Uruks vs. Uruk-hai

[Greenwood]

A week or two back, in a long thread on the movie forum, there was considerable discussion over the use of the terms Uruk vs. Uruk-hai in LOTR. A number of us contended that the terms have different meanings, while others said they were interchangeable. A number of quotes from the book were given. Since them I have spent some time looking through LOTR to find any additional instances I could of the use of the two terms. Following are all the instances I could find, including those already found:

1) In the chapter The Uruk-hai in The Two Towers, Ugluk says: "We are the fighting Uruk-hai! We slew the great warrior. We took the prisoners. We are the servants of Saruman the Wise, the White Hand: the Hand that gives us man's-flesh to eat. We came out of Isengard, and led you here ..... "

2) Later in the same chapter, Ugluk again speaking: "Leave them to me then! No killing, as I've told you before; but if you want to throw away what we've come all the way to get, throw it away! I'll look after it. Letting the fighting Uruk-hai do the work, as usual. ..... "

3) On the next page, Ugluk again: "You seem to know a lot. ... More than is good for you I guess. Perhaps those in Lugburz might wonder how, and why. But in the meantime the Uruk-hai of Isengard can do the dirty work, as usual. ...."

4) This is not exactly a quote, but in The Two Towers, Tolkien titles his chapter "The Uruk-hai", he does not call it "The Uruks".

5) In The Two Towers in the chapter Helm's Deep, as Aragorn looks out for the dawn there is the following passage:

"The Orcs yelled and jeered. 'Come down! Come down!' they cried. 'If you wish to speak to us, come down! Bring out your king! We are the fighting Uruk-hai. We will fetch him from his hole, if he does not come down. Bring out your skulking king!'

" 'The king stays or comes at his own will,' said Aragorn.

" 'Then what are you doing here?' they answered. 'Why do you look out? Do you wish to see the greatness of our army? We are the fighting Uruk-hai.'

" 'I looked out to see the dawn,' said Aragorn.

" 'What of the dawn?' they jeered. 'We are the Uruk-hai: we do not stop the fight for night or day, for fair weather or for storm. .... "

6) In The Return of the King, in the chapter The Seige of Gondor there is the following sentence: "No hours so dark had Pippin known, not even in the clutches of the Uruk-hai."

7) In The Return of the King, in the chapter The Land of Shadow, Sam and Frodo overhear two orcs talking and one says: ".... First they say it's a great Elf in bright armour, then it's a sort of small dwarf-man, then it must be a pack of rebel Uruk-hai; or maybe it's all the lot together."

8) In The Fellowship of the Ring, in the chapter The Bridge of Khazad-dum, Gandalf says: "There are Orcs, very many of them .... And some are large and evil: black Uruks of Mordor. ...."

9) In The Two Towers, in the chapter The Choices of Master Samwise, Gorbag says: " .... I say something has slipped. And we've got to look out. Always the poor Uruks to put slips right, and small thanks. ....."

10) In The Return of the King, in the chapter The Land of the Shadow, Sam and Frodo are overtaken on the road by troops of orcs and there is the following description of the troops: "Beside them, running up and down the line, went two of the large fierce uruks, cracking lashes and shouting." (Italics in original.)

11) In The Return of the King, in Appendix A it says: "In the last years of Denethor I the race of uruks, black orcs of great strength, first appeared out of Mordor, and in 2475 they swept across Ithilien and took Osgiliath."

12) In The Return of the King, in Appendix F it says: "Related. no doubt, was the word uruk of the Black Speech, though this was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard. The lesser kinds were called, especially by the Uruk-hai, snaga 'slave'." (Italics in the original.)

In examples 1 to 6, the term Uruk-hai is clearly referring to Saruman's orc troops. In examples 8 to 11, the term Uruks (sometimes spelled with a lower case "u") is clearly referring to Sauron's troops. We are left with examples 7 and 12. Example 7 is ambiguous since Sauron's orc could be referring to orcs in the employ of Saruman, who he might well consider rebels. Example 12 is the only case where Tolkien uses the two terms in close proximity and it seems to me to be ambiguous. The first sentence clearly refers makes uruk refer to Mordor orcs as in examples 8 to 11, but the second sentence use of Uruk-hai does not automatically make the two terms equivalent and I find it interesting that Tolkien captilizes Uruk-hai as if it is a specifc name, but does not do the same with uruk. Thus, it seems to me clear that uruk and Uruk-hai are used quite differently by Tolkien in LOTR with uruk referring to Sauron's large, soldier orcs and Uruk-hai referring to Saruman's large, soldier, daylight-tolerant orcs.

Cian and other forum members pointed out the Index entry (by Christopher Tolkien) in Unfinished Tales that says: "Uruks -- Anglicized form of Uruk-hai of the Black Speech." This entry specifcally refers to the account "The Battles of the Fords of Isen" in Unfinished Tales in which Tolkien repeatedly uses the term uruks when he is talking about Saruman's troops fighting with the troops of Rohan. This seems to be the only time where Tolkien uses the term uruk for Saruman's orc troops. However, this is a draft piece which Tolkien did not use in LOTR and hence can be assumed to not be in a final form.

Cian also posted many examples of third party "Tolkien scholars" repeating the definition of uruk as being an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai. I have come across references which claim that Uruk-hai is a plural form of Uruk, which clearly does not fit Tolkien's usage since he uses both uruk and uruks.

My question after all this is the following: Does anyone have any evidence from Tolkien, himself to support the interpretation that has been advanced by the various "Tolkien scholars". I have been able to find nothing in Tolkien's own hand to support the "scholar's" interpretation, with the exception of the account in Unfinished Tales, which is a unused draft and thus cannot be used against Tolkien's published words in LOTR.

I am not trying to reignite a controversy from the movie forum on the book forum. I have noticed that there are many knowledgeable members who never visit the movie forum and I thought perhaps someone might have additional knowledge to share.

I thank Aragil. Cian, Greymantle, ReadWryt, Thrakerzog and Wide Boy for originally finding some of the 12 passages cited above. (NOTE: I am not saying they were all on the same side of the question. They were not.) My apologies if I have left out any other member who also contributed to the thread in the movie forum.

[Beleg Strongbow]

I thought that the urak-hai was a development of normal orcs done by saruman from the orders of sauron that made them more versatile and bearable to sun. and that uruks were the massive orcs of mordor. In the 3 book lotr when sam and frodo are running in the orc host it says someting about the orcs running past ran staright through them and they were the big massive uruk orc from barad-dur. holla

[Greenwood]

In the 3 book lotr when sam and frodo are running in the orc host it says someting about the orcs running past ran staright through them and they were the big massive uruk orc from barad-dur. holla

Beleg Strongbow

Thank you. You are right. On the next page from the passage I cite in 10) in my post it says: "A troop of heavy-armed uruks from Barad-dur charged into the Durthang line and threw them into confusion." I guess I should number this as 13) so as not to chnage the numbering in my original post. That now means we have six instances (numbers 1 to 6) of Tolkien using Uruk-hai to refer to Saruman's orc troops and five instances (numbers 8 to 11 and 13) where Tolkien uses uruk to refer to Sauron's troops and two instances that are open to interpretatin.

I hoped others would be able to find instances I had missed.

[aragil]

Not to put too much faith in second sources, but a number of them seem to think that the translation of 'hai' should be 'people'. Here's a web example, from the encyclopedia of Arda:
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/u/urukhai.html
My point is that 'people' in our world, and 'people' in Middle-Earth could have very different connotations. In our world, there is only one species that is regularly referred to as 'people'- humans. In Middle-Earth there are many species which could take the term people- dwarves, hobbits, elves, orcs and humans, to name a few. I wonder how the secondary sources come to the conclusion that 'people' could be applied to any race in that context. Why couldn't it just be a synonym for humans?
Another use of 'hai' is for Olog-hai, which are trolls which could withstand sunlight. I don't remember what their references were, but Iron Crown Enterprises, which used to publish the Middle Earth Role-Playing game (talk about your disreputable secondary sources) claimed that the Olog-hai were bred from crossing humans and trolls, thusly givning them their sun tolerance. If this were the case, then maybe Olog-hai meant 'troll-men' or 'troll-humans', rather than 'troll-people'.
The only other use of hai which I am aware of, was the derogatory handle which orcs gave to the Woses, 'Ogor-hai' (sp?). I don't see why this wouldn't also seem to indicate some sort of half-human term, as the Orcs probably had no idea what the Woses were.
Anyway, I think that another bit of quotation which gives this theory credence, comes from the mouth (pen) of Tolkien himself, while discussing Saruman in Morgoths Ring

"... his wickedest deed: the interbreeding of Orcs and Men, producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile."
(thank you Cian).

According to the theory, Men-orcs and Orc-men (the names Tolkien uses here) would be the translations from the black speech of Uruk-hai, which these particular orcs call themselves.
Why not?

[Cian]

Well, I don't think I've been on either side, but I do have a few comments to add :)

Originally posted by Greenwood
The first sentence clearly refers makes uruk refer to Mordor orcs as in examples 8 to 11, but the second sentence use of Uruk-hai does not automatically make the two terms equivalent and I find it interesting that Tolkien captilizes Uruk-hai as if it is a specifc name, but does not do the same with uruk.

There it would be normal not to capitalize the word uruk as the context is linguistic, ie about the Black Speech word itself, as a word. Just as if JRRT wrote the word sinda ("grey") and then followed with nominal plural Sindar meaning "Grey-ones" or "Grey-elves".

That said, Tolkien does capitalize the word Uruk in LotR anyway, though not in all instances, and also in Unfinished Tales.

However, this is a draft piece which Tolkien did not use in LOTR and hence can be assumed to not be in a final form.

As I mentioned in the other thread, in reference to UT's The Battles of the Fords of Isen, this was not a draft for LoTR however. This is Tolkien writing about his mythology years after the publication of LotR, using "Uruks" throughout. For clarity, as your sentence might imply that it was written at the time of writing LotR. Christopher Tolkien defines this as a 'late' narrative.

Cian also posted many examples of third party "Tolkien scholars" repeating the definition of uruk as being an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai.

Tolkien linguistic scholars, yes (though some clearly know the works outside of the linguistic arena). We don't know the specific work process behind each opinion I gave, but I can say generally that they (the ling folk) often enough have different opinions about X and express such, like we do here :) In any case good scholarship is not simple parroting of course, and some of these folks publish, or want to.

I have come across references which claim that Uruk-hai is a plural form of Uruk, which clearly does not fit Tolkien's usage since he uses both uruk and uruks.

Compare Silmaril and "Silmarils" and Silmarilli though. Quenya pluralization Silmarilli along with anglicized Silmarils.

Just my comments to those points anyway. Cheers

[Wildcat98]

The way I see it, Uruk-hai is a subset of uruk. Uruks being a larger soldier type of orc first developed by Sauron. Uruk-hai are then a further advanced form of uruk. So therefore all Uruk-hai are Uruks, but only Sauraman's Uruks are considered Uruk-hai.

This would explain why in #12 Uruks are said to have come from both Mordor and Isengard.

"though this was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time issued from Mordor and Isengard."

[Grond]

Why don't we try this from a different tack. Does anyone remember if the Uruks could withstand sunlight. If there is proof that the Uruks were afraid of sunlight then we have a match and someone wins the Double Jeapordy prize. If Uruks were able to withstand sunlight, then we may be talking about the same thing.

I personally think Saruman (oops...edited from Sauron to Saruman)to did some breeding of his own and came up with a totally different animal. But the proof is in the pudding, as they say, so someone find the answer. Okay, okay, I'll look too.:)

[Greenwood]

Cian

My apologies for implying that you had taken a position on either side of the discussion on the other thread. I wanted to give credit to all who contibuted direct quotes, but I did not want to imply that everyone shared the same opinion. Also thank you for another excellent post.

