The Sinking of Beleriand

[elengil]

It may be that the answer is largely unknowable as it was never addressed by Tolkien, but as I have been lately considering the various geological changes that took place in Middle-earth over the various ages, it occurred to me to ask if anyone has any insight into the many realms of Beleriand and what would have happened to those who dwelt there when that land sank.

I am not sure if the time frame (with regard to how long it took to sink) would have allowed for a mass exodus, or if as in other flood myths it's just understood that countless lives were lost (which seems unusually punitive for Tolkien). Or if Ulmo somehow preserved them and ensured they were deposited safely upon dry land at the end?

Given that I have not read much in the broader histories of Middle-earth, does anyone know if this is addressed in any way or if the sinking of Beleriand is written of outside of the Silmarillion?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Interestingly, this very topic came up in a discussion at TORN not long ago. I thought that a poster named Felagund had a very good post on the subject, that I am going to quote and link to, rather than try to reproduce what he said as if it were my own thoughts.

Only mildly tangentially, I've wondered from time to time whether Tolkien conceptualised the destruction of Beleriand as a single cataclysmic event or one that took place over a period of days, months or even years.

At one point, as per 'The Tale of Years' and 'The Later Annals of Beleriand', Tolkien worked up the War of Wrath as a conflict that spanned c. 50 years, beginning around the Mouths of the Sirion and apparently grinding its way up to Angband (HoMe V & XI). Could Beleriand have been broken and sunk, piecemeal, during this long march, perhaps as part of a scorched (shattered, even) earth policy by Morgoth? Alternatively, perhaps Beleriand largely survived the war, all the way up to the final days or hours, when Ancalagon (and presumably various other behemoths bred by Morgoth) literally bit the dust, smashing mountain ranges and so on, in the process?

As set out in The Silmarillion ('Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age'), there is a direct link between the 'Great Battle' (the grand final of the War of Wrath), and the following:

"[in the] tumults of the fall of Thangorodrim there were mighty convulsions in the earth; and northward and westward many lands sank beneath the waters of the Great Sea. In the east, Ossiriand, the walls of Ered Luin were broken, and a great gap was made in them towards the south, and a gulf of the sea flowed in."

So far, so decisive? Alongside this, the narrative also maintains space for various survivors being able to make there way into what was left of Ossiriand (Lindon) or east across the Ered Luin - Beleriandic Easterlings, Sindar and Noldor, for example. This suggests that the upheaval kicked off by the destruction of Thangorodrim may have not instantaneously sunk Beleriand, meaning that there was (just) enough time to flee eastwards.

http://newboards.theonering.net/forum/g ... me;so=DESC;

There isn't anything that I recall on this subject in the new book The Nature of Middle-earth, but there is a short piece entitled "The Númenórean Catastrophe & End of 'Physical' Aman".

[narya]

*** cross posted as V was writing his post***

I can't speak to Tolkien's world building, but I have some real life geotechnical and historical examples. During the '64 Alaska earthquake (second largest recorded anywhere on Earth), some parts of the land sank as much as 30 feet, and became subject to high tides and saltwater infiltration into the ground water, so they had to be abandoned. Also during the quake, some river deltas (with their inhabitants) slid into the sea. Whole towns were wiped clean to the foundations by tsunamis. But the people came right back, and rebuilt their lives in nearby uplands. Only a small fraction of the land was made permanently uninhabitable. There was no mass exodus, leaving the land empty.

Subsidence on a slower time frame generally occurs when something is taken from underground - groundwater, oil, gas, coal, etc., or when a swampy area is pumped dry (like Tenochtitlan/Mexico City). On the other hand, in some parts of North America, the land is slowly rising, as it rebounds from the burden of the last ice age. Neither of these have caused mass emigration.

90% of North Americans died out when Europeans brought disease, murder, and land-avarice. There was a short lull between the deaths of the original inhabitants, and the build up of new immigrants. For a while, the land looked "unclaimed".

I don't know how you can have countless lives lost without it appearing punitive.

[elengil]

I meant that for Tolkien to simply have had all the inhabitants of the land destroyed in a biblical-type flood would feel unusually punitive for his style, so I would expect that such a mass destruction of all those lives did not occur in this case.

