Ossë by Dawn Walls-Thumma

Ossë is one among the pantheon of sea gods present in Tolkien's legendarium, as well as one of the oldest characters in the history of that legendarium. The fundamental plot of Ossë's story—involving the ferrying of Elves across the sea on an island—was in place from the earliest writings and remained in place until Tolkien's final word on the subject. Even Ossë's name remains unchanged across five decades of writing—another anomaly given the rapidity with which Tolkien often shifted characters' roles and names as he wrote and revised.

Yet across those five decades, Ossë's character also undergoes a shift both subtle and radical. I have observed before, in my biography of Uinen, that as the legendarium evolved, Tolkien shifted from permitting a morally complex and often paganistic ethical frame to one that was more dualistically aligned on a good-evil axis. Ossë is a case study of this. Beginning as a figure who is actively malevolent and driven by the base emotions of jealousy and lawlessness, Tolkien tames Ossë in iterations, leaving us with a character who, while still wrathful and mistrusted, becomes defined not by his merciless rage but by his friendship with the Teleri and patronage of shipbuilders—a tempestuous god, yes, but one capable of being subdued.

Normally, I begin a character biography by reviewing what the published Silmarillion says and then going back to the Lost Tales and working forward to see how Tolkien (or Christopher Tolkien, in some cases) arrived at the published text. In this case, because the essentials of Ossë's story change so little even as his character changes so much, I'm going to begin with the Lost Tales and proceed forward, documenting shifts in characterization as I go.

"The Mermaids in the Basement"¹: Ossë in the Lost Tales

The Book of Lost Tales, collected as the first two volumes of the History of Middle-earth series, includes Tolkien's earliest writings on the legendarium, dating back to the 1910s when he was in his twenties. Written in sumptuous detail, it describes the Ainur, their dwellings, and their actions much more lavishly than the published Silmarillion, often using whimsical details typical of the Victorian era fairy stories that diminish sinister folkloric creatures to dainty, wingéd, and glittery "flower-fairies and fluttering sprites."² The Ainur of the Lost Tales bear little resemblance to the somber figures of the published Silmarillion, instead recalling the pre-Christian pantheons of the Greeks, Norse, and Celts: sometimes playful, sometimes foolish, sometimes senselessly chaotic.

As noted above, Ossë is one of the few characters who emerges in the Lost Tales and persists through without a significant change in role or name to the published text. He is one of the pantheon-within-a-pantheon of sea gods: Ulmo sits at the helm, and Ossë, his wife Uinen, and Salmar are identified as Ulmo's vassals, as well as a fleet of "Oarni and Falmarini and the long-tressed Wingildi … spirits of the foam and the surf of ocean."³ Ulmo, Ossë, and Uinen are all Valar, though Ossë was always counted among the lesser of the Valar. In the Lost Tales, it is said that he arrived in Arda "behind those greatest chieftains" of the Valar,⁴ and in later texts, he is explicitly identified as among the youngest of the Valar.⁵ Ossë and Uinen govern the inner seas, which includes all bodies of water on Arda; Ulmo's realm is Vai, the arcane "outer ocean" that envelops the world in the early versions of the legendarium.

Ossë's relationship with Ulmo is described here as one borne out of "fear and reverence and not for love."⁶ This conflict is one of the key markers of Ossë's ethical shift across Tolkien's writing of the "Silmarillion" materials⁷; here, it is an outright case where Ulmo maintains a tenuous authority only through fear, with the implication that Ossë would become ungovernable otherwise.

"A merry yarn"⁸: Ossë the Heroic

Ossë enters the Lost Tales in a prosocial role, productively aiding the Ainur in their building of Arda and resistance against Melkor. When Melkor topples the Lamps and floods Middle-earth, it is Ossë, with the help of the Oarni, who drags an island free of the mire and within sight of Aman, where the Ainur decide to dwell.⁹ When Yavanna begins her work on the two trees, Ossë contributes three enormous pearls to the earth from which Telperion (then called Silpion) will arise. Ossë even maintains a dwelling in Aman, described in the whimsical style of the Victorian fairy-story, for the uncharacteristic purpose of escaping the noise of the waves:

Ossë too had a great house, and dwelt therein whenso a conclave of the Valar was held or did he grow weary of the noise of the waves upon his seas. Ónen [Uinen] and the Oarni brought thousands of pearls for its building, and its floors were of sea-water, and its tapestries like the glint of the silver skins of fishes, and it was roofed with foam.¹⁰

When the Ainur seek to punish Melkor for the harm he has done to Arda, Ossë "drew them across on a mighty raft whereon he himself sat in shimmering mail"; Tolkien is, however, careful to note that "Ulmo Vailimo was far ahead roaring in his deep-sea car and trumpeting in wrath upon a horn of conches."¹¹ The use of the rare¹² epithet Vailimo is important here too. Ulmo is the lord of Vai, the strange outer ocean, while Ossë presides over the more prosaic inner seas; later in the Lost Tales, Ulmo will taunt Ossë with the relative prestige of their domains.¹³ After Melkor is successfully captured and chained, Ossë speaks against him at the trial.¹⁴ Later, as the Ainur ponder the fate of the newly awakened Elves in Middle-earth,

Aulë and Lórien, Oromë and Nessa and Ulmo most mightily proclaimed their desire for the bidding of the Eldar to dwell among the Gods. Wherefore, albeit Ossë spake cautiously against it—belike out of that ever-smouldering jealousy and rebellion he felt against Ulmo …¹⁵

Anyone familiar with this scene in the published Silmarillion will likely marvel at the reversal of Ulmo's position here. In The Silmarillion, Ulmo is the chief opponent of bringing the Elves to Aman, whereas here, he speaks in its favor. This should not overshadow how Ossë relates to this expression of support, however. Here, we begin to see a subtle but important change in how Ossë relates to the other Ainur in that his decisions are largely motivated not by his own moral compass but by his desire to oppose Ulmo. Earlier in the text, as Melkor wrought havoc upon the world and the Valar sat in conclave, "came Ossë raging like a tide among the cliffs, for he was wroth at the upheaval of his realm and feared the displeasure of Ulmo his overlord," hearkening back to the earlier statement that Ossë was kept subordinate to Ulmo through fear and not love.¹⁶ Three times in relatively few pages, Ulmo and Ossë are positioned relative to each other with Ulmo in the role of authority and Ossë as the disaffected subordinate. In contrast to his earlier aid in dragging the island of the Ainur to Aman and coaxing Telperion from the earth, his later interventions are undertaken not from sincere conviction but from a desire to oppose and domineer Ulmo.

