Particularly notable is the passage in the tale in which Mavwin holds out the great gold-hoard of the Rodothlim as a bait to Tinwelint, and Tinwelint unashamedly admits that (as a wild Elf of the woods) it is this, not any hope of aiding Tъrin, that moves him to send out a party. The majesty, power, and pride of Thingol rose with the development of the conception of the Grey-elves of Beleriand; as I have said earlier (p. 63) ‘In the beginning, Tinwelint’s dwelling was not a subterranean city full of marvels…but a rugged cave’, and here he is seen planning a foray to augment his slender wealth in precious things—a far cry from the description of his vast treasury in the Narn (p. 76):
Now Thingol had in Menegroth deep armouries filled with great wealth of weapons: metal wrought like fishes’ mail and shining like water in the moon; swords and axes, shields and helms, wrought by Telchar himself or by his master Gamil Zirak the old, or by elven-wrights more skilful still. For some things he had received in gift that came out of Valinor and were wrought by Fлanor in his mastery, than whom no craftsman was greater in all the days of the world.
Great as are the differences from the later legend in the encounter with the dragon, the stinking vapours raised by his lying in the river as the cause of the miscarriage of the plan, the maddened flight of the horses, and the enspelling of Nienor so that all memory of her past was lost, are already present. Most striking perhaps of the many differences is the fact that Mavwin was present at the conversation with Glorund; and of these speeches there is no echo in the Narn (pp. 118–19), save that Nienor’s naming of Tъrin as the object of their quest revealed her identity to the dragon (this is explicit in the Narn, and may probably be surmised from the tale). The peculiar tone of Glaurung in the later narrative, sneering and curt, knowing and self-possessed, and unfathomably wicked, can be detected already in the words of Glorund, but as he evolved he gained immeasurably in dread by becoming more laconic.
The chief difference of structure lies in the total absence of the ‘Mablung-element’ from the tale, nor is there any foreshadowing of it. There is no suggestion of an exploration of the sacked dwellings in the dragon’s absence (indeed he does not, as it appears, go any distance from them); the purpose of the expedition from Artanor was expressly warlike (‘a strong party against the Foalуkл’, ‘they prepared them for battle’), since Tinwelint had hopes of laying hands on the treasure, whereas afterwards it became purely a scouting foray, for Thingol ‘desired greatly to know more of the fate of Nargothrond’ (Narn p. 113).
A curious point is that though Mavwin and Nienуri were to be stationed on the tree-covered ‘high place’ that was afterward called the Hill of Spies, and where they were in fact so stationed in The Silmarillion and the Narn, it seems that in the old story they never got there, but were ensnared by Glorund where he lay in, or not far from, the river. Thus the ‘high place’ had in the event almost no significance in the tale.
(viii) Turambar and Nнniel (pp. 99–102)
In the later legend Nienor was found by Mablung after her enspelling by Glaurung, and with three companions he led her back towards the borders of Doriath. The chase after Nienor by the band of Orcs (Narn p. 120) is present in the tale, but it does not have its later narrative function of leading to Nienor’s flight and loss by Mablung and the other Elves (who do not appear): rather it leads directly to her rescue by Turambar, now dwelling among the Woodmen. In the Narn (p. 122) the Woodmen of Brethil did indeed come past the spot where they found her on their return from a foray against Orcs; but the circumstances of her finding are altogether different, most especially since there is in the tale no mention of the Haudh-en-Elleth, the Mound of Finduilas.
An interesting detail concerns Nienor’s response to Turambar’s naming her Nнniel. In The Silmarillion and the Narn ‘she shook her head, but said: Nнniel’ in the present text she said: ‘Not Nнniel, not Nнniel.’ One has the impression that in the old story what impressed her darkened mind was only the resemblance of Nнniel to her own forgotten name Nienуri (and of Turambar to Tъrin), whereas in the later she both denied and in some way accepted the name Nнniel.
An original element in the legend is the Woodmen’s bringing of Nнniel to a place (‘Silver Bowl’) where there was a great waterfall (afterwards Dimrost, the Rainy Stair, where the stream of Celebros ‘fell towards Teiglin’): and these falls were near to the dwellings of the Woodmen—but the place where they found Nнniel was much further off in the forest (several days’ journey) than were the Crossings of Teiglin from Dimrost. When she came there she was filled with dread, a foreboding of what was to happen there afterwards, and this is the origin of her shuddering fit in the later narratives, from which the place was renamed Nen Girith, the Shuddering Water (see Narn p. 149, note 24).
The utter darkness imposed on Nнniel’s mind by the dragon’s spell is less emphasized in the tale, and there is no suggestion that she needed to relearn her very language; but it is interesting to observe the recurrence in a changed context of the simile of ‘one that seeks for something mislaid’: in the Narn (p. 123) Nнniel is said to have taken great delight in the relearning of words, ‘as one that finds again treasures great and small that were mislaid’.
The lame man, here called Tamar, and his vain love of Nнniel already appear; unlike his later counterpart Brandir he was not the chief of the Woodmen, but he was the son of the chief. He was also Half-elven! Most extraordinary is the statement that the wife of Bethos the chieftain and mother of Tamar was an Elf, a woman of the Noldoli: this is mentioned in passing, as if the great significance and rarity of the union of Elf and Mortal had not yet emerged—but in a Name-list associated with the tale of The Fall of Gondolin Eдrendel is said to be ‘the only being that is half of the kindred of the Eldaliл and half of Men’ (p. 215).*
The initial reluctance of Nнniel to receive Turambar’s suit is given no explanation in the tale: the implication must be that some instinct, some subconscious appreciation of the truth, held her back. In The Silmarillion (p. 220)
for that time she delayed in spite of her love. For Brandir foreboded he knew not what, and sought to restrain her, rather for her sake than his own or rivalry with Turambar; and he revealed to her that Turambar was Tъrin son of Hъrin, and though she knew not the name a shadow fell upon her mind.
In the final version as in the oldest, the Woodmen knew who Turambar was. My father’s scribbled directions for the alteration of the story cited in note 23 (‘Make Turambar never tell new folk of his lineage…’) are puzzling: for since Nнniel had lost all memory of her past she would not know the names Tъrin son of Hъrin even if it were told to her that Turambar was he. It is however possible that when my father wrote this he imagined Nнniel’s lost knowledge of herself and her family as being nearer the surface of her mind, and capable of being brought back by hearing the names—in contrast to the later story where she did not consciously recognise the name of Tъrin even when Brandir told it to her. Clearly the question-mark against the reference in the text of the tale to Turambar’s speaking to Nнniel ‘of his father and mother and the sister he had not seen’ and Nнniel’s distress at his words (see note 24) depends on the same train of thought. The statement here that Turambar had never seen his sister is at variance with what is said earlier in the tale, that he did not leave Hithlum until after Nienуri’s birth (p. 71); but my father was uncertain on this point, as is clearly seen from the succession of readings, changed back and forth between the two ideas, given in note 15.