The Entwives

[Andúnë]

In the Green Dragon, Sam talks about trees in the Shire that move.

The Hobbits notice that the trees in the Old Forest indeed seem to be alive.

So how come when Treebeard specifically asks the Hobbits about the possibility of Entwives in the Shire, they don't say anything? Not arguing about whether these trees are Entwives or not (incidentally, I think they are very likely to be), surely the Hobbits would have said something to help Treebeard.

What are your thoughts?

[Arrie]

I think the Hobbits were under a lot of stress at the time and had probably blanked the thought of the trees. Or they were just too amused by Treebeard to think properly.

[Esteldil]

maybe they never made the connection- ie they just thought they were scary trees not Entwives?

Maybe Tolkien was going to help them but had to go feed the cat/ went to make a cup of tea/ started chatting with a neighbour/ died before he could?

Also- maybe they never paid attention to Sam, because as far as I recall, he's the only hobbit vaguely interested in old lore etc. Merry and Pippin were probably concentrating on their beers.

[RastNim]

Charlie, sensible conversation here!

I thought the exact same thing, they didn't even mention anything when he asked! I agree that perhaps they just didn't listen to Sam but they themselves HAD seen the trees moving. For example what was old man willow!?

[Esteldil]

Old man willow wasn't an Entwife though!

I think they just thought they were enchanted trees (male) under Tom's control?

(I've just realised that some of Bombardill's words were given to Galadriel and Treebeard- how cool!)

[Andúnë]

Yay! I agree with everyone. It seems typical of Merry and Pippin to be oblivious to everything that goes on around them. Note also Pippin and Gandalf's exchange in Minas Tirith, something along the lines of "Don't tell him Aragorn is king" - "Aragorn is wha??".

If they had been more clear-headed people, I'd expect them to at least mention it to Treebeard, since they have no reason to keep the information from him, nor were they clear-headed enough to figure out for themselves that Old Man Willow wasn't an Entwife.

[RastNim]

How do we know it isn't an entwife? It is a possibility.

But anyway, they had seen trees in the Old forest moving, so they knew something was at work. Perhaps because the trees didn't move like the ents? They just assumed they had nothing to do with it.

Or perhaps there were being like Legolas is in Lei's talk, they kept quite to be annoying.

[Andúnë]

Merry and Pippin certainly did make the connection between the trees in Fangorn and the Old Forest.

From TTT chapter 4:

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TREEBEARD:
"... And then there are some trees in the valleys under the mountains, sound as a bell, and bad right through. That sort of thing seems to spread. There used to be some very dangerous parts in this country. There are still some very black patches."
"Like the Old Forest away to the north, do you mean?" asked Merry.
"Aye, aye. something like, but much worse. I do not doubt there is some shadow of the Great Darkness lying there still away north; and bad memories are handed down."
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But this also shows that Treebeard was aware of the trees in the North, and so they know there wouldn't be Entwives there, otherwise the trees in the Old Forest wouldn't have turned bad. Therefore they reject the possibility of there being Entwives in or near the Shire.

This then throws into confusion Treebeard's later line:

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"You never see any, hm, any Ents round there do you?" he asked. "Well, not Ents, _Entwives_ I should really say."
"Entwives?" said Pippin. "Are they like you at all?"
"Yes, hm, well no: I do not really know now," said Treebeard thoughtfully. 'But they would like your country, so I just wondered."
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And also:

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"But if you hear news up in your pleasant land, in the Shire, send me word! You know what I mean: word or sight of the Entwives."
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It's been a while since this topic was active, but I thought I'd drag it up again to see what people now think.

[Esteldil]

Isn't the Old Forest Tom Bombadil's domain? It's strange how the trees in the forest would turn evil if TB was near (or maybe his boundaries never got that far?)

Anyway, perhaps Treebeard is asking about the Ents because the Entwives may not necessarily have power over the trees as the Ents do. Or maybe, they might be wandering in other places of the Shire. From the descriptions of the Entwives, they certainly weren't very territorial creatures like the Ents- myabe they wandered?
And like Treebeard says, the Entwives aren't really like the Ents but like the country. So possibly the Old Forest has little connection with the Entwives.

[Andúnë]

Tom Bombadil probably didn't see it as his duty to try to "righten" the trees of the Old Forest. He could survive pretty well alongside them. Few others would enter the forest. And he would help any that do enter and get into trouble. He doesn't strike me as someone who would want to change anything that is around him.

[Esteldil]

True true. I just thought that maybe his 'niceness' would mean that all the trees of his domain are 'nice'.

Tis a mystrey- maybe it could become an offical 'Most Contentious Tolkien-related subject'?

