The Hoard

The poem the horde from The Adventures of Tom Bombadil also seems to make a nod at darker aspect of Dwarves as viewed from Rivendell, Elvish, and Numenorian lore concerning the heroic days at the end of the First Age (echoing bits of the tale of Turin and Mim the Dwarf).

In the first part of the poem Dwarves and Dragons are compared, with implication that dwarves may have been built from a pit (perhaps akin to the legends of men, and in Book of Lost Tales that they formed from the earth), and Dragons spawned from Hell.

The poem goes onto describe the greed and fall of the Shadow over the Elvenhome, and the treasures they piled up in dark holes. An old dwarf (apparently Mim the Dwarf or similar) apparently moves into the dark cave (apparently taken over from elven kings before him), with avarice, he holds onto his gotten treasures of silver and gold. In that cave he worked his fingers to the bone forging coins, and necklaces (described as 'strings of rings'), thought he could buy the power of the kings (he had essentially made himself a king). But as he worked his eyes grew dim and his ears dull, and his skin turned yellow on his old skull. His bony fingered claws had a pale sheen. He could no longer see the jewels he was working on. He couldn't hear the dragon (apparently "Glaurung") that entered his door, where he died alone in the dragon's fire, his bones were turned to ashes. Later the dragon would then be slain by a warrior (Turin as noted).

One strange aspect of this version of the tale besides "Mim" being killed by the Dragon, by the descriptions he may have already died. As it seems to describe his flesh decomposing from his bone before he is actually 'killed'. Yet he is ultimately slain by the dragon. Perhaps it is suggesting his greed lead to a kind of physical undeath on him, ultimately destroyed by dragon fire.

The theme of the poem is kings falling to greed, and then ultimately into darkness, only for their treasure to be captured by a new 'ruler or king', who also falls into darkness, and the treasure falls into the hands of the next king. As if there is a curse on the treasure horde.