gil-glad's death Elrond (related with Turgon, because his grandmother was Tugon's daughter Idril) would be High King, but he refused and so no more elven lords were left. Galadriel could maybe claimed the title as first female, but she didn't do it either. Círdan is not from Finwë's house and not Noldor, but related to Thingol (the other big founder of one of the great elves houses, like Finwë), same with Celeborn. So no High King of the Noldor in exile after this. I usually don't use the History of Middle-earth books for my videos, but sometimes I do unconsciously or when it makes sense, because Tolkien clearly changed his mind in this matter several times. Same with the orcs' origin. Sorry for the long answer, but I hope that clears things up. But ofc you are not wrong. In the Silmarillion he is clearly stated as Fingon's son. Quote: Great was the lamentation in Hithlum when the fall of Fingolfin became known, and Fingon in sorrow took the lordship of the house of Fingolfin and the kingdom of the Noldor; but his young son Ereinion (who was after named Gil-galad) he sent to the Havens.

The main trouble about Gil-Galad being either the son of Odrodeth or of Fingon, is the issue that after his father died he didn´t inherithed the title as High King of the Noldor, until all his uncles were dead, which makes no sense, unless he was meant to inherith much later as he wasn´t actually Fingon´s son but Odrodeth´s. Why would Gil-Galad didn´t get the title of High King after the death of his father, Fingon, but it actually went straightly for Turgon, his uncle? It makes more sense that then he wasn´t Fingon´s son, but Odrodeths, and therefore after his uncle died, the title wen´t into Finarfin´s blood line, and there as all the male heirs were already dead then (Odrodeths, Finrod, Aegnor and Amrod) he finally got the title. (Celebrimbor, Feanor´s grandson could have claimed it too, but as Feanor blood-line were already outcasted from the sucession. he didn´t make any attemp.)

:D

Thank you ^^

Thank you! haha yes that's a nice coincidence. Have fun playing with your D&D group :) Are you the DM?

Nope player I'm a monk with ice power that ended up with a fire dragon egg.

Thank you :) Yes agreed. Sadly using the film screenshots is already a grey+ area. Using illustrations of artists is even more problematic, if the illustrator finds out.

Thank you :P

Yes the story is really good. The characters and story have this tragedy and epic fate to it and it's so important to the universe. Tolkien's mythology is a lot of about fate and this story shows how powerful Morgoth is and how he forged the fate of so many characters, but the Dark Lord himself also is captured in the webs of Fate through his interaction with the Silmaril and the Trees of Valinor.

No problem. Happy you found it useful. It's ofc a bit of additional work and I'm a bit lazy when it comes to this, so I don't put the most effort into spell checking :P

ThePhilosophersGames too close to the microphone, try adjusting the sensitivity of your microphone.

Yes as I said, I was too close while recording. Sorry for that. The audio is not good.

Excellent job!... Have you ever considered doing a video discussing the possibility that the arkenstone is the Silmaril that was not cast into the ocean or taken with Earendil?

Interesting video! I have a potentially interesting question: Were all the dragons in tolkiens universe evil? Perhaps there were bad dragons who had, at some point, redeemed themselves? Even though they were originally created by Melkor(and since, to my knowledge, evil cannot create life) it is perhaps not impossible to envision some dragons not being entirely evil.

jonathan kyle That’s what I believe as well. At the end of the war of wrath, didn’t one of Feanors sons (with the one hand missing) take the silmarril and jump into a crack in the mountain the armies were resting at? Because that’s very coincidental that the Arkenstone was found in the middle of the mountain ⛰. And everyone lusts for it as they did for the Silmarrils.

Thank you :)

The Tolkien universe as a whole? (long answer incoming) I would start with reading Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. Then it gets complicated. Lord of the Rings has the appendices, which explain a lot of backstory. So I would read them a bit and in parallel look what you can find about the topic/backstory you are reading in the Silmarillion - so like a "compendium". And after you have a good overview of the most important stories, maybe read the Silmarillion as a whole. The Silmarillion (backstory the book, with a bit of Third Age, but mainly Second Age, First Age and prior) is a book, that is very dense when it comes to information. So it can become hard to read at times and very overwhelming or even confusing. Then there is also the Unfinished Tales, which are notes from J.R.R. Tolkien commented and published by his son Christopher Tolkien after his death. There is also the History of Middle-earth books (12 books), if you want to go really deep into the writing process, notes and ideas of Tolkien, but this is quite hardcore and often contradict what most people what consider "canon", because those ideas were work in progress and sometimes Tolkien decided against some concepts. There are also Tolkien's letters and some very story focused books, like The Children of Húrin, Beren and Lúthien and later this year (August?) the The Fall of Gondolin (which should include dragons). When it comes to the dragon stories, they are primarily split upon Lord of the Rings, Hobbit and the Silmarillion. The stories of the Fall of Gondolin and the tragic story of the Children of Húrin has Glaurung, Ancalagon. The Beast of Gondolin is only mentioned in the History of Middle-earth book, The Book of Lost Tales Part Two. Scatha is mentioned in the appendices of Lord of the Rings and I think in the Unfinished Tales and Smaug is from the Hobbit. What is very important to understand: Only the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings are written as fantasy novels. The Silmarillion reads more like a history book, focusing on important moments, so you get the idea, but it's not written as Lord of the Rings or the Hobbit, with a fleshed out and in-detail story. Unfinished Tales and the History of Middle-earth is more a commentary, that gives you further details on stories already told or elements mentioned in Lord if the Rings, Hobbit and the Silmarillion. I hope that helps ^^ Sorry of the long answer, but in Tolkien's universe most questions are quite difficult to answer :P

