A Sense of History: Straight Road
The next in a series of articles about ships passing to and from the West, Simon uses "The Fall of Númenor" to attempt to arrive at Tolkien's reading of the exordium to "Beowulf."
“Flame Light! Flee Night!” went the battle-cry of the Edain of the North.
Fingon knelt on the stairs of Barad Eithel, mourning Hador, slain with arrows despite the helmet gifted to him, and his son Gundor dead beside him. But still around him the cry of the Edain went up: “Flame Light! Flee Night!”
Galdor fell, also, seven years later, and Fingon wondered whether the Edain would change their cry. But still they cried: “Flame Light! Flee Night!” And Hurin and Huor charged into the fray by his side, their faith unshaken, like their father's and grandfather's before them.
And so, at last, when the morrow of the Fifth Great Battle dawned, Fingon stood with Hurin and Huor and their people beside him and he cried out: The day has come!
And no matter that he cried in Quenya, all who heard him understood and answered: The night is passing…
"Lacho calad! Drego morn! Flame Light! Flee Night!” appears as the customary battle-cry of the Edain of the North in the "Unfinished Tales" during the scene of Hurin's leave-taking from Dor-lomin. This scene is set earlier than Fingon's more famous cry at the start of the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, which is what gave me the original idea.
This first section was written for Day Two (Fingon) of Nolofinwean Week on Tumblr.