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thekingofwinterblog · 2 months

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They dug too greedily and too deep

One line that has always bothered me from Tolkien's legendarium, is Gandalf's condemnation of the actions of the Longbeard Dwarves of Khazad-Dum, later known as Moria.

Moria was the grandest city in the history of middle earth, and not by a small margin either, a marvel unlile any other, creates by hard work, dedication, and industrious spirit. And unlike so, so many other great treasures and places in Tolkien's legendarium, there was no harm here. Nature was not destroyed, natural beauty was not despoiled, other people did not suffer for Durin's Folk to prosper.

Almost everywhere else, when tolkien critiques a place or people, he very clearly lays out the big failing underpinning of the society that led to its fall, decline or conflict.

The leaders and people of Gondolin refused to leave their beloved city, even when it had been long foretold that they would need to leave it, and so everyone but 800 died there along with the wonder of that hidden vale.

Their great hubris was a prioriticing beauty and home over their own kind, living people, who's very existence and lives was far, far more valuable, important and beautiful than Gondolin ever was.

Gondor's decline was in large part because it's numenorean population stopped focusing on the next generation, the future that actually mattered, in favor of venerating ancestors who were long since in the grave.

Same as gondolin, only replace their love for their material city, with their ancestors.

The humans, elves and dwarfs at Erebor almost murder each other because their leaders are all too proud to make a peaceful negotiation and sharing of the spoils, and would rather kill each other than give have to give anything beyond what they themselves has deemed as "enough".

This is a clear cut example of how greed almost led to complete catastrophy.

What happened to Moria though, at the surface doesnt seem to fit this.

They dug, and dug, and dug, until they awakened Durin's bane... But Durin's Bane was not a natural part of the misty Mountains. He was an intruder who came here long ago.

Yet the way Gandalf described the doom of their civilization as something that would always come if they went down, down Into the mountain, he makes it sound like this was always going to be the outcome.

From a logical perspectice it makes sense... But from a moral one? At the surface, the dwarves going down, rather than east, west, north or south, or up, doesnt seem like it should be any different. The motivation was the same, and if there was a natural sin or hubris for that, their greed would not be all that different if they went in any of the other directions. And yet endlessly going down was different somehow.

A moral failing that just like Gonfolin prioriticing their stone over their people, or Turin's pride and vainglory leading to the fall of Nargothrond, would lead their civilization to ruin.

The question of course, is why? Why was going down deemed a moral failing of the Dwarves by Gandalf and by extension Tolkien?

Well, the answer comes if you look at moria from the side, because if so, you realize the dwarves were tempting fate long, long before they ever stumbled unto Durin's bane.

Durin's bridge spans over an enormous chasm, so deep that the Dwarves have never reached the bottom, and down there at the bottom is an enormous subteranean cavern and lake.

And in this lake, and in the caverns directly around it, there are things. Nightmarish things, so terrifying, that two Maia, upon reaching this place, rather than finish their battle here, instead flee the place in terror, and make their way back to Khazad-Dum.

That on it's own speaks volumes of what sort of horrors these creatures must have been, but it goes beyond that.

The way Gandalf describes them, and the way he refuses to even talk about them in depth in the light of the sun brings to mind some lovecraftian horrors that lurks in the depths of the earth, where they gnaw at the very roots of the world.

And what little we do know of what these creatures must have been further emphasizes this, for they are clearly describes as Older than Sauron.

This all on it's own gives us a good idea of what these things are, for there is only one, single creature in the legendarium who seems to fit that bill, and she is definitly an eldrich abomination.

Ungoliant, the enormous spider abomination from the first age sticks out like a sore thumb, having powers that are completely outside of the usual magic system of the world, but far more disturbingly, she is described as coming "from the void" aka the primeal outer space as the most likely of her origins, and she crept into the world after it was made.

She, and she alone is the only creature other than Eru himself that fits the bill of "Older than Sauron" for Sauron was there at the worlds creation, but the void was from before even that.