To give my views on a few of your points: I find it interesting that Tolkien (so far as I have been able to find) is quite consistent in always capitilizing Uruk-hai whenever he uses it, thus treating it as a proper name, but, as you say is inconsistent in captilizing uruk, only doing so about half the time in LOTR. If Uruk-hai were merely a plural form of uruk in another language I do not see why Tolkien would always capitilize it and only use it (except in example 12 which is ambiguous) to refer to Saruman's orc troops.

I should have been clearer in my original post. I think there are two related, but independent questions here. The first is: Does Tolkien, in LOTR, use the terms uruk and Uruk-hai interchangeably. In my opinion he does not. The word Uruk-hai occurs ten times in LOTR (counting the multiple uses in example 5); in eight cases it clearly refers to Saruman's troops and the remaining two cases are ambiguous. So far there have been six cases found in LOTR of the term Uruks/uruks/uruk being used; in five cases they are unambigously Sauron's troops; only in appendix F (example 12) are Sauron's and Saruman's troops referred to together (see below for my thoughts on that). The second question is what precisely do the two terms mean and what is their etymology. This is of course related to the first question, but not the same question.

I thank you for the clarification on when UT's The Battles of the Fords of Isen was written. However, since Tolkien never made any attempt to include it in LOTR, for instance in a later edition, I do not think it can be considered to be in a final form and hence is in a sense a draft. His use of the term Uruks is inconsistent in this piece with his use in LOTR. If he actually included it in a later edition of LOTR Tolkien probably would have made the usage consistent, or would have had the inconsistency brought to his attention. This is precisely why I say that all Tolkien's posthumously published material is a secondary source when we are looking at possible inconsistencies within LOTR.


Aragil

Your suggestion of the suffix -hai meaing "men" (or "half-men" in conjunction with orc or troll or Woses) makes sense to me given the usage of the terms in LOTR. Certainly, more sense than the definitions I have seen from the published "scholars". I started this thread to see if anyone had any idea why the scholars used their definition instead of something like this one.


Wildcat98

You make an excellent point. In the earlier incarnation of this discussion on the movie forum I suggested that the most inclusive term would be orcs. Uruks are then a subset of orcs, specifically the large, soldier orcs originally used by Sauron and the Uruk-hai are a further subset, specifically the large, light-tolerant soldier orcs "created" by Saruman. Thus as you say all Uruk-hai could be considered uruks (and orcs), but not all uruks are Uruk-hai. And while all uruks and Uruk-hai are orcs, not all orcs are either uruks or Uruk-hai.


Grond

The light tolerance question was raised on the other thread also (by Thrakerzog ?, perhaps Aragil?). Other than the Uruk-hai, who boast of their disdain for the sun, the only time I can remember any orcs unambiguously being active in daylight is inthe crossing of Rohan with Merry and Pippin. There we seem to have at least two and probably three kinds of orcs: 1) the Uruk-hai from Isengard led by Ugluk, 2) orcs of unspecified type from Mordor led by Grishnak, and 3) smaller, northern orcs apparently from Moria come to seek revenge for the Fellowship's trespass in Moria. Tolkien clearly has the Uruk-hai in charge, driving the other orcs and jeering at them for their weakness in the sun. The fact that even the Moria orcs could function in daylight would indicate that while orcs are not happy in the sun, they can function in it at need; i.e. they are not totally incapacitated by the sun or turned into stone like trolls. Grishnak leaves the group and later catches up again with some of his fellow Mordor orcs, so once again at great need, they seem able to abide the sun. In every other case I can think of in LOTR (or The Hobbit), orcs, other than the Uruk-hai, are only active at night or under cover of dense cloud provided by Sauron (as in the Seige of Gondor). Perhaps someone will remember something else. I just checked the ROTK for the final battle in front of the Black Gates and it does not appear to have been fought in full daylight. The few references to the light refer to the "grey light of early day" and "the sun gleamed red"; also "shadows" and "gloom" over Mordor. In any event, it does not sound like bright sunlight.

[Tar-Elenion]

Perhaps another look at '-hai' should be taken, particularly in reference to the 'Olog-hai'.

[Ossiriand Blade]

The easiest explanation is that uruk,black speech for orc,refers to pure bred orcs wheras uruk-hai means half orc,an orc crossed with man.Tolkien uses this elsewhere with olog and olog-hai,or troll and half troll.

[Lantarion]

I think that both Uruk and Uruk-hai are the same thing; it is simply easier to say uruk (ie. 'orc') than to say 'one of the Uruk-hai'. Unless I am mistaken, -hai is Morbeth, and means 'people, folk'. So Uruk-hai means 'orc-folk'. It is like saying "British people" and "a Briton". Uruk-hai is just the 'formal' way of saying 'orcs'. IMHO, at least.

[Cian]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Cian My apologies for implying that you had taken a position on either side of the discussion on the other thread.

Thanks and no apology needed really. I was just nitpicking about my "fence-sitting" there.

If Uruk-hai were merely a plural form of uruk in another language I do not see why Tolkien would always capitilize it and only use it (except in example 12 which is ambiguous) to refer to Saruman's orc troops.

Hmmm, it's not capitalized with the reference to "uruks" as a seeming "race" ("In the last years of Denethor I the race of uruks, ..."). Might need to look closer here ...

Aside: the HoMe quote I gave elsewhere seems to put a stamp on "training" interestingly, in that the word uruk ultimately referred specially to "trained and disciplined Orcs", though indeed lesser "breeds" were snaga

Anyway, perhaps we should look to UT where Tolkien seems to get quite consistent with his frequent enough, capitalized Uruks. Heheh ;)

... in eight cases it clearly refers to Saruman's troops and the remaining two cases are ambiguous.

But remember that 6 of 8 quotes you point out here are "Uruk-hai" (or a member of) calling themselves "Uruk-hai" and the seventh is the chapter name. We may simply look at this as maybe due to circumstance of chosen "scene(s)", ie do we have another scene(s) in which the troops of Mordor are being so vocal about themselves, and using "we are the fighting uruks ... " rather? Or similar.

I thank you for the clarification on when UT's The Battles of the Fords of Isen was written. However, since Tolkien never made any attempt to include it in LOTR, for instance in a later edition, I do not think it can be considered to be in a final form and hence is in a sense a draft. His use of the term Uruks is inconsistent in this piece with his use in LOTR. If he actually included it in a later edition of LOTR Tolkien probably would have made the usage consistent, or would have had the inconsistency brought to his attention. This is precisely why I say that all Tolkien's posthumously published material is a secondary source when we are looking at possible inconsistencies within LOTR

I understand your general view here. But will you briefly (as if I should ask you to be brief! considering how long this one's likely to come out ~ LoL) explain what you mean on how Tolkien's use of Uruks in The Battles of the Fords of Isen is "inconsistent" with that of LotR?

Here's CT's characterization of the narrative in any case (while I'm rambling here anyway), of the Isen Battles narrative, it:

"... belongs with other late pieces of severe historical analysis; it presented relatively little difficulty of a textual kind, and is only unfinished in the most obvious sense."

It breaks off in mid sentence (Garn it!). Compare this to Christopher Tolkien's introductory remarks regarding The History of Galadriel and Celeborn though ~ that this is an Unfinished Tale "... in the larger sense: not a narrative that comes to an abrupt halt".

That speaks to consistency in relation to published writings of course, any many Tolkien fans already know about the history of G & C in that light. Also, CT's general notes say that he has made no alterations (in UT) for the sake of consistency with published works, but still has rather: "drawn attention throughout to conflicts and variations".

And Imo, the use of Uruks cannot be easily tagged as an editorial "shift in nomenclature" (also mentioned in CT's intro) ... an editorial shift from "Uruk-hai" that is, because had U-h been used, it could hardly be said to fall into the category of "disproportionate confusion" I think. Cheers

I'm winded (for now)
:)

[Greenwood]

But remember that 6 of 8 quotes you point out here are "Uruk-hai" (or a member of) calling themselves "Uruk-hai" and the seventh is the chapter name. We may simply look at this as maybe due to circumstance of chosen "scene(s)", ie do we have another scene(s) in which the troops of Mordor are being so vocal about themselves, and using "we are the fighting uruks ... " rather?

Cian

A couple of quick comments at the end of my lunch break.

But see my example 6: In The Return of the King, in the chapter The Seige of Gondor there is the following sentence: "No hours so dark had Pippin known, not even in the clutches of the Uruk-hai."

In this case it is not any character using the term Uruk-hai to refer to Saruman's troops, but the book's "narrator" himself, Tolkien.


But will you briefly (as if I should ask you to be brief! considering how long this one's likely to come out ~ LoL) explain what you mean on how Tolkien's use of Uruks in The Battles of the Fords of Isen is "inconsistent" with that of LotR?

The inconsistency is that throughout LOTR Tolkien refers to Saruman's elite orc troops are referred to as Uruk-hai, but in The Battles of the Fords of Isen they are called Uruks.

[DGoeij]

This is a good thread. I do not have much more to add than to say that the addition -hai does look in the context of ME as something to refer to anything that has something to do with the human race. Which makes sense if you deal with several different races all the time.
But Pontifex makes sense with the idea that maybe it was just a kind of formal speach. These creatures from Isengard where pretty arrogant IMHO, being big, strong and able to endure sunlight. Maybe they where just used to boasting about themselves being: The Fighting Uruk-hai. Something like, I am John Doe, Big Bad Army Dude (not meant as an offence to people serving in the military, I just needed an example)

[Greenwood]

DGoeij

But in my examples 4, 6 and 8 it is the author (Tolkien) who uses the term Uruk-hai, not one of the Uruk-hai themselves. And in example 7 it is a Mordor orc who refers to a "pack of rebel Uruk-hai". None of these fit into the idea of an individual engaging in boasting about himself.

[DGoeij]

D'oh,
that thought popped up when I was typing. You're right, away with the boasting theory. Interesting problem nonetheless. I'll keep an eye on this thread.

[Grond]

One can't be sure this issue will ever be resolved. It appears from the text that the author himself didn't feel this should have been an issue. He never once (that I can find) sees fit to actually define the Uruk-hai. His descriptions and use of the term make me feel they are an entirely different breed of Orc.... but if we're so confused and the topic is so confusing, why didn't the author address it? Surely, learned tho all of us may be, this question has come up before the author's death. A real conundrum!!:confused:

[Greenwood]

His descriptions and use of the term make me feel they are an entirely different breed of Orc.

Grond

That certainly seems (to me) to be the way he uses the terms.

One can't be sure this issue will ever be resolved. It appears from the text that the author himself didn't feel this should have been an issue.

To me it seems the only reason it is an issue is because some "Tolkien scholars" have advanced definitions at odds with the apparent meanings in LOTR. When I started this thread it was because I wondered if anyone had any evidence as to what the "Tolkie scholars" based their definitions on. I suppose short of writing them individually we will not know.

[Grond]

Originally posted by Greenwood
To me it seems the only reason it is an issue is because some "Tolkien scholars" have advanced definitions at odds with the apparent meanings in LOTR. When I started this thread it was because I wondered if anyone had any evidence as to what the "Tolkie scholars" based their definitions on. I suppose short of writing them individually we will not know. The ultimate Tolkien scholar was the author himself. In all of his published works, there are deatailed descriptions of most of the races of Middle-earth. Specifically in the Appendices of RotK. There it speaks of Orcs. In his works which were published after his death there are definitions and indexes that could have answered this question very easily. My question is still the same. This question surely came up before the death of the author. This reader-student-scholor of Tolkien can't understand why we are debating an answer. The author should have answered it.

