# LOTR: Why the big debate about Balrogs and wings? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 11, 2005, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169 "2005-01-11T04:52:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/21 "2005-01-12T02:31:35Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > And from this, can we deduce the air speed of an unladen Balrog? Beleriand or Eriador? ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/22 "2005-01-12T02:56:38Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > Beleriand or Eriador? _pause_ I don’t KNOOOOOOOWWWWwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww… ---
**Author:** ![emekthian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecae2f/32.png) [@emekthian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emekthian)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/23 "2005-01-12T03:17:30Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > Beleriand or Eriador? “You’ve got to know these thing when you’re a king” -“But Aragorn, you’re not king yet.” “SHUT UP!!!” ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/24 "2005-01-12T03:21:29Z")
> [@emekthian](#): > > “You’ve got to know these thing when you’re a king” > -“But Aragorn, you’re not king yet.” > “SHUT UP!!!” “Sam will kill him if he tries anything!” (Yeah, I know, weak. But nothing will **ever** top the airspeed of an unladen Balrog – greatest witty comeback line in SDMB history! ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/25 "2005-01-12T06:26:17Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > Well… sort of. In the first movie, it was fairly ambiguous; you could make out wings, but they were wrapped in shadow. Hard to say. > > In the second movie, Gandalf stabbed Mister B, then we saw the Balrog fall to the ground, dead. With visible wings. > > So PJ’s Balrog had wings. We still don’t know (and will never know) if JRRT’s balrog had wings. In FOTR, we do see wing bones. The smoke never clears enough to see if these are equipped with muscles, tendons, or the membrane needed to fly. I haven’t seen TTT in a while, but I only remember seeing wing bones on the dead Balrog. I took this to mean that PJ’s interpretation was that originally, before they served Melkor, the Balrogs had actual wings. Either due to their corruption, or their defeat by the forces of good, their wings were destroyed. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/26 "2005-01-12T07:29:09Z")
**DocCathode** , ok, so they had ineffectual wings. Which was more or less my point, no? ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/27 "2005-01-12T07:52:14Z")
**Squeegee** No, that wasn’t your point. You say that FOTR, is unclear on the matter. Then you state that TTT shows wings. You conclude that PJ’s Balrogs had wings. You do not state that they were ineffectual. This subject demands clarity and detail, dammit! ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/28 "2005-01-12T10:47:11Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > That’s at least the second known case of a balrog falling to its death. Way back in the First Age, in the exile from Gondolin, Glorfindel (yes, presumibly the same fellow who was or was not at the Fords in _Fellowship_) fought a Balrog in the mountain passes, with the end result being that both combatants fell to their deaths (interestingly, in the only other attested death of a Balrog, the fight between Gothmog and Ecthelion, both also die). We’re not told how wide was the valley into which Glorfindel’s 'rog fell, but it being outdoors, it was presumably wide enough for wingspread. So was Glorfindel also brought back to life like Gandalf? Is there a pattern here? [Gandalf and Glorfindel in a bar, speaking to an adoring group of bar-wenches] **Gandalf:** Balrogs - pffft - it’s not like they can _really_ kill you. **Glorfindel:** Hurts like hell, though. They always want to drag you over cliff, or into a chasm. **Gandalf:** They’re just irritating putzes, that’s all. All smoke and shadow, no sizzle. **Glorfindel:** How 'bout another round, girls? ---
**Author:** ![Antonius\_Block](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Antonius\_Block](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antonius_Block)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/29 "2005-01-12T11:46:35Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > **Glorfindel:** How 'bout another round, girls? _[Pssst. Be sure to put them on **Gandalf** ’s tab. Guy’s rakin’ in the residuals from the movies, where I can’t seem to catch a break. First they replace me with [Legolas](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077869/?fr=c2l0ZT1kZnxteD0yMHxzZz0xfGxtPTIwMHx0dD1vbnxwbj0wfHE9bG9yZCBvZiB0aGUgcmluZ3N8aHRtbD0xfG5tPW9u;fc=4;ft=24;fm=1) at the Ford of Bruinen, then it’s [Arwen](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120737/?fr=c2l0ZT1kZnxteD0yMHxzZz0xfGxtPTIwMHx0dD1vbnxwbj0wfHE9bG9yZCBvZiB0aGUgcmluZ3N8aHRtbD0xfG5tPW9u;fc=1;ft=24;fm=1). I tells ya, I just don’t get no respect from the movie goombas. One of these days, Bombadil and I are gonna go First-Age on their ass…_ ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/30 "2005-01-12T14:24:07Z")
> [@Northern Piper](#): > > So was Glorfindel also brought back to life like Gandalf? Is there a pattern here? > > [Gandalf and Glorfindel in a bar, speaking to an adoring group of bar-wenches] > > **Gandalf:** Balrogs - pffft - it’s not like they can _really_ kill you. > > **Glorfindel:** Hurts like hell, though. They always want to drag you over cliff, or into a chasm. > > **Gandalf:** They’re just irritating putzes, that’s all. All smoke and shadow, no sizzle. > > **Glorfindel:** How 'bout another round, girls? Actually, yeah. Elves reincarnate if they get killed; that’s Tolkien canon. (Of course, when and where – and in a couple of cases, _if_ – is not within their control. But they do.) Men, however, do not. (Don’t ask about dwarves – Terry Pratchett-on-dwarves is calm, sane, and humorless by comparison!) As for Gandalf, however, there are several issues at hand. First, as a Wizard, he is an incarnated Maia – just as much an angel-wearing-a-body as anything Della Reese ever came up with. Second, he appears to have been the only Maia to have ever met death by mischance while remaining true to the duties he was doing for Eru Iluvatar. So we don’t **know** “what the rules are” for Maiar – the ones portrayed as having turned to evil end up turning to smoke and blowing west, presumably for judgment by Manwe or Mandos. As I once pointed out in a religious thread over in Great Debates, the rate of resurrections among human beings is not relevant to the Easter story – according to the Bible, the rate of resurrections among Persons-of-the-Trinity-in-human-form is 100%, the sample set universe from which we can generate valid statistics being one. Likewise, the sample set for “good”-Maiar-who-were-incarnate-and-killed is one, i.e., Olorin, called Mithrandir and Gandalf among other things. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/31 "2005-01-12T14:35:56Z")
