Théoden

” Westu Théoden Hál!” The Healing of the King and the Healing of Rohan.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 671-677

Éomer has been a prisoner since returning from his mission to track down and destroy the orc company that had been travelling across Rohan. Wormtongue has long been in secret service to Saruman and throughout that time his purpose has been to weaken the will of Théoden and his people until they are defeated and crushed. We have seen how he was able to reduce the King to a broken old man incapable of action but Éomer remained a threat with his youthful vigour and capacity to inspire action in others. In disobeying Théoden’s decree that no-one should leave Edoras without permission of the King Éomer had offered Wormtongue an opportunity to remove him from the scene but now with Wormtongue’s defeat Éomer is freed and he comes Théoden in order to lay his sword at his feet.

Théoden receives the sword and just as Gandalf had predicted his fingers remember their old strength again in their grasping of the hilt. He lifts the blade and swings it “shimmering and whistling in the air” and gives a great cry.

Arise now, arise, Riders of Théoden!
Dire deeds awake, dark is it eastward. 
Let horse be bridled, horn be sounded!
Forth Eorlingas!

Théoden's men rush in thinking that they have been called by their lord and seeing him, sword raised in the air, draw their own swords to lay them at his feet, and Éomer cries out in joy, "Westu Théoden hál!"

The literal translation of these words, taken from Old English, the language spoken throughout England by all its people before the Norman conquest of 1066, and by the ordinary people thereafter, is “health to Théoden”, but a better translation that gives the sense of the words is the cry that rang out in Westminster Abbey at the recent coronation of King Charles III of “Long live the King!”. It is a declaration of personal loyalty and devotion.

The relationship between the health of the King and the health of the people was wonderfully portrayed in the medieval Grail legend and within it the story of The Fisher King. This story tells of how the grail is in the keeping of Amfortas who is the Grail King and of how he was wounded by the sacred spear that was thrust into the side of Christ at his crucifixion. Thereafter Amfortas is only able to find relief from his pain when he goes fishing and so he spends all his days by a lake side while his kingdom declines into hopelessness and barrenness. In The Lord of the Rings this relationship between king and people is displayed throughout the story. The final volume of the trilogy is entitled The Return of the King and tells of how Gondor and the West are healed as Aragorn returns in triumph to claim the crown.

The relationship between kings as they manifest themselves in the world and kings as they are in their archetypal reality is always complicated. At the time of the death of Queen Elizabeth and the accession to the throne of her son, Charles, I wrote a piece on words spoken by Merlin in C.S Lewis’s That Hideous Strength. I think that they express this tension perfectly. “The Saxon king of yours, who sits at Windsor, now, is there no help in him?” Merlin knows that the true King of Logres, of Britain, is not the one who occupies the throne in Windsor but it is the Pendragon, the archetypal king. Only the true king or queen can heal, something that Tolkien beautifully expresses in the chapter when Aragorn comes to the Houses of Healing after the battle on the Pelennor Fields. It is the hands of a true king that are the hands of a healer and in the Christian story this is displayed in the figure of Christ, the true king, who serves the people, who lays down his life for them, and who heals all creation. The way in which this story has shaped the whole of western history and still does, albeit often in sadly diminished ways, has recently been demonstrated in Tom Holland’s masterful study, Dominion. Théoden is a true king who demonstrates this in laying down his life for his people. They recognise this truth and so they gladly follow him. As Aragorn says as preparation is made for battle, “even the defeat of Rohan will be glorious in song”.

“Your Fingers Would Remember Their Old Strength Better, if They Grasped a Sword-hilt.” Gandalf and The Healing of Théoden.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 671-677

It is in the record for the 2nd of March in the year 3019 of the Third Age in the Tale of Years that we are told explicitly, “Gandalf comes to Edoras and heals Théoden.” And yet what kind of healing is this when the patient will be dead within two weeks, falling in battle before Minas Tirith, slain by the Lord of the Nazgûl? Surely if Gandalf had left Théoden to the darkness of Meduseld and the care of Wormtongue he would have lived longer. At least until the armies of Saruman overcame the defence of Edoras and he fell in his own hall.

Last week we thought about how Gandalf overthrew Wormtongue, revealing for a brief moment something of his greatness and power, now made all the more potent after he was sent back again by command of Ilúvatar to complete his work in Middle-earth. And as Wormtongue grovels on the floor Gandalf calls Théoden to rise from his chair and leave the darkness of his hall. At first Théoden’s steps are uncertain and he is aided by Éowyn, sister of Éomer and Théoden’s niece. But even as he begins to walk again strength slowly returns to his body and as he steps out of the doors of his hall he takes in deep breaths of fresh cool air and feels the rain upon his face.