I am going to write a letter to CT himself and see what/if he responds. Of course, I know that won't satisfy you Greenwood since he is a secondary source.:rolleyes: :D

[Greenwood]

I am going to write a letter to CT himself and see what/if he responds. Of course, I know that won't satisfy you Greenwood since he is a secondary source

Grond

Actually, I would find CT's take on the whole question interesting given that his entry in the index of UT conflicts with the apparent meaning in LOTR. It would not surprise me if the various Tolkien scholars were relying on CT's index entry in UT, a not unreasonable thing for them to do, but it does demonstrate the dangers of not going back to the primary source that I have been stressing. What I wonder about is that the Tolkien reference book (by JEA Tyler) that Greymantle cited on the earlier thread actually predates the publication of UT. So, did CT use an outside source when making up his index or is Greymantle's copy of the reference book a later edition that incorporated material from UT?


This question surely came up before the death of the author. This reader-student-scholor of Tolkien can't understand why we are debating an answer. The author should have answered it.

Perhaps the question never came up before Tolkien's death because the usage is clear in LOTR? At least it always seemed clear to me. Without CT's index entry in UT and without third party "scholars" opinions, it would still seem clear.

[Grond]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Perhaps the question never came up before Tolkien's death because the usage is clear in LOTR? At least it always seemed clear to me. Without CT's index entry in UT and without third party "scholars" opinions, it would still seem clear. What would have made it clear is the author discussing Orcs, Uruks and Uruk-hai in the Appendix under Orcs. That would have left nothing open for discussion. This blaring ommission makes one wonder as to what the proper answer is. It matters not what CT says or Tolkien scholars, the author should have included the information in the Appendix to LotR. So I hold the author's feet to the fire for not clearing the matter up.

I must say that it astounds me that we all think we know more about this conflicted issue than the author's son. He was his father's confidant and sounding board. But I still see enough evidence in the works to disagree with him; but, I am able to see that there are definately two sides to this issue.;)

[Greenwood]

So I hold the author's feet to the fire for not clearing the matter up.

Grond

Poor old JRR! I hope you aren't drummed out of the purist's league for that one. :) :)

[Grond]

There are times that even a great author makes a mistake. JRRT admitted as much on several occassions. If I'm drummed out of the purist elite for simply stating something the author himself portrayed, then so be it. I still consider myself a purist but I guess one would say I am a "realistic" purist or a purist resigned to the fact that the author is dead and not here to lend us his expertise. For anyone to say how the author would feel today if he saw the movie is ludicrous. He said over thirty years ago that his book wasn't a suitable subject for a movie (probably because of it's narrative style and the limited ability to render the world believable); however, with today's graphics and the right screenplay (maybe even PJ's although I'm sure the author would object to Arwen's expanded role :)) it is possible that the author would have been "tickled pink" with a movie version of his book.

Who's to say? Certainly not the ever so humble Grond.;)

[Aldanil]

Although I think it very likely that Ronald would have been (most justifiably) horrified at quite a number of things that were done to his book in the course of this movie, the willful mangling / manufacturing of Arwen's character not least among them, I also have to concur with my main man the Mace that Tolkien's effort in creating the secondary world which he bequeathed to us was not an exercise in perfect certainty; the chapter on "The Problem of Ros"in The Peoples of Middle-earth shows that he very often struggled at length, and sometimes unsuccessfully, to bring all the fine details into agreement with one another and his own conception. Given the truly prodigious quantity and quality of his authorial invention, it seems only natural that there are gaps and lacunae left for subsequent explorers of Arda to wander around in. I'd further affirm with our humble Hammer that a screenplay might be written which would have pleased him; had PJ and his co-conspirators spent as much time working on the script as they did on all the other cinematic wonders on display at a theater near you, they might have come a little closer to it. Finally, any surety of ours, thirty years after the author's death, about how he would have reacted to the current movie must be speculative at best, if not necessarily "ludicrous". As I started by saying, I believe he would not have been happy by half, but we can hardly be certain, and one would like to imagine he would have found some solace in the tremendous success of a film derived from his Tale, however much flawed it might otherwise be.

All this is probably better suited to one of the movie forums, I'm sure, but Grond's comment got me going...

[Tar-Elenion]

Originally posted by Ossiriand Blade
The easiest explanation is that uruk,black speech for orc,refers to pure bred orcs wheras uruk-hai means half orc,an orc crossed with man.Tolkien uses this elsewhere with olog and olog-hai,or troll and half troll.

There is nothing in the corpus that indicates 'hai' is used for 'half'. The Uruk-hai are not 'Half-orcs' (a cross breed of Men and Orcs) and the Olog-hai are not 'Half-trolls' (a cross breed of Men and Trools). Try reading App. F, I, Other Races, Trolls.

[Greenwood]

The Uruk-hai are not 'Half-orcs' (a cross breed of Men and Orcs)

Tar-Elenion

Actually there are a number of indications in LOTR that the Uruk-hai are a some sort of half-breed, probably with men. Here are three quotations form LOTR:

A) In The Two Towers in the chapter "Treebeard", Treebeard says in talking about Saruman: "He has taken up with foul folk, with the Orcs. Brm, hoom! Worse than that he has been doing something to them; something dangerous. For these Isengarders are more like wicked Men. It is a mark of evil things that came in the Great Darkness that they cannot abide the Sun; but Saruman's Orcs can endure it, even if they hate it. I wonder what he has done? Are they Men he has ruined, ir has he blended the races of Orcs and Men? That would be a black evil!" (While not using the term Uruk-hai directly, this quote specifically suggests that the elite orc troops of Saruman that are capable of fighting in daylight, unlike orcs in general, were created by blending orcs and men.

B) Again in the chapter "Helm's Deep", Glamling says: "But these creatures of Isengard, these half-orcs and goblin-men that the foul craft of Saruman has bred, they will not quail at the sun." (Another character, not Treebeard, describes Isengard's, i. e. Saruman's, troops as being half breeds whose specialty is being able to fight in the sun.)

C) In The Two Towers in the chapter "Flotsam and Jetsam", Aragorn says: "We had many of these half-orcs to deal with at Helm's Deep." (Yet another character referring to Saruman's orc troops as "half-breeds" or a blending of races.

Tolkien does not say specifically how it is that the Olog-hai can endure the sun or where they came from. He does say that no one doubted that Sauron bred them and that as long as "the will of Sauron held sway over them" they could endure the sun.

[Grond]

Well said Greenwood. I was just getting ready to dig into the books for quotes myself. Alas, you beat me to it.

[Tar-Elenion]

-----------------
Quothe Greenwood:
Cian and other forum members pointed out the Index entry (by Christopher Tolkien) in Unfinished Tales that says: "Uruks -- Anglicized form of Uruk-hai of the Black Speech."

[and]

Actually, I would find CT's take on the whole question interesting given that his entry in the index of UT conflicts with the apparent meaning in LOTR. It would not surprise me if the various Tolkien scholars were relying on CT's index entry in UT, a not unreasonable thing for them to do, but it does demonstrate the dangers of not going back to the primary source that I have been stressing.
--------------------

That the entry in the index to UT is CT's not necessarily accurate. What CT said about the index is:
"In the event there was no index to The Lord of the Rings until the second edition of 1966, but my father's original rough draft has been preserved. From it I derived the plan of my index to The Silmarillion... and also, both there and in the index to this book, some of the translations and the wording of some of the 'definitions'."
UT, Introduction, The Istari


Also try Letter 78: "Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks..."

------------
Quote:

Actually there are a number of indications in LOTR that the Uruk-hai are a some sort of half-breed, probably with men. Here are three quotations form LOTR:

A) In The Two Towers in the chapter "Treebeard",
<snip>
----------------------

As you note, Treebeard does not specifically refer to the Uruk-hai.
And as JRRT said of Treebeard (and Treebeard's reference to Orcs): "Treebeard is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and some earthy wisdom, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot that he does not know or understand."
Letter 153

--------------
Quote:
B) Again in the chapter "Helm's Deep", Glamling says: "But these creatures of Isengard, these half-orcs and goblin-men that the foul craft of Saruman has bred, they will not quail at the sun." (Another character, not Treebeard, describes Isengard's, i. e. Saruman's, troops as being half breeds whose specialty is being able to fight in the sun.)
-----------------------

Replace 'Treebeard' with 'Gamling' in the above quote.

--------------
Quote:
C) In The Two Towers in the chapter "Flotsam and Jetsam", Aragorn says: "We had many of these half-orcs to deal with at Helm's Deep." (Yet another character referring to Saruman's orc troops as "half-breeds" or a blending of races.
---------------------------

You would be better served by providing a fuller context, particularly by noting that Aragorns reference to 'half-orcs' is in responce to Merry speaking of 'marching Orcs', and 'troops [of Orcs] on great wolves', and 'battalions of Men, most ordinary looking but others that were horrible with goblin-faces'.


Now go to UT, Battles of the Fords of Isen.
"In its van were some Dunlending horsemen and a great pack of the dreadful Orcish wolfriders, feared by horses. Behind them came two battalions of the fierce Uruks... The garrison of the east bank, surprised by the sudden assault of the massed Uruks was swept away... they were driven from the Fords... with the Uruks in pursuit".
"As soon as the enemy had gained possession of the eastern end of the Fords there appeard a company of men or orc-men (evidently dispatched for the purpose), ferocious, mail-clad, and armed with axes... Theodred fell, hewn down by a great orc-man."

There is a clear distinction here between Orcs (the lesser variety small enough to ride wolves), Uruks (or Uruk-hai) and, Orc-men (or Half-orcs).

-------------------
Quote:
Tolkien does not say specifically how it is that the Olog-hai can endure the sun or where they came from. He does say that no one doubted that Sauron bred them and that as long as "the will of Sauron held sway over them" they could endure the sun.
---------------------

He also says "Trolls they were". Not Man-trolls, or Troll-men.

[Greenwood]

Tar-Elenion

my father's original rough draft has been preserved. From it I derived the plan of my index to The Silmarillion... and also, both there and in the index to this book, some of the translations and the wording of some of the 'definitions'."

And how do we, the readers, know what is JRR Tolkien and what is C Tolkien? He says he derived the "plan" of "my" index. This hardly sounds like we can take the whole index as being definitively JRR Tolkien's.

Also try Letter 78: "Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks..."

This is indeed interesting. This is the first time I have seen any reference to Tolkien ever discussing Uruk-hai. Can you give us some background and context for this quotation? To who and when was it written? Was Tolkien answering a question and if he was, what was it? Can you put the above quote in context? What comes before and after it?


As you note, Treebeard does not specifically refer to the Uruk-hai.
And as JRRT said of Treebeard (and Treebeard's reference to Orcs): "Treebeard is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and some earthy wisdom, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot that he does not know or understand."
Letter 153

Who or what else could Treebeard be referring to? There are repeated references to the Uruk-hai being some form of orc, that they belong to Saruman and that they do not care about sunlight. As for the Tolkien letter, the same questions as for the above letter. When did Tolkien write this and to who and what is the context? We know that Tolkien kept changing his mind about the origins of orcs; to such an extent that it seems it is impossible to resolve the question about orcs' origins because Tolkien himself never resolved it to his own satisfaction.


Replace 'Treebeard' with 'Gamling' in the above quote.

It is always a quaint conceit when an author treats his fictional characters as completely seperate personas from himself, but he did write them and put those words in their mouths. Following the above reasoning for Treebeard and now Gamling means we might as well not try to figure out what Tolkien meant on anything in his books. You are not seriously arguing that we treat LOTR as an actual history of real events and Tolkien is just repeating real people's conversations?


