Who made the Hobbits?

[Winddancer]

So I was reading the thread about do Hobbits have pointy ears and went to look up who made them, just to see if that would answer that question and was quite surprised to see that there was no difinitive answer! Not only that, but there is no clear reference as to WHEN they came into being, whether it was with the first Edain, or if they came later.

Now I know that Tolkien is bad for being vague on a lot of things, but with the Hobbits I would have thought that they of all the races were the most fleshed out and I am quite surprised to find they aren't. I would have thought the one of the most important races (that finally destroyed the One ring) would be more fleshed out and not so vague.

This page https://middle-earth.xenite.org/who-cre ... e-hobbits/ is quite interesting, but of course just speculations. Totally don't believe the one about Melkor, I can't see the Hobbits being made by someone evil.

But why isn't it clearly stated who made them and when they came into being??

[Androthelm]

So, on the one hand the answer has to be Eru, since no living (or, sentient anyway?) thing can be created in the Legendarium without having come from Eru at the foundation. Melkor / Sauron corrupt -- making the orcs out of elves or men and the trolls out of... I guess really big orcs? They're parodies of the ents, I know, but it certainly doesn't seem right that they would BE ents, even twisted as orcs are. But Eru creates.

That being said (and, in a more helpful way) my understanding (uncited and unsourced, I know! if anyone has a passage, please tell me) is that they are cousins to that race of men which dwelt in the Vales of Anduin -- cousins, as that post you linked points out, who just happened to grow smaller with the passing of generations. So I suppose they were created when Men were created, or you could say that Evolution "created" them (in the sense that Melkor "created" the orcs).

[Winddancer]

I know this is a fantasy world, but wouldn't evolution going from a man to a hobbit, take a loooong time? And where would the pointy ears come from? Aren't the Hobbits also a better version of men, without the greed and ambition? Suggesting they were made separately?

[Elenhir]

Odd that Martinez omits one of the most blatant statements about hobbit origins:

The beginnings of the Hobbits lies far back in the Elder Days that are now lost and forgotten. Only the Elves still preserve any records of that vanished time, and their traditions are concerned almost entirely with their own history, in which Men appear seldom and Hobbits are not mentioned at all. Yet it is clear that Hobbits had, in fact, lived quietly in Middle-earth for many long years before other folk became even aware of them.

I'm not sure I see the special mystery here. There's also no mention of when the Druedain, another distinct group of Men appeared. Or when the Edain-to-be came to be the differing groups that they were when they passed in succession into Beleriand. Apart from one very early writing in which we see Men sleeping, the origins of Men have always been more shrouded off the margins than the origins of Elves. We hear of Hildorien, but we see Cuivienen. I don't see any particular reason to suppose something wildly different for the hobbits than for the rest of Men. If the question is did they emerge initially as hobbits in all but name, or did they develop out of a more 'normal' group of Men, I do not know. But if the question is were they made later? It would take some extraordinary evidence to even consider the notion, and I see none.

[Winddancer]

More of a surprise really, as to me the Hobbits seem to be the most important race and the one Tolkien identifies with(?). Also stated that they were better than men, so just found it surprising that the Elves, Dwarves and Men are covered, but the Hobbits arent. I mean could they go from man to hobbit in 10.000 years (or however long the timeline is) and developed pointy ears. I dont think so, so that would mean they were made at the same time as Men, but whyyy no mention of it? Makes no sense when he obviously adored this race.

[Elenhir]

I think you're fancifying hobbits a bit here. Better than Men? Sure, in some ways. In others, clearly less able. Hobbits wouldn't have solved the Second Age's troubles, nor the First's, though they were instrumental for the Third's. I don't see any real indication he adored them more than he did Elves. One might expect, if so, that they would have found their way into post-LotR revisions of Silmarillion stories. But they were essentially put aside after LotR. They're hardly the most important race.

And there is a solution to your belief that there is no mention of their making. The solution is that there is mention of it, being the exactly the same mentions as the making of Men get, since hobbits are Men. We solve your disconnect by not disconnecting hobbits to the degree you want to. Tolkien, from the author's perspective, is always pointing out to us that Hobbits are Men, whether it's in letters where he says they are a branch of the specifically human race, or in the prologue where he talks about it in slightly less certain terms. The only places where the big distinction, a hard divide, is ever made is from characters' perspectives: the note in the Appendices about the Rohirrim considering Merry to still count for the prophecy alongside Eowyn, or Treebeard's list of talking peoples. The narration exists in part to show the difference between character perception and truth.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Elenhir everything you say (I think) is correct, but it still leaves a feeling of something missing. In LOTR hobbits are indeed specified as a branch of men. But this is not the case in the original story of Bilbo Baggins - where they are the Little People and clearly not quite like us (Big People) at all. I have a feeling that hobbits became a branch of men only when the hobbit stories became central to the newly imagined Third Age but Tolkien resisted adding to or revising his earlier stories about the making of elves and men and dwarves.

