#erendis

[nimphelos]

more tolkien ladies: eärwen, erendis, morwen, and nerdanel

[mhevarujta]

Aldarion feeling his "sea-longing" and putting it above everything else, leaving Erendis behind again and again despite any feelings he had for her and knowing that she had less time than he did.

VS

Galadriel feeling the "sea-longing" grow strong in her and immediately "seeking Celeborn", whom she doesn't leave again until it's time for ther to fade and go West, even though they have all the time in the world.

[magicalhideoutengineer]

Women of Steel

Erendis alone at a window watched him riding down the hill, and she marked that he rode towards Hyarastorni and not towards Armenelos. Then she wept, from grief, but still more from anger. She had looked for some penitence, that she might extend after rebuke pardon if prayed for; but he had dealt with her as if she were the offender, and ignored her before her daughter. Too late she remembered the words of Núneth long before, and she saw Aldarion now as something large and not to be tamed, driven by a fierce will, more perilous when chill. She rose, and turned from the window, thinking of her wrongs. ‘Perilous!’ she said. ‘I am steel hard to break. So he would find even were he the King of Númenor.’

- Unfinished Tales: Aldarion and Erendis

Slender and tall she was in her white robe girt with silver; but strong she seemed and stern as steel, a daughter of kings.

- The Two Towers: The King of the Golden Hall

Still she did not blench: maiden of the Rohirrim, child of kings, slender but as a steel-blade, fair yet terrible.

Then Merry heard of all sounds in that hour the strangest. It seemed that Dernhelm laughed, and the clear voice was like the ring of steel. ‘But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Éowyn I am, Éomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him.

- The Return of the King: The Battle of the Pelennor Fields

but Éowyn was slender and tall, with a grace and pride that came to her out of the South from Morwen of Lossarnach, whom the Rohirrim had called Steelsheen.

- The Return of the King: Appendix A: Annals of the Kings and Rulers

All of these steely women have a thematic connection to Morwen. The eyes of Erendis were said to be 'as bright as were the eyes of Morwen Eledhwen of old.' Steelsheen would be a very fitting epessë for the First Age Morwen, a woman of famously steely temper. In the earlier drafting of the Two Towers, Éowyn is also called Elfsheen(the translation of Eledhwen).

(5) Eowyn Elfsheen daughter of Eomund?

- The Treason of Isengard: The Riders of Rohan

[emyn-arnens]

@numenorweek Day 2: The Mariner's Wife ⇢ Erendis

Erendis alone at a window watched him riding down the hill, and she marked that he rode towards Hyarastorni and not towards Armenelos. Then she wept, from grief, but still more from anger. She had looked for some penitence, that she might extend after rebuke pardon if prayed for; but he had dealt with her as if she were the offender, and ignored her before her daughter. Too late she remembered the words of Núneth long before, and she saw Aldarion now as something large and not to be tamed, driven by a fierce will, more perilous when chill. She rose, and turned from the window, thinking of her wrongs. ‘Perilous!’ she said. ‘I am steel hard to break. So he would find even were he the King of Númenor.’

[slightnettles]

Therefore do not bend, Ancalimë. Once bend a little, and they will bend you further until you are bowed down. Sink your roots into the rock, and face the wind, though it blow away all your leaves.

[kisses-in-the-void]

[maenefa]

I love how Tolkien’s women have such a consistently spicy reaction to Numenorian men.

Opinions range from “they’re so hot and arrogant, ugh I just want one to tie me up” to “they’re hot but they’re man babies who will ruin your life.”

Eowyn: “‘Then must I leave my own people, man of Gondor?' she said. 'And would you have your proud folk say of you: "There goes a lord who tamed a wild shieldmaiden of the North! Was there no woman of the race of Numenor to choose?"'

Arwen: “But I say to you, King of the Númenoreans, not till now have I understood the tale of your people and their fall. As wicked fools I scorned them, but I pity them at last.”

Erendis: “Men in Númenor are half-Elves, especially the high men; they are neither the one nor the other. The long life that they were granted deceives them, and they dally in the world, children in mind, until age finds them – and then many only forsake play out of doors for play in their houses. They turn their play into great matters and great matters into play. They would be craftsmen and loremasters and heroes all at once; and women to them are but fires on the hearth – for others to tend, until they are tired of play in the evening.”

[arofili]

@tolkienseaweek day seven | escape, avoidance, freedom | tar-aldarion x erendis

Her love for him was not lessened, nor did she retreat out of guile; but she feared now in her heart that in the war between herself and the Sea for the keeping of Aldarion she would not conquer. Never would Erendis take less, that she might not lose all; and fearing the Sea, and begrudging to all ships the felling of trees which she loved, she determined that she must utterly defeat the Sea and the ships, or else be herself defeated utterly.

—Unfinished Tales, “The Mariner’s Wife: Aldarion and Erendis”