Where'd the Entwives Go? The Answer...

[FiddlestickBundy]

Where Did the Ent-Wives Go? The Answer

By Fiddlestick Bundy, Jr.


When I read The Lord of the Rings, the biggest and most perplexing mystery for me was not the presense of Balrog wings, or why Frodo wasn’t flown to Mordor, or who Tom Bombadil was. It had to do with my personal favorite character – Treebeard. The question on the lips of every Ent: where did the Ent-wives go?

The answer came to me like a bolt of lightening.

In the style of Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, let us first review the evidence:

When the first encounter between Hobbits and Ents takes place in The Two Towers, Treebeard asks of Merry and Pippin these questions, in this order: who are you, whence did you come, and where are the Entwives. The Ent-wives, we learn, were taken to people-ish activities: they liked to talk, they enjoyed social activity, gardening, “order, plenty and peace”, and were generally very hasty. Then, one day, the Ent-wives departed. The direction in which they were last seen was the Brown Lands, over the Great River.

I personally never bought the story that Ents had overlooked the existence of the little folk known as Hobbits. Sauron must have known of them, and so must have the Ents, unless I am correct.

Treebeard also tells of the changing of the Ent-wives, how the events of the world changed them, so that Treebeard arrvies at this statement: “…very fair she was, still in my eyes, when I had least seen her, though little like the Ent-maiden of old. For the Ent-wives were bent and brown by their labor, their hair parched by the sun to the hue of ripe corn and their cheeks like red apples.” Here are a few more things he said about the Ents that support my theory:

“For the Ents loved the great trees, and the wild woods, and the slopes of the high hills…”

“Many men learned the crafts of the Ent-wives and honored them greatly.”

The Ent song of the races has this line for the Ents: “Ents the earthborn…”

“Yet here we still are, while all the gardens of the Ent-wives are wasted: Men call them the Brown Lands now.” It was in this place that Smeagol acquired the One Ring, so we can also postulate that Hobbit-folk lived there. At another point, mention is made about the great similarities between the Brown Lands and the Black Forest of the Shire.

Treebeard also said that the Ent-wives never died. It is also presumed that upon leaving Fangorn the Ent-wives lost access to the Entish foods and “draughts”. The draughts, might I remind you, were promised to make Merry and Pippin grow “big and green”.

Another of the great questions that intrigued me was the origin of the Hobbits. Then it occurred to me that the two questions were connected: where did the Ent-wives go and where did the Hobbits come from?

At this point, Holmes starts to puff wildly at his pipe and Monsieur Poirot beams childishly at his audience…

Now we come at last to the most unexpected cohorts of this mystery: the Hobbits. After many hundreds of years of waiting for news of the Ent-wives, Treebeard and his kind have no answers, until it passes clean under their noses, unseen. Tired and hungry, sought by the enemy, two little folk stumble into Fangorn, where Treebeard spares their lives when one of the Hobbits states how very much he likes it there in the forest: “I almost felt I liked the place.” Appropriate, since he had been there before. Treebeard quickly discovers that he likes these hasty little tikes. Again, this is appropriate, for Treebeard had met Hobbits before.

Why didn’t the Hobbits appear in the Old Lists? Why is it that Hobbit and Entish kinds migrated in a similar manner—from the Brown Lands to the Shire? What would have happened to Merry and Pippin if they had continued on the Entish diet? Why all the similarities between Hobbits and Ent-wives—both loved gardens, socializing, the company of humans, playing in the green fields, plenty, peace, reading old poems, and both had rosey cheeks. The first records of the Hobbits and last of the Ent-wives takes up in the Brown Lands, and now Hobbits are found in the Shire, with hints of Entish-ness in the Black Forest.

There is only one conclusion to be drawn from these details – the only details we have to go on. It is an answer saturated with ironies within ironies, and perhaps greater mystery than the question itself. The Entwives, on their diet of humanity and lesser living, gradually transformed… they became bent, fair-haired, rosey-cheeked little beings in love with nature and gardening and poetry and… tea. My friends, the Entwives are no more. They have become bent, fair-haired, rosey-cheeked Hobbits.

[webwizard333]

So you're saying that some of the Entwives became male? Interesting, reminds me of the novel Jurassic Park.

[FiddlestickBundy]

Congrads... I think you are the only person to ever successfully link Jurassic Park with LOTR...

[Ma Uai: Ua Nemti]

You, FiddlestickBundy, are to be complimented! Very few times before have I heard such deductive reasoning. My hat is off to you sir (or madam?). I applaud your triumph.

[Gilrond]

Interesting...

[Firekitten2006]

hmmmmmmm

I never really worried too much about the Ent Wives, but thats a pretty interesting theory. The Grey Havens are what really interested me.

[katya]

FiddlestickBundy: Very very interesting theory and i love your reasoning and logic. I never ever ever would've thought that thought. I am very impressed. It's a bit radical in a way but it seems a very possible theory now that I hear your case. Maybe you should come here and solve the new mystery of the missing stuff and dead rabbits in my neighborhood. Very interesting.

[bropous]

Nice try, but I think the arrow flies far from the mark.

Hobbits are MEN. They are a smaller variety of man, but human nonetheless. They have no entish blood in them.