I probably know where you have this idea from :D The Nazgûl in the books (later) don't wear their rings anymore (If I recall correctly Sauron wears them to increase his power). So they are not bound by just wearing their rings, they under the influence of Sauron's will, corrupted by nature (they got transformed into this state) and are lost forever. But I need some more research on this. I probably cover this in my next video, which is in "pre-production" right now. I hope, I get it done this weekend, but no promise. My time estimations are not worth a dime :D Last time I said in a week or two, it took me over four weeks (Sauron video).

Yes there could be still dragons left in the north, but they would be "lesser" dragons. In The Lord of the Rings (chapter Shadow of the Past), Gandalf explains: "It has been said that dragon-fire could melt and consume the Rings of Power, but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough" this indicates that there are still dragons, but without the power of dragons from ancient times.

It is funny indeed. That greed for gold made them able to deny sauron.

You are right and I mention it in the video too. Pretty much at the beginning :)

Sorry I missed that! I like your Tolkein expositions quite a bit & find them very informative & entertaining. Please keep making them!

Thank you and no problem ^^ Easy to miss, could have dedicated this a bigger section in my video.

The Story of Fingolfin duelling Morgoth is canon. However Fingolfin was more of a noble warrior (also High king of the Noldor; he fought in wars) and it can be red, that when he rode to face Morgoth his eyes shone like the eyes of a Valar: "He passed over Dor-nu-Fauglith like a wind amid the dust, and all that beheld his onset fled in amaze, thinking that Oromë himself was come: for a great madness of rage was upon him, so that his eyes shone like the eyes of the Valar." So there was something, that empowered him for this fight. Celebrimbor's deeds were crafting Rings and creating other things (inscription of Durin's Door, etc), not fighting. I imagine him as quite peaceful, never really fighting in wars. So their power and deeds are vastly different. And that's why I would argue, that Celebrimbor would have not been able to fight Sauron or even Morgoth. It must also be said, that Fingolfin had bascially not chance. His power was not enough to undo Morgoth. He could not overthrow him. He wounded him 7 times and inured his foot (so Morgoth would limp from now on), but ultimately died. The reason he was able to do this, was is great swiftness. So he dodged all the attacks of Morgoth with his mace Grond. In addition Fingolfin had his sword Ringil, which is probably one of the most powerful weapons of the Elves. Celebrimbor's weapon is not known. Still a powerful Elf can definitely fight Sauron, but also lose his life to him. Gil-galad (High-King of the Noldor) fought Sauron together with Elendil at the end of the Second Age (Last Alliance in the Siege of Barad-dûr) and Sauron killed both of them, but was thrown down too, so that isildur could cut of his finger, but Sauron was still there and came back. In addition Elendil is a Dúnedain from the Kings line of Númenor and he wielded Narsil (an extremely powerful weapon made by a legendary Dwarf Smith Telchar). This weapon was one of the few, that was actually able to hurt Sauron. Not many Men could even get close to Sauron's presence. Gil-galad wielded his spear Aeglos, which was feared by the enemy and probably also able to hurt Sauron. In addition he possessed the most powerful Elven Ring of Power, but ofc did not use it, because Sauron still had the One Ring. In contrast Talion was just an Ithilien Ranger. He was likely a Dúnedain too, but we don't know for sure. And Celebrimbor was a ring smith, known for his master pieces the Three Elven Rings of Power. We don't know if he had a "legendary" weapon too. I assume he could have made a powerful weapon too. However waht we know is, that Celebimbor could not defeat Sauron and was killed by him and his orcs. The Orcs put his body on a pole and carried it through the streets of his realm like a banner. To be fair: Sauron was on the peak of his power at this time. But I would argue, that it is unlikely, that Celebrimbor and Talion could really be a threat to Sauron.

@@ThePhilosophersGames oh yeah i forgot that in the books Celebrimbor should've been just a smith not a warrior. The game depicts him as such a powerhouse that i forgot lol.

@@smug880 Though that does make one appreciate how tremendous Elendil and Gil-Galad must have been, and Isuldur too. (Elrond was at hand, but does not boast of his own deeds, whatever they were.)

Tolkien never did this, specifically to avoid such questions.

Thank you :) Happy you liked it

You have either a cool or a terrifying shopping list then :P

I assume four lords of the higher dwarven houses with Rings were killed by dragons fire during the War of the Dwarves and Dragons (around Third Age 2570) in the Grey Mountains and so the Rings were destroyed too. But that's just my theory. I think there's a hint, that it was definitely in this time.