[Elenhir]

Except the making of Dwarves isn't earlier. The idea that Aule made the Dwarves first appears after Tolkien had written The Hobbit, in 'The Later Annals of Beleriand' as found in HoME V: The Lost Road and Other Writings. Prior to this, in the version of the Silmarillion writings from just before Tolkien began work on The Hobbit Dwarves were specifically called out to be of unknown origin. In fact, I've seen it argued that writing The Hobbit led to such changes in Dwarves, though personally I'd argue it merely continued what was already slowly happening (as the Dwarves of the Quenta Noldorinwa are still quite different from the Dwarves of the Book of Lost Tales).

Tolkien was in a constant state of revision. If you want to act like something was too holy to alter, you're going to need something substantive to back that up. Dwarves plainly show Tolkien was not beyond adding in new origins for older concepts when he felt like it. And the Ents show the same with new concepts, too. Their Silmarillion explanation, as one might suspect for a concept created during the writing of The Lord of the Rings, was written after Tolkien finished the narrative of LotR.

Nothing's missing here. It just hurts the fanciful view you're taking of the worldbuilding process. But if that perspective leads to incorrect conclusions, perhaps it needs to be adjusted.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Elenhir. Thanks for putting me right about Dwarvish creation. Still, it does not feel to me quite right that Tolkien could look upon hobbits (his own name) in the same way as Dwarves or even Ents (who are, after all, named in Beowulf).

[Elenhir]

I don't doubt that you do. But how am I supposed to work with your gut feelings? Are they lore? Can they ever be something of substance if they can just wisp around corrections and persist unhindered? Can I just have a feeling that's the opposite of yours, and we agree they cancel each other out, and then go back to relying on stuff that's actually arguable and comes from evidence?

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Well, obviously, you don't work with them.

[Elenhir]

Then kindly don't @ me just to air empty disapproval.

[Winddancer]

Oi, y'all play nice or I will have myself some roasted humans!

People can have gut feelings about the books, especially as Tolkien was so vague with SO many frigging things and since we can't ask him, we are allowed to speculate. And seeing as we have concluded that there is no clear evidence, well then let's speculate and discuss the possibilities! You never know what will come of it if you kill it off immediately. It feels wrong to me as well, like the hobbits were an afterthought.

[Elenhir]

@Winddancer, that's precisely my point. What I did was speculate, based on material we have. What I was met with was a denial based on nothing but a feeling, attached to an incorrect statement that apparently had nothing to do with the feeling, since learning it was wrong changed nothing of the underlying denial. So, please, let's not kill off speculation immediately. I didn't come in here and only say I didn't like what you were saying, and leave that as the sum total of my argument. I would appreciate the same level of basic respect in return.

[Winddancer]

What else are you going to base your speculation on if not your feelings? As there is no evidence. So surely it must be a base feeling of he did this and this and this for them, so surely there should be that for these ones? It just doesnt feel right he left them out. You say your feelings cancel out simons, but what happens when 2 people feel the same way? And why shouldnt feelings be discussed if it is the sense of it seems off that they got missed out?

[Elenhir]

What else are you going to base your speculation on if not your feelings? As there is no evidence.

I've provided evidence in support of and against many claims here. Are you honestly suggesting that we should abandon any and all pretense of basing things off the books when we can't find an explicit answer laid out so simply a five-year old could understand it? Anything less than that isn't 'evidence'? Surely not.

And everyone here knows this. @Androthelm speculates, invoking the idea that only Eru can create life as evidence, which could easily be quoted, arguing that the hobbits must come from Eru. That's not speculation based on feelings. That's speculation based on known facts taken to reasonable conclusions where some special additional, particularly damning evidence would have to be found to counter it and throw us into other territory. Say, if hobbits were evil creatures, we might argue against @Androthelm 's point, saying that since we know Melkor to be responsible for at least corrupting a variety of things, resulting in Orcs and dragons and werewolves and so forth, that this sub-creative power of Melkor might be involved. But since hobbits aren't evil minions of Melkor, we don't do that, as that makes no sense. That's how this works. This is lore. We base our speculation on demonstrable facts, reasonable assertions backed by information from the books, that sort of thing. Not necessarily proof, because there is often no definitive statement. But something that tries to work relatively close to proof. Not whims. Not feelings. Perhaps I'm mistaking what you're suggesting, because even needing to say this feels absurd. Of course we speculate from Tolkien's writings.

