Berúthiel

Berúthiel was a Queen of Gondor in the Third Age before the reign of the Stewards.^[1]

Biography

Berúthiel was a Black Númenórean and the wife of Tarannon Falastur of Gondor. She was noted for being "nefarious, solitary, and loveless". It is therefore of no surprise that Tarannon died childless. She lived with her husband in Osgiliath but hated the sound and smell of the sea. She had ten cats under her service — nine black and one white, with whom she conversed and set as spies to the Men of Gondor. Eventually, Tarannon exiled her from Gondor. He set her and her cats on a ship that was last seen past Umbar.

Her name was removed from the Books of the Kings but not from the memory of Men. It was proved when Aragorn had made mention of Berúthiel and her cats more than 2,000 years after her disappearance.^[2]

Behind the Scenes

In an interview Tolkien had in 1966 he added the following information on her:

Well, Berúthiel went back to live in the inland city, and went to the bad (or returned to it she was a Black Númenórean in origin, I guess). She was one of these people, who loathe cats, but cats will jump on them and follow them about you know how sometimes they pursue people who hate them? I have a friend like that. I'm afraid she took to torturing them for amusement, but she kept some and used them: trained them to go on evil errands by night, to spy on her enemies or terrify them.

Piecing all this info together, it can be surmised that Berúthiel was a Black Númenórean from an unnamed Black Númenórean settlement south of Umbar (there were several, mentioned a couple of times but never mapped or named), and that Tarannon probably married her in an attempt to settle the feuds Gondor had with the more southern Númenórean realms in exile. Berúthiel probably returned home, and her expulsion from Gondor must have reignited hostilities between the Black Númenórean realms and Gondor, which eventually lead to the capture of Umbar in TA 933 after a new war.^[3]

Etymology

The name Berúthiel was Sindarin, meaning "Angry Queen", from bereth ("queen"), ruth ("anger"), and the common feminine suffx -iel.

House of Anárion

Translations

References

1. ↑ Unfinished Tales, Introduction, Part Four, II: "The Istari", Note 7
2. ↑ The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, Book Two, Chapter IV: "A Journey in the Dark"
3. ↑ Unfinished Tales, Part Four: II: "The Istari"

External links

• "The Realms of Tolkien", originally published in New Worlds in November 1966, reprinted in Carandaith in 1969 and again in Fantastic Metropolis in 2001.