> [@Qadgop the Mercotan](#): > > What **Chronos** said. Being Maiar, Balrogs could manifest wings if they wanted to, at least back in the beginning. But if they’re like their master, Melkor, they probably spent a lot of their power in malice, and sorta got locked into one form. I bet they got locked into wings which were inadequate for flying! So you’re telling me that penguins are descended from balrogs? I always thought they looked a little too suave to NOT be evil in the end. And in Zoo Tycoon there’s an easter egg where if you put a Tyrannosaur in with a penguin the penguin kicks it’s ass every time. Coincidence? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/32 "2005-01-12T15:23:43Z")
Penguins **can** fly. Just not in air. It’s a rather inane point, but an interesting one. Penguins use the methodology of how a bird flies to “swim” in the water; that’s why they’re so fast in the water. Unlike other paleognaths, they preserve the functionality of “flying” but are only able to use it in dense media, i.e., water. (It might be interesting to generate a SF scenario of a low-gravity, high-pressure-atmosphere world where penguins are imported and can fly.) ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/33 "2005-01-12T15:30:22Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > Penguins **can** fly. > > Just not in air. > > It’s a rather inane point, but an interesting one. > > Penguins use the methodology of how a bird flies to “swim” in the water; that’s why they’re so fast in the water. Unlike other paleognaths, they preserve the functionality of “flying” but are only able to use it in dense media, i.e., water. > > (It might be interesting to generate a SF scenario of a low-gravity, high-pressure-atmosphere world where penguins are imported and can fly.) Minor nitpick, **Poly**. Penguins are neognaths, not palaeognaths. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/34 "2005-01-12T16:17:44Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Minor nitpick, **Poly**. > > Penguins are neognaths, not palaeognaths. 😛 See if I compliment **you** for wittiness again! ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/35 "2005-01-12T17:11:40Z")
> [@Jonathan Chance](#): > > So you’re telling me that penguins are descended from balrogs? Darn glad you cleared that up. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/36 "2005-01-12T17:36:52Z")
Wait… And they live in extremely cold zones because they retain the oven-like heat of their forebears, right? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/37 "2005-01-12T19:29:43Z")
OK, one of my favorite cartoons is several thousand penguins on an ice flow, and a tiny little balloon over them, saying, “You want to know what we need around here? I’ll tell you want we need around here. We need some gawddam \*name tags \*around here.” So, switch it to looking over the wire at Jurassic Park and a couple hundred little velicoraptors, “You want to know what…” See? **They are the same** ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 8:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/38 "2005-01-12T20:48:54Z")
> [@](#): > > So was Glorfindel also brought back to life like Gandalf? Is there a pattern here? He did (presumably) come back to life, but I wouldn’t say that it happened “like Gandalf”. There’s some indication that Gandalf’s was a special case, requiring direct intervention from God Himself. When he did come back, it was in the same place as where he “died”, and presumably in the same body (or at least, in a fully mature and rather aged body, like the one he had before). With Elves, by contrast, reincarnation is the normal state of affairs, and an Elf is only _not_ reincarnated in special cases and by intervention of God Himself. Elves aren’t subject to many of the same causes of death as humans, but if an Elf should happen to die by misadventure or by grief, his spirit goes to the Halls of Mandos for a while, before eventually being reborn. The reborn Elf starts as a baby and grows up as normal, but some time around attaining adulthood, regains the memory of his previous life. How long this takes varies, and in the case of Feänor it’s believed that it won’t be until the end of the World. But the Elves are intrinsically bound up in the World, and unlike humans, can never truly leave it until the End. This much, about Elves in general, we have from Tolkien directly. Nowhere is it made explicit that this is the case for Glorfindel specifically, and it’s possible that the fellow at the Fords was a separate person from the exile of Gondolin who just happened to have the same name. But given that there are no other known cases of Elves reusing names, and given that Glorfindel is an Elf-lord of great standing, and who glows radiantly as he appears “on the other side”, and given that Elves get reborn, it’s the simplest conclusion. If Glorfindel was reborn, he’s the only such case mentioned in Tolkien’s works, but remember that most Elves are in the West, death by misadventure is uncommon for Elves, and we don’t know what a typical waiting period is before rebirth. So it’s still quite plausible that we would have only heard of one. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/39 "2005-01-12T22:26:56Z")
So if humans aren’t reborn, and elves are, what of crossbreeds? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2005, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169/40 "2005-01-12T22:30:48Z")
> [@Inigo Montoya](#): > > So if humans aren’t reborn, and elves are, what of crossbreeds? They are required to choose which Kindred they will belong to, and live out the life appropriate to that Kindred. That’s an enormous piece of why the Elrond-Arwen-Aragorn tension is what it is; Arwen is choosing the opposite Kindred from what her father had chosen 6,500 years before. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-why-the-big-debate-about-balrogs-and-wings/284169.md?page=3)