It is very likely then, that Ungoliath was one of these "nameless things" whose kin, now during the third age delved beneath the world.

And there is more that suggests this to be the case. For Unholiath before she vanished from recorded history was last seen in a place in Beleriand called Nan Dungortheb, the valley of dreadful death, where in the mountains above the valley, she bred forth a race of monstrous, giant spiders, such as Shelob.

But she and her spawn was not the only ones who lived here. For along with these monstrosities, there lived men here. Clans of mysterious renegade men, who carved altars to strange, heathen, nameless gods, who were neither the Valar nor Morgoth, and who's very laughter from the mists, brought fear and terror, even into the likes of Turin Turambar.

And to further seal that there is a definite connection here, the northern part of the valley, and the mountains where these terrifying spiders and men dwelt, was one of the few olaces to survive the war of wrath, by the far the largest landmass that survived of Beleriand, when it sunk into the sea... As if some greater power ensured it would remain standing.

Today it is the island of Tol Fuin.

And for all we know, both the spiders, and the men who worshipped these terrible "gods" still live there.

In my opinion, it is probably an underground tunnel and cave system on this island, that if you go down, down, down far enough, and keep going, slowly, but surely, you will find your ways to the caverns beneath Khazad-Dum, and in ages past, when the Balrog of Morgoth fled the war of wrath, it was this passage he used to find a deep, deep hole to hid in, where the Valar could not find him. He has to have gotten there somewhere, and clearly there is a connection between the island and the things beneath Moria.

But with all of this in mind, with these horrible creatures under Khazad-Dum, why was it such a cardinal sin for the Dwarfs to dig deeper?

It was a horrific danger yes, and clearly it was an absolutely terrible idea, regardless of wheter or not there was a Balrog, but why was it it a moral sin where they should have known better?

Well, rhe answer comes if you take another look at the map. From Gandalf's description, one would assume that the great lake was miles, and miles and miles and miles beneath the lowest point the dwarves ever dug.

Theyre not though. That well that Pippin threw a rock down? It goes WAY deeper than where the abyss ends. And it was down beneath that well, that the Balrog seemes to have been when the fellowship came.

Allow me to repeat that. There was a well established, and probably old well in Moria, that went ALLLLL the the way down to these caverns where these nameless things roamed.

Then if we trace the route Gandalf and the Balrog made back to Khazad Dum, we don't know exactly where the two different carved systems of passages interconnected, but interconnect they did, and if that side passage that leads to the Redhorn Lodes is anything to go by, this was probably a very well known and used part of Moria.

Which, if that's true, it it completely changes the ballgame.

Because if so, the dwarves didn't just crack a wall one day, and then accidentally awaken a balrog. No, they dug down, down, down, until they stumbled unto these strange tunnels that were no their own... And kept going anyway, interconnecting them, delving deper, exploring, regardless of the fact that at some point, some Dwarves MUST have stumbled on to the creatures that lived here.

And yet they kept going. They found these tunnels leqding to eldrich abominations, and rather than sealing them, and going the opposite way, they just kept going, following the Mithril lodes down, down, down into the depths, down to the mountain roots, heedless of the obvious danger, all in the search of more and more Mithril... Right up until they awoke something that would follow them back up through the tunnels, they themselves made.

They dug much too greedily... and far, FAR too deep. No they kept digging, long, long , long after the point they should have stopped, the point where all signs and common sense would have told them to go back and never go this way again.

That was the sin of Khazad-Dum. That was their greed and folly, and blinded by greed, they ignored all sense and wisdom in the pursuit of Mithril beyond down the level that was their birthright, beyond the mountain's depths and into the roots of the world, where nameless horrors lie... And one of these horrors followed them home.

#tolkien's legendarium #lord of the rings #moria #khazad dum #khazad dûm #balrog #durin's bane #meta #theory #nameless things #ungoliant

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