why were there so many dwarves?

[Twilight]

Yes, trolls are the sort of oponent that you wouldn't want to hold anything back on.


(Edited just to correct a mispelling)

[elendili]

There had to be lots of dwarves in The Hobbit coz otherwise you'd get bored with only a couple of characters. Plus these particular dwarves seemed quite dense so maybe they thought they'd be safer if they went in a large group. Pretty dumb if you asked me they went to fight a huge fire breathing dragon with no weapons or armour between them, it was surprising they got as far as they did. But i suppose the intelligent hobbit who wanted a tissue helped them a bit.

[Twilight]

Having fewer dwarves would have allowed for greater personality and character development for each dwarf. There is something to say about safety in numbers, but that only really helps if they are prepared to meet danger. The dwarves didn't really seem that prepared. A smaller group would have done every bit as good, and would have atracted less problems. The dwarves problably didn't think of that though.

[samwiselvr2008]

i like there being alot of dwarves! it gives you the filling about IT WOULD BE TERRABLE IF.... and allso, if kids are reading this book, since ppl think this is a kids book, it will give them more to visualize! same with every one else, that likes to see the picture in there mind, and tolkien did write it for his kids, not for us, and his kids might have liked long lists...

i don't know, there are so many dif. resons why!!!

[Dolenloteiel]

The Dwarves were essential to the story. Nearly all of them were related, and they all played important roles in the book. They all wanted their share of the treasure, so they all went.

[The Lady of Ithilien]

Yes, in the appendix it said that Gandalf was worried about Sauron using Smaug to devastate the North. He (Gandalf) was in the Inn at Bree one night, and Thorin introduced himself to talk about Smaug. Gandalf said something like, he was on his way to the Shire but had realized that was the way to Thorin's dwellings, too; Thorin said Gandalf would always be welcome there, and so it got started.

Is that similar to the version in Unfinished Tales?

As for why there were so many dwarves, what better way to grab children's attention than starting off with an absurd and unexpected character, say,

. . . a dwarf with a blue beard tucked into a golden belt, and very bright eyes under his dark-green hood.

and then piling it on from there, finishing up with that "enormously important dwarf," Thorin Oakenshield, getting squashed by Bombur.

Then, once having gotten the children's attention, other touches are added to show that these dwarves are not like any dwarf they've ever heard of before (kids wouldn't care about the distinction between "dwarfs" and "dwarves," after all). These dwarves have their own colors, their own very distinctive musical instrument, and only then, once they've been "fleshed out," so to speak, they can start with the singing and the history and the map and their tale.

That's a good point about the dwarves in the Trollshaw not bringing their arms when they head out to the fire to see what happened to Bilbo. Maybe the first few could have left them behind (though that seems unlikely), but we're told that Thorin was already suspicious when he approached. Of course by then it was one dwarf against three big Trolls, and he might have been using the burning branch purposely to put two of them out of action (as he did) so he could use a weapon on the third. That seems a bit too cautious, though, for someone who fought orcs at Moria using an oak limb for a shield. And Bilbo doesn't report seeing a sword or axe.

As for the dragon, maybe they planned to burgle enough of the treasure away from Smaug to pay for and fit out an army that could come back and deal with Old Ozone-Head definitively? Wish Tolkien could have gone into more detail on that discussion on

. . . dragon-slayings historical, dubious, and mythical . . .