Troll (Middle-earth)
| Trolls | |
|---|---|
| Information | |
| Created date | First Age |
| Created by fictional being | Morgoth |
| Home world | Middle-earth |
| Base of operations | Trollshaws, Moria, Mordor |
| Sub-races | Olog-hai |
Trolls are fictional characters in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium. They are portrayed as large humanoids of great strength and poor intellect. In this they differed from the trolls of Norse mythology, which were magical and sometimes beautiful creatures, with special skills.
Commentators have noted the different effects Tolkien uses trolls for, from comedy in Sam Gamgee's poem and the Cockney accents and table-manners of the working-class trolls in The Hobbit, to the hellish atmosphere in Moria as the protagonists are confronted by darkness and monsters. Tolkien drew back from giving trolls the power of speech, as he had done in The Hobbit, as it implied to him that they had souls, so he made the trolls in The Silmarillion and The Lord of the Rings darker and more bestial.
Trolls feature in Peter Jackson's Middle-earth films and in games derived from them.
Appearances[edit]
The Hobbit[edit]
In The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins and the Dwarf company encountered three trolls on their journey to Erebor. The trolls captured the Dwarves and prepared to eat them, but the wizard Gandalf managed to distract them until dawn, when exposure to sunlight turned them into stone. They had vulgar table-manners, constantly argued and fought amongst themselves, in Tolkien's narrator's words "not drawing-room fashion at all, at all",[1] spoke with Cockney accents, and had matching English working-class names: Tom, Bert, and Bill.[T 1][2] The English scholar Jennifer Eastman Attebery states that they "signify the uncouth".[1]
The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey criticises this depiction, and that of the goblins "incidentally still too close to munitions workers as the trolls were to labourers".[3] Shippey notes, too, Tolkien's storytelling technique here, observing that making the troll's purse able to speak blurs the line between the ordinary and the magical.[4]
The medievalist Marjorie Burns writes that the trolls' tiredness with eating mutton every day matches the fantasy writer and designer William Morris's account of his travels in Iceland, one of many Middle-earth features to do so; Morris visited places called Tröllakirkja ("Trollchurch") and Tröllahals ("Trollneck").[5] She notes, too, that the adventure with the three trolls combines the fear of being eaten with the temptation of delicious food.[6]
The Lord of the Rings[edit]
As the Fellowship of the Ring made their way towards Rivendell through the Trollshaws, after Frodo had been stabbed by the Nazgûl with a Morgul-knife, they came upon the three trolls that Bilbo and the dwarves had encountered many years earlier, and had seen turned to stone at daybreak. Sam Gamgee recited a comic poem, "The Stone Troll", on the supposed dangers of kicking a troll, who has a "seat" which is "harder than stone", to cheer everyone up.[T 2][7] The poem appears also in The Adventures of Tom Bombadil. In the Tolkien critic Paul H. Kocher's words, it achieves a certain "grisly slapstick".[7]
The leader of the Ents, Treebeard, remarked that trolls were "made ... in mockery of Ents", as Orcs were of Elves.[T 3] With the destruction of Sauron, trolls like the rest of Sauron's minions were scattered in defeat, though trolls survived in hiding in the hills; the medievalist Marjorie Burns comments that Tolkien thus appears both optimistic, since evil can be defeated, and pessimistic, as that defeat is never absolute.[8]
Cave trolls attacked the Fellowship in Moria. One had dark greenish scales, black blood, and a hide so thick that when Boromir struck it in the arm his sword was notched. However, Frodo Baggins was able to impale the "toeless" foot of the same troll with the enchanted dagger Sting.[T 4] The Tolkien scholar Charles A. Huttar writes that the trolls' presence, alongside orcs and the Balrog, means that "Moria not only houses inert obstacles but active monsters".[9]
Mountain trolls wielded the great battering ram Grond in shattering the gates of Minas Tirith.[T 5]
Snow trolls are mentioned only in the story of Helm Hammerhand. When Helm went out clad in white during the Long Winter to stalk and slay his enemies, he was described as looking like a snow-troll.[T 6]
The Silmarillion[edit]
Morgoth, the evil Vala, created the first trolls in the First Age of Middle-earth.[T 7] They were strong and vicious but stupid. Their major weakness was that they turned to stone in sunlight. The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey notes that the belief that such monsters must be below ground before dawn dates back to the Elder Edda of Norse mythology, where in the Alvissmal, Thorr keeps the dwarf Alviss talking until dawn, and sees him turn to stone.[10]
During the wars of Beleriand, Gothmog (the Lord of Balrogs) had a bodyguard of trolls. During the Nírnaeth Arnoediad, the Battle of Unnumbered Tears, in which Morgoth defeated the united armies of Elves, Men, and Dwarves, the great human warrior Húrin faced Gothmog's trolls to protect the retreat of the Elven king Turgon. As Morgoth had ordered to capture Húrin alive, the warrior managed to wipe out the trolls before being captured by orcs. Many trolls died in the War of Wrath, but some survived and joined Sauron, the greatest surviving servant of Morgoth.[T 8]
Origins[edit]
Tolkien's trolls have both real-world (literary) and in-fiction origins.