[RastNim]

Dredging slightly again but I just came across this during my internet surfing...ness thing...hm. Ill copy and paste it, it is very long -

Was there any definitive explanation given on what happened to the Entwives?

No definite answer was given to this question within the story. However, Tolkien did comment on the matter in two letters, and while he was careful to say "I think" and "I do not know", nevertheless the tone of these comments was on the whole pessimistic. Moreover, he doesn't seem to have changed his mind over time. The following was written in 1954 (in fact before the publication of LotR):

What happened to them is not resolved in this book. ... I think that in fact the Entwives had disappeared for good, being destroyed with their gardens in the War of the Last Alliance (Second Age 3429-3441) when Sauron pursued a scorched earth policy and burned their land against the advance of the Allies down the Anduin. They survived only in the 'agriculture' transmitted to Men (and Hobbits). Some, of course, may have fled east, or even have become enslaved: tyrants even in such tales must have an economic and agricultural background to their soldiers and metal-workers. If any survived so, they would indeed be far estranged from the Ents, and any rapprochement would be difficult -- unless experience of industrialised and militarised agriculture had made them a little more anarchic. I hope so. I don't know. [Letters, 179 (#144)]
Note that the above reference to a "scorched earth policy" by Sauron makes the destruction of the Entwives' land seem a much more serious and deliberate affair than was apparent from the main story, in which Treebeard merely said that "war had passed over it" (TT, 79 (III, 4)). The following was written in 1972, the last year of Tolkien's life:
As for the Entwives: I do not know. ... But I think in TT, 80-81 it is plain that there would be for the Ents no re-union in 'history' -- but Ents and their wives being rational creatures would find some 'earthly paradise' until the end of this world: beyond which the wisdom neither of Elves nor Ents could see. Though maybe they shared the hope of Aragorn that they were 'not bound for ever to the circles of the world and beyond them is more than memory.' .... [Letters, 419 (#338)]
( The reference to TT 80-81 is to the song of the Ent and the Ent-wife, as recited to Merry and Pippin by Treebeard; the speech by Aragorn which Tolkien quotes is from RK, 344 (Appendix A). ) While the above comments do not sound hopeful, there nevertheless remains the unresolved mystery of the conversation between Sam Gamgee and Ted Sandyman in The Green Dragon. It took place during the second chapter of FR and has been pointed to by many as possible evidence of the Entwives' survival:
'All right', said Sam, laughing with the rest. 'But what about these Tree-men, these giants, as you might call them? They do say that one bigger than a tree was seen up away beyond the North Moors not long back.'
'Who's they?'
'My cousin Hal for one. He works for Mr. Boffin at Overhill and goes up to the Northfarthing for the hunting. He saw one.'
'Says he did, perhaps. Your Hal's always saying that he's seen things; and maybe he sees things that ain't there.'
'But this one was as big as an elm tree, and walking -- walking seven yards to a stride, if it was an inch.'
'Then I bet it wasn't an inch. What he saw was an elm tree, as like as not.'
'But this one was walking, I tell you; and there ain't no elm tree on the North Moors.'
'Then Hal can't have seen one', said Ted. [FR 53-54 (I, 2)]
Now, this conversation takes place early in the story, when its tone was still the "children's story" ambience of the Hobbit (did the tone the change?). When it is first read the natural reaction is to accept it as "more of the same" (i.e. another miscellaneous "fairy story" matter). However, once one has learned about the Ents it is impossible to reread it without thinking of them. This impression is strengthened by Treebeard's own words to Merry and Pippin:
He made them describe the Shire and its country over and over again. He said an odd thing at this point. 'You never see any, hm, any Ents round there, do you?' he asked. 'Well, not Ents, Entwives I should really say.'
'Entwives?' said Pippin. 'Are they like you at all?'
'Yes, hm, well no: I do not really know now', said Treebeard thoughtfully. 'But they would like your country, so I just wondered.' [TT, 75 (III, 4)]
Taken together, these two conversations make the notion that what Halfast saw was an Entwife seem at least plausible. However, as far as can be determined Tolkien never explicitly connected the matter with the Entwives, indeed never mentioned it at all. So we are left to speculate. (The fact that a creature described as being "as big as an elm tree" couldn't be an Ent doesn't prove anything one way or the other. It could indicate that the story is just a fabrication by a fanciful Hobbit, but it is equally possible that a fourteen foot tall Ent might look gigantic to an unprepared hobbit and that the story was exaggerated in the telling.) Nor is textual analysis helpful. Tolkien himself, in a discussion of his methods of invention, mentioned that the Treebeard adventure was wholly unplanned until he came to that place in the story:
I have long ceased to invent ... : I wait till I seem to know what really happened. Or till it writes itself. Thus, though I knew for years that Frodo would run into a tree-adventure somewhere far down the Great River, I have no recollection of inventing Ents. I came at last to the point, and write the 'Treebeard' chapter without any recollection of any previous thought: just as it now is. And then I saw that, of course, it had not happened to Frodo at all. [Letters, 231 (#180)]
The rough drafts in HoMe confirm that Sam and Ted's conversation was composed long before Ents ever entered the story (Return of the Shadow, 253-254; Treason, 411-414). Thus, Tolkien could not have had them in mind when he wrote it, and it must indeed have originally been a random, vaguely fantastic element. On the other hand, as he said of Tom Bombadil, who also entered the story early: "I would not have left him in if he did not have some kind of function." (Letters, 178) The implication is clear: everything in the early chapters which was allowed to remain was left in for a reason. When he did so with the Sam/Ted conversation he must have known how suggestive it would be. But how it fits in with the darker speculations expressed in his letters is not clear (unless he changed his mind later). This may be a case of Tolkien's emotions being in conflict with his thoughts. T.A. Shippey has noted that "he was in minor matters soft-hearted" (RtMe, 173). (Thus, Bill the pony escapes, Shadowfax is allowed to go into the West with Gandalf, and in the late-written narratives of UT Isildur is shown using the Ring far more reluctantly than the Council of Elrond would suggest (UT, 271-285) and a way is contrived so that Galadriel might be absolved from all guilt in the crimes of Fëanor (UT, 231-233)). It may be that, lover of trees that he was, Tolkien wished to preserve at least the hope that the Ents and Entwives might find each other and the race continue. But the unwelcome conclusions from what he elsewhere called "the logic of the story" must have proven inescapable.