I don't, in fact, say that my feelings cancel out simon's. I suggest, mockingly, that a feelings-based dismissal is either not a dismissal or it can also be dismissed with a feelings-based dismissal. If it seems off, you should be able to tell me why it seems off. Which is what simon did, initially, making an argument about how Tolkien treated reinserting race origins into his Silmarillion writings. That argument was wrong, though. I can find you the quotes to show you the difference between the versions and the years they were written, if you don't want to trust my reference to it and simon's agreement that those references check out. But then a new argument really wasn't offered, and that side of the argument, where it was claimed that something was missing from my argument, only the feelings remained. So, I am allowed to speculate. You acting like the gut feeling telling me I'm wrong is speculation and actually using evidence is trying to disallow speculation is obscene. If you want to discuss possibilities, don't let people use their gut feelings and their gut feelings alone to shut other ideas down. Literally, I was told I just wasn't supposed to work with his gut feelings. Where is the possibility of discussion in that?

And, if that counts as discussion, simply saying that my argument feels wrong, and ending it there, what do you even have a problem with here? Surely I'm allowed to go with similar gut feelings. And my gut feeling is that simon's gut feeling is seems off. I should get to play by the same rules as everyone else. Yeah, when two people do that, it highlights how stupid the framework is, because then it's just two people going back and forth saying 'no, you'. But the stupid is innate to the framework; it doesn't appear with the second use.

[Galadrihell]

- Speculation is fine
- Expressing your feelings is also fine
- The latter is not an evidential argument, but may be used to invite further evidence from other commentators: it’s fine to present your thoughts/feelings and/or speculative comments to be either supported or denied by evidence
- you may get further comments that aren’t evidence - that are just more speculation or feelings. There’s nothing wrong with that, unless someone is trying to impose those feelings and speculation on you as a universal view
- There’s no need for the mockery
- If you’ve just both agreed you disagree with each other’s feelings let’s leave it there

[Winddancer]

What she said.

And yes I am prolly overly fancifying the hobbits, when I said they were better than men, it was more in the sense of they had no greed or ambition, not that they were more capable of solving problems.

How about this? That the Hobbits are an amalgamation of all 3 races, Men, Dwarves and Elves. Height from dwarves, ears and love of nature from elves and appearance from men? Who knows, maybe way back they interbred and this was the outcome :P

Btw Aule created the dwarves so that Eru was not the only creator? Dont bite my head off! I know he made them, just dont know if he "breathed life" into them or if that was Eru. I would google, but I just got up, sorry.

[Boromir88]

When I was reading this thread I was actually precisely thinking of this very point @Winddancer (btw, has your name always had 2 d's? ):

How about this? That the Hobbits are an amalgamation of all 3 races, Men, Dwarves and Elves. Height from dwarves, ears and love of nature from elves and appearance from men? Who knows, maybe way back they interbred and this was the outcome :P

In that when talking about the Stoors, Harfoots and Fallohides, they're compared to being similar to different races.

The Harfoots had much to do with Dwarves in ancient times, and long lived in the foothills of the mountains.

The Stoors lingered long by the banks of the Great River Anduin, and were less shy of Men.

The Fallohides, the least numerous, were a northerly branch. They were more friendly with Elves than the other Hobbits were, and had more skill in language and song than in handicrafts;

(All quotes from The Lord of the Rings Prologue)

That's interesting to me. I'm not sure if it's relevant to your questions of their creation and how there came to be hobbits. But it is interesting to your point about being an amalgamation. I wonder what role location plays as well? The Harfoots "long lived in the foothills of the mountains" and seem to have the most dealing with being near dwarves. The Stoors "lingered" around Men. I can't remember for sure, but were most of the hobbits of Bree-land Stoors?

[Androthelm]

That's very interesting @Boromir88. I cannot remember the exact quote to save my life, but don't we later get some speculation in the Prologue on the origin of certain Hobbit architectural and tool-making styles coming from either Dwarves or Men?

[Elenhir]

Hobbits do have greed and ambition, though, @Winddancer. When Bilbo disappeared and the will was being handled, we are told several hobbits were digging out his walls to find treasure and had to be kicked out of Bag End. There is tragedy to the Sackville-Bagginses, but it was their greed and ambition that helped the Shire fall under Saruman's horror. Ted Sandyman, as we are shown in 'The Scouring of the Shire', is the sort of lout pleased with those changes even when they knocked him down a few rungs on life's ladder. These are hardly sinless beings.

They might have less. Or it might just be more petty, and not liable to impact others, like, say, Grima's ambition, or Thingol's greed, because of the compounding effects of a more rigid hierarchy of authority.

[Winddancer]

Yeah thats true, had forgotten about them.