Tolkien was aware that his creation myth differed from the Jewish and Christian versions in one important aspect – evil is built into the world from the beginning rather than brought in, by Satan, from outside. … The difference this makes for Tolkien’s creation is that the built-in darkness of the world gives it more the flavor of Northern myth, and yet this darkness is just as much a part of the Bible, though it begins in Eden. [pp. 99–101]
Brian Rosebury in Tolkien: A Cultural Phenomenon (2003) finds the Ainulindalë
a success both in literary and philosophical terms. Its fundamental mythical conception, the world as a Great Music made visible, its history a fulfilment of creative purposes which proceed both directly from God and mediately from him, through the sub-creativity of created beings, dates from as early as 1918–20 … it is the key to much else in Tolkien’s religious, moral and aesthetic vision. And its prose is at once appropriately ‘scriptural’ and distinctive of Tolkien. [p. 107]
He points out the similarities to Christian myth with Ilúvatar, the Ainur, and Melkor in place of God, the angels, and Lucifer, and notes that ‘the basic Augustinian apparatus in which nothing is created evil, but evil arises from the free will of created beings, is in place’. He also discusses differences mainly arising because the Creation ‘is carried out partly through intermediaries’ (p. 187).
See also Howard Davis, ‘The Ainulindalë: Music of Creation’ in Mythlore 9, no. 2, whole no. 32 (Summer 1982).
Akallabêth: The Downfall of Númenor. The penultimate component of *The Silmarillion (1977), pp. 259–82, and the last of three accounts of the island realm of *Númenor (see entry for summary) and its destruction at the end of the Second Age.
HISTORY
Tolkien had previously told this story in *The Fall of Númenor (c. 1936) and *The Drowning of Anadûnê (first part of 1946). Probably in the autumn of 1948 he wrote a new version, drawing on the earlier accounts; its original title was The Fall of Númenor, later changed to The Downfall of Númenor, but Tolkien always referred to it as the Akallabêth (‘the downfallen’ in the Númenórean language Adûnaic).
Although he apparently wrote the Akallabêth in parallel with the Appendices of *The Lord of the Rings, he seems to have intended that the history of Númenor and the Second Age should be part of *‘The Silmarillion’. On 7 April 1948 he referred in a letter to *Hugh Brogan to ‘The Silmarillion, which is virtually a history of the Eldalië (or Elves …) from their rise to the Last Alliance, and the first temporary overthrow of Sauron (the Necromancer); that would bring you nearly down to the period of “The Hobbit”’ (Letters, p. 129). He still hoped to publish The Silmarillion, and indeed felt, as he wrote to *Stanley Unwin on 24 February 1950, that its publication was necessary to make The Lord of the Rings ‘fully intelligible’ (Letters, p. 137).
Before he began work on the Akallabêth Tolkien made an outline history of Númenor, with rough dates for the thirteen kings (most of them not named) who followed after the death of Elros in Second Age 460, and for significant events. He then produced a manuscript of twenty-three pages, rewriting and replacing several of them in the process, emended these, and made a typed copy. Probably in 1951 he took up and emended the typescript, altered some names and the sequence of some events, rewrote certain passages, and inserted a lengthy rider with more details of the history of the last Númenórean kings, in particular their growing hostility to the Eldar and the Valar and to the Faithful. *Christopher Tolkien notes in detail in *Sauron Defeated (1992, pp. 375–87) and *The Peoples of Middle-earth (1996, ch. 5) how this version of the Akallabêth derives from both The Fall of Númenor and The Drowning of Anadûnê. He also calculates that from ‘the sailing to Anadûnê … no less than three-fifths of the precise wording of [the second version of the Drowning] was preserved in the Akallabêth’, but from ‘the same point … only three-eighths of the latter (again, in precisely the same wording) are present in [the second version of the Drowning]’ (Sauron Defeated, p. 376).
The emended typescript text, with a few corrections added to a later amanuensis typescript, was published in The Silmarillion as the Akallabêth. When dealing with the Akallabêth in The Peoples of Middle-earth Christopher Tolkien noted only the differences between the published version and the earlier versions, and explained changes he made to the text for publication in The Silmarillion, some of which he came to regret. Earlier he noted other changes in the published text in *Unfinished Tales (1980), pp. 226–7.
For comment and criticism, see *Númenor.
Alcar mi Tarmenel na Erun. Translations of the opening verse of the Gloria (Luke 2:14) into Quenya (*Languages, Invented), edited with notes and analysis by Arden R. Smith, published in Vinyar Tengwar 44 (June 2002), pp. 31–7. Five texts are extant, dating evidently from the mid-1960s.
Aldarion and Erendis: The Mariner’s Wife. Story, published with commentary and notes in *Unfinished Tales (1980), pp. 173–217.
SYNOPSIS
Aldarion, son of Tar-Meneldur, fifth king of the island of *Númenor, has a great love for the sea, and from the age of twenty-five makes many voyages to Middle-earth. He forms a Guild of Venturers, and establishes in Middle-earth the haven of Vinyalondë. He is welcomed by Gil-galad, the last High King of the Noldorin Elves in Middle-earth, and by Círdan the Shipwright. In time, while in Númenor Aldarion comes to live on board ship and to spend much of his time improving harbours, overseeing the building of ships, and planting and tending trees to provide timber for ships. But ‘Tar-Meneldur looked coldly on the enterprises of his son, and cared not to hear the tale of his journeys, believing that he sowed the seeds of restlessness and the desire of other lands to hold’ (Unfinished Tales, p. 176). At last the king commands his son to stay in Númenor for a while, and in Second Age 800 proclaims him the King’s Heir. At a feast of celebration Aldarion meets Erendis: she is immediately attracted, and enters the queen’s household.
After only six years Aldarion resumes his voyages, dismissing his father’s plea that ‘the need of the King’s house is for a man who knows and loves this land and people’ (p. 178), and that Aldarion take a wife. Tar-Meneldur becomes wrathful, and forbids his wife and daughters from setting upon Aldarion’s ship the Green Bough of Return, cut from the tree oiolairë; but Erendis takes the bough in the queen’s stead, and Aldarion for the first time looks on her with love. Nevertheless many years pass before he seeks to marry her. He had not wanted to be bound; but now Erendis hesitates, not for lack of love, but unwilling to share Aldarion with the Sea. Her mother believes that it is not so much ships, the Sea, the winds, or strange lands which appeal to Aldarion, ‘but some heat in his mind, or some dream that pursues him’; to which the narrator of the story adds: ‘And it may be that she struck near the truth; for Aldarion was a man long-sighted, and he looked forward to days when the people would need more room and greater wealth; and whether he himself knew this clearly or no, he dreamed of the glory of Númenor and the power of its kings, and he sought for footholds whence they could step to wider dominion’ (p. 191).
For a while Aldarion neglects the Sea and, wooing Erendis, finds ‘more contentment in those days than in any others of his life, though he did not know it until he looked back long after when old age was upon him’ (p. 182). Eventually he persuades Erendis to be his wife, but is seized again with longing for the Sea. He suggests to Erendis that she sail with him; she refuses, having no desire to leave Númenor and fearing that she will die out of sight of land, but nevertheless places a bough on his ship. Aldarion finds Vinyalondë ruined and men in Middle-earth hostile to Númenóreans, and on his return voyage winds drive his ship into the icy North, where the bough of oiolairë withers.
Despite his absence the love between Aldarion and Erendis remains warm, and they are married at last in Second Age 870. Three years later, their daughter, Ancalimë, is born. But when she is only four Aldarion again sails for