“It is not so dark here,” he says to Gandalf. And Gandalf replies, “Nor does age lie so heavily on your shoulders as some would have you think”

At Gandalf’s bidding Théoden casts aside his stick and draws himself up slowly, “as a man that is stiff from long bending over some dull toil”.

Théoden calls for Éomer to be released from his imprisonment, imposed upon him after his disobedience in riding north to deal with the orc company that were going to Isengard bearing Pippin and Merry as prisoners and for threatening death to Wormtongue in Théoden’s presence. As they wait for Éomer to come Gandalf secretly takes Théoden into his confidence about Frodo’s mission to take the Ring to Mordor and as he does so “the light shone brighter in Théoden’s eyes, and at the last he rose from his seat to his full height”.

For a brief moment Théoden is stirred by the tale of Frodo’s bravery and the hope of victory but soon he becomes aware again of the slenderness of that hope and slumps back into a seat. Like Frodo in the study at Bag End a year before he bemoans his fate that such evil things should come to him instead of the peace that old age has earned and he clutches at his knees with his wrinkled hands.

“Your fingers would remember their old strength better, if they grasped a sword hilt,” said Gandalf.

Éomer offers Théoden his own sword and new strength surges through the body of the old man. He swings the sword aloft and cries out a mighty call to arms.

“Forth Eorlingas!”

The King of Rohan will go to war at the head of his men.

Glory lies ahead of him in the last days of his life and he will be remembered as the greatest King of Rohan since Eorl himself rode victoriously to the relief of Gondor many years before. But the question remains to be answered. What kind of healing does Gandalf perform when the patient’s life is almost certainly shortened by it? Was not Théoden right in saying that he had earned the right to peace in his old age?

It was Abraham Lincoln, another man whose life was violently foreshortened, who said that “it’s not the years in your life that count, but the life in your years”. Such a spirit seems to run very much counter to the contemporary desire to extend life for as long as possible, even to achieve some form of immortality. And this is not only a desire of our own time. Tolkien gave us the Kings of Númenor who were seduced by Sauron to resent death as a form of unjust punishment who tried to seize immortality by force. Elendil’s faithfulness in opposing his king and Sauron meant an acceptance of death but also, as Aragorn was one day to say to Arwen that “we are not bound to the circles of the world, and beyond them there is more than memory”. Théoden, in accepting his healing, foreshortens his life but in those last days he lives that life to its fulness.

“I Have Not Passed Through Fire and Death to Bandy Crooked Words With a Serving-Man Till The Lightning Falls. ” Gandalf Overcomes Wormtongue in Meduseld.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 668-671

As Gandalf and his companions enter the hall of Théoden Tolkien gives us many contrasts. The light of the sun falls only upon the image of Eorl the Young while everything else is in cloying darkness. A man sits upon a gilded chair “so bent with age that he seemed almost a dwarf; but his white hair was long and thick and fell in great braids from beneath a thin golden circlet set upon his brow.” This man has a beard that reaches his knees “but his eyes still burned with a bright light”.

In other words we are meant to see that the decline of the House of Eorl is only superficial. There is a potency within Rohan that now lies hidden but could be unveiled in a moment. Gandalf knows this and appeals to Théoden to join the conflict against Sauron.

But there is one other person who is, perhaps, more aware than any of the hidden power of Rohan and that is Grima, Wormtongue, the King’s chief counsellor. He has long been secretly in the service of Saruman ever working to weaken the resistance of the Rohirrim against his true master, ever weakening the resolve of Théoden to resist him. When Saruman was not at open war against Rohan it was easy to convince Théoden that he posed no threat. But when open war began Wormtongue’s task became more difficult. Now what he sought to achieve was to weaken Théoden’s resolve and to convince him that his only hope lay in keeping the larger part of his force within Edoras so that in the battle at the Fords of the Isen where Théodred, Théoden’s son fell in battle, his armies were insufficient in number to mount an effective defence. And, perhaps worst of all, the King of Rohan was sitting upon a chair in his darkened hall while his people were falling in battle vainly seeking to defend their homes.

In his guise as the Grey Pilgrim Gandalf has always sought to achieve his purpose by encouragement and persuasion. He has never used force except by necessity. He has remained true to the charge that the Istari, the wizards, were given by the Valar not “to reveal themselves in forms of majesty, or to seek to rule the wills of Men or Elves by open display of power” (Unfinished Tales p.389). As the secret keeper of Narya the Red, one of the three Elven Rings forged by Celebrimbor he has sought to kindle hearts and not to dominate them. But now the great crisis of the Third Age of Arda has come. There is no longer the time to work in this way. in time past Gandalf had been willing to accept rejection patiently, to withdraw from Edoras as he did upon Shadowfax after his escape from Isengard, but now there is no time to act in this fashion. Saruman is at open war with Rohan and, worst of all, so is the Dark Lord in Mordor.