You would be better served by providing a fuller context, particularly by noting that Aragorns reference to 'half-orcs' is in responce to Merry speaking of 'marching Orcs', and 'troops [of Orcs] on great wolves', and 'battalions of Men, most ordinary looking but others that were horrible with goblin-faces'.

If you want a fuller context, you should give it. The full sentences before Aragorn's statement are (Merry speaking): " 'Most of them were ordinary men, rather tall and dark-haired, and grim but not particularly evil-looking. But there were some others that were horrible: man-high, but with goblin-faces, sallow, leering, squint-eyed. Do you know, they reminded me at once of that Southerner at Bree; only he was not so obviously orc-like as most of these were.' " It then continues: " 'I thought of him too,' said Aragorn. 'We had many of these half-orcs to deal with at Helm's Deep.' "

We have four of Tolkien's characters Treebeard, Gamling, Merry and Aragorn all clearly saying that these troops of Saruman's are not normal orcs, nor normal men, but something in between. Maybe Tolkien was changing his mind in later years, but he never changed what he wrote in LOTR and it is pretty clear that in LOTR these are some sort of half-orc/half-man creatures. I do not see how these passages can be reasonably read in any other way.

Now as to the Battles of the Fords of Isen in Unfinished Tales I have stated at great length on other threads (see for example The Council of Elrond thread) why Tolkien's posthumously published works cannot be used to argue against the clear meaning of things in LOTR. Here I will only repeat part of Christopher Tolkien's Introduction to Unfinished Tales: "The problems that confront one given responsibility for the writings of a dead author are hard to resolve. Some persons in this position may elect to make no material whatsoever available for publication, save perhaps for work that was in a virtually finished state at the time of the author's death. In the case of the unpublished writings of J. R. R. Tolkien this might seem at first sight the proper course; since he himself, peculiarly critical and exacting of his own work, would not have dreamt of allowing even the more completed narratives in this book to appear without much further refinement. [emphasis added] Also germane is Christopher Tolkien's remarks in the Introduction to The Silmarillion: "A complete consistency (either within the compass of The Silmarillion itself or between The Silmarillion and other published writings of my father's) is not to be looked for .... " This certainly holds true for all of Tolkien's unpublished work.


He also says "Trolls they were". Not Man-trolls, or Troll-men.

No where have I ever said that Olog-hai were crossbreeds or half anything. I said Tolkien said they could abide the sun when normal trolls could not and that Tolkien does not specify how this ability is arrived at. I have never said that -hai meant half. That was Ossiriand Blade's suggestion. I do not agree with it. I think an argument could be made that the suffix -hai refers to a sun tolerant ability in a creature that normally cannot abide, or shuns the sun, but I have not done enough research into LOTR to see if there are any exceptions that would argue against that.

[Cian]

Originally posted by Greenwood
But see my example 6: In The Return of the King, in the chapter The Seige of Gondor there is the following sentence: "No hours so dark had Pippin known, not even in the clutches of the Uruk-hai." In this case it is not any character using the term Uruk-hai to refer to Saruman's troops, but the book's "narrator" himself, Tolkien.

My usually bad math attests that I'm aware of example 6 :) but this is my point here actually, to the number of quotes and to their characterization. You have shown (so far) one quote in the narrative voice that points to Saruman's elite as -hai.

On the net, an orc enthusiast called "Shagrat" points out the same thing, when he says: "It's noteworthy that "Uruk-hai" is almost never used by the narrative voice in LotR."

The inconsistency is that throughout LOTR Tolkien refers to Saruman's elite orc troops are referred to as Uruk-hai, but in The Battles of the Fords of Isen they are called Uruks.

As said, Tolkien is "narrator" in UT, and in this way the Prof refers to Saruman's elite not throughout LotR with -hai, but once rather, using the examples given so far ~ generally note that "Uruks" occurs something like 9 times in UT I think.

Another mention about a quote given: when we do get to orc-eavesdrop a bit in Mordor, indeed we see the term "Uruk-hai" pop up ~ and "rebel" Uruk-hai, which (arguably anyway), might imply that there are non-rebel "Uruk-hai". A point such as it is anyway. Cheers

[Greenwood]

Another mention about a quote given: when we do get to orc-eavesdrop a bit in Mordor, indeed we see the term "Uruk-hai" pop up ~ and "rebel" Uruk-hai, which (arguably anyway), might imply that there are non-rebel "Uruk-hai". A point such as it is anyway.

Cian

It could equally be argued that to a Mordor orc, all Uruk-hai are rebels because they are Saruman's troops.

If one accepts the (I believe reasonable and justifiable) premise that uruk and Uruk-hai refer to subsets of the broader category of "orcs" and that uruk refers to Sauron's large, soldier orcs from Mordor and that Uruk-hai are a further refinement of uruks and refers to Saruman's elite, sun-tolerant orcs (these last two premises also seem reasonable and justifiable to me) than there are no inconsistencies within LOTR. All the examples given fit within this framework. It is only when material written by people other than Tolkien or Tolkien's posthumously published Battles of the Fords of Isen are considered that there is any inconsistency. I have repeatedly given the reasons why posthumously published material cannot be used in a case such as this (see my response to Tar-Elenion). We are left with an inconsistency apparently created by others, not Tolkien. If Tar-Elenion can give the relevant information about the letter he mentions in which Tolkien refers to Uruk-hai, then perhaps we can lay the inconsistency on Tolkien's doorstep. Based on what has been presented so far, I don't see how we can.

[Cian]

The quote is from a letter to Christopher Tolkien. Tar-E may elaborate or whatever, but here's a longer section:

"And of course, as you already discover, one of the discoveries of the process is the realization of the values that often lurk under dreadful appearances. Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks, that is folk made bad by the intention of their maker; and not many who are so corrupted as to be irredeemable (though I fear it must be admitted that there are human creatures that seem irredeemable short of a special miracle, ...) JRRT 1944

Another:

"But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs. Not that in real life things are as clear cut as in a story, and we started out with a great many Orcs on our side ... Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai. Keep up your hobbitry in heart, and think that all stories feel like that when you are in them." 1944 to CT

[Greenwood]

Cian

Thank you for the expanded material. Tar-Elenion's use of the quote was clearly out of context and not relevant to this discussion.

[aragil]

Just thought that I'd remark on the fact that quotes 2 and 9 (from the first page of this thread) seem to be in almost exactly the same context: 'Other people have messed up, now it is time for the biggest, meanest orcs to take care of it.' Both are referring to a group of orcs (plural), and both are essentially bragging about the abilities of big orcs. However, the Mordor orc says uruks, the Isengard orc says Uruk-hai. I think that it is lucky that the two terms are both used in virtually the same context, and I think it is useful to note how the two terms seem to make a distinction between the orcs of Mordor and those of Isengard.

Regarding secondary sources:
http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/g/greatorcs.html
What I love about this entry is that it addresses the fact that the characters seem to regard the orcs of Isengard as a new race, but rather than following suit the encyclopedia insists that the characters in the book were wrong and that the Uruk-hai are really just the uruks, despite the fact that there is no use of the term Uruk-hai used anywhere between the fall of Ithilien and before the treason of Isengard.
I would also like to point out that Aragorn thinks that the orcs of Saruman (specifically those slain by Boromir at Amon hen) are different than any other orcs he's seen (he remarks about this), and he also claims to know more about orcs than any other man in Middle-Earth. It is to Aragorn that Gamling is speaking when he describes the half-orcs of Isengard. If Aragorn knew so much about orc-kind, and if the Uruk-hai were really just Uruks with white badges on, then it is unlikely that Aragorn would have been so perplexed by their appearance at Amon Hen, or that he wouldn't have corrected Gamling if the old warrior of Rohan was off base. Would Tolkien say:
"Aragorn is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and knows more of orc-kind than any man in Middle-Earth, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot that he does not know or understand."
Would anybody buy that as an excuse for Aragorn being unable to recognize that the Uruk-hai of Isengard are the same as the uruks which had been plaguing Middle-Earth for 500 years? Gandalf was able to recognize Uruks (from Mordor) in a matter of seconds while dodging arrows and trying to peer out of the chamber of Marzbul. Is there the slightest possibility that Uruks really are different from the Uruk-hai, and that perhaps Eomer, Glamding, Treebeard, and Aragorn really do know a little about Orcs?

[Tar-Elenion]

----------------
Quothe Greenwood"

And how do we, the readers, know what is JRR Tolkien and what is C Tolkien? He says he derived the "plan" of "my" index.
------------------------

He says 'my index' in reference to the Silmarillion. He says 'the index' for UT (which is what we are discussing).
Further he says he derived not only the 'plan' but used both the translations and wording of some definitions.

--------------------
Quote:
This hardly sounds like we can take the whole index as being definitively JRR Tolkien's.
------------------------


I did not say that the whole index could be definitively taken as JRRT's. What I did say was that the entry in question was not necessarily CT's.


But lets add some further circumstantial evidence. Robert Foster in his 'Complete Guide to Middle-earth' (which is useful despite some errors) notes the same thing, that 'uruks' is the "Anglicized" plural. It is odd that both CT and RF would use the same term, in the same circumstance, except that RF also had access to the (at that time) unpublished materials. So perhaps RF made it up, and CT (he did note that he found the Guide quite useful) simply lifted the terminology from RF. Or perhaps they are both drawing from the same source, JRRT and his index, with translations and wording.
Circumstantial, but intriguing none the less.



quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Also try Letter 78: "Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks..."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


-------------------
Quote:
This is indeed interesting. This is the first time I have seen any reference to Tolkien ever discussing Uruk-hai. Can you give us some background and context for this quotation? To who and when was it written? Was Tolkien answering a question and if he was, what was it? Can you put the above quote in context? What comes before and after it?
-----------------------

I take it, then, that you do not have Letters?

Certainly, though I note that Cian has given part of it, so I will respond below.



quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As you note, Treebeard does not specifically refer to the Uruk-hai.
And as JRRT said of Treebeard (and Treebeard's reference to Orcs): "Treebeard is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and some earthy wisdom, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot that he does not know or understand."
Letter 153
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


------------
Quote:
Who or what else could Treebeard be referring to? There are repeated references to the Uruk-hai being some form of orc, that they belong to Saruman and that they do not care about sunlight.
---------------

And also to Uruk-hai in Mordor. These would be Saurons.

-------------------
Quote:
As for the Tolkien letter, the same questions as for the above letter. When did Tolkien write this and to who and what is the context?
---------------------

He wrote it in 1954, to Peter Hastings, in responce to PH asking if he had not 'overstepped the mark in metaphysical matters regarding for example Treebeards statement that the Dark Lord created Trolls and Orcs'. Tolkien responded that Treebeard does not say 'created' but rather 'made in counterfeit', and that Treebeard does not know everything anyways (or words to that effect).

-----------------
Quote:
We know that Tolkien kept changing his mind about the origins of orcs; to such an extent that it seems it is impossible to resolve the question about orcs' origins because Tolkien himself never resolved it to his own satisfaction.
-------------------

Here we agree.



