Maedhros
the Tall; eldest son of Fëanor; lord of Himring
Name and Lineage
Maedhros — “the Tall”, the eldest of the seven sons of Fëanor and of Nerdanel; the most loyal and, by all accounts, the noblest of them. He was named Maedhros (from his great height) and in Valarin Russiandol — the “Red-brow” — his hair was copper-red, the mark of his mother’s kindred. He was held in love by the Noldor as, after his father, the first in honour among the Fëanorians.
The Rescue from Thangorodrim
His first great deedon of Thingol. Its ruin broke the Long Peace and led to the fall of the realms.anor’s making: after the burning of the ships and the Doom, Maedhros — seeking Nor — was taken by Morgoth and hung by the wrist from Thangorodrim, chained with a ring of burning metal. There Fingon (his friend from Aman, of the rival house) found him, and — with the bitter choice between shooting the hand and abandoning him to death — sang, and with Thorondor’s aid cut off Maedhros’ hand, rescuing him. The deed sealed the reconciliation of the two houses, and Maedhros, “in return for the mercy”, gave up the High Kingship to Fingolfin — the crown of the Noldor passing from the house of Fëanor.
The Lord of the March
Raised, he founded in the north-east of Beleriand the realm of Himring, the hill-girt “March of Maedhros”, the chief bulwark of the long siege of Angband. He was the wisest and most just of his brothers
— preserving the Leaguer, reconciling the houses, and (when the Oath-driven evils came) the one who most resisted their pull.
The Oath and the Union
His great political work was the Union of Maedhros — the league of Elves (and Men) against Morgoth that culminated in the disastrous Nirnaeth Arnoediad, broken by the treachery of the Easterlings and the indecision of Thingol. Its ruin broke the Long Peace and led to the fall of the realms.
- The end: After the War of Wrath, when the last two remaining Silmarils were in the hands of Eönwë’s host, Maedhros and Maglor (the final survivors of the House) stole the jewels to fulfil the Oath; but the Silmarils burned their hands (for Maedhros had committed the Kinslayings — they “would not suffer the touch of any evil or unlawful hand”). In despair Maedhros cast himself into a chasm of fire — a death consonant with his burning hand, whose stump had already been the mark of his fate.
Significance
Maedhros is the “good Fëanorian”: the eldest and the least guilty, whose loyalty to the Oath yet drags him from the greatest nobility to the last, worst deed — Tolkien’s evidence that the Oath damns even the most honourable of its swearers. His story spans the whole First Age, from the rescue to the suicidal fall.