My theory of what happened to the Entwives can be summed up in two concepts: "Troll" and "Olog-Hai".

The Orcs were initially Elves who were taken and tortured, misshapen and twisted by Morgoth. It was his joy to take the children of Iluvatar and malform them, thumbing his nose at Eru and the Valar, especially revelling in bringing sorrow and dread to the heart of Yavanna, whose "children" the ents were.

Sauron, being pretty much like Morgoth, also got off to destroying thigns of beauty and peace. He found that the Entwives were abroad, and had them captured by the Orcs, dragged off to the breeding pits of Mordor, and bred generation after generation of troll, which is to the ent as an Orc is to the Elf.

Sauron's final triumph over the Ents and Entwives was the foul offspring of nameless sires and Entwives, the hideous and massive Olog-Hai, which make their appearance at the Battle of the Morrannon.

The entwives never return to the Ents, as they are all mercifully slain in the collapse of Barad-Dur. They would have been like death camp victims and all joy of their return to fangorn Forest would have been eradicated by the pain and sorrow brought on by the ents seeing their condition, and Sauron would have had one last great victory over the Shepherds of Trees, of whom he was more than certainly aware and against whom he would also have possessed a deep-seated hatred.

[entss89]

so ummm your saying that entwives are little hobbits? now i was just wandering if ents are 14 ft then wouldnt the entwives be 14 ft? but instead now they are 4 ft?im so confused well i do say you write a longgg and brillant post though. wtg sherlock

[Sminty_Smeagol]

good logic but a little too far-fetched for my liking. Aren't hobbits called a diminished race of MAN or something?

'I think that in fact the Entwives had disappeared for good, being destroyed with their gardens in the War of the Last Alliance (Second Age 3429 - 3441)...' (The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien No 144, dated 1954). This is less definite than it might appear, because he goes on to suggest that some might have fled into the east, and finally simply states of their fate, 'I don't know.'

[bropous]

...and, of course, who knows, the Entwives and the Blue Wizards may have been in cahoots off in Easterlingville and were instrumental in keeping the vast majority of the Easterlings out of the War. If not for their actions, the West may have been overrun by Islamosauronist fascists.

[Linarryl]

What do you mean happend to the entwives?

[Fred Baggins]

I don't think the entwives are hobbits. My theory? THe Entwives are the trees of the Old Forest. Now before you argue let me explain. When the hobbits meet Treebeard he told them that many of the older ents were becoming "sleepy" and "Treeish". So I think that when the Entwives disappeard they found a place and a race that pleased them...Hobbiton. But they became "sleepy" and "treeish" and eventualy became the trees of the Old Forest. But why then are the trees so cranky? Well, I belive that when the became "sleepy" was before the Brandybucks settled near there forest. When the Brandybucks settled there they began to cut down some of the outer trees...the ones that had compleatly fallen asleep. The other entwives were mad about that and thus the Old "Cranky" Forest. Make sense?

[Falagar]

Tolkien himself supported the theory that the Entwives had been killed by Sauron (as far as I remember).

[BeardofPants]

Originally posted by Fred Baggins
I don't think the entwives are hobbits. My theory? THe Entwives are the trees of the Old Forest.

I don't think so; there's no evidence of gardens.

Tolkien mentioned that they were probably destroyed in Saurons scorched earth policy.

[markedel]

Actually he said they could be enslaved as agricultural workers...

[Falagar]

Actually he said they could be enslaved as agricultural workers...

That's almost the same...

[BeardofPants]

Well, he mentioned both possibilities.

[FiddlestickBundy]

I am still not convinced otherwise... Sorry, but I just haven't heard any really strong arguments to the contrary. All the sources quoted are either obscured by context (such as spoken dialogue that takes the form of conjecture and has no authority) or is based on your vague memories. No offense, but I have been many times disappointed by people citing inaccurate memories. Thank you all for replying, though. I would like to hear more...

The closest I got to an answer is from Sminty_Smeagol, who quotes Tolkien as saying he "doesn't know" what happened to the Entwives. What I am suggesting is that this was the true story behind Tolkien's reasoning behind placing these numerous clues in the texts to set up the revelation, but chose in the end not to reveal it -- I can only guess why. Perhaps he realized what a hard pill that would be for some fans to swallow (see Sminty_Smeagols emotional reaction to my theories).

In light that there are no truly solid arguments out there, I am going to stand by my theory for the time being.

[BeardofPants]

Well, there is no real answer, since Tolkien himself wasn't sure.

Tolkien's Letters #144:
What happened to them is not resolved in this book. ... I think that in fact the Entwives had disappeared for good, being destroyed with their gardens in the War of the Last Alliance (Second Age 3429-3441) when Sauron pursued a scorched earth policy and burned their land against the advance of the Allies down the Anduin. They survived only in the 'agriculture' transmitted to Men (and Hobbits). Some, of course, may have fled east, or even have become enslaved: tyrants even in such tales must have an economic and agricultural background to their soldiers and metal-workers. If any survived so, they would indeed be far estranged from the Ents, and any rapprochement would be difficult -- unless experience of industrialised and militarised agriculture had made them a little more anarchic. I hope so. I don't know.