@@ThePhilosophersGames The war of Dwarves and Dragons exclusively featured the Longbeards, who actually survived it with their ring. We never know who held the other rings, as the Broadbeams and Firebeards were actually part of Khazad-dum's community by the time the Balrog evicted them (Bifur, Bombur and Bofur are not Longbeards). it is possible an independent Dwarf-lord somewhere was given a ring, rather than all four fathers

Tolkien was a professor for Philology in Oxford (Old English). With this background he put a ton of work into the languages of his works. As a result he dedicated a chapter (Appendix E) in LotR to those. There he writes about how he imagined the pronunciation of his languages (there are also information about notations and the writing systems). In addition there are some records of him reading Quenya too: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6de_SbVUVfA.html In some cases like Smeagol, Smaug, Isengard, some of the dwarf names, etc he borrowed them from existing languages (often very old ones). E.g. Smeagol is Old English. Ofc in the past philologists have reconstructed the sound of many old languages (e.g. by looking at closely related modern versions of those languages, analysing old texts and poems, etc). So for these words I take the pronunciation rules of those existing (reconstructed) languages (they exist in Toolkien's world too; e.g. Rohan speaks basically Old English with some own words in it). My reasoning behind it is just to provide additional information, because languages are such a big part of his works. He really put a mind blowing amount of detail into it. Even the movement of peoples in Middle-earth results in language changes, reflecting what we also see in the real world. If someone reads LotR's story I would argue it makes sense to anglicize many of the words, if possible. Even Tolkien did this in his readings. But since my format here is more about information, I think it makes sense and I have some consistency in my videos, which I wouldn't have, when when I would anglicise the words. E.g. how would you pronounce Nirnaeth Arnoediad? It's Sindarin, same with Mordor.

@@ThePhilosophersGames Thank you for the time taken with your detailed reply. I understand Tolkien's linguistic world view in authorship. Could you clarify for me the accent that you use further? Are the words "anglecized"? Or are you imitating Tolkein's accent in his reading of sindarin? Thanks again, I look forward to your expert response.

It's a mixture. Ofc I listened to Tolkien's elvish readings to get a feeling for his elvish languages. In addition he describes the sounds in his book, which I use to know how words are pronounced. E.g. Quote: R represents a trilled r in all positions; the sound was not lost before consonants (as in English part). So I know the R sound is almost always rolled. IPA /r/ And I go through all the sounds (ofc also considering the diphthongs) and form the word after those rules. In some cases I check other good sources, like tolkiengateway.com (the have always a good etymology section), but also elfdict.com or listen to somebody else read on sites like www.jrrvf.com/glaemscrafu/. In all those cases I try to understand why the words are pronounced that way and if they are correspond Tolkien's rules from Appendix E. More recently I started to consider more where the stress of a word lies. However in some cases words use old Germanic languages and a like and so I check those. Ofc coming from Germany and speaking other languages with a German accent, you could say I also speak Sindarin, Quenya, Old English with a German accent. Ofc through the Germanic touch, they often feel a bit German too. E.g. the vowels in Sindarin and Quenya are pronounced like they are pronounced in German (diphthongs are different though). The "i" is maybe a bit sharper and so I usually also pronounce it sharper. Quote: "the sounds were approximately those represented by i, e, a, o, u in English machine, were, father, for, brute, irrespective of quantity." That's also why I say "I try to pronounce it as Tolkien described it". So I try to pronounce the words as the native characters in his world would do, but I let Westron/Common Speech and friends be replaced with Modern English (which is also what Tolkien did). So I say Frodo instead of Maura (else it would be very confusing for my listeners). It's quite interesting. All this started when I wrote my first LotR lore video and had to read it. I came across the problem: how do I pronounce the words now? As a Tolkien fan I knew a few things and that hardcore fans also like to use Tolkien's description for pronunciation and even learn the languages. Ofc I also searched the Interent how fans (who are native English speakers) pronounce names. Since I often don't pronounce normal English words correctly too (due to my German accent) and seeing that there is no agreement of how to anglicize names, I knew I would risk consistency in my video. So i decided to go with Tolkien's pronunciation rules, which make things often consistent. Ofc Tolkien implemented some inconsistencies himself at times. E.g. he uses the (Quenya) singular/plural for Maia/Maiar, but uses Balrog/Balrogs instead of Balrog/Balroeg (or maybe Balryg depending on if you take (Bal)raug as root or (Bal)rog). In this case I go with Tolkien's writings. Balrog is also Sindarin. But for the Quenya Silmaril I like to use Silmarilli instead of Tolkien's Silmarils. So tons of little details to consider :)

@@ThePhilosophersGames extremely detailed answer, again thanks for the time you spent. I am particularly gratified you addressed the "rolled "r"" Another tangent: what impact does the Finnish language have on the pronunciation. I understand that Tolkien believed Finnish was a most beautiful sounding language and modeled Quenya after it.

Sorry for the late answer. I think Finnish is kind of an interesting case in Europe. It's not a Germanic language not even an Indo-European language (it's a Finno-Ugric language), but there are some influences of Indo-European languages and also Germanic languages. So it has something unique but also something familiar I guess, which probably made it for Tolkien the best of two worlds so to say. In addition the Finnish Kalevala (something like the Finnish National Epic) was a great influence for Tolkien's works too. PS: No problem :)

Thank you :) Yes, Tolkien took inspiration from several European languages (modern and old), like Finnish, Spanish, Old Norse, Old English/Anglo-Saxon, etc.

