Tirion

Tirion, known fully as Tirion upon Túna, was the city of the Ñoldor in Aman.

It was from here that Finwë ruled, and where his sons Fëanor, Fingolfin, and Finarfin lived.

J.R.R. Tolkien's original name for this city - until the final development of his First Age tales as accounted in The History of Middle-earth - was Kôr.^[3]

History[]

The green hill of Túna was located in the steep-walled valley of Calacirya (translated from Quenya as "The Cleft of Light"), the only pass through the mountains of the Pelóri. Upon the crown of the hill, the Elves raised their largest settlement west of the sea. The walls and terraces were white, and the sand in the streets was said to be of grains of diamond, and white crystal stairs climbed from the fertile land beneath to the great gates.

At the city's center was Ingwë's tower, Mindon Eldaliéva, whose silver lantern shone far out to sea. Beneath the tower was the house of Finwë, first High King of the Ñoldor. Here also was the Great Square, where the white tree Galathilion flourished, and later the site of Fëanor's infamous oath.^[4]

After most of the Vanyar resettled in Valinor, rule of Tirion was given to Finwë. Many years of bliss followed, until Tirion was shaken by the king's eldest son, Fëanor. He stirred up rebellion against the Valar and was exiled to Formenos, a punishment that Finwë chose to share. In their absence, the city was ruled by Fingolfin. After Finwë's murder by the Dark Lord Morgoth and the theft of the precious gems, the Silmarils, his son Fëanor assembled the Ñoldor at the Great Square, where he urged them to leave with him for Middle-earth to avenge their king and reclaim the Silmarils, claiming that their lives in Tirion were simply a prison brought upon them by the Valar. In the end only a tenth of the population remained when Fëanor, his brothers and his and their children departed, and some would soon after return with Finarfin back to Tirion.

Nearly 600 years later, once all Elven kingdoms in Beleriand had been defeated, the half-elf Eärendil (father of the famous Elrond) sailed into the west in search of Valinor to request assistance from the Valar in the war against Morgoth. Eärendil arrived in Tirion on a day of festival in Valinor, when the city was empty, and only when he had turned and begun to leave a herald of the Valar approached him.

More than 3,000 years followed before Tirion was for the first time seen by mortal eyes by the soldiers of the twenty-fifth and last King of Númenor, deceived by Sauron, landed on the shores of Eldamar and camped around Túna, which the fleeing elves emptied. When the Men of Númenor were buried under falling hills, Tirion, along with all the Undying Lands, was taken out of mortal reach forever.^[5]

Etymology[]

Tirion was a Quenya word that meant 'Watch-tower'.

See also[]

• Kortirion

Translations[]

References[]