Particularly interesting is the account here of the origins of Tuor’s people: they came out of the East to the Battle of Unnumbered Tears, but they came too late. This can hardly be wholly unconnected with the coming of the Easterlings before the battle in the later story. The genealogy of Tuor (Turlin, Turgon) is here ‘son of Peleg son of Indor son of Fengel’. In The Fall of Gondolin he is ‘son of Peleg son of Indor’ (II. 160); in the fragment of the Lay of the Fall of Gondolin he is the son of Fengel, and in associated notes Tuor is himself called Fengel (III. 145). His people are here the Tunglin, the folk of the Harp, whereas in The Fall of Gondolin (ibid.) he belongs to ‘the house of the Swan of the sons of the Men of the North’.
Also noteworthy is the opening of the present text where Ulmo’s desires and devisings are described: his unceasing attempts to persuade the Gnomes to send messengers to Valinor, his isolation from the other Valar, his wish that the power of Valinor should go against Melko in time. There does not appear to be any other mention of Ulmo’s attempting to arouse the Gnomes to send messages to Valinor; and though his isolation in his pity for the Gnomes in the Great Lands appears strongly at the beginning of the tale of The Hiding of Valinor (I. 209), there Manwë and Varda beside Ulmo were opposed to the withdrawal of Valinor from the fate of ‘the world’.
Lastly, ‘the Vale of Niniach’ must be the site of the Battle of Unnumbered Tears; cf. ‘the Vale (Valley) of Weeping Waters’ in the outlines for Gilfanon’s Tale (I. 239–40). Niniach never occurs again in this application, though the way by which Tuor went down to the sea came to be called Cirith Ninniach, the Rainbow Cleft.
(ii)
The manuscript Turlin and the Exiles of Gondolin continues (the paper and the handwriting are identical, and all were placed together) with a further text of great interest, since it represents the first step towards the later story of the coming of the Noldor to Middle-earth since the outlines for Gilfanon’s Tale (I. 237ff.). This was hastily pencilled and is in places difficult to make out.
Then Gelmir king of the Gnomes marshalled his unhappy folk and he said to them: ‘We are come at last to the Great Lands and have set our feet upon the Earth, and not even Elf-wisdom may yet say what shall come of it; but the torment and the pain and the tears that we have borne in the way hither shall be sung in song and told in tale by all the folk of the Elfin race hereafter; yea and even among other children of Ior shall some remember it.’
Long time did the Gnome-folk dwell nigh those westward shores in the northern regions of the Earth; and their anguish was lessened. Some were there that fared far afield and gained knowledge of the lands about, and they sought ever to know whither Melko had fled, or where was hidden the gems and treasury of Valinor. [Struck out: Then did Gelmir marshal his hosts and three great armies had he, and Golfin his son was captain of the one, and Delin his son of a second, [Oleg >] Lúthien his son of the third, but Gelmir was lord and king.] Thereafter did all the folk move onward to the East and somewhat South, and all the armies of Golfin and of Delin moved ahead unhampered. Now the ice melted, and the snow [?thinned], and the trees grew deep upon the hills, and their hearts knew comfort, till their harps and elfin pipes awoke once more. Then did the rocks ring with the sweet music of the Elves, and countless [?coming] of their many feet; new flowers sprang behind those armies as they trod, for the earth was glad of the coming of the Gnomes, nor had the sun or the white moon yet seen fairer things in those places than their moving field of glinting spears and their goldwrought elfin armoury. But the women and the Gnome-maids and Gnome-children sang as they journeyed after, and no such clear song of hope have the lands heard since, yet was it sad and boding beside that singing that was heard upon [Kôr >] the hill of Tûn while the Two Trees blossomed still.