"Þe þa wræclastas widost lecgað"¹⁷: Ossë the Exile

The conflict between the sea gods comes to a head after the Elves accept the invitation of the Ainur and begin their journey westward. The Elves having arrived at the Great Sea, Ulmo purposes to transport them westward on an island: mass transportation of the gods. Unfortunately, the island he selects was the very island, Tol Eressëa, that Ossë used when rescuing the Ainur from the floods brought on by Melkor's overthrow of the Lamps. Its purpose served, the Ainur had forgotten and forsaken this once-useful chunk of land, and "during all that time the island had floated darkly in the Shadowy Seas, desolate save when Ossë climbed its beaches on his journeys in the deeps." Now, without asking, Ulmo repossesses his secret island and "drew the island mightily to the very shores of the Great Lands, even to the coast of Hisilome northward of the Iron Mountains whither all the deepest shades withdrew when the Sun first arose."¹⁸

Ossë surfaces, sees his island repurposed to ferry the Vanyar (then called Teleri) and Noldor to Aman, and gives chase. However, just as when he transported the Ainur to Middle-earth in pursuit of Melkor, he cannot keep up with Ulmo and "is left far behind, for Ulmo set the might of the Valar in Uin and the whales."¹⁹

At first, Ossë stirs up storms, seeking to waylay the island from returning to carry the Teleri (then called Solosimpi) westward. But despite his efforts, Tol Eressëa returns to Middle-earth, the Teleri board, and Ulmo resumes his journey westward. But less than halfway to Aman,

Ossë seizes that island in his great hand, and all the great strength of Uin may scarcely drag it onward, for at swimming and in deeds of bodily strength in the water none of the Valar, not even Ulmo's self, is Ossë's match, and indeed Ulmo was not at hand, for he was far ahead piloting the great craft in the glooms that Ossë had gathered, leading it onward with the music of his conches. Now ere he can return Ossë with Ónen's [Uinen's] aid had brought the isle to a stand, and was anchoring it even to the sea-bottom with giant ropes of those leather-weeds and polyps that in those dark days had grown already in slow centuries to unimagined girth about the pillars of his deep-sea house. Thereto as Ulmo urges the whales to put forth all their strength and himself aids with all his godlike power, Ossë piles rocks and boulders of huge mass that Melko's ancient wrath had strewn about the seafloor, and builds these as a column beneath the island.²⁰

Ulmo may be the faster of the two, in the vanguard while Ossë straggles behind, but here, Ossë is resourceful in using his strength and ability to sow disorientation on the sea. Uinen proves a worthy accomplice as well—and throughout the history of the legendarium, Ulmo is always depicted as alone, here to his detriment as he lacks a co-conspirator, much less one as worthy as Uinen. Importantly, Ossë's disobedience is accomplished using the scattered rocks left behind by Melkor—not the first instance where Ossë's actions draw him near to the fallen Vala.

Ulmo and his great whale Uin attempt to dislodge Tol Eressëa, but Ossë summons "every kind of deep sea creature that buildeth itself a house and dwelling of stony shell." These further reinforce the island, and Ulmo is forced to retreat and "returned to Valmar in wrath and dismay" that the Teleri might be permanently stranded in the midst of the Great Sea.²¹

Ulmo returns to the island and sits upon the rocks, giving comfort to and teaching the Teleri sea-lore and music, particularly how to play pipes made of shells. "Then Falman-Ossë's heart melted towards them"—but he does not release them. For alongside his growing affection for the Elves is pride that they and their beauty dwell in his realm "so that their pipes gave perpetual pleasure to his ear."²²

Ossë's antics with the island mark a turning point for his character in this earliest version of the tale. To recap, Ossë begins magnanimously, lending his aid for presumably sincere motives. As the story evolves, his actions become increasingly tainted by his jealousy of and desire to obstruct Ulmo. While Ulmo is not wholly innocent in this, Ossë's anchoring of Tol Eressëa in the middle of the Great Sea²³ strands an entire people away from both country and kin. This act of cruel defiance is such that the other Ainur even contemplate war, an action only (reluctantly) taken once before, against Melkor. Again, we see Ossë draw near to Melkor's own destructive purpose. The Valar are furious, especially Ulmo, but "war had been but held off by the Gods, who desired peace and would not suffer Ulmo to gather the folk of the Valar and assail Ossë and rend the islands from their new roots."²⁴

Even worse, Ossë is beginning to regret his own actions. His affection for the stranded Teleri is growing, and "if Ulmo be not nigh he sits upon a reef at sea and many of the Oarni are by him, and hearkens to their [the Teleri's] voice and watches their flitting dances on this shore." But he is barred from Aman, and he misses it. Recalling his house in Valinor, "he longs for the light and happiness upon the plain, but most for the song of birds and the swift movement of their wings into the clean air, grown weary of his silver and dark fish silent and strange amid the deep waters." He goes so far as to swim into the bay at Arvalin—but he cannot approach, only look from without at the shore.²⁵ Again, the distance forced upon him by his own antisocial actions recalls Melkor's isolation in Utumno.

When some of Yavanna's songbirds wander astray and end up at Ossë's island, he allows them to roost on his broad shoulders. This poetic passage describes how he instructs them to become seabirds: strong of arm like he is and harsh-voiced from their rugged existence far from the safety of Valinor. He teaches them to catch fish and drenches their feathers in fish oil so that they can withstand the water. But even this seemingly harmless attempt at easing his loneliness displeases Ulmo, for "he was ill-pleased for the havoc wrought amid the fishes wherewith he had filled the waters with the aid of [Yavanna]."²⁶

The marooned Teleri, meanwhile, have not been idle. They begin constructing rafts from planks of fallen wood and have begun to venture forth upon the lakes of their islands and even the sea. The seabirds they cherish they put to good use, harnessing them to their rafts to draw them across the water. Ulmo observes this and rejoices, for the problem of the stranded Teleri is so far unsolvable and he "cannot yet think of any device save by help of Ossë and the Oarni, and will not be humbled to this." Inadvertently, however, Ossë has revealed the solution. With Aulë and Oromë, Ulmo journeys to Tol Eressëa, and they set about building swanships to bear the Teleri to Aman. Ossë's work waterproofing and taming the birds takes a bitter turn, as Ulmo uses both to his benefit in covering his boats with feathers and having the Teleri summon the tamed waterbirds to them. In great excitement and amid the music of flutes and pipes, the Teleri sail at last onward to Aman, leaving Ossë behind. As he goes, Ulmo "fares at the rear in his fishy car and trumpets loudly for the discomfiture of Ossë and the rescue of the Shoreland Elves."²⁷

