Idril
Idril Celebrindal; the Silver-footed; the lady of the rainbow
Celebrindal
Name and Nature
Idril — called Celebrindal, “the Silver-footed”, because of her silver-white feet; the daughter of Turgon and Elenwë, and the “half-Teleri” princess of Gondolin. The Quenta says of her: “the fairest of the Elves” — she had the gift of far-sight — in the tale she is the one who foresees the shadow: — she “spied dimly things far off, and the dread counsel of Ulmo was fulfilled through her”. Her silver foot and her bright mind make her as much of the light of Gondolin as her father’s towers.
The Marriage with Tuor Against the custom and the pride of kings
— Idril set her heart on Tuor, the mortal Man sent by Ulmo, and wed him (the second of the great Elf-Man marriages of the age); their son is Eärendil. The Quenta records the tale of the “grey cloak” — Tuor’s coming, the making of the and the child Eärendil, “the Mariner”, of whom the greatest of all songs are sung.
The Finding of the Secret Way
Idril’s chief deed of wisdom is the secret: foreseeing that Gondolin might fall, she had Turgon
(against the counsel of all) hew in secret a tunnel beneath the city to the Encircling Mountains — the way of escape through which, at the Fall, the remnant of her people at last fled with Tuor and the child into the twilight. Her vision is, in the tale, the instrument of salvation that the pride of the city had refused to the warnings of Ulmo.
In the Fall
At the sack of Gondolin
— where her cousin Maeglin (who had desired her) betrayed the city in jealousy of Tuor — Idril was the princess who rallied: she armed herself, cut down a foe — in the older tale she — she slew a — she — she fought and planned, and led out the fugitives by her secret way; bore her husband and child through the passes under the eagles’ wings to the South and the sea — from whence, at the last, she sailed with Eärendil to the West.
Significance
Idril is the great heroine of the “good” Noldor: the princess whose foresight (against all male pride and custom) saves what can be saved, whose blood unites Eldar and Men, and whose son redeems the doom. With Lúthien she is one of the two central women of the mythology — from their unions the entire later history of the Half-elven descends.