They’re like Funions, only Rhunny.
Well, damn. Looks like all the obvious smart-ass answers have been taken. Um, how about:
Hobbits come from the imaginations of people who think it’s hillarious to backstab the paladin and run off with his Holy Avenger.
I am almost 5’10" thankyouverymuch, and my hairy toes were oft a topic of discussion when the sheets were a bit entangled and other activities had ceased.
harumph.
Do I know you IRL? That joke sounds very familar.
I always thought the absence of a creation myth among hobbits was one of the ways Tolkien reinforced their characterization as both easily overlooked and generally incurious stay-at-home types. Other people don’t have much if any knowledge of hobbits, and accounts of the great happenings of Middle-Earth doesn’t mention them, because they don’t aspire to greatness and seek to keep out of trouble. Nobody else knows the origins of hobbits because nobody else pays much attention to hobbits, period. Gandalf himself probably knew more of their origins than anyone else, and he was also the one who valued their humble stature and inconspicuousness-- too unfamiliar to be recognized by scent, too small to be noticed by dark forces.
For their own part, hobbits generally mind their business and don’t look too far afield from their own immediate concerns. Hobbits who value ancient lore above the practical values of hearth and home are looked on by their neighbors as somewhat weird. Though hobbits do appreciate antiquarianism and genealogy, they seem to regard these pursuits as ways of reinforcing community bonds. Questions of ultimate origins are probably too remote and abstract for their tastes.
Are you missing a holy avenger?
Ted, is that you?
:eek:
Yes. Specifically from JRRT himself:
- “It is plain indeed that in spite of later estrangement Hobbits
are relatives of ours: far nearer to us than Elves, or even than
Dwarves. Of old they spoke the languages of Men, after their own
fashion, and liked and disliked much the same things as Men did.
But what exactly our relationship is can no longer be discovered.
The beginning of Hobbits lies far back in the Elder Days that are
now lost and forgotten.”
Fellowship of the Ring, 11 (Prologue)
2)“The Hobbits are, of course, really meant to be a branch of the
specifically human race (not Elves or Dwarves) – hence the two
kinds can dwell together (as at Bree), and are called just the Big
Folk and Little Folk. They are entirely without non-human powers,
but are represented as being more in touch with ‘nature’ (the soil
and other living things, plants and animals), and abnormally, for
humans, free from ambition or greed of wealth.”
Letters by JRRT, 158 (footnote) (#131)
That second is more what I had in mind, though I’ll note that it’s not strictly “canon” (since what the Professor wrote in his letters would at times change with time). But that first is indecisive, because when he says “far nearer to us than Elves, or even than Dwarves” he implies that he would use the term “relative” to apply to both of those races, and we know both of THEM are not off shoots of men. AND, as someone has helpfully supplied, the Ents apparently considered them something other than “men” since they got a line in the Lore of the Creatures poem.
However, I tend to think that the Professor’s letter makes the most sense. 
Oh, and Jim, I’m QUITE well acquainted with the Tolkein works, having read them repeatedly since about age 13 (which was some 34 years ago!). 
Sorry I meant no insults, in fact by that point, I was writing in general for any casual fans that were reading the thread.
Jim
Gotcha
I believe the more commonly accepted construction is: I am always wondering what a “Runyon” is.
Wasn’t there a mention that Smeagol’s ancestors were hobbit-like? Is there a formal relationship between the two groups?
I suppose it’s possible, if you’ve been in the Huntsville, Alabama or Richardson, Texas area in the past several years. But I suspect you may be hearing echoes of Dragon #104 which dealt with the typical halfling thief in two out of three of its articles. This was the same issue that reviewed a brand new supplement called Oriental Adventures, if that tells you how olde schoole it is. I found these passages particularly memorable:
The original of my crack about backstabbing the paladin came from the same issue:
I don’t see as much of this kind of stuff these days, but most of the olde schoole crowd has met this gamer – the one specializes in the backstabbing hobbit. We had one guy who even played his Elf in HeroQuest as a backstabbing hobbit. It was because of him that I insist when I run that adventurers have a code of ethics for the safety of everyone, and anyone who cannot be trusted will be summarily executed even if the paladin has to do it.
Hobbits = Short & Hairy Humans.
Wel-well-well.
I guess that Nobby Nobbs must be a Hobbit, then.
Yep.
A Hobbit.
With syphilis.
Speaking of “halflings”, does Tolkien ever use the term or that strictly from gaming?
Edit: And I was unaware that Nobby Nobbs ever had the opportunity to contract syphillis.
IIRC Smeagol and Deagol were said to be “river folk” an intermediary between man and hobbit.
RE The Current Fate Of Hobbits
They dwell largely in Florida. I defy you to look at pictures of my parents and their friends and not see halflings. Or, look at the grandparents in Eight Crazy Nights or Boris and Minka of Rugrats. We have short people with hairy feet, who do little work, who love talking for hours especially about their relatives, who trade mathoms, who eat many meals.
When I am old, I shall be a hobbit.
ETA
Lumpy When, either Merry or Pippin, adds hobbits to Treebeard’s song he says “Call us ‘Hobbit, halfling, the hole dweller’.”
Yes, Smeagol was definitely close to being a Hobbit, he seemed to belong to a primitive matriarch society in the same area that Hobbit emigrated out of.
That might well explain it, I probably read that issue. I have the book, though I almost never used it.
In addition to the other answers, there’s the mysterious staves from Faramir’s (and Boromir’s once, but mostly Faramir’s) dream:
…and the Halfling forth shall stand.
Halfling was used quite often in the books if I recall. Didn’t Theoden use that term?