Yes, it would be really interesting to learn more about that. Seeing how many details Tolkien has described and how much time he put into all his works, it becomes clear of how much work it is to form fictional universe with this amount of detail.

permeus2nd Have you ever heard of Gicko Gecko? No? That’s why.

The Children of Húrin is the Story of the in the video mentioned Túrin and his tragic story, that is crossed by Melkor/Morgoth and his servant, the dragon Glaurung. It's the fleshed out and long version of the Glaurung part in my video (I left some details and the beginning of his story out in the video). It's quite interesting and also told in the Silmarillion (but much more condensed). It's also quite "grim" I would say. It's a story from the First Age and fate and a curse plays a big part in it. Also interesting side note: Turin's cousin Tuor is the Grandfather of Elrond. But he is not bound the same fate as Húrin and Túrin.

Thanks for the respond man! Will gladly start reading it .

I FOUND YOU!!!!!!

😄 haha interesting idea, but very unlikely I think.

Hi, nice to hear from you again :) Probably not before the game releases or maybe a week before. I have a long list of planned videos, some more experimental :D

Hey again :) are you currently playing Shadow of War? If so, what do you think? I don't yet own the game, and probably won't for quite a while. (Wasn't a huge fan of the first game) but I watched the ending on RU-vid (I WON'T SPOIL ANYTHING! ) And was wondering if you had seen the true ending, and overall what you think of the story.

I want to play it, but I'm haunted with tech issues (last month my internet connection was broken for 2 weeks, plsu some computer issues and now SoW makes trouble). So I have to solve them first. I plan on making another lore comparison video. At least I wrote down some notes so far :D

Awesome, I'm looking forward to it!

Yes, that came to my mind too, but those eagles (like Gwaihir) are sentient, powerful and probably even Maiar. It's described, that fell beasts are possessed by an evil spirit. Also quite interesting: Tolkien distanced over his life more and more from the idea of corrupted elves for orcs. It's still in the Silmarillion, but very carefully worded.

ThePhilosophersGames cv c

Thank you :) Yes that's true. haha the Tatzelwurm forgotten about that creature ^^

@@ThePhilosophersGames The Kitty Dragon

Yes, you are right. Ofc. Tolkien knew about Oedipus as well and for most people it's probably the more well known myth - funnily enough I know all 3, but when I wrote the text, I only remembered Oedipus. Tolkien himself wrote in a letter (131): There are other stories almost equally full in treatment, and equally independent and yet linked to the general history. There is the Children of Húrin, the tragic tale of Túrin Turambar and his sister Níniel - of which Turin is the hero: a figure that might be said (by people who like that son of thing, though it is not very useful) to be derived from elements in Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo. PS: I put a note into the description

Indeed, the Turin Turambar story is the most complex and tragic of the three greater stories that will make the central core of the Sillmarillion as he propposed to do it, however at the time of his death, his son only could make a some kind of review of the stories, having then the final book a much smaller size than what it was originally meant to be. (However the last news and publications from the Tolkien State had allowed Christopher Tolkien to finally did those central stories i.e. The Children of Hurin, Beren and Luthien and The Fall of Gondolin in full lenght in recent and upcomming years, so the Silmarillion of Tolkien somehow might end be real as he planned to be after a so long time!!)

Yes, sounds a bit similar :D The dwarves left Erebor 2 times. One time under Thorin I (becauseof the War against the dragons) and one time under Thrór (Thorin Oakenshield's grandfather), because of Smaug.

Maybe. He was a cursed figure and he brought his curse (doom if you want) over those he met.

@@ThePhilosophersGames I agree Chris, it is consistent that Húrin does Morgoth's work at this point. I think however that if the Haladin were to ignore or oust him, that would be an interesting counterpoint. They are still free to not follow the negative impulses Húrin spreads.

Yes, I can see why. It's an interesting character with huge impact on the world. I can see how you can miss him a bit. Having stories about dragons is always interesting :)

ThePhilosophersGames aye, and when I got to read Silmarillion Glaurung was even more impressive, even without flight his cunning & power sealed many fates

Yes, I really like the portrayal of Glaurung and Smaug too. They are not simply beasts of fire and destruction, but intelligent evil entities, that are able to change the fate of the world and many characters. The danger of them does not only come from their fire, but also from their words. A very nice contrast, which makes them much more dangerous and fearsome, than they would be otherwise.

And their origins are still a mystery..

It's a bit hard to explain. In the First Age Middle-earth was bigger and Beleriand was Middle-earth's western part and west coast. But the forces that fought in the War of Wrath were so powerful, that it devastated this part of Middle-earth, until it was no more and sunk into the ocean (so to say). So it was gone in the Second Age (and beyond). Silmarillion describes it quite well: Thus an end was made of the power of Angband in the North, and' the evil realm was brought to naught; and out of the deep prisons a multitude of slaves came forth beyond all hope into the light of day, and they looked upon a world that was changed. For so great was the fury of those adversaries that the northern regions of the western world were rent asunder, and the sea roared in through many chasms, and there was confusion and great noise; and rivers perished or found new paths, and the valleys were upheaved and the hills trod down; and Sirion was no more. So after it sunk into the ocean, the area around Mithlond/Grey Havens (Lindon), the Blue Mountains (where Thorin Oakenshield and his people lived, before their quest to recapture Erebor), etc. became the new west coast so to say. This shows it quite well I guess: i.stack.imgur.com/pXddc.jpg

ThePhilosophersGames I just rewatched your video and just saw that you answered me. Thank you for this good answer.