I quite prefer the idea the destruction happened over many years during the war which would have allowed most to flee rather than being lost in a single catastrophic event (such as with the fall of Númenor.)

[lazycat]

It could be both/and: Here's my educated take: Look up Doggerland. Through the long ice ages, Europe was bigger. The North Sea was a plain, there was a big island precisely where Plato says Atlantis was. Very much in the same configuration as well. (Funny how 70s Atlantis enthusiasts always wanted it to be a space age civilization in Antarctica but...) There is a great deal of scientific mystery about how the ice melted so quickly. One idea is a series of impacts which caused upper atmospheric heating. But what I'm getting at is - north of Ered Engrin is the nothing but a wall of glacial ice. We all know about Helcaraxë, &c... So the Valar come and Melkor unleashes his full panoply of fire breathing monsters, &C. Ancalagon, a bigger than Godzilla type monster is killed by a guy in a flynf boat. People read this literally, but you could easily take a symbolic slant. Ancalagon and the flying boat are allegory for the powers of the West striving magically with their enemy, breaking his wall of mountains causing the rapid flooring of large areas and the gradual subsumation of most of the other low lying areas. It's states explicitly that Himring was reachable by ship and there were other islands out there, being high places.
Geologically speaking, there are a whole range of effects of melting glaciers- isostatic rebound, &c.

[elengil]

I actually love reading about Doggerland, and the various theories of what happened and how quickly. I have never heard of it being linked to Atlantis, but that would be an interesting read.

While that's a perfectly logical real-world approach to the question, the problem is, of course, that Middle-earth was written by a person who made things happen the way he wanted them to, not necessarily aligning with real-world physics or logic.

But that is a good parallel, in any case. It would have been amazing if Tolkien had been inspired by Doggerland, but I *believe* that wasn't even a theory until well after he had written his works? I could be mistaken in that, but it does at least give some good alternate ways to think about it.

[lazycat]

I threw that out because I think of the Silmarillion events as happening in that way. The text seems to indicate a battle of the gods with vast armies of elves/lesser angels attending. Dragons and demons are defeated. Afterward there are a number of events (final treachery of Fëanor's sons) and many of the people seem to get a choice to get away before Beleriand sinks. So the text does not seem to indicate 'boom' it's gone away and everyone drowns.

[Frelga]

I didn't know about Doggerland, that was interesting.

While that's a perfectly logical real-world approach to the question, the problem is, of course, that Middle-earth was written by a person who made things happen the way he wanted them to, not necessarily aligning with real-world physics or logic.

That's an important point to remember when debating what "really" happened. There is no "really", not even in the subjective reality of the imaginary Middle-earth, because Tolkien kept changing his mind about things.

That noted, I came across a post recently that pointed out how Tolkien did not just create a tale that is "real in the context of the imaginary world", he created a mythology - e.g., an account that was somewhat fictionalized within the context of that imaginary world. The post went on to say that it explains seemingly incongruous inserts like the talking fox and Tom Bombadil - they are accretions from much older myths or borrowings from other mythologies.

Framed that way, it is logical that Beleriand took its time sinking so that enough people had escaped to tell the tale, which became the myth. I remember* it as a story of survivors who made it out, not the story of told by people who just happened to be away and the found that there was suddenly more water and less home.

* It's been a while, so I may remember wrong.

[elengil]

Went back and read the chapter on the War of Wrath last night.

Might have been 100% wrong in my understanding of what happened - and this is where we once again run into the issue of "what happened is whatever Tolkien said happened."

Thus an end was made of the power of Angband in the North, and' the evil realm was brought to naught; and out of the deep prisons a multitude of slaves came forth beyond all hope into the light of day, and they looked upon a world that was changed. For so great was the fury of those adversaries that the northern regions of the western world were rent asunder, and the sea roared in through many chasms, and there was confusion and great noise; and rivers perished or found new paths, and the valleys were upheaved and the hills trod down; and Sirion was no more.

Then Eönwë as herald of the Elder King summoned the Elves of Beleriand to depart from Middle-earth.

So even after the battle they were able to gather the elves of Beleriand to travel with them, rather than those lands presumably already having been sunk and its inhabitants dispersed in some fashion?

Maybe, then, after they departed is when the lands actually fully sank? When everyone had reached some area of safety rather than fleeing a disaster?