In folklore and early fantasy[edit]
Shippey writes that The Hobbit's audience in 1937 were familiar with trolls from fairy tale collections such as those of Grimm, and Asbjørnsen and Moe's Norwegian Folktales; Tolkien's use of monsters of different kinds - orcs, trolls, and a Balrog in Moria made that journey "a descent into hell".[11] T
Attebery notes that trolls came into English first through Asbjørnsen and Moe's 1841 collection of traditional Norwegian tales, Norske-Eventyr, but that this was followed by Scandinavian retellings with reimagined trolls, such as John Albert Bauer's Trollskogen (translated to "In the Troll Wood") with friendly man-sized trolls. Trolls thus moved from being grim Norse ogres to more sympathetic modern humanoids. In her view, Tolkien's trolls are based on the ogre type, but with two "incarnations": ancient trolls, "creatures of dull and lumpish nature" in Tolkien's words,[T 9] unable to speak; and the malicious giants of strength, courage, and those bred by Sauron with "enough intelligence to present a real danger".[1]
Redaction[edit]
The critic Gregory Hartley notes that for The Hobbit, Tolkien's trolls were much like those of Norse mythology, "archetypal, stereotypical ... basking in unexamined sentience",[12] whereas for The Silmarillion and Lord of the Rings,[12]
Tolkien undertook the difficult task of melding fairy tale with epic, which was in turn bonded with the Christian mythos. Characters and creatures began functioning on a multiplicity of registers."[12]
The entertainingly "light-hearted informality" of The Hobbit's Cockney-speaking trolls gave way to the "more bestial trolls" of the later works.[12] Hartley notes that by making all the beasts in The Hobbit talk, Tolkien, a devout Roman Catholic, had created a serious problem for himself: were trolls and other monsters supposed to be sentient, and in Christian terms therefore to have souls? Hartley noted that Tolkien directly addressed this keenly-felt question:[12]
Of course ... when you make Trolls speak [Tolkien's emphasis] you are giving them a power, which in our world (probably) connotes the possession of a 'soul'.[T 10]
Hartley comments that the redaction effort that Tolkien threw himself into for his legendarium was driven by the way he had composed The Hobbit; and that the resulting "rich, curious roles" that trolls and other beasts play in Middle-earth would not have existed without it.[12]
In-fiction[edit]
Wayne Hammond and Christina Scull note that in Tolkien's fiction, trolls were bred by Sauron "in counterfeit" of other creatures, such as ents.[T 3][13][T 10] Friedhelm Schneidewind, writing in the J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia, states the precise origin of trolls "perhaps from giant apes but possibly from Men, Orcs, or 'Spirits'" is not given by Tolkien, but like Orcs, trolls were bred by Melkor and Sauron for their own evil purposes.[14]
Adaptations[edit]
Rankin/Bass' The Hobbit[edit]
Rankin/Bass' animated 1977 adaptation of The Hobbit depicts Bilbo's encounter with the trolls. In this film, the trolls are presented with tan-colored skin, large bulbous noses, and tusks. As in the book, they turn to stone when exposed to sunlight. The trolls were voiced by Paul Frees, Jack DeLeon, and Don Messick.[15]
Ralph Bakshi's The Lord of the Rings[edit]
Ralph Bakshi's 1978 animated version of The Lord of the Rings follows the book faithfully in its depiction of the encounter with the troll in the Chamber, though the troll's foot has toes. Glenn Gaslin, reviewing the film on Slate, describes a clip from the film as "of ravenous trolls, [and it] does no justice to Tolkien's darker elements".[16]
Peter Jackson[edit]
The Lord of the Rings trilogy[edit]
Numerous trolls appear in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.
In The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Bilbo Baggins recounts his altercation with the three stone-trolls and later on, the four hobbits and Aragorn are shown resting in the shelter of the petrified trolls. The location used was Piopio, Waitomo district, in New Zealand.[17] In the mines of Moria, a single cave troll is among the attackers.[18] First sighted by Boromir, the troll barges through the open doors, and smashes much of the Chamber, including Balin's tomb, in the ensuing fight. It has a collar with a trailing chain, and is undisciplined enough to inadvertently crush some of its goblin allies in the skirmish with Gandalf's company. The troll appears to impale Frodo with a metal stave, but Frodo is saved from fatal injury by his mithril shirt. In the book it is an Orc captain who spears him. The troll is killed by Legolas with a well-aimed arrow shot through the roof of its mouth.
