Finrod: 30-Day Character Study - Study Days by cuarthol

Day 1. Drop Everything and Read, Part One.

Drop Everything and Read, Part One. Take at least a half-hour to read what the texts say about your chosen character.

Canto VII and VIII of The Lay of Leithian - The Lays of Beleriand
Selected passages of the Silmarillion
Selected passages of Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth - Morgoth's Ring

Started by reading parts of the Lay of Leithian

http://tolkienleithian.blogspot.com/2013/03/canto-vii.html
http://tolkienleithian.blogspot.com/2013/03/canto-viii.html

I love the additional information we have on how the group of 12 came to disguise themselves as Orcs, taking the arms and armor of the band they slew but also the descriptions of Finrod's 'magic':

They smeared their hands and faces fair    
with pigment dark; the matted hair
all lank and black from goblin head    
they shore, and joined it thread by thread    
with Elvish skill. As each one leers    
at each dismayed, about his ears    
he hangs it noisome, shuddering.

Then Felagund a spell did sing
of changing and of shifting shape;
their ears grew hideous, and agape
their mouths did start, and like a fang
each tooth became, as slow he sang.
Their Elvish raiment then they hid,
and one by one behind him slid,
behind a foul and goblin thing
that once was elven-fair and king.

Interesting to interpret some of these lines - such as taking the hair from the Orcs and making ... wigs? False beards?  It almost reads like beards to me, hanging from their ears, where they can smell it (noisome: stinky, not loud) just under their noses.

So did... did orcs have beards?

I also note the sheer number of times that he is called Felagund in the text vs Finrod.  It certainly seems to have been Tolkien's preferred name for him.  The Silmarillion has both, but even there he is referred to by Felagund about 30% more than Finrod (and often by both).

There in Nargothrond Finrod made his home with many of his people, and he was named in the tongue of the Dwarves Felagund, Hewer of Caves; and that name he bore thereafter until his end.

I won't get too deep into the name here as it comes up later in the challenge, but it was interesting to note the preference.

In the Silmarillion, Finrod is called The Faithful, and Friend of Men, and given the name Felagund by the Dwarves.  He seemed to be the friend to everyone - he and his brothers and sister were the only ones welcomed in Doriath and took counsel with Thingol, he was friendly with Cirdan, traveled with Turgon, and was noted as hunting later with Maedhros and Maglor. 

But as much as the instinct to make him a shiny, sweet boy is derived from all the references to him as friendly, we cannot forget that he took out a werewolf with his bare hands and teeth!

Thus King Finrod Felagund, fairest and most beloved of the house of Finwe, redeemed his oath;

What is interesting is that the oath presumably does not require him to die for the sake of Beren.

but he swore an oath of abiding friendship and aid in every need to Barahir and all his kin

Friendship and aid could have come in many forms: shelter, weapons, guidance - as we have it, the oath did not necessitate that Finrod give his very life (though given that his life was saved by Barahir it could be argued it was what was owed in the end).

He is also a sort of pivot upon which the First Age turns.  Had he not held to his oath, Beren's quest may well have failed, Beren himself may have died, the Silmarill unrecovered, and Elwing never born, nor would she with Earendil have come to Valinor to seek the aid of the West or to persuade the Teleri to at last lend the use of their ships.

He is also the only Exile explicitly stated to have been reborn in Valinor.  (Yes, Glorfindel, the conclusion is obvious but never explicitly stated.)

They buried the body of Felagund upon the hill-top of his own isle, and it was clean again; and the green grave of Finrod Finarfin’s son, fairest of all the princes of the Elves, remained inviolate, until the land was changed and broken, and foundered under destroying seas. But Finrod walks with Finarfin his father beneath the trees in Eldamar.

I also appreciate that we have the Athrabeth, which gives more insight into Finrod's personality as we have an intimate conversation rather than the more high-level approach of the Silmarillion.  We can see that he does have a sense of being correct in his beliefs, but even so he appears willing to have his beliefs challenged and his assumptions overturned.   He does not always agree with Andreth but he accepts that the Edain have their own history and wisdom that does not always align with the Eldar's, and that there may be more than he knows that she can teach him.

Even so, it's somewhat humorous to me that he accepts as a very real possible future of the fate of Men something which Andreth says she does not necessarily believe herself.

I think one of my absolute favorite bits of description can be found in the Athrabeth:

Finrod (son of Finarfin, son of Finwë) was the wisest of the exiled Noldor, being more concerned than all others with matters of thought (rather than with making or with skill of hand);

It reinforces him being perhaps less a warrior than his brothers and more a scholar and explorer as we see him act.