Oh you are right it's from SoM. My mistake.

Yes it's very similar. I actually knew the story of Kullervo, but forgot about it ^^ Interestingly, there are several stories, that are quite similar and Tolkien mentions 3 of them as inspiration in one of his letters, including Kullervo, which was probably the biggest inspiration. Tolkien wrote in letter 131: There are other stories almost equally full in treatment, and equally independent and yet linked to the general history. There is the Children of Húrin, the tragic tale of Túrin Turambar and his sister Níniel - of which Turin is the hero: a figure that might be said (by people who like that son of thing, though it is not very useful) to be derived from elements in Sigurd the Volsung, Oedipus, and the Finnish Kullervo.

He was not the last, but the greatest fire-breathing dragon. There could be more fire dragons, but none as powerful as Smaug.

@@ThePhilosophersGames WHAAAAAATTT???

@@reinerbraun1798 haha well Ancalagon is just another league even as Smaug ^^

@@ThePhilosophersGames you mean i am another league right?

Thank you :) Happy you liked it. I also thought it was very funny, when I made this video ^^

@@ThePhilosophersGames I liked the bridge aswell because you timed it brilliant when you said "and they built a bridge", then a random bridge appeared.it, IMO, was funny because of the iguana pic. I love humour like that.brilliant.cheers.

Thank you ^^ The problem for me is often to find pictures for my videos. I try to contact artists to get permission for using their art work, but I rarely get an answer =/ (Out of about 30 artists, only 3 answered). So I use pictures free for commercial use, sometimes generating funny moments ^^

Yes friends is maybe a strong word for their relationship. But they also were not really foes either. Maybe "rivals"? I don't know, I needed a word that expressed, that they knew each other relatively well and that they also helped each other in the past or "worked together", without me explaining it in all detail. It's one of the famous shortcuts you need to take in summaries.

Yes I can see that ^^

Gil-galad's parentage was a problem for Tolkien and so he had trouble finding a family where he could fit and be High King of the Noldor later. Not ideal but in his later writings he is a grand child of Angrod (Galadriel's brother; Galadriel's father is Finarfin). The three main royal families in Middle-earth where the House of Fëanor, the House of Fingolfin and the House of Finarfin (Finarfin himself remained in Aman). A Noldor King must be from those families. Fëanor's house was almost extinct (later only Maglor, Maedhros and Celebrimbor remained) and they gave up on the Kingship and gave it to the house of Fingolfin very early on. Christopher Tolkien wrote that in the Silmarillion he made an editorial mistake and made Gil-galad a son of Fingon (by mistake, which would have worked too, but this was only a brief idea by Tolkien, and his last word was him being the son of Orodreth). This problem is explained in - I think it was - in the War of Jewels. Some of the HoMe books primarily explain how the Silmarillion was build and why Christopher made it the way it is. he was very transparent with it.

Yes Tolkien mentions it too as inspiration.

Yes, a really outstanding and tragic story. I also really like the story of Beren and Lúthien.

@@ThePhilosophersGames is it hurin that kills malkor at dagger daggeroth?

Thank you :) Quite funny, I tried to find Artwork for this video, bur artists (as always) never respond, so I couldn't use any and had to improvise. So I searched for films and games with really big dragons and I had really problems finding some. I knew the Anime series (OVA from the early 90s) Record of Lodoss War, but the quality wasn't there and using Japanese Film stuff on YT is dangerous territory in terms of claims, so I skipped that and ended up with some Demon's Souls footage. So if you find something, let me know ^^ Yes I wonder too. All we know is, that Eärendil fought Ancalagon for about a day and that the Great Eagles helped him too. Maybe he ultimately landed on Ancalagon and slew him from there.

Personally most of the dragons I know of, atleast of recent memory is dragons in World of Warcraft, there used to be alot at some point in the game and people still love them, and i reckon there's plenty of awesome fanart theres maybe worth looking up. Besides that well, game of thrones, not sure how safe it is to use though, wouldnt know not much of a expert on the subject That actually atleast makes sense and sounds epic (Ancalagon/Eärendil)

And thanks for the reply, always good to see people active on their own videos in the comments!