And so in this moment when a choice must be made Gandalf casts aside his tattered cloak and reveals himself in power.

“The wise speak only of what they know, Grima son of Gálmód. A witless worm you have become. Therefore be silent, and keep your forked tongue behind your teeth. I have not passed through fire and death to bandy crooked words with a serving-man till the lightning falls.”

There is a particular kind of wisdom required to know the true moment of crisis when all normal forms of action must be cast aside and replaced by decision. Some are too quick to do this and so act too soon. Gandalf knows that patient diplomacy is now insufficient, that if Rohan remains passive it will fall, so too will Gondor, and ultimately so will all the free peoples of Middle-earth and so night will fall. Gandalf has passed through his own personal crisis in his battle against the Balrog of Moria that ended with his death and so no longer fears anything less than that. He must rouse Théoden from his illusion of decrepitude and with the King restored to who he truly is so too will the Rohirrim rediscover their greatness.

“That is Shadowfax. He is The Chief of The Mearas, Lords of Horses”. Gandalf Must Reach Edoras Swiftly.

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The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991, 2007) pp. 657-659

Aragorn need do no more choosing. At least not for a while. Gandalf has bidden him not to regret the choice that he made in the valley of the Emyn Muil and to go to Edoras and to Théoden in his hall where he is needed.

“The light of Andúril must now be uncovered in the battle for which it has so long waited.”

And so on the edge of the forest and the plains of Rohan Gandalf gives a long whistle, “clear and piercing” and soon the companions hear the whinny of a horse and soon the sound of hooves also.

“There are three,” said Legolas, gazing over the plain. “See how they run! There is Hasufel, and there is my friend Arod beside him! But there is another that strides ahead: a very great horse. I have not seen his like before.”

Readers will remember how, on the night before they had entered Fangorn in search of Merry and Pippin, Saruman had come to the camp in search of news of what had happened to the band of orcs that he had sent in search of the Fellowship and of hobbits in particular. He chased Arod and Hasufel away but soon Legolas and Gimli heard a sound that mystified them. They had expected to hear the cries of frightened horses but heard joy instead. For what they heard was their horses meeting Shadowfax, their lord.

“That is Shadowfax,” said Gandalf. “He is the chief of the Mearas , lords of horses, and not even Théoden, King of Rohan, has ever looked on a better. Does he not shine like silver, and run as swiftly as a swift stream?”

Gandalf first met Shadowfax after he escaped from his captivity in Isengard, borne by Gwaihir, lord of eagles, to Edoras. Gandalf had tried to warn Théoden about Saruman but he was not listened to. Théoden told Gandalf to choose a horse and to depart and Gandalf chose Shadowfax who had never been ridden before.

The Rohirrim had long had a close relationship to horses, closer than any other people in Middle-earth. Tolkien based this people upon the English who dwelt in this land before the Norman conquest of 1066. The language that he created for them was closest to Old English, a language that he taught in Oxford. But Tolkien gave the Rohirrim something that the ancient people of England never had, a mastery of horses. For although the warrior elite of England could ride the mass of the people who would make up the army in time of war could not. The army of England was essentially an infantry force and in 1066 it had to fight two battles against invading forces. The first against Harold Hadrada of Norway was fought at Stamford Bridge in the north of England and the second, just a few days later, was fought against a Norman army under William the Conquerer near Hastings on the south coast. The Normans won the battle decisively and William became king. Tolkien believed that the imposition of the French language as the language of the new rulers of England and the relegation of English to the language of the peasantry destroyed the indigenous mythology of England. He also believed that a key factor in the English defeat was the lack of any effective cavalry in the English army and the use of cavalry by the Normans. As a consequence he not only gave horses to the Rohirrim but built an entire culture around this. The Rohirrim were the horse lords.

I know little about horses myself but have long admired them and I live in an area of England with a strong tradition of horse riding and horse racing. I spent many hours watching my daughters learn to ride as they grew up and observed the bond that can develop between horse and rider at close quarters. This bond is very deep indeed between Gandalf and Shadowfax. We see him ask permission of him and Arod and Hasufel to carry the four companions to Edoras.

“Gandalf caressed him. ‘It is a long way from Rivendell, my friend,’ he said, ‘but you are wise and swift and come at need. Far let us ride now together, and part not in this world again!’