In The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, shackled trolls open and close the Black Gate to an army of approaching Easterlings.
In The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Mountain-trolls are shown being used to load catapults and to move extremely heavy objects such as siege towers and the battering ram Grond. After the gate of Minas Tirith is broken, Battle trolls enter the city as shock troops, sporting armour and spiked clubs alluded to in the appendices. At least one survived and is seen later, attempting to break down a gate. During the Battle of the Morannon, Aragorn fights one of the Olog-hai, whose upper body is covered in black plated-armour, making it more menacing. While most trolls in the films wielded clubs, this one wielded a sword and a mace.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey[edit]
In The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey the three stone trolls appear as in Tolkien's book. The trolls are portrayed through voice and motion capture.[19] Bert is played by Mark Hadlow (Dori), Tom is played by William Kircher (Bifur) and William is played by Peter Hambleton (Glóin).
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies[edit]
In The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, Azog the Defiler's army from Dol Guldur contains many types of trolls. In a departure from the book, Weta Workshop included them as shock troops, as according to their Design & Special Effects Supervisor Richard Taylor, "they seemed to be a natural extension of an Orc army". The battle trolls were depicted as being larger than the trolls in The Lord of the Rings and fitted with armour and weapons, such as bladed shields. Others were used as mobile siege weapons with back-mounted catapults.[20] Some had their hands replaced with flails and had maces for feet, with reins sutured into their eye sockets so that orcs could control and ride them. In the extended edition of the film and in concept art shown in The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies Chronicles: Art And Design, Bofur takes control of one such troll to turn the tide of the battle in the Dwarves' favor.[21]
Beyond the screen[edit]
Various movie-only sources, like The Lord of the Rings: Weapons and Warfare and the spin-off games by Electronic Arts, greatly expand on what Tolkien wrote about trolls.
In the world of the films, mountain-trolls, including the cave-trolls of Moria, are about 18 feet (5 m) tall, with massive limbs, potbellies, and dark scales on the back and shoulders. They come in stony colors, with the most common being grey. They have 22 teeth, including two fangs on the lower canines. As in the book, their blood is black, and is so hot that when spilt, it sizzles on the floor. They are mainly carnivorous, but can digest plant matter if need be. The eyes are either grey or blue. They wear loincloths of leather that they find in the Mines or are given by the Goblins. They sometimes roar when in a battle rage, but are incapable of forming words or language. They often wield either a great club or a hammer. Cave-trolls are usually found with small groups of Orcs. They are too unintelligent to hunt food for themselves, often consuming whatever hapless creature they come across, so food is an advantage they get from working with the Orcs. Their fingernails extend to most of their fingers, and were allegedly used to dig holes into the rock itself.
The Olog-hai differ from the other trolls depicted in New Line movies in that they have more forward-facing eyes, as well as hair on their bodies, suggesting that they are a more advanced form of troll. They are usually grey to black in colour. Mountain trolls and Olog-hai have much in common: they are both much larger and more intelligent than most trolls and more resistant to light. However Olog-hai are certainly far superior to mountain trolls in all these aspects.
Forest trolls were invented for the EA game version of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.[22]
For the game version of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, trolls are featured as enemy units. They also appear as enemies in "Lord of the Rings: The Third Age". In this game, they are also slow but powerful, and can take a lot of damage before dying. Some of the later "attack trolls" in the game wield a pair of large swords, while a stronger kind carries massive war hammers, as well as at least one troll encountered in Moria who carries a pair of drums, which are used to heal and increase the damage of an accompanying troll. Trolls also appear as controllable units in The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth, its sequel, The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth II and its expansion The Rise of the Witch-king. In The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-earth, it is necessary for a regular mountain troll to gain a rank (after destroying enemy units, etc.), to become an attack troll where it gains an armor bonus and can heal by itself as the only non-hero unit who is able to do so. In The Battle for Middle-earth II, attack trolls can be made from a Rank 3 Troll Cage. In The Rise of the Witch-king, the Angmar faction has a troll hero named Rogash, as well as hill and snow trolls. In all the Battle for Middle-earth games, trolls are depicted as "tank" units (slow, very strong, can take massive damage before being killed).
Lord of the Rings tabletop wargame, produced by Games Workshop, includes a troll.[23]
References[edit]
Primary[edit]
- This list identifies each item's location in Tolkien's writings.