And that is because I can't be bothered to argue for myself lol as it involves me having to type.

I think that this site pretty much answers the question of why Merry and Pippin said nothing and I think that the hobbits, being the simple fold that they are are just to fanciful to be taken seriously.

[Esteldil]

This may be a daft question, but what are the Entwives?

Are they definitely tree-y things? For some reason, when reading that, I see them as having the form of women. But doesn't TReebeard describe one of the Entwives as very fair?

Maybe also, the Entwives are very slender, willowy trees? Perhaps not,a ctually since I think Tolkien would not have been so clichéd; perhaps the Entwives do look very much like the Ents.

But, this is a lot more confusing than the TB issue; why indeed didn't Merry/Pippin say anything?

Or maybe, as is in one of Anduné's earlier posts, they did but since they'd never seen anything quite like Treebeard in it, they didn't say more than that?

Oh, I don't think I've really added much here so, I'll shut up.

[Andúnë]

RastNim, the post you find is very interesting - it thankfully backs up a lot of new stuff that I found out over the holidays, and certainly brings this debate forward a little.

You say that it explains why Merry/Pippin didn't say anything... but I don't think it does. These rumours were running about in the Shire, and Merry/Pippin were hobbits themselves so they wouldn't discount anything they hear as being "fanciful".

I don't get it - Tom Bombadil did not serve any useful purpose in the story. Therefore the "reason" for leaving him in must have been merely to fulfil a whim of Tolkien's. [TB = being one with nature, being in control but not master, etc etc.] Perhaps this thing with the Entwives is nothing more than a whim also? He wanted a little mystery; thought it would be amusing to keep this in, as a little joke to lead others in speculation.

Our next door neighbours came round for dinner yesterday evening. They're an elderly couple. The woman (incidentally called Tina) used to go to Oxford while Tolkien was teaching there, and some of her friends attended his lectures and tutorials (Norse stuff). She says that he was seen as a bit of a crazy guy.

Esteldil - I see the Entwives being the same as Ents Treebeard says they're different, but I don't think Tolkien would expect us to easily tell the difference, any more than we can expect other animals to tell the difference between male and female humans. And they may very well be fair in Treebeard's eyes

[Esteldil]

Hm- you're probably right, after all, it's hard to imagine what else they could be,

I also agree that they were probably a bit of a whim. i mean we know that som of what Tolky wrote contradicted itself, especially towards the end when he died before finalising stuff. There's a story about TB in Tales from the Perilous Realm. Maybe Tolky would have elaborated later had he had time? Also, it's perhaps not unexpected that not everything he wrote was completely cohesive.

Maybe the reason M&P didn't say anything was because Treebeard knew about the Old Forest and the rumours about trees walking etc. only concerned the Old Forest, not the actual Shire?