Bede

“Where Now The Horse and The Rider?” Aragorn Sings of The Brevity of Human Life.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 660-665

After a hard and weary crossing of the plains of Rohan Gandalf and his three companions arrive at the feet of the White Mountains and to Meduseld, the hall of Théoden amidst the courts of Edoras. Legolas is the first to see them clearly and Gandalf asks him to describe what he can see.

“I see a white stream that comes from the snows,” he said. “Where it issues from the shadow of the vale a great hill rises upon the east. A dike and mighty wall and thorny fence encircle it. Within there rise the roofs of houses; and in the midst, set upon a green terrace, there stands aloft a great hall of Men. And it seems to my eyes that it is thatched with gold.”

As the road draws near to the gates of Edoras it passes under many grassy mounds covered with white flowers. These are the barrows in which the kings of Rohan lie. There are sixteen of them, “seven mounds upon the left, and nine upon the right”, and the first was raised 500 years before this time. To Legolas it is but a little while but to the Riders of the Mark this seems so long ago “that the raising of this house is but a memory in song, and the years before are lost in the mist of time.”

There are many barrows in England, none of which are made beautiful by Evermind. They are thousands of years old and “lost in the mist of time” and yet to Legolas this would still be but a little while.

This contrast between the immensity of time itself and the brevity of each human life within it is one of the major themes within Tolkien’s works. Elves and Men feel this contrast in different ways but both feel its sadness. Elves are immortal unless they suffer violent death and yet they live amidst change and decay. The three Rings that Celebrimbor forged in the Second Age and hid from Sauron were an effort to mitigate the effects of Time. They have done much good and Gandalf himself bears one of them, using it secretly to warm human hearts wherever he goes, but they are ultimately a futile effort to prevent what is inevitable. And for humankind, while they feel deeply the immensity of time they feel also how short each life within time is doomed to be.

Aragorn has been here before. In the days of his lonely wanderings in Middle-earth after learning from Elrond his true identity as the heir of Isildur and Elendil he served both the Steward of Gondor and the King of Rohan, preparing in hope for the day on which he would claim the throne. Thanks to the way in which he has inherited the longevity of the Númenorians he has already lived a long life by the time he returns to Edoras. He is older than Théoden and none of the people who now live in Rohan have any memory of him from the days of Thengel, Théoden’s father. In his time among the Rohirrim he mastered their language and now he begins to sing from the Lay of Eorl, words “laden with the sadness of Mortal Men”.

Where now the horse and the rider? Where  is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?
Where is the hand on the harpstring, and the red fire glowing?
Where is the spring and the harvest and the tall corn growing?
They have passed like rain on the mountain, like a wind in the meadow;
The days have gone down in the West behind the hills into shadow. 
Who shall gather the smoke of the dead wood burning, 
Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?

Tolkien draws here from the poetry of the people who created kingdoms in England after the departure of the Romans in 410 A.D. Like the Rohirrim they felt the brevity of life deeply, the tragedy of what it is to be human, to be aware of the immensity of time and space, of the possibility of the eternal, and to know that life is too short to explore the potential of all this. He knew the story that St Bede recounted in his history of the English people, of Bishop Paulinus standing before the King of Northumbria and telling him of the Christian faith. And of how, after Paulinus had finished speaking that Coifi, the high priest replied and spoke of how to be human is to be like a bird in winter flying from the dark and storm outside the hall of the King and enjoying, for a brief moment, the light and warmth within before returning again to the cold and dark outside. “So man appears on earth for a little while,” Coifi concludes, “but of what went before this life, or what follows, we know nothing.”

And so the scene is set for the encounter between the travellers and Théoden in Meduseld, upon whom, with the malicious aid of Wormtongue, this tragic sense of life lies so heavily.

A Life as Brief as a Sparrow’s Flight

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As Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli approach Edoras, the dwelling place of Théoden, King of Rohan and the Rohirrim they ponder the story of that people. Five hundred years the Rohirrim have dwelt in that land since first Eorl the Young led them to the field of Celebrant to aid the people of Gondor in battle. To them that day is so long ago that they have no memory of what came before but to Legolas, ageless wood elf of the Greenwood, those five hundred fallings of the leaves seem “but a little while.” And so Tolkien calls to mind another of the great themes of his stories, the great difference between elves and humankind. The sorrow of being human is to know the brevity of life; the sorrow of being an elf is not themselves to know death and yet to know the decay and loss of all else that lies about them.

Aragorn, who served Théoden’s father, Thengel, at one time in his youth, sings one of the songs of the Rohirrim in their own tongue. Legolas, not knowing the tongue, speaks of it as “laden with the sadness of Mortal Men.”

Where now the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing? Where is the helm and the hauberk, and the bright hair flowing?…Who shall gather the smoke of the dead wood burning, Or behold the flowing years from the Sea returning?”

It is the image of the vain attempt to gather up the smoke of the fire that is most poignant in the song reminding us that we, who are mortal, can no more hold onto life than to perform this impossible task.

Tolkien was one of the greatest scholars of early English of his time and surely here he recalls the famous speech recounted by the Venerable Bede in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People in which the pagan priest, Coifi, addresses Edwin, mighty king of the Northumbrians. Paulinus has just declared the Christian message to the king and Coifi speaks.

“It seems to me that the life of a man on earth is like the swift flight of a single sparrow through the hall, where you, O King, sit at table on a winter’s day with your captains and counsellors. In the midst of the hall there is a comforting fire to warm it. Outside the storms of winter rain and snow are raging. This sparrow flies swiftly in through one window of that hall and out through another. While he is inside, the bird is safe from the winter storms, but after a few moments of comfort, he vanishes from sight into the wintry world from which he came. So man appears upon earth for a little while- but of what went before this life, or what follows, we know nothing.”

I first heard this story as a young boy and this image seared itself into my consciousness. I could see the hall of the king, the fire burning brightly, the winter storm blowing outside. I could see the bird flying swiftly from one window to another. And at some level, perhaps beyond understanding, I knew that life was short, so heartbreakingly short.

When Gandalf and his companions arrive at Meduseld, the hall of the king, they find the Rohirrim, bowed down under the weight of this consciousness and unmanned by the whisperings of Grima Wormtongue, secret servant of Saruman. But soon the people of Rohan will be woken to new hope and to brave deeds. They will find such meaning in their brief life that they will be able to stand against all the powers of darkness that now oppress them.

But that is for another week…