Quenta 1 — Of the Beginning of Days
Chapter 1 of the Quenta Silmarillion
Summary
After the Music of the Ainur, the Valar entered Arda and laboured to order the world, but Melkor contended with them until, at the coming of Tulkas, he fled into the outer darkness. They set the Two Lamps, Illuin and Ormal, upon tall pillars, and dwelt in the “Spring of Arda” upon the island of Almaren. Melkor returned in secret, overthrew the lamps, and in the great tumults that followed the world was broken and the “Marring of Arda” accomplished; he withdrew to the north as the great enemy. The Valar then removed into the uttermost West and built Valinor, walled about by the Pelóri, as the fairest of the regions of the world. There Yavanna caused the Two Trees, Telperion and Laurelin, to spring up and shine, and Varda kindled new stars far off above the darkness. From the first flowering of the Trees time was afterward counted in the Years of the Trees. The chapter closes with the Trees’ mingled light filling Valinor with the brightness that the Elves of Aman long remembered.