Ossë despairs. It is fear of Ulmo, Aulë, and Oromë—and love for the Teleri—that restrains him from unleashing a fury of storms as he did when Ulmo sought to return with Tol Eressëa to transport them from Middle-earth. Ossë ends up exiled from the other Ainur, bereft of the Teleri, and even abandoned by the birds he trained and tamed:

Far behind lay Tol Eressea in silence and its woods and shores were still, for nearly all that host of sea-birds had flown after the Eldar and wailed now about the shores of Eldamar. but Osse dwelt in despondency and his silver halls in Valmar abode long empty, for he came no nearer to them for a great while than the shadow's edge, whither came the wailing of his sea-birds far away.²⁸

This lengthy and detailed story contains several elements of interest. First is the tone so common to the tales of the Ainur in the Lost Tales, where the gravity of their deeds is tempered by a playful note. An island drawn like a barge by a massive whale, Ossë marshaling an army of corals to root his island to the seabed, his "invention" of seabirds by dousing them in fish oil—these details leaven an otherwise glum tale of an innocent people stranded far out to sea, the collateral damage in a spat between two warring gods. It is reminiscent of the Lost Tales version of the tale of Melkor's destruction of the Lamps, where he tricks Aulë into making them out of ice that eventually succumbs to the Lamps' heat. There is a hint of the trickster god even in the most cataclysmic of events in the Lost Tales. Additionally, many of the episodes included at this point in the Lost Tales, especially those that involve Ossë, evoke the arc of just-so stories—how the island got its roots, how the seagull got its cry—that avert the epic in favor of the fairy-story.

Yet even the Lost Tales cannot make light of the outcome for Ossë. His story is one of loneliness and trying to alleviate that loneliness only to be repeatedly thwarted by a more powerful, hostile god: a sort of older sibling whom he can never overtake and who seems to delight in flaunting his superior power. Amid Ossë's trickster-god exploits, the outcome of his conflict with Ulmo here carries an edge of cruelty that those stories do not. The safe arrival and reunion of the Teleri with their kin in Aman does not reinstate Ossë in the good graces of the other Ainur, and the Lost Tales note that alongside the splendor of Aman, "the Great Lands were still and dark and very lonesome, and Ossë sat without the precincts and saw the moongleam of Silpion twinkle on the pebbles of diamonds and of crystals which the Gnomes cast in prodigality about the margin of the seas."²⁹ At this phase of the story, Ossë is a complex character, often acting with good intentions but dogged by his poor choices.

"The menace and caress"³⁰: Ossë the Conflicted

As the story in the Lost Tales evolves, Ossë works to reassert himself as an entity of good. At the feast where the Two Trees are slain, "Ossë even was there, dissembling for those seven days his feud and jealousy with Ulmo." Somewhat strangely, Tolkien also asserts, in the same chapter, that Ossë notices the death of the Trees when he thrusts his head above the water and sees that the shore has gone dark. Regardless of where he was at the outset, Tolkien is clear that he joined the hunt for Melkor eagerly,³¹ giving the pursuit his all, until "he gasped leaning on a staff and was very much athirst, for mighty as he was about the seas and tireless, such desperate travail on the bosom of Earth spent his vigour utterly." At the first rising of the Sun, Ossë exclaims in delight to Manwë about the beautiful blue of the sky.³² When the Teleri come to Ossë—chastened by Ulmo for their fears that the passes to the north could be used by the enemy to attack Aman—he raises the Magic Isles with the help of Uinen but "in Ulmo's despite," mazing the seas with islands so lugubrious with enchantment that "few had power to pass them by, and did any essay to then [sic] sudden storms drove them perforce against those beaches whose pebbles shone like silver and like gold."³³

Yet the sinister undertone to his characterization also remains. Returning to the episode where Melkor and Ungoliant slay the Two Trees:

Then does she [Ungoliant] throw a black cloak of invisibility about Melko and herself and they steal across the plain, and the Gods are in wonder and the Elves in Kôr are afraid; nonetheless they do not as yet suspect the hand of Melko in this, thinking rather it is some work of Ossë’s, who at times with his storms caused great mists and darkness to be wafted off the Shadowy Seas, encroaching even the bright airs of Valinor; though in this he met the anger both of Ulmo and of Manwë.³⁴

The most overt connection between Ossë and Melkor so far shows two important details about his character as written in the early texts. First is the association between Ossë and malicious evil. This distinguishes him from Uinen, who as I wrote in her biography, embodies the grim aloofness of Nature. Rather, Ossë is defiant, positioned as a foil to goodness, and actively destructive in a way that approximates Melkor's own malevolence, though always veering back into compliance with the other Ainur. This brings us to the second important characterization detail: that this rebelliousness and wickedness can coexist with heroism, sacrifice, and generosity—all virtues extolled across the entirety of Tolkien's body of work. Ossë is a complicated character, embodying neither good nor evil but occupying an uneasy gray area. Even the episode recounted above, where the Teleri sought Ossë's aid after being rejected by Ulmo for lacking faith in their protection from evil, it is possible for Ossë to occupy the role of their savior because he exists in that gray area. They may lack faith but he is sympathetic. He is able to see the aftermath of the Noldorin exodus as they do: as revelatory of the weaknesses of Aman, the supposedly protected realm. He understands their fear as beings who are not numbered among the gods but relatively frail and coping with the aftermath of a terroristic act by the most powerful of the Ainur. Always winding up back on the side of good, Ossë wields the same arts earlier compared with those of Melkor to protect Aman, not at the bequest of the greatest but of the smallest.

As the first volume of the collected Lost Tales concludes, however, Ossë is a character with a complex arc that is far from resolved toward unequivocal good. His final action in this volume is the protection of the Teleri with the raising of the Magic Isles: a generous act but a rebellious one that employs unsavory magic. In the second volume, as the plot turns toward events happening in Middle-earth, Ossë largely disappears from the story. However, as Tolkien outlined and drafted the conclusion to the Lost Tales, Ossë reemerges, and this time, he does not veer into goodness.

He becomes a villain.