Yes, WoW could have worked, but i think I had trouble finding a cutscene with what I need. You could interpret the text, that Anacalgon burried 3 mountain tops under him, when he fall down on earth, so he must be huge (most would argue for a more metaphorical interpretation though, but he must still be a very big dragon). No problem, I enjoy conversing with my viewers and answer almost all comments. As a positive side effect, It also helps my channel ^^

That is why a film adaptation does not work for all "lore". (I've wondered about the particulars of that myself, and deemed it was best for me to not over-think it.)

tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Smaug#Etymology Tolkien was a professor for Philology, he put a lot of work into his names and languages and he taught Old English In Oxford. The root of "Smaug" is Old English and it seems Tolkien ment something like "worm" (worm, wyrm I guess). In this case the "g" at the end becomes a "ch" sound (as in German "Bach"). Still it's very likely that he anglicised the name to some degree, so it would be a "k" sound at the end. The "au" part is more debatable and weird, because it's not a diphthong in Old English, but imo (Old English) "a" and "u" pretty much automatically become a diphthong-like, if spoken fast (same with "a" and "i"). And Tolkien could have written it Smáug or Smäug to make it more clear, but he didn't. So I assume it's "au" as described in in Appendix E of LotR. However I can see how this is debatable ^^ Yes agreed many writers do this and smoke seems like a good reference.

There is just so much. I read a lot of Tolkien's works for research, when I make videos like this, but I always learn something new :)

You mean at the end? The one, that is probably not canon? Gostir was his name.

I found the pic on a public domain picture site ^^ Getting artists permissions to use their artwork is quite difficult (they rarely answer requests it seems =/), so I had to be creative and thought it was quite funny too :) Maybe Glaurung also looked a bit like a Iguana. I liked this picture: www.deviantart.com/ckgoksoy/art/Glaurung-The-Deciever-494701469

Oh yes, I totally forgot about that name (I think it's only briefly mentioned in the Hobbit). But you are right should have mentioned it. PS: and it's east of the Grey Mountains I guess, so my point is not wrong just missing this rare name.

@@ThePhilosophersGames the Whithered Heath and the Grey Mountains still kept a rather nasty and eerie forbidding nature about the creatures lurking there, even at the end of The Hobbit as Gandalf and Bilbo go back to the Shire. Pretty interesting subject, considering it a cursed evil place with some persistent remains of Morgoth´s essence at the former and very eroded Iron Mountains of the North that protected the earliest fortess of evil, Utumno, lost in the farthest northern iced wasteland (pretty much alike the Lovecraftian unknown Kadath, which supposedly Tolkien didn´t knew anything about it). It seems to me as some unsettling evil conspiracy darker ancient theme that Tolkien couldn´t handle well how to weaven up, but still there are those pieces over there, and could be understood relating with other high fantastic worlds on the cosmic horror influence as Lovecraft, Howard of Ashton Smith; their keys are: - the ruins of unknown Utumno hidden somewhere in the fartherst northern iced wasteland, where still some rather nasty secrets kept hidden and dormant untill perhaps Melkor´s command at the Final Battle and the End of the World. - the dreaded Iron Mountains still remain in the farthest northern of Middle Earth being where actually the kingdom of Angmar were and so domains ruled by Orcs at Gundabad Mountains, and Dragons at the Grey Mountains and the Whithered Heath (Gandalf enlist several odd nasty creatures on the Grey Mountains including the hobbgoblins, never mentioned again aside the Hobbit.) - there goes the Nameless Things and their mission of gnawing deep under the whole Middle Earth foundations, kinda to make it sunken down, and Gandalf is pretty much both depressed and fearfull to talk much about them, so he choosed to talk more about the Balrog, being a more known foe, he was capable of facing up. (I still think they´re pretty much the same Wereworms of the Hobbit movie, eventhough officially the reference where the supposed creatures of the farthest deserts on the East, but still doesn´t makes sense about Azog´s line stating the creatures were some very ancient and long forgotten earth-gnawers by the people of Middle Earth, more like the Nameless Things description, than those worms. Or both could be the same, just referenced differently by Tolkien on each time.) - the Watcher in the Water, was pretty much an rather odd creature, that seems to be very ancient, lusting for power on his own (as he attacked Frodo wearing the Ring in particular) though not actually on Sauron´s command. He seemed to came from underneath the mountain, perhaps the underground icy salted water lake where both the Balrog and Gandalf felt fighting up, and so being one of the Nameless Things or related to their kind. - Aragorn quotes have found some unknown ancient and nasty evil creatures around the world that didn´t follow Sauron´s command but still do a lot of trouble. And not much after that, happens the episode about the foul voices in the air at Caradhras Pass before the Company of the Ring chooses to leave there after that threathening odd menance and the storms there. (The movies made it look like it was Saruman´s deed but in the book happens different, and might be either related with the random mischevious Stone Giants of the Hobbit or SOMETHING ELSE!!) Furtherlymore for more uneasy feeling, Gimli quotes that Caradhras had already have a rather nasty reputation long before the lurking of Orcs there, and didn´t much have a solid explaining why that happened there! - Ungoliant´s origin, true nature and ultimate fate on the story: considering her just a Maiar doesn´t makes sense as why among all other Maiar, did Morgoth choosed ONLY HER to do his bidding aid at ruining all there in Valinor. Why he didn´t called before Sauron or the Balrogs being more loyal and faithfull followers of him? Ungoliant seems to be pretty much independent and evil aside of whatever Morgoth influenced her at the very beggining being a random Maiar or unclassified Ainur at the beggining of all. (Tolkien earliest drafts, set her as the wholesome embodyment of Primeval Mystery - Outer Darkness beyond the Creation Power of Illuvatar, then herself might have knew Melkor when he searched Illuvatar´s Imperishable Creation Flame in vain at the deep of Darkness, so he might be corrupted by her rather than the opposite!! Also she wasn´t always a spider-creature, and he might have known her in a more fair and seductive form, that resembled or mocked, Melkor´s unattainable love-interest, Varda, herself actually the most powerfull of Valar rather than Manwe, as she was primarly made up the whole Imperishable Creation Flame of Illuvatar herself!! Melkor lusted for her power and so herself, and then Ungoliant somehow early was like the Shadow opposite against the pure prime Light that Varda represented, so he felt upon her.) - the Black Rider or Hunter of the earliest days when the Elves awakened at Cuviennen and got captured by it and brought to Utumno where in the end Melkor made the Orcs from they!! - the true nature on the Barrow' wights and the Old Man Willow tree, alongside the true nature of Tom Bombadill, his wife and his rather unknown mother-in-law! - what about the spy cats and their true nature on Queen Beruthia of Gondor, when actually things started to go awry in their lineage? - what goes in the farther east and south of Middle Earth and in the other continents of Arda, as the Dark Lands and the Sun and Moon´s Land? What happened with the Blue Wizards in the East? (Could be Saruman be actually trusted about what he said about their fate as he came back alone from there? He could have killed them too, unknown to all!) And Radagast´s fate? It´s a shame that neither Tolkien or his son or anyone is pretty much interested to develop further about it.