- ↑ The Hobbit, ch. 2 "Roast Mutton"
- ↑ Fellowship of the Ring, book 1, ch. 12, "Flight to the Ford"
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 The Two Towers, book 3, ch. 4, "Treebeard"
- ↑ Fellowship of the Ring, book 2, ch. 5 "The Bridge of Khazad-dûm"
- ↑ The Return of the King, book 5, ch. 4 "The Siege of Gondor"
- ↑ The Return of the King, Appendix A. II "The House of Eorl"
- ↑ Return of the King Appendix F, "The Languages and Peoples of the Third Age", "Of Other Races"
- ↑ The Children of Húrin, ch. 2 "The Battle of Unnumbered Tears"
- ↑ Return of the King, Appendix F, I, "Of Other Races", "Trolls"
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, #153, to Peter Hastings, September 1954.
Secondary[edit]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Attebery, Jennifer Eastman (1996). "The Trolls of Fiction: Ogres or Warm Fuzzies?". Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts. 7 (1 (25)): 61–74. JSTOR 43308256.
The comedy is conveyed chiefly through the trolls' lower class British dialect and their clumsy handling of little Bilbo
- ↑ Stevens, David; Stevens, Carol D. (2008). Harold Bloom, ed. The Hobbit (PDF). J. R. R. Tolkien. Bloom's Modern Critical Views. Bloom's Literary Criticism, an imprint of Infobase Publishing. pp. 17–26. ISBN 978-1-60413-146-8. Search this book on
- ↑ Shippey, Tom (2005) [1982]. The Road to Middle-Earth (Third ed.). HarperCollins. p. 87. ISBN 978-0261102750. Search this book on
- ↑ Shippey, Tom (2005) [1982]. The Road to Middle-Earth (Third ed.). HarperCollins. pp. 85–86. ISBN 978-0261102750. Search this book on
- ↑ Burns, Marjorie (2005). Perilous Realms: Celtic and Norse in Tolkien's Middle-earth. University of Toronto Press. p. 84. ISBN 978-0-8020-3806-7. Search this book on
- ↑ Burns, Marjorie (2005). Perilous Realms: Celtic and Norse in Tolkien's Middle-earth. University of Toronto Press. pp. 159–161. ISBN 978-0-8020-3806-7. Search this book on
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Kocher, Paul (1974) [1972]. Master of Middle-Earth: The Achievement of J.R.R. Tolkien. Penguin Books. pp. 190–191. ISBN 0140038779. Search this book on
- ↑ Burns, Marjorie (2005). Perilous Realms: Celtic and Norse in Tolkien's Middle-earth. University of Toronto Press. p. 176. ISBN 978-0-8020-3806-7. Search this book on
- ↑ Huttar, Charles A. (1975). Lobdell, Jared, ed. Hell and The City: Tolkien and the Traditions of Western Literature. A Tolkien Compass. Open Court. p. 125. ISBN 978-0875483030. Search this book on
- ↑ Shippey, Tom (1982). The Road to Middle-Earth. Grafton (HarperCollins). p. 69. ISBN 0261102753. Search this book on
- ↑ Shippey, Tom (2001). J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century. HarperCollins. p. 12. ISBN 978-0261-10401-3. Search this book on
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4 12.5 Hartley, Gregory (2014). "Civilized goblins and Talking Animals: How The Hobbit Created Problems of Sentience for Tolkien". In Bradford Lee Eden. The Hobbit and Tolkien's mythology : essays on revisions and influences. Part III: Themes. McFarland. ISBN 978-0-7864-7960-3. OCLC 889426663. Search this book on
- ↑ Hammond, Wayne G.; Scull, Christina (2005). The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion. HarperCollins. pp. 76, 389. ISBN 978-0-00-720907-1. Search this book on
- ↑ Schneidewind, Friedhelm (2013) [2007]. "Biology of Middle-earth". In Drout, Michael D. C. J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia: Scholarship and Critical Assessment. Routledge. p. 66. ISBN 978-0-415-86511-1.
- ↑ "The Hobbit (1977)". IMDb. Retrieved 11 April 2020.
- ↑ Gaslin, Glenn (21 November 2001). "Hobbits on Film". Slate. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
- ↑ Plush, Hazel (21 September 2017). "10 epic Middle Earth locations that really exist in New Zealand". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
- ↑ Sibley, Brian (2006). "Quest for the Ring". Peter Jackson: A Film-maker's Journey. HarperCollins. pp. 329–387. ISBN 978-0-00-717558-1. Search this book on
- ↑ "The Hobbit Then and Now". The Insider. 2 January 2019. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
- ↑ Gilsdorf, Ethan (19 December 2014). "Peter Jackson Must Be Stopped". Wired. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
- ↑ Falconer, Daniel (2014). The Hobbit: The Battle of The Five Armies Chronicles: Art & Design. Search this book on
- ↑ "Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Cheats". GamesRadar. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
- ↑ "The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game (Review)". Kulkmann's Gamebox. Retrieved 10 April 2020.
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