"And I had done a hellish thing"³⁵: Ossë the Villain

Ossë appears in the texts The Tale of Eärendel and The History of Eriol or Ælfwine and the End of the Tales, both part of the Lost Tales. He plays similar roles in both. These texts are not coherent narratives but, in Christopher's words, "scribbled plot-outlines, endlessly varying, written on separate slips of paper."³⁶ In The Tale of Eärendel, he is identified as the enemy of Eärendil, responsible for first wrecking his ship and then raging with storms and waves to deprive Eärendil of access to Tol Eressëa. The Oarni—here identified as mermaids—"love Eärendel, in Ossë's despite, and teach him the lore of boat-building and of swimming"; it is the Oarni also who save him from shipwreck.³⁷The History of Eriol is likewise fragmentary; it exists in two schemes, the first of which involves the uprooting and movement eastward of Tol Eressëa to become England. Ossë "is wroth at the breaking of the roots of the isle he set so long ago—and many of his rare sea-treasures grow about it" and yanks the island back, breaking off a piece that becomes Ireland. This is reminiscent of Ossë's rage when Ulmo takes his island for the transport of the Elves to Valinor. In the second scheme, Tol Eressëa and England exist independently of one another. In this version, as in The Tale of Eärendel, Ossë appears as an enemy of Eärendil and the Anglo-Saxon king Ing or Ingwë, making war upon them, wrecking their ships, and driving them asunder when they attempt to sail westward.³⁸

The poem "The Horns of Ylmir," made in 1917 around the same time as these late and fragmentary texts, likewise presents Ossë in the dread aspect, describing his seas as "unplumbed wrath" full of "the power of all the seas / Gathered like one mountain about Osse's awful knees."³⁹ The Lost Tales texts are so inscrutable that even Christopher Tolkien despairs of making sense of them, so it is hardly possible to definitively identify Tolkien's motive in characterizing Ossë here. However, given the trajectory of his character development to this point and his growing association with Melkor, his transition fully into an antagonistic character is an unsurprising direction for his character arc to take.

"At thy silently listening smile … free as waves"⁴⁰: Ossë before The Lord of the Rings

As evidenced by the fragmentary nature of the final texts, Tolkien never completed the Lost Tales. In the late 1920s, he started again from scratch. Although there are clear connections between the Lost Tales and this next phase of work on the "Silmarillion," these texts were new, presented from a different narrative point of view, and of a very different tone than the Lost Tales. His initial effort, written in 1926, was a bare-bones version of the story, appropriately titled "The Sketch of the Mythology." Over the next decade or so, Tolkien would layer flesh upon those bones, building out his "Silmarillion" stories through successive drafts in various forms. His work was interrupted by his commencement of writing The Lord of the Rings (LotR), and Christopher Tolkien identifies this as the first of two major phases of work on the texts that would become the published Silmarillion.

Where we left Ossë, he was a character in conflict: often at odds with the other Ainur—especially Ulmo and others of the "greatest chieftains," like Manwë, Aulë, and Oromë—but more importantly, in conflict with himself. We see a story unfold where Ossë experiences an internal push-pull between cooperation and rebellion, fellowship and loneliness, cruelty and empathy. At multiple points, Ossë is associated with Melkor, first in a trickster-like aspect and then in the ominous powers he wields as he assumes an antagonist role.

In this next phase, we begin to see Tolkien shift Ossë's character from the morally and psychologically complex character of the Lost Tales to the more temperate character we meet in the published Silmarillion. This next set of texts is interesting in its implication that Tolkien wasn't entirely certain, as yet, the direction Ossë's character should take. We simultaneously see Tolkien drilling down on the Melkor-like associations even as he tempers elements of Ossë's story to deemphasize his conflict with Ulmo, a character likewise undergoing transformation to become one of the wisest and most ethical of the Valar.

The 1926 "Sketch of the Mythology" retains many of the elements from the Lost Tales. Ossë's jealousy of Ulmo remains and partly motivates his chaining of Tol Eressëa to the sea floor, in defiance of Ulmo, but there is a shift too: Ossë becomes enamored of the Telerin singing, and this love also drives his choice here. The island here is rooted "whence the Mountains of Valinor could be dimly seen" rather than in the middle of the Great Sea, as in the Lost Tales. This is the first shift we see toward the published version.⁴¹

Even more importantly, however, Ossë's character undergoes his first softening toward the Teleri and willingness to yield to Ulmo's authority. To the former, in this version of the story, the plot point emerges that it was Ossë—not Ulmo—who taught his "strange music" to the Teleri as they waited upon Tol Eressëa. But even more astonishingly, while in the Lost Tales Ossë resisted the Teleri's departure for Aman, subdued only for fear of Ulmo, Aulë, and Oromë, in the "Sketch":

The Teleri seeing afar the light of Valinor were tom between desire to rejoin their kindred and to dwell by the sea. Ylmir taught them craft of boat-building. Ossë yielding gave them swans, and harnessing many swans to their boats they sailed to Valinor …⁴²

In the Lost Tales, Ossë's making of the seabirds was an act of defiance. Here, it becomes something he does for the delight of the Teleri before, "yielding," he even gives them swans to draw their ships. After the prolonged drama of the transport of the Elves and specifically the Teleri in the Lost Tales, this much-reduced telling smooths many of Ossë's rebellious edges.

The 1937 Quenta fleshes out the "Sketch." In the Quenta, Tolkien intensifies the importance of Ossë's love for the Teleri. He introduces the element where Ossë encourages (and succeeds in) persuading some of the Teleri to remain behind. In this version, Ossë speaks to the Teleri while they are marooned in Middle-earth, and when Ulmo finally returns for them, "Ossë followed them, and in rebellion, it is said, he seized the isle and chained it to the sea-bottom."⁴³ The story then follows the plot outlined in the "Sketch": Ossë teaches the Teleri on Tol Eressëa and later grants them swans to complete their journey to Aman. The rebellious element remains⁴⁴ but is subsumed in a storyline that emphasizes his affection for the Teleri as a prime motive for his actions. His conflict with Ulmo is entirely absent, except by implication in the word rebellion.