Of all those scouts and scattered hosts that went far ahead or upon either side of the marching Gnomes none were more eager or burnt with greater fire than Fëanor the gem-smith and his seven sons; but nothing did they discover yet, and came the Gnomes at length unto that magic northern land of which tales often speak, and by reason of its dark woods and grey mountains and its deep mists the Gnomes named Dor Lómin land of shadows. There lies a lake, Mithrim whose mighty waters reflect a pale image of the encircling hills. Here did the Gnomes rest once more a great while, and Gelmir let build dwellings for the folk about the shores and shoreland woods, but there too he numbered and marshalled all his hosts both of spearmen, and bowmen, and of swordsmen, for no lack of arms did the Gnomes bring out of Valinor and the armouries of Makar to their war with Melko. And three great armies had Gelmir under his lordship, and Golfin his son was captain of one, and Delin his son of another, and Lúthien (not that Lúthien of the Roses who is of another and a later tale) of a third; and Golfin’s might was in swordsmen, and Delin had more of those who bore the long.… elfin spears, but Lúthien’s joy was in the number and …. of his bowmen – and the bow has ever been the weapon wherein the Elf-kin has had the most wondrous skill. Now the colours of the Gnomes were gold and white in those ancient days in memory of the Two Trees, but Gelmir’s standard bore upon a silver field a crown of gold, and each captain had a fair banner; and the sign of Golfin in those days was upon gold a silver sword, and of Delin a green beech leaf upon silver diapered with golden flowers, and of Lúthien a golden swallow that winged through an azure field as it were the sky set with silver stars, and the sons of Fëanor wrought that standard and those banners, and they shone by sunlight and by mist and by moonlight and by starless dark by the light of the Gnome-wrought gems that sewed them [sic].
Now it happened on a while that Fëanor got him beyond to the hills that girt Dor Lómin in those parts [northward of >] beyond Artanor where there were open empty lands and treeless hills, and he had no small company and three of his sons were with him. Thus came they on a day nigh evening to a hilltop, and afar off descried a red light leaping in a vale open on that side that looked toward [?them]. Then Fëanor wondered what this fire might be, and he and his folk marched in the still night swiftly thereto, so that ere dawn they looked down into that vale. There saw they an armed company no less than their own, and they sat around a mighty fire of wood. The most were asleep, but some few stirred, and Fëanor stood then up and called in his clear voice so that the dark vale rang: ‘Who be ye; men of the Gnomes or other what – say swiftly for ’tis best for [you to] know the children of Fëanor compass you around.’
Then a great clamour broke forth in the vale and the folk of Fëanor knew full soon that here were no elfin folk, by reason of their harsh voices and unlovely cries, and many arrows came winging in the dark towards that voice, but Fëanor was no longer there. Swiftly had he gone and drawn the most of his folk before the vale’s mouth whence a stream issued forth tree-hung
Here the text ends abruptly and near the top of a new page; it is clear that no more was written.
The Noldorin house has still not emerged, but we have a king Gelmir of the Gnomes, with his sons Golfin, Delin, Lúthien (the last emended from Oleg), captains of his three armies. There is no suggestion that Fëanor and his sons were associated with these in any sort of close kinship. In the fragment of the Lay of the Fall of Gondolin (see III. 146–7) there appears – for the first time – Fingolfin, who steps into Finwë Nólemë’s place as the father of Turgon and Isfin, but is not the son of Finwë, rather of Gelmir. I have suggested there that this Gelmir, father of Golfin/Fingolfin, is to be identified with Finwë, father of Fingolfin in the alliterative poems and later; and it may be that the name Gelmir is formally connected with Fin-golma, which in the outlines for Gilfanon’s Tale is another name for Finwë Nólemë (I. 238–9, and see I. 263, entry Nólemë). It is to be remembered that Finwë Nóleme was not in the earliest legend the father of Fëanor and was not slain by Melko in Valinor, but came to the Great Lands. – Of the other sons of Gelmir named in the present text, Delin and Lúthien, there is no trace elsewhere.
It is certainly clear that Golfin here is the first appearance of Fingolfin, and by the same token that this text preceded the abandoned beginning of the Lay of the Fall of Gondolin. On the other hand, the obscure story of the death of Fëanor in the earliest outlines (I.