--------------------
Quote:
It is always a quaint conceit when an author treats his fictional characters as completely seperate personas from himself, but he did write them and put those words in their mouths. Following the above reasoning for Treebeard and now Gamling means we might as well not try to figure out what Tolkien meant on anything in his books. You are not seriously arguing that we treat LOTR as an actual history of real events and Tolkien is just repeating real people's conversations?
------------------

I suggested no so thing. Though JRRT does note some such circumstances in any event, even in LotR itself.
Are you suggesting that we should just ignore what JRRT had to say about certain things just because it does not fit into a particular veiw?



quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
You would be better served by providing a fuller context, particularly by noting that Aragorns reference to 'half-orcs' is in responce to Merry speaking of 'marching Orcs', and 'troops [of Orcs] on great wolves', and 'battalions of Men, most ordinary looking but others that were horrible with goblin-faces'.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


------------------
If you want a fuller context, you should give it.
-------------------

My paraphrase was clear enough. And notes the different types that Merry was speaking of.


--------------------
Quote:
The full sentences before Aragorn's statement are (Merry speaking): " 'Most of them were ordinary men, rather tall and dark-haired, and grim but not particularly evil-looking. But there were some others that were horrible: man-high, but with goblin-faces, sallow, leering, squint-eyed. Do you know, they reminded me at once of that Southerner at Bree; only he was not so obviously orc-like as most of these were.' " It then continues: " 'I thought of him too,' said Aragorn. 'We had many of these half-orcs to deal with at Helm's Deep.' "
-----------------------

You left out the preceeding sentences where Merry speaks of the "endless lines of marching Orcs; and troops of them mounted on great wolves. And there were battalions of Men too[and then continue with the quote you provided above]."

Which of course ties in neatly with the 'Fords of Isen' narrative.

---------------------
Quote:
We have four of Tolkien's characters Treebeard, Gamling, Merry and Aragorn all clearly saying that these troops of Saruman's are not normal orcs, nor normal men, but something in between.
----------------------

We also have Merry and Pippin captured by the Uruk-hai, but do they ever call them Orc-men, or Man-orcs, or Half-orcs?
Note also"The Orcs yelled and jeered. 'Come down! Come down!' they cried... We are the fighting Uruk-hai."
The 'Orcs' are the Uruk-hai, not the Half-orcs, or Orc-men.

We know that _some_ of these troops are 'Half-orcs'. We do not have any defintive statement that the Uruk-hai are the 'Half-orcs'.
We do know that Saruman interbred Orcs and Men, in MR, JRRT refers to these as 'Saruman's wickedest deed producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile' (Morgoth's Ring pg 419), but he does not refer to these as Uruk-hai.

----------------
Quote:
Maybe Tolkien was changing his mind in later years, but he never changed what he wrote in LOTR
------------------

And perhaps he did not change his mind at all.

------------------
Quote:
and it is pretty clear that in LOTR these are some sort of half-orc/half-man creatures. I do not see how these passages can be reasonably read in any other way.
--------------------

I have not suggested that there were not any 'half/orc/half man creatures. What I have suggested is that the Uruks are not Half-orcs.

-----------------------
Quote:
Now as to the Battles of the Fords of Isen in Unfinished Tales I have stated at great length on other threads (see for example The Council of Elrond thread)
-----------------------

I will look at it.

-----------------
Quote:
why Tolkien's posthumously published works cannot be used to argue against the clear meaning of things in LOTR.
------------------

Yes they can. And they can also be used to clarify what is actually intended by the author himself.
------------------------
<some snipage>
Quote:
Also germane is Christopher Tolkien's remarks in the Introduction to The Silmarillion: "A complete consistency (either within the compass of The Silmarillion itself or between The Silmarillion and other published writings of my father's) is not to be looked for .... " This certainly holds true for all of Tolkien's unpublished work.
---------------------------

Not necessarily. In many cases there is great consistancy. And when further clarity and insight into the Legendarium is offered by the posthumously published corpus it should be utilized, even if it forces one to put aside preconceived notions.


--------------------
Quote:
No where have I ever said that Olog-hai were crossbreeds or half anything. I said Tolkien said they could abide the sun when normal trolls could not and that Tolkien does not specify how this ability is arrived at. I have never said that -hai meant half. That was Ossiriand Blade's suggestion. I do not agree with it.
-------------------

Excellent.

------------------
Quote:
I think an argument could be made that the suffix -hai refers to a sun tolerant ability in a creature that normally cannot abide, or shuns the sun, but I have not done enough research into LOTR to see if there are any exceptions that would argue against that.
-------------------

It would be interesting to see that kind of argument.
However the Druedain are named Oghor-hai by the Orcs. The Druedain were Men and not of some creature that was normally sun-intolerant.

[Tar-Elenion]

-------------
Quothe aragil:
Would anybody buy that as an excuse for Aragorn being unable to recognize that the Uruk-hai of Isengard are the same as the uruks which had been plaguing Middle-Earth for 500 years? Gandalf was able to recognize Uruks (from Mordor) in a matter of seconds while dodging arrows and trying to peer out of the chamber of Marzbul. Is there the slightest possibility that Uruks really are different from the Uruk-hai, and that perhaps Eomer, Glamding, Treebeard, and Aragorn really do know a little about Orcs?
----------------

Is there any possibilty that JRRT might know what he is speaking of? There are Uruk-hai in Mordor as well, (refer to Cian's quote above), and JRRT refers to Saruman's as Uruks.
In any event I am not arguing that there were not differences between Sauron's Uruks and Saruman's Uruks. What I am debating is whether they were 'Half-orcs' or not. The Half-orcs are a seperate group, as is distinguished by the author. I am also debating that 'uruks' is the 'Anglicized' form of 'uruk-hai'.

[Tar-Elenion]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Cian

Thank you for the expanded material. Tar-Elenion's use of the quote was clearly out of context and not relevant to this discussion.

You may consider it irrelevant, but I do not.

Letter 78 shows JRRT using Urukhai and its 'Anglicized' counterpart 'Uruks'.

Letter 66 shows JRRT using the plural 'Orcs' and then refers to CT being among the 'Urukhai', again suggesting that 'Uruk-hai' is a plural form.

Thank you Cian for typing those out. :)

[Cian]

Little favor for Tal-Elmar, since "winging" it's way into better MB circulation ;)

[Greenwood]

Tar-Elenion

Your style of mixing one line quotes with one line answers is extremely difficult to read but I will do my best to interpret it and answer you points in the order you made them.

First in regards to the index in Unfinshed Tales. Are you seriously arguing that JRRT produced the index for a book published seven years after his death? I also suggest you look at the copyright page of UT. There you will find it says "Introduction, Commentary, Index, and Maps copyright 1980 by Christopher Reuel Tolkien. [emphasis added] Clearly the index, like the introduction and commentary are Christopher Tolkien's work, not his father's. As such they bear no more weight than any other outside party's writings, they are not JRRT's words. Robert Foster's work is equally worthless in regard to the question since we do not know on what it is based. You say yourself there are errors in it. You cannot arbitrarily decide that in cases where Foster agrees with you he is right without any further evidence. You say: "So perhaps RF made it up, and CT (he did note that he found the Guide quite useful) simply lifted the terminology from RF"! That is precisely the point! Thank you for making it for me. This may indeed have happened. Personally, I suspect it did, but I have no proof. The point is it cannot be ruled out. You continue: "Or perhaps they are both drawing from the same source, JRRT and his index". But there is no JRRT index for Unfinished Tales! It is Christopher Tolkien's index.


I take it, then, that you do not have Letters?

You are correct. I do not own a copy of Tolkien's Letters. Neither do a lot of other Forum members, that is why it is incumbent on someone quoting from them to give a full enough account so that readers can judge what you are quoting. I have thanked Cian for taking the trouble to give some of the context of the letter. The fuller quote provided by Cian is: "And of course, as you already discover, one of the discoveries of the process is the realization of the values that often lurk under dreadful appearances. Urukhai is only a figure of speech. There are no genuine Uruks, that is folk made bad by the intention of their maker; and not many who are so corrupted as to be irredeemable". Clearly, Tolkien is discussing the nature of "bad folk" and whether they are created that way by their maker. He is not talking about the terms uruk and Uruk-hai and their meanings relative to each other. Your limited quote was totally misleading. The quote is irrelevant to this discussion.

You then say in regard to my question of what else could Treebeard being referring to: "And also to Uruk-hai in Mordor. These would be Saurons." But there is not a single bit of unambiguous evidence that there are any Uruk-hai in Mordor except for your contention that uruk and Uruk-hai are equivalent. You are engaging in circular reasoning, you are assuming the two terms as equivalent and then using the results of that assumption to "proof" the assumption.

Thank you for the fuller context of Tolkien's letter to Peter Hastings. As with the earlier letter to Christopher Tolkien above we now see that Tolkien's comment about Treebeard has nothing to do with the subject under discussion, but was in reference to the creation of orcs and trolls, something we are not discussing here.

I repeat, it is a quaint conceit when an author treats his fictional characters as seperate personas. It is the author who puts the words in his fictional characters mouths, so they are indeed the authors words. I am not ignoring JRRT's words in LOTR. You are attempting to do that by citing outside sources like Robert Foster and Christopher Tolkien over JRRT's own words in LOTR.

Moving on, if you wish more of the passage from the chapter Flotsam and Jetsam, very well we will move several more sentences up. Merry speaking: " 'He emptied Isengard. I saw the enemy go: endless lines of marching Orcs; and troops of them mounted on great wolves. And there were battalions of Men, too. Many of them carried torches, and in the flare I could see their faces. Most of them were ordinary men, rather tall and dark-haired, and grim but not particularly evil-looking. But there were some others that were horrible: man-high, but with goblin-faces, sallow, leering, squint-eyed. Do you know, they reminded me at once of that Southerner at Bree; only he was not so obviously orc-like as most of these were.' " It then continues: " 'I thought of him too,' said Aragorn. 'We had many of these half-orcs to deal with at Helm's Deep.' " I fail to see how this longer quote in anyway changes Aragorn's statement calling them "half-orcs" and as Aragil has pointed out Aragorn is supposed to be one of the most knowledgeable men in all of Middle Earth on the subject of orcs. As for tying in with the "Fords of Isen", for the umpteenth time, Tolkien's posthumously published work cannot be used to refute the clear meaning of his words in LOTR.

You then go on to talk about Merry and Pippins capture and say that they do not call them half-orcs. But Merry and Pippin were captured by a mixed party. Some were Saruman's elite troops, the Uruk-hai. Some were Sauron's troops, but it is never specified whether they are the large uruks or the smaller kinds of orcs. And finally, some were definitely identified as the smaller, northern orcs from Moria. Therefore, of course, as a group Merry and Pippin would class them all as orcs. This was also Merry's and Pippin's first ever close-up encounter with orcs and not exactly the time to be composing a treatise on the different varieties.

Continuing, you say: "What I have suggested is that the Uruks are not Half-orcs." No one in this thread has suggested that uruks are half-orcs. This in fact is the opposite of what is being discussed. For you to even be arguing the point suggests you have not read and understood the thread. You seem to have jumped into the middle of it without understanding the discussion. The contention here is that uruks are a breed of orcs and that Uruk-hai are another kind of orc, belonging to Saruman who are light-tolerant and who are probably a blend of orcs (possibly uruks) and men.

Finally, on the subject of the suffix -hai you state: "However the Druedain are named Oghor-hai by the Orcs." The term Oghor-hai, as far as I can find appears no where in LOTR. The only reference I can find to it is a single mention in Unfinished Tales which appears to be the basis for your statement. There is no indication what-so-ever as to why orcs called the Druedain the Oghor-hai. Therefore, it could mean anything and cannot be used to argue for or against any meaning that might be considered for the suffix -hai.