In 1937-8, Tolkien "characteristically" (in Christopher Tolkien's words) returned to the beginning of the "Silmarillion" story and began again. The resulting Quenta Silmarillion builds on his work on the "Sketch" and the Quenta, and Ossë undergoes yet another interesting shift. In this version, Ossë's love for the Teleri receives further embellishment, and he instructs as well as speaks to them as they await Ulmo's return. As in the Quenta, he is grieved when they depart and follow them. But it is the anchoring of Tol Eressëa that contains the most marked change:

Ossë followed them, and when they were come near to their journey's end he called to them; and they begged Ulmo to halt for a while, so that they might take leave of their friend and look their last upon the sky of stars. For the light of the Trees, that filtered through the passes of the hills, filled them with awe. And Ulmo was wroth with them, yet he granted their request, and left them for a while. Then Ossë seized the isle and chained it to the sea-bottom.⁴⁵

Ossë's calling to the Teleri and their "begging" of Ulmo to stop so they can say goodbye to their friend is filled with pathos. The rebellious element is completely gone. Ulmo's anger is now directed toward the Teleri; while Ossë doesn't have permission to anchor the island, neither does Tolkien characterize his action as done out of anger, jealousy, or rebellion—all emotions earlier associated with this scene. He can be understood as acting in the interest and by the request of his friends.

When the Teleri finally do complete their journey, Ossë is again complacent, as he was in the "Sketch":

Therefore Ulmo taught them the craft of shipbuilding; and Osse, submitting to Ulmo, brought them as his farewell gift the strong-winged swans. These they harnessed to their fleet of white ships, and thus they were drawn without the help of the winds to Valinor.⁴⁶

The "Sketch" version had Ossë yielding without being grammatically clear if he is yielding to Ulmo or the Teleri (with the implication that he is yielding to the Teleri since they are the ones who choose to go to Aman). Here, Tolkien is clear that Ossë is obeying Ulmo's wishes. Once again, his rebellion is diminished.

Interestingly, however, the contemporaneous text The Etymologies contains a hint of Ossë's earlier dread aspect:

GOS-, GOTH- dread. Q osse terror, as name Osse. Cf. Mandos (see MBAD). N has Oeros for Osse (*Goss). Cf. Taur-os [TAWAR]. N gost dread, terror; gosta- fear exceedingly; cf. Gothrog = Dread Demon [RUK]; Gothmog [MBAW]. Gostir 'dread glance', dragon-name [THE].⁴⁷

These etymologies recall the associations with Melkor that Tolkien wrote into the earliest versions of Ossë's story. However, in terms of how that story is presented now, these etymologies are no longer reflected in the actions of Ossë's character.

Finally, the pre-LotR phase of Tolkien's work on the "Silmarillion" introduces the tale of Númenor. Ossë is immediately present in this story and would remain a key figure in the tales of Númenor through Tolkien's latest writings. Númenor first appears in the 1936 The Fall of Númenor, which has Ossë and Aulë raise up the island for the Númenóreans to dwell upon.⁴⁸ In subsequent drafts, credit for raising the island is given solely to Ossë, while Aulë "established" it.⁴⁹ Here, it seems that Tolkien has extended Ossë's earlier role in generating islands to the tale of Númenor, and it will be seen in Tolkien's later writings on Númenor as well.

Before the publication of LotR, then, we see Tolkien reducing Ossë's dread aspect and rebelliousness in favor of emphasizing his friendship with the Teleri. Furthermore, he is introduced into the nascent Númenórean tale, where he will come to play a similar role when Tolkien resumes work on the "Silmarillion" after the publication of LotR.

"I need the sea because it teaches me"⁵⁰: Ossë after The Lord of the Rings

Tolkien largely ceased his work on the "Silmarillion" materials during the prolonged years that he spent writing The Lord of the Rings. This second phase of work on the "Silmarillion" resumed roughly circa 1951. The first is a text that Christopher calls The Later Quenta Silmarillion 1 (LQ1): a typescript made from revisions to the pre-LotR Quenta Silmarillion text. Christopher dates LQ1 to 1951.

Several important shifts occur in LQ1. Ossë continues to become more compliant, but we also see him assuming the role as a patron of shipbuilders. First, Tolkien reintroduces the idea of Ossë gifting seabirds to delight the Teleri stranded on Tol Eressëa. Lacking the detail of the original Lost Tales version, more importantly, the birds in this version are a "gift of Yavanna" rather than a threat to her creation, as they are in the Lost Tales—another example where Ossë's trickery and insubordination are minimized or erased entirely.⁵¹

Ossë's role is further altered in the migration of the Teleri as well. First, Ossë aids Ulmo in uprooting the island upon which the Elves will be transported. The 1951 text the Grey Annals states, "Then Ulmo and Ossë took an island, which stood far out in the Sea, and they moved it, and brought it, as it were a mighty ship, into the Bay of Balar."⁵² In subsequent texts, including the published Silmarillion, it is Ulmo's "servants" who aid in the removal of the island; while Ossë is not specifically mentioned, he could certainly belong in this group.⁵³

Ossë also anchors Tol Eressëa at the bidding of Ulmo, a complete reversal from his earlier motive of outright defiance in binding the island to the sea floor.⁵⁴ Previously, Ossë did not disrupt Ulmo's teaching of shipbuilding to the Teleri and in fact contributed swans. In an edit made to the Quenta Silmarillion after the LQ1 typescript was made—Christopher Tolkien calls these "lost emendations"—Ossë himself does the teaching, albeit at Ulmo's request:

Therefore Ulmo, submitting to the will of the Valar, sent unto them Osse their friend, and he, albeit in grief, taught them the craft of ship-building; and when their ships were built he brought to them as his farewell gift the strong-winged swans."⁵⁵

This also introduces a growing emphasis on Ossë's role as a shipbuilder. In LQ1, Ossë helps the Teleri rebuild their stolen fleet of ships in order to guard the coasts of Aman from possible intruders.⁵⁶ As Ossë's role in the Númenor story grows, his skill in shipbuilding will only become more salient.

Tolkien had not entirely abandoned Ossë's dread aspect, however. In the 1951 text "Of Tuor and His Coming to Gondolin," when Tuor arrives at Nevrast, and speaks to Ulmo, Ulmo interestingly names him as a servant of Námo, describing him as "wroth" and a "servant of the Doom." Ulmo also blames Ossë for the destruction of the ship that Turgon attempted to send into the West, from which Voronwë will emerge the only survivor—a detail that survives in the published Silmarillion and recalls Ossë's aggression toward ships seeking Aman found in the late Lost Tales texts. After Ulmo departs, "the sea was in tumult, as the wild waves of Ossë rode against the walls of Nevrast."⁵⁷

These passages are reminiscent of Tolkien's earliest descriptions of Ossë: positioned in opposition to Ulmo and perilous in his anger, which arises as waves and storms at sea. In Narn i Hín Húrin, written sometime during the 1950s, Túrin tells Gwindor that attempting to keep Nargothrond secret will result in forcing the Elves "to cower on the shores of the Sea, caught between Morgoth and Ossë."⁵⁸ Here, Ossë and Melkor are depicted as the proverbial "rock and a hard place," each equally dangerous, hearkening back to Ossë's early associations with Melkor and antagonism toward mortal mariners.

