Free to follow every thread. No paywall, no dead ends.
Ent: the story on HearLore | HearLore
Common questions
Who created the Ents in The Lord of the Rings?
The Vala Aulë and his wife Yavanna created the Ents as the Shepherds of the Trees. Yavanna appealed to Manwë to protect the forests after Aulë created the Dwarves, leading to the Ents being brought into existence. They were designed to ensure that the trees were not forgotten in the grand design of the world.
When did the Ents learn to speak in Middle-earth?
The Ents learned to speak when the Elves taught them language and cured them of their dumbness. This event occurred when much of Eriador was a continuous forest so vast that a squirrel could travel from what is now the Shire to Dunland without ever touching the ground. The Elves granted them the gift of language to allow them to communicate with other beings.
Where did the Entwives move to after separating from the Ents?
The Entwives moved to what became the Brown Lands across the Great River Anduin. They interacted with Men and taught them the art of agriculture in this region before their gardens were destroyed by Sauron. Their disappearance left the male Ents to wander in grief and never fully resolve their separation.
How many Ents participated in the Last March of the Ents?
The Ents numbered about fifty during the Last March of the Ents. They were led by Treebeard and accompanied by the hobbits Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took. They also brought an army of Huorns to destroy Saruman's fortress at Isengard.
What is the origin of the word Ent in The Lord of the Rings?
The word Ent is derived from the Old English ent or eoten meaning giant. Tolkien borrowed the word from a phrase in the Anglo-Saxon poems The Ruin and Maxims II which translates to cunning work of giants. In Sindarin the word for Ent is Onod and the plural Enyd refers to the Ents as a race.
Ent
The oldest living thing that walks in Middle-earth is not a man, an elf, or a dragon, but a tree that has learned to speak. Treebeard, the leader of the Ents, stands tall enough to look down upon the tallest pines and possesses skin as tough as bark, capable of eroding stone with the patience of a glacier. These giant humanoids, known as Ents, are the shepherds of the forest, ancient guardians who have watched the world change for thousands of years. They are not merely large; they are a distinct race of beings who closely resemble the trees they protect, with some Ents bearing the specific traits of the species they guard. Quickbeam, for instance, is tall and slender with smooth skin and grey-green hair, mirroring the rowan trees he once watched over. Their existence is a testament to the deep connection between the land and its guardians, a bond so strong that they can tear down the walls of Isengard like bread-crust when roused to anger. Yet, for all their power, they remain vulnerable to fire and the sharp edge of an axe, a paradox that defines their tragic history.
The Shepherds of Trees
The origin of the Ents lies in a conversation between the Vala Aulë and his wife Yavanna, the lover of all things that grow in the earth. When Aulë created the Dwarves to delve into the earth, Yavanna feared that these new children would destroy the trees without pity. She appealed to Manwë, the king of the Valar, to protect the forests, and in response, the Ents were brought into being as the Shepherds of the Trees. They did not know how to speak until the Elves taught them, curing them of their dumbness and granting them the gift of language. This event occurred when much of Eriador was a continuous forest, so vast that a squirrel could travel from what is now the Shire to Dunland without ever touching the ground. The Ents were part of the Song of Creation, a power that would walk in the forests and whose wrath the Dwarves would arouse at their peril. They were not created to be warriors, but to be guardians, ensuring that the trees were not forgotten in the grand design of the world. Their existence was a direct response to the threat posed by the Dwarves, a living defense mechanism woven into the fabric of Middle-earth.
The Lost Entwives
The Entwives began to move farther away from the Ents because they liked to plant and control things, while the Ents preferred forests and liked to let things take their natural course. This divergence in philosophy led to a separation that would never be fully resolved. The Entwives moved away to what became the Brown Lands across the Great River Anduin, where they interacted with Men and taught them the art of agriculture. Their gardens were eventually destroyed by Sauron, and the Entwives disappeared, leaving the male Ents to wander in grief. Tolkien spent much time considering the fate of the Entwives, stating in Letters number one hundred and forty-four that he believed they had disappeared for good, destroyed with their gardens in the War of the Last Alliance, or perhaps had fled east and become enslaved. Treebeard implored the Hobbits to send word to him if they had news of the Entwives, a plea that went unanswered. After Aragorn was crowned king, he promised Treebeard that the Ents could prosper again and spread to new lands with the threat of Mordor gone, but Treebeard lamented that forests may spread while the Ents would not. He predicted that the few remaining Ents would remain in Fangorn forest and dwindle or become treeish, a tragic end to a race that had once been the guardians of the world.
When did Ents appear in the Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying game?