[Grond]

Okay, I've been searching the works and have a few more tidbits of info to throw into the fire. They resolve the conflict for me but I know won't convince all or even any.

quote
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This quote is from Morgoth's Ring, Text X, Myths Transformed, it states, "Finally, there is a cogent point though horrible to relate. It became clear in time that undoubted Men could under the domination of Morgoth or his agents in a few generations be reduced almost to the Orc-level of mind and habits; and then they would or could be made to mate with Orcs, producing new breeds, often larger and more cunning. There is no doubt that long afterwards, in the Third Age, Saruman rediscovered this, or learned of it in lore, and in his lust for mastery committed this, his wickedest deed: interbreeding of Orcs and Men, producing both Men-orcs large and cunning, and Orc-men treacherous and vile...'
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end quote

Here is the perfect opportunity for the author (who wrote this passage himself) to clearly identify these half breeds as Uruk-hai and he does not. He instead refers to them as Men-orcs and Orc-men. We now have proof from the author's own hand that Saruman did indeed make Half-orcs as Tar-Elenion has stated. I now must agree with him that Uruk-hai does not identify them, else the author would have pointed it out in the referenced passage.

This quote also answers another thread about how orc's breed. I think my post back then was "the old fashioned way" and I think that this quote answers that riddle as well.

My logic is sound, even though this is from a later published source, it indicates clear evidence to me of the answer to the subject of this post. Argue if you will, but it is crystal clear to me.

That is my humble opinion, but I could be wrong.;)

***note***
I would like to emphasize that the quote above is that of JRRT and not CT. In my copy of Morgoth's Ring, CT's remarks are made in small type with JRRT's writings in large type.

[Greenwood]

Tar-Elenion

It was easiest to deal with your first long post in one reply, now I will reply to your shorter posts to Aragil and myself.

Is there any possibilty that JRRT might know what he is speaking of? There are Uruk-hai in Mordor as well, (refer to Cian's quote above), and JRRT refers to Saruman's as Uruks.
Nowhere in LOTR does Tolkien place Uruk-hai in Mordor. The only thing that even comes close is the reference to a "rebel pack of Uruk-hai" which can easily be understood as referring to Saruman's troops. Nowhere in LOTR are Saruman's troops referred to as uruks.


In any event I am not arguing that there were not differences between Sauron's Uruks and Saruman's Uruks. What I am debating is whether they were 'Half-orcs' or not. The Half-orcs are a seperate group, as is distinguished by the author. I am also debating that 'uruks' is the 'Anglicized' form of 'uruk-hai'.

No one is saying that uruks are half-orcs. You are apparently debating that with yourself. What we are saying is that the Uruk-hai are Saruman's elite troops and they are probably a blend of orcs and men. As to uruks being an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai, neither you nor anyone else has yet presented a single piece of hard, uncontovertible evidence for this contention.

Moving on to your next post, I discussed the first Tolkien letter in my previous post. Cian's longer quotation from it shows that it does not mean what you implied it meant.

Moving to the second letter (once again a thank you to Cian for supplying a fuller quotation) it says: "But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs. Not that in real life things are as clear cut as in a story, and we started out with a great many Orcs on our side ... Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai. Keep up your hobbitry in heart, and think that all stories feel like that when you are in them." Once again we see from the fuller quotation Tolkien is not saying what you implied he was saying. In the context of the letter orcs and Urukhai are not necessarily equivalent. The phrase "a hobbit amongst the Urukhai" in the context of Tolkien's writings would appear to be a reference to Merry's and Pippin's time in captivity during their trek across Rohan. Tolkien does not define Uruk-hai as the plural form of uruk.

Once again we are left solely with secondary sources stating that uruks and Uruk-hai are equivalent. There is nothing in Tolkien's writing to state this. It might indeed be a reasonable hypothesis, except for the fact that it does not explain Tolkien's usage of the two terms in LOTR. In LOTR he consistently uses Uruk-hai (always capitalized) to refer to Saruman's elite, sun-tolerant orc troops and uruks (sometimes capitalized, sometimes not) to refer to Sauron's large, soldier orcs. I find it hard to believe that this sort of consistency from a perfectionist, philogogist doesn't mean anything and that the terms are really interchangeable.

[Greenwood]

Grond

Thank you for your research. I accept it as JRRT's own writing and will not argue with it. It does indeed make clear that Saruman blended men and orcs. It does not, however, shed any direct light on the question of uruk and Uruk-hai being equivalent or not. There is no reason for JRRT to use the term Uruk-hai in the passage you cite.

If we accept Tar-Elenion's argument then we have the following in LOTR:

a) orcs -- (no problem here)
b) uruks/Uruk-hai -- these are in the employ of both Sauron and Saruman, but Saruman's have absolutely no problem with the sun, unlike all other orcs. Saruman's even boast about their disdain for the sun
c) orc/men hybrids bred by Saruman that are different from his sun tolerant Uruk-hai.

I hate to sound like Harad here and invoke logic, but if b) and c) are totally different, where did Saruman's sun tolerant Uruk-hai come from? Was this yet another unnamed deviltry of Saruman's? What of Treebeard's comments? Do we now dismiss them afterall. If Saruman's breeding experiments were not for the purpose of creating sun-tolerant orcs what were they for? The soldier uruks already existed. Isn't it far simpler to accept that Saruman's breeding experiments produced his sun-tolerant Uruk-hai? That seems crystal clear to me.

Well that is my opinion. :)

[Tar-Elenion]

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Quothe Greenwood:
Your style of mixing one line quotes with one line answers is extremely difficult to read but I will do my best to interpret it and answer you points in the order you made them.
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Thanks, I often find it easier to respond point by point.

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Quote:
First in regards to the index in Unfinshed Tales. Are you seriously arguing that JRRT produced the index for a book published seven years after his death?
<snip>
Clearly the index, like the introduction and commentary are Christopher Tolkien's work, not his father's. As such they bear no more weight than any other outside party's writings, they are not JRRT's words.
------------------------

I suggest you reread what I actually posted, including what CT said, about the index in UT (nowhere did I argue that JRRT 'produced' the UT index).
What CT said about the index is:
"In the event there was no index to The Lord of the Rings until the second edition of 1966, but my father's original rough draft has been preserved. From it I derived the plan of my index to The Silmarillion... and also, both there and in the index to this book, some of the translations and the wording of some of the 'definitions'."
UT, Introduction, The Istari
In otherwords, CT is saying that some of the translations and wordings and definitions in the UT (and Sil.) index are his father's.

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Quote:
Robert Foster's work is equally worthless in regard to the question since we do not know on what it is based. You say yourself there are errors in it. You cannot arbitrarily decide that in cases where Foster agrees with you he is right without any further evidence.
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But you can arbitrarily decide that JRRT's words in UT are wortheless, because they do not agree with your interpretation of passages in LotR?

In any event I did not decide or say that Foster was right, I said the evidence was 'circumstantial'. But nonetheless it is there. People can judge it how they wish. If you wish to arbitrarily dismiss it because it does not agree with your interpretation, that is your right. :)

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Quote:
You say: "So perhaps RF made it up, and CT (he did note that he found the Guide quite useful) simply lifted the terminology from RF"! That is precisely the point! Thank you for making it for me. This may indeed have happened. Personally, I suspect it did, but I have no proof. The point is it cannot be ruled out.
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Ah, the point also is that given the two sources saying the samething, both having access to JRRT's own notes and drafts it is entirely possible that this was drawn from JRRT's own notes. Indeed the circumstantial evidence points toward it.

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Quote:
You continue: "Or perhaps they are both drawing from the same source, JRRT and his index". But there is no JRRT index for Unfinished Tales! It is Christopher Tolkien's index.
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I did not say the _index in UT_ was JRRT's. I refer you again to the CT's statement about the index:
"In the event there was no index to The Lord of the Rings until the second edition of 1966, but my father's original rough draft has been preserved. From it I derived the plan of my index to The Silmarillion... and also, both there and in the index to this book, some of the translations and the wording of some of the 'definitions'."
The index I am referring to is the draft JRRT originally made for the LotR.


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Quote:
You are correct. I do not own a copy of Tolkien's Letters.
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That is a shame. You should look into getting a copy. It is very informative and there is a (relatively) new edition out.

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<snip>
Quote:
[In Letter 78]
Clearly, Tolkien is discussing the nature of "bad folk" and whether they are created that way by their maker. He is not talking about the terms uruk and Uruk-hai and their meanings relative to each other. Your limited quote was totally misleading. The quote is irrelevant to this discussion.
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What he is discussing may be irrelevant, but his use of the terms 'Uruks' and 'Urukhai' is not. He is using the 'Anglicized' form.


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Quote:
You then say in regard to my question of what else could Treebeard being referring to: "And also to Uruk-hai in Mordor. These would be Saurons." But there is not a single bit of unambiguous evidence that there are any Uruk-hai in Mordor except for your contention that uruk and Uruk-hai are equivalent--------------

Cian has already posted about Uruk-hai in Mordor.


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Quote:
Thank you for the fuller context of Tolkien's letter to Peter Hastings. As with the earlier letter to Christopher Tolkien above we now see that Tolkien's comment about Treebeard has nothing to do with the subject under discussion
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Welcome. The reference stands. JRRT was pointing out that characters in his works are not all knowing or otherwise always correct, which is the point I was making.

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Quote:
It is the author who puts the words in his fictional characters mouths, so they are indeed the authors words. I am not ignoring JRRT's words in LOTR. You are attempting to do that by citing outside sources like Robert Foster and Christopher Tolkien over JRRT's own words in LOTR.
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You are ignoring JRRT's words outside LotR, because they do not agree with your interpretation of passages in LotR. You have also chosen to dismiss 'JRRT's' own words about Uruk-hai in Mordor by suggesting that they are Sarumans, because it does not support your interpretation.

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Quote:
Moving on, if you wish more of the passage from the chapter Flotsam and Jetsam
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I already posted the relevant portion.

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Quote:
I fail to see how this longer quote in anyway changes Aragorn's statement calling them "half-orcs" and as Aragil has pointed out Aragorn is supposed to be one of the most knowledgeable men in all of Middle Earth on the subject of orcs.
------------------------------

It doesn't, especially if he is calling the 'half-orcs' "half-orcs". What it does show is that he is not calling Uruk-hai 'half-orcs'.


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Quote:
As for tying in with the "Fords of Isen", for the umpteenth time, Tolkien's posthumously published work cannot be used to refute the clear meaning of his words in LOTR.
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You are welcome to dismiss JRRTs posthumously published works, because they do not agree with your interpretation of LotR, but for myself I will use them because they explain and clarify what he meant. Especially when it is quite clear in LotR that Sauron and Saruman had Uruk-hai, '-hai' refers to 'folk' or 'race', and 'half-orcs' and Uruks are seperate creatures.

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Quote:
You then go on to talk about Merry and Pippins capture and say that they do not call them half-orcs. But Merry and Pippin were captured by a mixed party. Some were Saruman's elite troops, the Uruk-hai. Some were Sauron's troops, but it is never specified whether they are the large uruks or the smaller kinds of orcs. And finally, some were definitely identified as the smaller, northern orcs from Moria. Therefore, of course, as a group Merry and Pippin would class them all as orcs. This was also Merry's and Pippin's first ever close-up encounter with orcs and not exactly the time to be composing a treatise on the different varieties.
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And none of them were 'Half-orcs'.

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Quote:
Continuing, you say: "What I have suggested is that the Uruks are not Half-orcs." No one in this thread has suggested that uruks are half-orcs.
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That is what it seemed 'Ossiriand Blade' was suggesting in post 1-22-02 2:55 am, and to what I was responding in post 1-22-02 5:31 pm.