The next phase of work came around 1958 with the Annals of Aman. At this stage, Ossë is removed from the ranks of the Valar⁵⁹; while his vassalage to Ulmo was always explicit from the earliest versions of the story, his position as a Maia cements that subordinate status more firmly and reshapes the nature of his rebellious impulses. The Annals of Aman also continue to build on the conception of Ossë as a patron of shipbuilders. While the idea that he convinced some of the Sindar to remain in Middle-earth has been in place for two decades at this point, Tolkien elevates their importance by identifying them as "the first mariners upon earth and the first makers of ships."⁶⁰ Furthermore, as noted above, Tolkien revised LQ1 so that Ossë—not Ulmo—taught shipbuilding to the Tol Eressëan Elves, but the revision was "lost": made on a manuscript from which the typescript had already been made. In the Annals of Aman, we see Tolkien initially carry forward the original version where Ulmo taught shipbuilding to the Teleri on Tol Eressëa, but Christopher Tolkien notes that this task was reassigned early to Ossë, matching the "lost" changes made on the Quenta Silmarillion manuscript.⁶¹ This suggests that the idea of Ossë as a patron of shipbuilding was gaining traction in Tolkien's mind, and the particular story of him teaching the Teleri, albeit in grief and "ill-pleased," the art of shipbuilding was amply solidified that Tolkien seems to have changed it in two places independently of each other.⁶²

Finally, the Annals of Aman also reverses the initial characterization of Ossë as needing, at times, to escape the noise of the sea to live in his silvery, foam-roofed hall in Valinor. Here, "his care was for the seas of Middle-earth and the shores of the Outer Lands, and he came seldom to Aman, unless summoned to council …."⁶³ One such council immediately followed Melkor's destruction of the Two Trees. Ossë was in attendance there when the Telerin mariners called for his aid in restraining the Noldor who had slain their kin and stolen their ships.⁶⁴

When I wrote Uinen's biography, I identified her uprising against the Noldor as a "willingness to act from a moral position in defense of those over whom she exercises stewardship" and traced her evolution from a naturalistic ethic to a moral alignment more like that of the other Valar.⁶⁵ I did not consider her actions in the context of Ossë's inaction, which in the published Silmarillion is quite starkly stated: "And Olwë called upon Ossë, but he came not, for it was not permitted by the Valar that the flight of the Noldor should be hindered by force."⁶⁶In a comment on the essay, Himring asked a very valid question: "Uinen seems to be doing here what the Valar have decided and perhaps even promised not to do and what Osse has been explicitly forbidden to do (and Osse obeys, this time). There seems to be no explicit comment on why Uinen is permitted to do this, while Osse is not, unless the idea is that she is somehow succumbing to uncontrollable emotion?" Not considering this issue—particularly with respect to the ethical shift we see Uinen undergo, similar to that of Ossë—strikes me now as an oversight. In light of the characterizations of Ossë and Uinen, this passage doesn't make much sense: Why does Uinen, known for soothing her wrathful husband, rise up where the notoriously rebellious Ossë stands idly by?

I think that the passage from the Annals of Aman where this detail is introduced perhaps sheds some light on, at least, Ossë's lack of involvement:

And Olwë called upon Ossë, but he came not; for he had been summoned to Valmar to the vigil and council of the gods; and it was not permitted by the Valar that the Flight of the Noldor should be hindered by force. But Uinen wept for the mariners of the Teleri; and the sea rose in wrath against the slayers, so that many of the ships were wrecked and those in them drowned.⁶⁷

Tolkien here seems to be explaining Ossë's relative inaction through his physical removal from the setting where he may have intervened, as we see Uinen do. Because, as Himring implies, his inaction in the published Silmarillion, absent this additional context, is wholly uncharacteristic and presents a version of Ossë that is not just mellowed but defanged. It's not clear why this change was made to the published text. The Annals of Aman version is the last version of this passage and is identified by Douglas Charles Kane as the source text for this passage in the published Silmarillion.⁶⁸ Initially defined by his rebellious and at times audacious personality—so extreme that Tolkien aligns him with Melkor in several places—and later by his love and allegiance to the Teleri, an Ossë who chooses obedience over helping the people he loves seems improbable.

Tolkien's late writings did not solely trend toward subduing Ossë's characterization, however. The Later Quenta Silmarillion 2 (LQ2) was created from the LQ1 typescript around 1958. Here, the lengthy Valaquenta passage about Ossë was introduced:

Melkor hated the Sea, for he could not subdue it. It is said that in the making of Arda he endeavoured to draw Ossë to his allegiance, promising to him all the realm and power of Ulmo, if he would serve him. So it was that long ago there arose great tumults in the sea that wrought ruin to the lands. But Uinen, at the prayer of Aulë, restrained Ossë and brought him before Ulmo; and he was pardoned and returned to his allegiance, to which he has remained faithful. For the most part; for the delight in violence has never wholly departed from him, and at times he will rage in his wilfulness without any command from Ulmo his lord. Therefore those who dwell by the sea or go up in ships may love him, but they do not trust him."⁶⁹

We have seen Ossë's character transform in iterations, so this passage is interesting because it is wholly new: clearly drawing from elements going back to the Lost Tales and disappearing and resurfacing in subsequent revisions. However, despite earlier parallels between Melkor and Ossë, this is the first time a story emerges where Melkor tempted Ossë with promises of power, similar to his temptation of Sauron. While the conflict between Ossë and Ulmo is not new, as we have seen, it takes on a new motive here: rather than being driven by jealousy and provocation from Ulmo and Ossë both, the motive is now external: Melkor and, specifically, a lust for power.

This is an important shift, especially in the context of Tolkien's post-LotR writings. As I noted in the discussion of the Lost Tales, that version of the story often has the trickster-like tone that calls to mind the squabbles of gods found in the pagan pantheons of the Greeks and Norse. These petty tussles humanize the divine and are often cited as reasons for the mass appeal of these myth cycles compared to more somber myths and scriptures. The Lord of the Rings, however, centered power as a driving theme in Tolkien's mythology, making it notable that his depiction of Ossë shifts away from the paganistic and toward a conflict similarly driven by a lust for power.