Ents appeared in the earliest edition of the roleplaying game Dungeons and Dragons in the 1974 white box set. In 1975 Elan Merchandising issued a cease-and-desist order regarding the use of the word ent so the creatures were renamed treants. The TV series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power features Ents in the season two episode Eldest.
The Ents, angry at Saruman for cutting down their trees, convened an Entmoot to decide their course of action. They decided to march on Saruman's fortress at Isengard, an event known as the Last March of the Ents. Led by Treebeard and accompanied by the hobbits Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took, the Ents numbered about fifty, plus an army of Huorns. They destroyed Isengard, tearing down the wall around it with such force that if the Great Sea had risen in wrath and fallen on the hills with storm, it could have worked no greater ruin. Saruman was trapped in the tower of Orthanc, his power broken by the very trees he had sought to destroy. The Ents ensured victory at the Battle of Helm's Deep by herding a forest of angry, tree-like Huorns there to destroy Saruman's army of Orcs. This march was not just a military campaign; it was a declaration of war against the destruction of nature. The Ents, who had considered a three-day deliberation hasty, finally moved with a speed and fury that surprised even themselves. They tore down the walls of Isengard, proving that the trees could indeed go to war, fulfilling a wish that Tolkien had long harbored since his schooldays.
The Cunning Work of Giants
The word Ent is derived from the Old English ent or eoten, meaning giant, and Tolkien borrowed the word from a phrase in the Anglo-Saxon poems The Ruin and Maxims II. The phrase orðanc enta geþeorc, or orthanc enta geweorc, translates to cunning work of giants and describes Roman ruins. In Sindarin, one of Tolkien's invented Elvish languages, the word for Ent is Onod, and the plural Enyd refers to the Ents as a race. Tolkien stated that he had created Ents in response to his bitter disappointment and disgust from schooldays with the shabby use made in Shakespeare's Macbeth of the coming of Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane hill. He longed to devise a setting in which the trees might really march to war, a desire that found its fulfillment in the Last March of the Ents. The Ents were not merely a plot device; they were a response to the environmental damage Tolkien witnessed in the English countryside during the twentieth century. Commentators have observed that having the Ents march to war against the tree-destroyers represented a wish-fulfilment on Tolkien's part, concerned as he was with the increasing damage to the land. The Ents were a living embodiment of the need to preserve and look after every kind of wild place, especially forests, a vital part of Tolkien's environmental ethic.
The Song of the Entwives
Corey Olsen interprets the song of the Ents and the Entwives as a myth that warns of the dangers of apathetically isolating oneself in nature. The song goes through the four seasons of the year, each time with a stanza by the Ent and then one by the Entwife. The Ent is passive, even languid and somnolent in summer, the only active process being dreaming, whereas the Entwife's summer season is simply bursting with activity. These are perhaps not in competition; both contemplation and action are valuable ways of celebrating natural beauty. However, Treebeard's view of the song is biased, and the Ent is not as humble as he claims to be, especially with respect to the Entwives. If the Ents and the Entwives were to be unified, they would balance and complete each other, but they face moral dangers without such balance. In the case of the Ents, the danger is of letting their life in nature lapse into mere lassitude. Examples of this include the apathetic isolationism of Skinbark, who refuses to come out of his hills, and Leaflock's somnolent oblivion, just standing in the long grass all summer doing nothing. The song is a cautionary tale and a tragedy, quite unlike Treebeard's In the willow-meads of Tasarinan, which is a lament covering the four seasons.
The Legacy of the Ents
Ents appeared in the earliest edition of the roleplaying game Dungeons and Dragons in the 1974 white box set, where they were described as tree-like creatures able to command trees and lawful in nature. In 1975, Elan Merchandising, which owned the game licence to the Tolkien estate, issued a cease-and-desist order regarding the use of the word ent, so the Dungeons and Dragons creatures were renamed treants. The TV series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, set in the Second Age, features Ents, with two of the Ents that appear in the season two episode Eldest being Snaggleroot and Winterbloom, voiced by Jim Broadbent and Olivia Williams. In Peter Jackson's films The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Treebeard is a combination of a large animatronic model and a CGI construct, voiced by John Rhys-Davies, who also portrays Gimli. The Fall of Troy has a song entitled The Last March of the Ents on their self-titled debut album released in 2003. Permission was granted for a statue of Treebeard by Tim Tolkien, near his great-uncle J. R. R. Tolkien's former home in Moseley, Birmingham. The Ents have become a symbol of environmentalism and the power of nature, appearing in a variety of media and works of fantasy, from World of Warcraft to the pages of Tolkien's own letters.