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Quote:
This in fact is the opposite of what is being discussed. For you to even be arguing the point suggests you have not read and understood the thread. You seem to have jumped into the middle of it without understanding the discussion. The contention here is that uruks are a breed of orcs and that Uruk-hai are another kind of orc, belonging to Saruman who are light-tolerant and who are probably a blend of orcs (possibly uruks) and men.
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Ah, no, you seem not to have understood. My contention is that 'Uruks' and 'Uruk-hai' are synonomous in this manner, and the Uruks (the 'anglicized form of 'Uruk-hai'), (or, if you prefer, Uruk-hai) are not 'half-orcs'.


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Quote:
The term Oghor-hai, as far as I can find appears no where in LOTR. The only reference I can find to it is a single mention in Unfinished Tales which appears to be the basis for your statement. There is no indication what-so-ever as to why orcs called the Druedain the Oghor-hai. Therefore, it could mean anything and cannot be used to argue for or against any meaning that might be considered for the suffix -hai.
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It is obvious that they called them the Oghor-hai, because they were the Oghor-folk. Just like the Olog-hai and the Uruk-hai, were respectively 'folk' (or 'race' or otherwise pluralized).
It can be used to argue against your 'consideration' that:
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Quothe Greenwood:
I think an argument could be made that the suffix -hai refers to a sun tolerant ability in a creature that normally cannot abide, or shuns the sun, but I have not done enough research into LOTR to see if there are any exceptions that would argue against that.
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Since there is no indication that the Druedain were originally some creature that could not abide or tolerate the sun, considering that they were Men. This would be an 'exception', that would argue against that possible interpretation.

[Tar-Elenion]

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Quote:
Nowhere in LOTR does Tolkien place Uruk-hai in Mordor. The only thing that even comes close is the reference to a "rebel pack of Uruk-hai" which can easily be understood as referring to Saruman's troops. Nowhere in LOTR are Saruman's troops referred to as uruks.
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The context is clear. The rebel Uruk-hai are in Mordor. They would be 'rebelling' against Sauron. There is a LotR reference to Sarumans troops as uruk: "Related, no doubt, was the word URUK of the Black Speech, though this was applied as a rule only to the great soldier-orcs that at this time ISSUED from Mordor and ISENGARD. The lesser kinds were called, especially by the Uruk-hai, snaga, slave."
Emphasis mine.
LotR, App. F.

Hmm... 'great soldier-orcs from Isengard' (Saruman's troops), referred to by the word 'uruk'. 'Snaga' is used in both the Uruk-hai chapter, and in the Tower of Cirith Ungol chapter.


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Quote:
No one is saying that uruks are half-orcs. You are apparently debating that with yourself.
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You seem to be debating with me.

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Quote:
What we are saying is that the Uruk-hai are Saruman's elite troops and they are probably a blend of orcs and men. As to uruks being an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai, neither you nor anyone else has yet presented a single piece of hard, uncontovertible evidence for this contention.
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What you are saying, yes. What I am saying, no.
You have presented no 'uncontrovertible' evidence to support your contention.

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Quote:
Moving on to your next post, I discussed the first Tolkien letter in my previous post. Cian's longer quotation from it shows that it does not mean what you implied it meant.
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What was it that I implied it meant?

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Quote:
Moving to the second letter (once again a thank you to Cian for supplying a fuller quotation) it says: "But the penalty is, as you will know, to breed new Saurons, and slowly turn Men and Elves into Orcs. Not that in real life things are as clear cut as in a story, and we started out with a great many Orcs on our side ... Well, there you are: a hobbit amongst the Urukhai. Keep up your hobbitry in heart, and think that all stories feel like that when you are in them." Once again we see from the fuller quotation Tolkien is not saying what you implied he was saying. In the context of the letter orcs and Urukhai are not necessarily equivalent. The phrase "a hobbit amongst the Urukhai" in the context of Tolkien's writings would appear to be a reference to Merry's and Pippin's time in captivity during their trek across Rohan. Tolkien does not define Uruk-hai as the plural form of uruk.
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The 'Hobbit' being referred to is CT. The Orcs (or Urukhai) are referring to the Nazis and those less reputable elements among the Allies, if I am not greatly mistaken.

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Quote:
Once again we are left solely with secondary sources stating that uruks and Uruk-hai are equivalent. There is nothing in Tolkien's writing to state this. It might indeed be a reasonable hypothesis, except for the fact that it does not explain Tolkien's usage of the two terms in LOTR. In LOTR he consistently uses Uruk-hai (always capitalized) to refer to Saruman's elite, sun-tolerant orc troops and uruks (sometimes capitalized, sometimes not) to refer to Sauron's large, soldier orcs. I find it hard to believe that this sort of consistency from a perfectionist, philogogist doesn't mean anything and that the terms are really interchangeable.
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In accurate but seem quote from App. F above, where he uses 'uruk' for the great soldier-orcs from both Isengard and Mordor.

Also note Ugluk refering to the "Uruk-hai of Isengard" when speaking to Grishnakh.
"But in the meantime the Uruk-hai of Isengard can do the dirty work, as usual."
Is this because there are other Uruk-hai than just those of Isengard?

[Greenwood]

Tar-Elenion

Part of the time your reasoning ignores your own statements, the rest of the time it is circular. You have never once gone back to the original post in this thread and dealt with the quotations presented there from LOTR. You have never once presented any evidence to back up your assertion that uruk is an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai other than to repeat the assertion. You always ignore the fact that there is a possible alternative interpretation to a passage you cite. You never give any reason why the alternative interpretation could not be correct; you merely assert that yours is correct without any support for the assertion.

The hypothesis under discussion here, which you have never yet addressed directly is simple, but I will restate it. There are undoubtedly orcs in LOTR. There is a subset of orcs known as uruks. There is another subset of orcs known as Uruk-hai; these last belong to Saruman, are disdainful of the sun and apparently were created by Saruman by blending orcs and men. Thus all uruks are orcs, but not all orcs are uruks. Also all Uruk-hai can be considered orcs, but not all orcs are Uruk-hai. If we consider the likely possibility that Saruman created his breed by crossing men with uruks to create his Uruk-hai, then we can also say that all Uruk-hai are uruks, but not all uruks are Uruk-hai.

Moving on to your last posts: You keep repeating that CT says "some of the translations and wordings and definitions in the UT (and Sil.) index are his father's". That is precisely the point. Some are his father's, but the rest are CT's. Which are which? There is no way to know. The individual entries are not initialed. You want to say that the uruk being an Anglicized form of Uruk-hai entry is JRRT's entry, but you have absolutely no evidence to back this up. It could well be CT's entry. You say that I want to: "arbitrarily decide that JRRT's words in UT are wortheless". But you have absolutely no evidence that the index entry in UT are JRRT's words and this entry is the sole basis for the "Anglicized" theory. In you own earlier post you entertain the possibility that CT merely copied Foster's viewpoint for this definition. Nowhere have you given anything in JRRT's own hand that says this was his definition. All you say is that both CT and Foster had access to JRRT's notes so they could have found the "Anglicized definition" there. Yes, they could have, but you have no evidence they did, other than to say that they agree with each other, but you have also said they may agree with each other because they copied from each other rather than finding it in Tolkien. Your own arguments refute each other.

As to the whole question of using Tolkien's posthumously published work to refute something in LOTR. It cannot be done. You do not seem to grasp the difference between primary sources and secondary sources that Aragil and I have pointed out. As I suggested earlier, go read the discussions about this on the other threads, for instance the Council of Elrond thread in this section (http://www.thetolkienforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2160&perpage=15&pagenumber=1 ). The difference between primary and secondary sources is basic to doing any research. Secondary sources cannot refute primary sources.

Moving on to Tolkien's letters you say: "What he is discussing may be irrelevant, but his use of the terms 'Uruks' and 'Urukhai' is not. He is using the 'Anglicized' form." The only evidence that Tolkien is using the "Anglicized form" is your assertion that he is. You have never proven the "Anglicized" theory.

(BTW, snide and somewhat smug comments like: "That is a shame. You should look into getting a copy [of Tolkien's letters]. It is very informative and there is a (relatively) new edition out." do not advance your arguments in the least.)

You say: "Cian has already posted about Uruk-hai in Mordor". But, Cian's post does not prove there are Uruk-hai in Mordor. It is ambiguous and open to multiple interpretations. It proves nothing. You say: "You have also chosen to dismiss 'JRRT's' own words about Uruk-hai in Mordor ... ". But nowhere does JRRT say there are Uruk-hai in Mordor. I ignore it because JRRT doesn't say it. Please give a direct quote from LOTR where JRRT says there are Uruk-hai in Mordor. No one else has yet been able to find such a statement. If you are going to point to the two orcs overheard by Sam and Frodo in Mordor in Return of the King (number 7 in my original post) please do not engage in your usual habit of taking snippets out of context. This quote starts out with the orc saying: "First they say it's a great Elf in bright armour ... ". Are we to take it that there are "great elves in bright armor" running around Mordor? In addition, if you refer to my example 9 you will see we have Gorbag, a Mordor orc speaking, he says, talking of himself and his orcs: "Always the poor Uruks to put slips right, and small thanks". He does not call himself and his men "Uruk-hai", but rather "Uruks".

You say: "It is obvious that they called them the Oghor-hai, because they were the Oghor-folk." It is only obvious, because you say that -hai equals -folk. There is nothing in the text to make it obvious. You are engaging in circular reasoning again, in essence saying: "I define it this way therefore it is obvious that my definition is right."

Moving on to your later posts, you say: "The context is clear. The rebel Uruk-hai are in Mordor." I have dealt with this point above, the context is not clear. Or are you saying that the are "great elves in bright armor" running around Mordor. As for your quotation form Appendix F in ROTK, this was also dealt with earlier in this thread, please scroll up and read the posts. At this point I will merely point to two things, as I said at the beginning of this particular post Uruk-hai may indeed be classed as uruks so the quote from the appendix saying that uruks "issued from Mordor and Isengard" does not mean that Uruk-hai came from Mordor. Much more interesting, however is the part of the quote from the Appendix that says: "word uruk of the Black Speech". You have been arguing that uruk is the Anglicized form of Uruk-hai and citing Foster and Christopher Tolkien as your only sources for this. Here we have JRRT himself saying that uruk is a word "of the Black Speech". How can uruk than be an Anglicized word if it is Black Speech? Or are you now going to argue that Black Speech and English are equivalent? Your thesis that uruk is an Anglicized word has just been shot down by JRRT's own words.

You say: "Snaga' is used in both the Uruk-hai chapter, and in the Tower of Cirith Ungol chapter". I cannot find snaga anywhere in the Uruk-hai chapter. Can you give a quotation? As for the Cirith Ungol chapter, Snaga is clearly used in this chapter as the name of a particular orc in the service of the tower of Cirith Ungol.

The rest of your post has already been dealt with either above or in earlier posts.

Finally:

Also note Ugluk refering to the "Uruk-hai of Isengard" when speaking to Grishnakh.
"But in the meantime the Uruk-hai of Isengard can do the dirty work, as usual."
Is this because there are other Uruk-hai than just those of Isengard?


This last suggestion is the thinnest argument yet. Suggesting that Ugluk's statement implies there are Uruk-hai other than Isengard's is about as ludicrous as Greymantle's thesis about "mercenary" bands of Uruk-hai in the original discussion on the movie thread.

[Cian]

"And here are others strange to me. Their gear is not the manner of orcs at all!" TTT

The "goblin-soldiers" are then described, and what is said to be not usual is that they were armed with short, broad-bladed swords, (as opposed to curved scimitars) also (seemingly as implied), that they bore bows like that of Men. They further had a "strange" device upon their shields, and Aragorn comments that he has not seen these tokens before (include S-rune on helms).