Np :P

That is a very interesting question. Sadly I have to say, that I don't know it. There's not much information about it. E.g. we can read few of the Balrogs survived and hid beneath the earth. I assume some of the dragons also fled and hid somewhere, probably in the northern regions, probably because they were less effected by the destruction of Beleriand. All we can read is (Silmarillion): "Then the sun rose, and the host of the Valar prevailed, and well-nigh all the dragons were destroyed" and after the war: and Men dwelt in darkness and were troubled by many evil things that Morgoth had devised in the days of his dominion: demons, and dragons, and misshapen beasts, and the unclean Orcs that are mockeries of the Children of Ilúvatar. And the lot of Men was unhappy. So the eastern regions were plagued by the remaining servants of Morgoth. That's all. The next mention of dragons is millennia later later (Third Age), when the 7 Rings of the dwarves were destroyed by Dragon fire.

Not sure how it's in other translations (might really be an error), but not even Ancalagon the Black (the greatest of all Dragons) could have destroyed it as stated by Gandalf to Frodo. Here's the quote from LotR, The Shadow of the Past: Your small fire, of course, would not melt even ordinary gold. This Ring has already passed through it unscathed, and even unheated. But there is no smith’s forge in this Shire that could change it at all. Not even the anvils and furnaces of the Dwarves could do that. It has been said that dragon-fire could melt and consume the Rings of Power, but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough; nor was there ever any dragon, not even Ancalagon the Black, who could have harmed the One Ring, the Ruling Ring, for that was made by Sauron himself.

@@ThePhilosophersGames Ah, I was misremembering it. Halfway through reading your quote it came back to me. The bit about the other rings of power was what threw me for a loop. To be fair, it's been around 15 years since I read it hahaha

haha yes I can relate to that. I also often misremember small details 😅 So I have to often double check things. Sometimes memories fuse in a weird way.

Correct, the Silmaril of Eärendil definitely added a lot to his power.

Hence the light dude

Vingilot was made of mithril and hallowed by the Valar, so Earendil basically had a dragon killing wagon

Yes (I think) it is. I was looking for public domain pictures I could use and thought it was fitting. There's a cool art work of Nargothrond, but I did not get permission to use it.

@@ThePhilosophersGames it is, I used to cross that bridge every day on my way to high school.

@@ThePhilosophersGames and thank you, it was a lovely surprise.

He is as big as a men a bit taller though, but no giant and there is the implication, that his hide is black, maybe like a shadow. He is also missing a finger during the Third Age and it's terrible to look at him in his Third Age form. I think I have this picture of him in the video: tolkiengateway.net/wiki/File:J.R.R._Tolkien_-_Sauron.jpg This is a sketch by J.R.R. Tolkien. It's a bit more Nazgûl like, but he is not clad in armor.

thanks

Sauron is a Maia who was created in the timeless halls before Arda came into being. He has no true from.

lol

Yes sure. Scatha is a name derived from Old English "sceadan" (to sperate, pronounced /ʃæ͜ɑː.dɑn/) or "sceaþa" (enemy, ravager, warrior, injury; related to "scathe") and the language of the people of Rohan (and their ancestors the Éothéod) is represented by Old English. SC in Old English is often pronounced as SH as in "shatter". The rest is straight forward. A is pronounced as A in father, etc. I guess you could also argue that you can anglicise the name (and pronounce it maybe similar to "scathe"), but I decided to go with the Old English

@@ThePhilosophersGames Thanks!

