Arda Kompendium

Gothmog

Lord of the Balrogs; High-captain of Angband

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Name and Office

Gothmog — “the Lord of the Balrogs”, the most terrible of Morgoth’s captains, “High-captain of Angband”. In the Quenta he is one of the few named generals of the fortress below Thangorodrim, and the deeds of the balrogs in the great battles cluster about his name.

Deeds in the Tale

  • The mortal wound of Fëanor:

  • In the battle at the gates of Angband after the Dagor-nuin-Giliath, the host of the Noldor was overwhelmed by the balrogs; Fëanor, surrounded and “long was he… holding all the… at arrows’ range” — the account: — Fëanor, mortally wounded, was borne back and died, “and his spirit passed to the halls of Mandos, and it is said that he never departs”. Gothmog’s third — In the War of the Jewels a later story has him leading the assault that broke the hosts.

In the Texts

Gothmog appears in the Quenta and, with much greater detail and a different fate, in the Book of Lost Tales Fall of Gondolin. The Shaping of Middle-earth and the later annals vary the details of the balrog-lords (a point of long editorial debate, since Tolkien wavered between one chief balrog and many). He is also the namesake-link to the later Third Age “Mount Doom” — no; that is a coincidence of naming with the Gil-galad… Christopher Tolkien’s introductions to The Fall of Gondolin and The Book of Lost Tales II discuss Gothmog at length.

Verknüpfte Seiten

BalrogsThangorodrimFëanorMelkorEcthelionAngbandConcordance — A to ZThe Fall of GondolinNirnaeth ArnoediadFingon
Werke: die Quellen sind seitenübergreifend die Bücher von J.R.R. und Christopher Tolkien (Silmarillion, Hobbit, Herr der Ringe, Unfinished Tales, History of Middle-earth, Nature of Middle-earth u. a.) — eigene Zusammenfassung. Siehe die Concordance und den README der Quelle für die Einzelbelege.
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