Tolkien's final writings on Ossë appear first in the 1959-60 essay Quendi and Eldar and, finally, in the 1965 Númenórean story Aldarion and Erendis: The Mariner's Wife. In both, Ossë's tempestuous nature emerges. In Quendi and Eldar, Ossë's name is identified as Valarin, but the narrator notes that the Teleri of Beleriand—especially those who lived inland—used names for Ossë that meant awful, fearful, astound,and aghast.⁷⁰ While the dread aspect is still present, comparing this text to the late 1930s Etymologies shows that the explicit association with Melkor is gone. The remarkable story Aldarion and Erendis locates Ossë's role in Númenor as that of a patron and protector—but that protection seems fragile, and Meneldur cautions Aldarion on multiple occasions not to risk the wrath of Ossë.⁷¹ We seem, here, to come full circle, with Tolkien's final writings, as his first, focusing upon Ossë's unpredictable and often wrathful nature. Yet the tone here is still tempered when compared to the Lost Tales. Ossë can be restrained and placated, and his anger comes as a rumor and a threat. Gone are the primal descriptions of the Lost Tales where anyone who came within sight of Ossë's waves risked becoming ensnared in his capricious cruelty.

"Begin, and cease, and then again begin"⁷²: The Published Version

And, at last, we settle into the version of Ossë most of us met for the first time: the sea-god of the published Silmarillion. By turns, he is complex, conflicted, villainous, loyal, loving, complacent, educative, and perilous, going through many transformations—in many ways, as changeful as the sea itself.

Having traced the evolution of his character, what emerges of Ossë in the published Silmarillion is little surprise. He (along with Uinen) governs the inner seas and is especially associated with the Teleri and later with the Númenóreans, making them "best known to the Children of Eru." Ossë, however, is unpredictable, and it falls to Uinen to placate him. As noted above, the published text uses the relatively late story from the Valaquenta, whereby Ossë is tempted by Melkor but, heeding Uinen, is calmed and pardoned and "returned to his allegiance, to which he has remained faithful." However, he still experiences "delight in violence" and will rage when he can get away with it, so that those who live near or sail upon the sea "may love him, but they do not trust him."⁷³

Ossë's history with the Teleri is the culmination of the long evolution of this very old story. Ossë and Uinen approach the Teleri after the Vanyar and Noldor depart without them. Ossë befriends and instructs them so that they became "the fairest singers of all the Elves, were after enamoured of the seas, and their songs were filled with the sound of waves upon the shore." When Ulmo at last returns for them, Ossë is "ill-pleased that the voices of the Teleri should be heard no more in his domain" and convinces some to remain behind with him: the Falathrim, who become the first mariners in Middle-earth. He follows the Teleri who do choose to go, calling to them as they approach Aman. They beg Ulmo to stay their voyage, which he does, and at his bidding, Ossë roots the island to the sea floor. The other Valar are displeased—but with Ulmo, not Ossë.⁷⁴ As discussed above, Ossë undergoes a lengthy and iterative change from wholly rebellious to wholly compliant, the defiance now assigned to Ulmo.

Ulmo does submit to the will of the Valar when he later sends Ossë to the Teleri to teach them shipbuilding so that they may complete their journey to Aman. Ossë additionally gifts them with swans to draw their ships over the sea.⁷⁵

During the kinslaying at Alqualondë, Ossë—given his violent spirit and his love for the Teleri—is uncharacteristically absent. However, as discussed above, the published text does not include the detail that Ossë was called to council and not physically present at the sea—an omission that isn't explained but may shed light on an otherwise challenging passage. Regardless, the effect of this omission is to give the impression that Ossë is further tempered into obedience to the Valar.

Ossë is absent from the story for a lengthy stretch, resurfacing when Turgon sends a ship into the West. The ship becomes lost and then founders in a wild storm, "but one of them was saved by Ulmo from the wrath of Ossë, and the waves bore him up, and cast him ashore in Nevrast. His name was Voronwë."⁷⁶

Ossë is mentioned one final time, in association with Númenor:

A land was made for the Edain to dwell in, neither part of Middle-earth nor of Valinor, for it was sundered from either by a wide sea; yet it was nearer to Valinor. It was raised by Ossë out of the depths of the Great Water, and it was established by Aulë and enriched by Yavanna; and the Eldar brought thither flowers and fountains out of Tol Eressëa.⁷⁷

Ossë in the published Silmarillion emerged from six decades of work on the text. With his character's history taken in its entirety, all of his attributes can be traced to those earlier works and observable patterns in how the various texts that make up the "Silmarillion" tradition evolved. And the published text does achieve the balance that Tolkien seemed to be reaching for: an edgy, rebellious character whose peril is tempered by his benevolence to the people of Middle-earth.