In general, not everything in this goblin description can be said to be especially notable however (outside of the comparison to the other Orcs present here of course), including I think, the stature of these soldier-orcs, as they likely do not outstrip that of the huge Orc-chieftain met in Moria, or at least, it doesn't seem implied. I too think Aragorn knows his goblins pretty well, and just to note, his reaction, immediately following the notice of "strange", drew an exclamation about their gear.

Make what you will of that. Or ... make what you will of that! ;)

[Cian]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Here we have JRRT himself saying that uruk is a word "of the Black Speech". How can uruk than be an Anglicized word if it is Black Speech? Or are you now going to argue that Black Speech and English are equivalent? Your thesis that uruk is an Anglicized word has just been shot down by JRRT's own words.

For clarity, the argument, if I may speak for Tar-E here, is that "Uruks" or "uruks" is anglicized, not uruk, which Tolkien saith is a probable borrowing from archaic Elvish (and indeed is given so as archaic uruk). Compare Silmarils to Silmaril, Silmarilli. Any anglicization here must reasonably refer to the pluralization -s.

[Greenwood]

Cian

Just so I am clear here on this argument.

Uruk-hai is Black Speech
uruk is Black Speech
uruks is an Anglicization

?

Even if this is the argument, nowhere does JRRT say uruks is the Anglicized form of Uruk-hai.

And if uruks is an Anglicization, why does an orc of Mordor use it? Is he just back from a jaunt to Merrie Olde England?

[Grond]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Grond
Thank you for your research. I accept it as JRRT's own writing and will not argue with it. It does indeed make clear that Saruman blended men and orcs. It does not, however, shed any direct light on the question of uruk and Uruk-hai being equivalent or not. There is no reason for JRRT to use the term Uruk-hai in the passage you cite.
If we accept Tar-Elenion's argument then we have the following in LOTR:
a) orcs -- (no problem here)
b) uruks/Uruk-hai -- these are in the employ of both Sauron and Saruman, but Saruman's have absolutely no problem with the sun, unlike all other orcs. Saruman's even boast about their disdain for the sun
c) orc/men hybrids bred by Saruman that are different from his sun tolerant Uruk-hai.
I hate to sound like Harad here and invoke logic, but if b) and c) are totally different, where did Saruman's sun tolerant Uruk-hai come from? Was this yet another unnamed deviltry of Saruman's? What of Treebeard's comments? Do we now dismiss them afterall. If Saruman's breeding experiments were not for the purpose of creating sun-tolerant orcs what were they for? The soldier uruks already existed. Isn't it far simpler to accept that Saruman's breeding experiments produced his sun-tolerant Uruk-hai? That seems crystal clear to me.
Well that is my opinion. :)
Originally posted by Greenwood
This last suggestion is the thinnest argument yet. Suggesting that Ugluk's statement implies there are Uruk-hai other than Isengard's is about as ludicrous as Greymantle's thesis about "mercenary" bands of Uruk-hai in the original discussion on the movie thread. Greenwood, as to your first post above, I totally disagree with your assertion in the first paragraph. You make JRRT seem a fool. Had the Orc-men or Man-orcs been called the Fighting Uruk-hai, he would have stated it here. When does an author actually tell you of the greatest abomination of one of his anti-heroes and then not give you the whole story? This is beyond debate to me and is what influenced my decision in this matter more than all other arguments. As to your sun tolerant theory of "if b) and c) are totally different, where did Saruman's sun tolerant Uruk-hai come from? I haven't found anything in the texts that would suggest that the Uruks weren't sun tolerant. But I will look.

As to your final paragraph above stated to Tar-Elenion, in response to his Uruk-hai of Isengard statement, your comments are just too strong. I think Ugluk's comments are one of the best arguments yet that there must be other Uruk-hai. The argument is at least as good as any other put forward as they are all speculation.

I had definitively made up my mind but will put it on hold until I have researched the issue as to whether there is evidence that the Mordor Uruks were sun tolerant or not. If I find evidence that they are, my opinion that the Uruk-hai are just another verbal form of Uruk will stand (at least in my humble opinion). This thread is just about played out. We are nearing the point to where it will degenerate into a logic argument (my logic's better than your logic) and I will have no part in another "Why did Gandalf take the Fellowship through Moria thread"; but we're not quite to that point yet.:)

[Tar-Elenion]

Originally posted by Cian
Little favor for Tal-Elmar, since "winging" it's way into better MB circulation ;)


You are welcome. I have been paying little attention to those particular threads. I think I noted one use of it at the 'Inklings' forum, but it had no reply as I recall. Are there any interesting ones using Tar-Elmar and where?
:)

[Cian]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Cian Just so I am clear here on this argument.
Uruk-hai is Black Speech/uruk is Black Speech/
uruks is an Anglicization

Right (unless there is some evidence about that BS employs plural marker -s!!!). In other words, words inflected for plurality would normally inflect using the markers of their own languages.

And if uruks is an Anglicization, why does an orc of Mordor use it? Is he just back from a jaunt to Merrie Olde England?

This is just Tolkien's choice within his role as translator apparently. Note that Thingol and Aragorn, for examples, both seemingly use "Silmarils" as we read the translation. But -s is not the "correct" plural marker here of course: the word is Quenya, as it's creator knows of course, and it's (nominative) plural marker is properly -i (cf. alternate singular Silmarillë for this example).

This is what's meant by Uruks being "anglicized" ~ ie made English in quality or characteristics.

[aragil]

Originally posted by Cian


In general, not everything in this goblin description can be said to be especially notable however (outside of the comparison to the other Orcs present here of course), including I think, the stature of these soldier-orcs, as they likely do not outstrip that of the huge Orc-chieftain met in Moria, or at least, it doesn't seem implied. I too think Aragorn knows his goblins pretty well, and just to note, his reaction, immediately following the notice of "strange", drew an exclamation about their gear.

Make what you will of that. Or ... make what you will of that! ;)

I think what is most noticeable here is that the Isengard orcs' gear is more like to that of humans than to the gear of other orcs. I think the reason behind this is that Saruman's orcs are some sort of orc-men hybrid. In the quote from Morgoth's ring Tolkien seems to be making a distinction between men-orcs and orc-men. Of course, it can be argued that Tolkien writes this way a lot, using 'blah and bleh' to describe the same thing. But I think that in this case Tolkien might be referring to two different things- orc men being men with a little orc blood in them (still mostly mannish), which he might use as spies in Bree, and which might compose a minority of his troops at Helm's deep; and men-orcs, orcs with enough mannish blood to not be affected by sunlight, which form the base of his troops. Both Gamling and Treebeard seem to think that Saruman's man/orc breeding program has been devised to bring out sun tolerant orcs. The orcs at Helm's Deep say that 'We are the Uruk-hai: we do not stop the fight for night or day, for fair weather or for storm'. This seems to imply that other orcs do stop the fight for day. If the bulk of Saruman's troops were uruks (and if this was distinct from orc-men), then either they would perform poorly in the light of day, or else all uruks would have already been sun tolerant. This brings up the issue of why Saruman would bother to cross orcs and men if there had been a supply of sun-tolerant orcs available for the last 500 years? If there had been such a supply of orcs available for 500 years (uruks appeared 35 years before the establishment of Rohan), why would Gamling remark that the Isengarders could fight in the sun? Wouldn't the fact that generations of men were fighting sun-tolerant orcs for the past 500 years have made sun-tolerance in orcs pretty much a standard thing?
Just for the sake of drawing out old arguments, I'd again like to point out that in our world folk, people, and men all tend to have the same connotation, and usually refer to humans. In Tolkiens world this would not be the case, and it would be important to make a distinction between men and folk. I assume that Tolkien linguists derive their translations from the context with which a word is used. A linguist familiar with our world could confuse the distinction between folk and men, and hence get that Uruk-hai meant 'orc-folk', when it might mean 'orc-men'. In our world it wouldn't really matter, both would be 'people of the orc'. In Tolkien's world it would matter- Orc-men is used very often to refer to the troops of Saruman, by several different characters (Aragorn, Treebeard, Gamling, and notably Tolkien himself). Of note is the fact that Saruman's troops don't refer to themselves as orc-men. They seem to prefer the term Uruk-hai.

ps Cian- so that I am pronouncing your name in my head correctly, should it be 'Kee-un', 'Sigh-ann', or other?

[aragil]

Originally posted by Cian

This is just Tolkien's choice within his role as translator apparently. Note that Thingol and Aragorn, for examples, both seemingly use "Silmarils" as we read the translation. But -s is not the "correct" plural marker here of course: the word is Quenya, as it's creator knows of course, and it's (nominative) plural marker is properly -i (cf. alternate singular Silmarillë for this example).


Why should Tolkien choose to anglicize for Gorbag, and yet consistently not anglicize for Ugluk or all of the orcs at Helm's Deep? Ugluk and Gorbag were bragging in the same context- they are members of breeds of orcs that can handle stuff that regular orcs can't. If Tolkien were just randomly flipping a coin in his head as to when to anglicize and when to not, it is statistically improbable (very improbable) that Tolkien would use the anglicized version in his lone quote from a Mordor Uruk, yet consistently use the black speech version for the quotes from Saruman's orcs. If Tolkien was not mentally flipping a coin, but instead intended to make this distinction then we should ask ourselves why he wanted to make this distinction.

[Cian]

Originally posted by Tar-Elenion
You are welcome. I have been paying little attention to those particular threads. I think I noted one use of it at the 'Inklings' forum, but it had no reply as I recall. Are there any interesting ones using Tar-Elmar and where?


I'm a bit winded to those as well. And even where I used it doesn't seem particulary interesting to me lately ;)

Is Inklings forums Xenite, or something else? Heheh, not that I need more places to chat Tolkien though.

[Greenwood]

Right (unless there is some evidence about that BS employs plural marker -s!). In other words, words inflected for plurality would normally inflect using the markers of their own languages.

Cian

If Black Speech employs the plural marker -s than the word uruks is not an Anglicization but Black Speech! You can't it both ways.

I simply do not understand why it is necessary to invoke all sorts of tortured explanations to justify the Anglicization hypothesis when there is no evidence that JRRT himself ever thought it or said it. All the different usages of uruk/uruks and Uruk-hai are perfectly consistent throughout LOTR without the Anglicization hypothesis.

[Greenwood]

Grond

I will grant you some wiggle room on whether the Uruk-hai are a blend of orcs and men or whether there are other half-breeds out there without a name of their own. It does not make sense to me, but we are arguing different opinions. However, I will point out, again, that Morgoth's Ring is a secondary source compared to the primary source, LOTR, and secondary sources cannot be used to manufacture inconsistencies in primary sources.

As for Tar-Elenion invoking Ugluk's statement "we are the fighting Uruk-hai of Isengard" as evidence that there are Uruk-hai other than Isengard's, this is indeed pulling a rabbit out of thin air. If uruks and Uruk-hai are equivalent and both are a plural form of uruk, why doesn't the Mordor orc just call himself Uruk-hai.

[Cian]

Originally posted by Greenwood
Cian. If Black Speech employs the plural marker -s than the word uruks is not an Anglicization but Black Speech! You can't it both ways.

I simply do not understand why it is necessary to invoke all sorts of tortured explanations to justify the Anglicization hypothesis when there is no evidence that JRRT himself ever thought it or said it. All the different usages of uruk/uruks and Uruk-hai are perfectly consistent throughout LOTR without the Anglicization hypothesis.

I'm not trying to have it both ways Greenwood ~ the parenthetical added was simply remarking that someone who wants to actually "prove" uruks is not an anglicization, should simply show evidence of -s as a plural marker in Black Speech :)