I think it was quite funny and Glaurung looked like it a bit, just golden. But thank you :D

No not canon. Urgost is not in the books and created by the game devs. But: Smaug was greatest dragon of the Third Age, but not the last. And the dwarves lost the war against the dragons. So there are defenitely still dragons left even in the Fourth Age. they are probably "lesser" breads compared to the ancient First Age Dragons, but still dragons. Tolkien wrote in a letter (144): Dragons. They had not stopped; since they were active in far later times, close to our own. Have I said anything to suggest the final ending of dragons? If so it should be altered. The only passage I can think of is Vol. I p. 70 : 'there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough'. But that implies, I think, that there are still dragons, if not of full primeval stature.

You mean the name Azaghâl? It's not 100% clear how the GH is pronounced here. It could be something like K and then just an H or it could be a voiced velar fricative. The G in Sméagol is also voiced velar fricative, when you pronounce it Old English (Tolkien interestingly anglicized the name). PS: tough to pronounce for me xD

No sadly not =/ I searched for something to show in the video, but had trouble finding a good looking dragon of this size (big like a mountain) at all. So I went with the shadow of the dragon in the Demon's Souls intro. Another candidate were the Record of Lodoss War dragons, but some Japanese stuff on YT is always a bit risky. There are only some cool fan arts. Some can be found here: lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Ancalagon (for Information I like tolkiengateway.net more)

oh man, well thanks for answering. Sadness arises... i love ur channel

No problem and thank you, happy you like my content :)

I would say yes, it's most likely toxic. The blood of Glaurung poisoned Túrin, when it touched him. ofc this is only confirmed for Glaurung, but I guess it could be argued it's true for other dragons too. By definition they are evil creatures "formed" by Morgoth, who probably summoned and evil spirit into them. And Morgoth's blood also seemed to be unusual: "and the blood [of Morgoth] gashed forth black and smoking"

Luckily the share of gold from the Mountain far outweighed the value of the diamonds on Smaug's corpse.

They are possessed by spirits, who could be Ainur. So the were created through Ilúvatar's thought. I assume this is true for Ungoliant too, but it's not 100% known, just a theory.

Since ERu is all and created all, such an idea dictates EVERYTHING is under Eru.

@@ThePhilosophersGames regarding Christianity, too, if God were in fact the ALL-being, having created all, that too suggests EVERYTHING, including Satan and every dark element of existence, were fashioned by God, the ALL-being. To think otherwise is nonsensical, for nothing could exist outside of that which is ALL, because there is NO existence outside of ALL, correct?

@@valentinomiller6251 Not sure I understand you. You probably ignore several things here: The original question was *not* "were dragons created by Eru", it was: Wouldn't dragons be part of the music? Same for Ungoliant? I answered with "So the(y) were created through Ilúvatar's thought." Tolkien's world was created through the Music of the Ainur in harmony (and unity for the most part except for Melkor) and this harmony was brought to existence. While Eru is the biggest part of this, the other Ainur are also a part of it too. Some species exist, that were altered forms of existing ones, like the orcs. Ofc they have an origin or essence related to the Music of the Ainur and Eru too, but they were formed by Melkor. Ungoliant is a strange being and it is not 100% clear, if she is an Ainu herself or some side effect of the Music of the Ainur (maybe brought into it by the dissonance of Melkor, even though Melkor would have not foreseen this creature). That is why I wrote: "I assume this is true for Ungoliant too, but it's not 100% known". The question can't be answered for Ungoliant in detail without speculation. There are also comparable things in our lives, like our thoughts. From a Christianty standpoint god created us and gave us the ability to form thoughts/ideas (and have free will) and maybe he knows in advance what our thoughts will be, but they are still our thoughts and part of our own reality, else we would not be sentient. The idea of the All-creator god is more, that he has a part in everything, because the other creators (humans) were created by him and have a part of him inside them too, so everything the create, god is a part of it too.

I definitely see your point, also Tolkien struggled to fit him somewhere and we ended up with Orodreth. Fingolfin's line got pretty thin and Idril marring Tuor probably made it difficult for the line (half-elven must decide at some point, but not initially). When Turgon died a new High King was needed and Eärendil was just 7 at this time and the concept of deciding on being Elf on Men wasn't there yet, so I assume his status was pretty much unknown. Interestingly Gil-galad wanted Elrond to become king (he also got his Ring), but he did not claim (or even refused) kingship after Gil-galad's death. Galadriel would be another option, but also she did not claim it.

Correct. I mention that at the beginning of the video. Valar like Morgoth can't create intelligent life. It is actually never stated what the dragon's origin is in the main books. We only learn, that they are under Morgoth's control, are his servants and that they were first seen, when they left Angband (Glaurung, who showed himself early), which could be interpreted as that they were created in Morgoth's stronghold. In the history of Middle-earth Books (The War of the Jewels) we can read about, that Morgoth saw that orcs were inefficient against his enemies and so he "bethought him of dragons". I can understand, that you protest there, but from my perspective it is not far fetched to assume, that Morgoth "created" them: in the form he changed the form of existing intelligent live or imprisoned an intelligent and powerful spirits into them.

They could also be Maiar like the Balrogs.

Yes that's a possibility too.

John Reeves or goth bred them

Morgoth had sex with a balrog.

Thank you ^^ I thought it was quite funny and fitting at the same time; happy you liked it :D