Works Cited

1. Emily Dickinson, "I started Early—Took my Dog (656)," Poetry Foundation, accessed 1 March 2022, line 3.
2. The Tolkien Reader, On Fairy-Stories. Tolkien would later reject these whimsical depictions of fairies entirely but, at this stage in his work and in his youth, they remain.
3. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor.
4. Ibid.
5. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, The Later Annals of Valinor, introductory section.
6. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor.
7. I am following Christopher Tolkien's usage in referring to the collected early history and mythology of his Legendarium as the "Silmarillion" (with quotes) and the 1977 published text of those compiled stories as, italicized, The Silmarillion.
8. John Masefield, "Sea Fever," Poetry Foundation, accessed 1 March 2022, line 11.
9. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Coming of the Valar and the Building of Valinor.
10. Ibid.
11. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Chaining of Melko.
12. Vailimo is used four times in the first volume of the Book of Lost Tales and never again. Each use, aside from this one, is in conjunction with Ulmo's role as the lord of Vai, suggesting that its use here is intended to invoke that role as well.
13. "Lo, there is but one Ocean, and that is Vai, for those that Osse esteemeth as oceans are but seas, waters that lie in the hollows of the rock; but Vai runneth from the Wall of Things unto the Wall of Things whithersoever you may fare." History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Hiding of Valinor.
14. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Chaining of Melko.
15. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, Of the Coming of the Elves and the Making of Kôr.
16. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Chaining of Melko.
17. "The Seafarer," Anglo-Saxons.net, accessed 1 March 2022, line 57. Line 57 is translated as, "Those who tread most widely / the paths of exile."
18. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, Of the Coming of the Elves and the Making of Kôr.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. Ibid.
23. And it was the middle. It is not until later drafts that Tol Eressëa is rooted within sight of Aman.
24. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, Of the Coming of the Elves and the Making of Kôr.
25. Ibid.
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
29. Ibid.
30. T.S. Eliot, "Four Quartets: The Dry Salvages," FadedPage.com, accessed 1 March 2022, line 31.
31. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Theft of Melko and the Darkening of Valinor.
32. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Tale of the Sun and Moon.
33. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Hiding of Valinor.
34. History of Middle-earth, Volume I: The Book of Lost Tales 1, The Theft of Melko and the Darkening of Valinor, emphasis mine.
35. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner," Poetry Foundation, accessed 1 March 2022, Part II.
36. History of Middle-earth, Volume II: The Book of Lost Tales 2, The History of Eriol or Ælfwine and the End of the Tales, introductory remarks.
37. History of Middle-earth, Volume II: The Book of Lost Tales 2, The Tale of Eärendel.
38. History of Middle-earth, Volume II: The Book of Lost Tales 2, The History of Eriol or Ælfwine and the End of the Tales.
39. History of Middle-earth, Volume IV: The Shaping of Middle-earth, The Quenta, "The Horns of Ylmir," lines 34 and 41-2.
40. Rabindranath Tagore, "Sail Away," PoemHunter.com, accessed March 1, 2022, lines 5-6.
41. History of Middle-earth, Volume IV: The Shaping of Middle-earth, "The Sketch of the Mythology."
42. Ibid.
43. History of Middle-earth, Volume IV: The Shaping of Middle-earth, The Quenta, section 3.
44. I would also be remiss if I didn't note the presence of the phrase "it is said," which has been added to this sentence. In April 2019, I presented at the Tolkien at UVM Conference about the narrators of The Silmarillion. Part of that presentation focused on Tolkien's use of the phrases "it is said," "it is told," and "it is sung," which my analysis suggests he often uses when the narrator wishes to impart information that he did not himself witness or doesn't have a firm source for: "a Middle-earth urban legend," I called it in the paper. Tolkien's addition of the "it is said" phrase here, then, is interesting because it introduces an element of uncertainty into Ossë's rebellious characterization in the Quenta, further reducing this key character trait. Dawn Walls-Thumma, "The Most Important Characters Never Named: Unveiling the Narrators of The Silmarillion," DawnFelagund.com, accessed 25 February 2022.
45. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, Quenta Silmarillion, "Of Kôr and Alqualondë, §§36-7.
46. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, Quenta Silmarillion, Quenta Silmarillion, "Of Kôr and Alqualondë, §43, emphasis mine.
47. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, The Etymologies, GOS- GOTH-.
48. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, The Fall of Númenor, i. The original outline. Christopher Tolkien addresses the genesis of the Númenor legend in this text and concludes that the Númenórean story was always conceived as part of the mythology of the legendarium. See the preceding section "The Early History of the Legend" for his evidence supporting this claim.
49. History of Middle-earth, Volume V: The Lost Road, The Fall of Númenor, “ii. The first version of The Fall of Númenor,” §2 and “iii. The second version of The Fall of Númenor,” §2.
50. Pablo Neruda, "The Sea," The Dewdrop, accessed March 1, 2022, line 1.
51. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Of Eldanor and the Princes of the Eldalië," §37.
52. History of Middle-earth, Volume XI: The War of the Jewels, The Grey Annals, Annal 1132, §11.
53. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, Annal 1132, §66; History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Of Eldanor and the Princes of the Eldalië," §35; The Silmarillion, "Of Eldamar and the Princes of the Eldalië."
54. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Of Eldanor and the Princes of the Eldalie," §37.
55. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Commentary on Chapter 5, 'Of Eldanor and the Princes of the Eldalië," §43.
56. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor," §79.
57. Unfinished Tales, "Of Tuor and His Coming to Gondolin."
58. Unfinished Tales, Narn i Hín Húrin, Appendix.
59. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, "Section 1, untitled section beginning 'emendations made to amanuensis typescript,'" §1, and "Section 3, untitled section beginning 'late notes on typescript texts,'" §70.
60. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, §70.
61. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, note 8 on §75.
62. The first change, as noted above, was to the Quenta Silmarillion manuscript after he'd had a typescript copy made that became LQ1. Christopher Tolkien calls these the "lost emendations" and labels this version of LQ1 "Text A"; for a fuller explanation, see History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, The Later Quenta Silmarillion (I), "Of the Coming of the Elves," introductory remarks. Christopher does not date Text A, noting only that the changes were made after LQ1 was made in 1951. The "early" change of Ulmo to Ossë in the Annals of Aman would have been made in 1958 or shortly thereafter. It's certainly possible that he changed both texts at the same time but seems unlikely. In 1958, he was both working on the Annals of Aman and revisions to relatively later Quenta Silmarillion chapters, which would become LQ2. It seems improbable that he also revised a text by then twenty years old (instead of the newer LQ1 version of the same text) … but it's also Tolkien, and if Morgoth's Ring attests to anything, it is that the process of developing the "Silmarillion" post-LotR was a tangled jungle of revisions that can be, at best, imprecisely dated.
63. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, §70.
64. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, §150.
65. Dawn Walls-Thumma, "Uinen," Silmarillion Writers' Guild, September 22, 2021, accessed February 26, 2021.
66. The Silmarillion, "Of the Flight of the Noldor."
67. History of Middle-earth, Volume X: Morgoth's Ring, Annals of Aman, §150.
68. Douglas Charles Kane, Arda Reconstructed: The Creation of the Published Silmarillion (Bethlehem, PA: Lehigh University Press, 2009), 105.
69. The Silmarillion, Valaquenta.
70. History of Middle-earth, Volume XI: The War of the Jewels, Quendi and Eldar, "Note on the 'Language of the Valar.'"
71. Unfinished Tales: Aldarion and Erendis: The Mariner's Wife.
72. Matthew Arnold, "Dover Beach," Poetry Foundation, accessed March 1, 2022, line 12.
73. The Silmarillion, Valaquenta.
74. The Silmarillion, "Of Eldamar and the Princes of the Eldalië."
75. Ibid.
76. The Silmarillion, "Of the Fifth Battle: Nirnaeth Arnoediad."
77. The Silmarillion, Akallabêth.