Balin

Lineage and early life

Balin was born in T.A. 2763, the elder son of Fundin, a Dwarf of the royal kindred of Durin's Folk descended from Borin, brother of Dáin I. His younger brother was Dwalin. He was a child of seven at Erebor when Smaug came in 2770, and he remembered the day for the rest of his life, and grew up among the exiled Dwarves in Dunland and the Blue Mountains. At the Battle of Azanulbizar in the Dimrill Dale in 2799 his father Fundin was killed, and Balin, then thirty-six, fought there beside Thorin.

Companion of Thráin

When Thráin II left the Blue Mountains in 2841 on his restless journey toward Erebor, Balin and Dwalin were among the few who went with him. The party was hunted by Orcs and wolves and, in Mirkwood, was lost in the dark; one night Thráin simply vanished, and Balin searched for him in vain before leading the survivors home. He carried the memory of that failure, and at Bag End it was Balin who told Thorin that no one knew what had become of his father.

The quest of Erebor

Balin was the second Dwarf to knock at Bilbo's door in April 2941, white-bearded and courteous, and throughout the journey he was the company's look-out, the one who kept watch, saw what was coming and remembered the way. He was also the Dwarf who thought best of the hobbit. When Bilbo came out of the goblin tunnels unseen and walked past Balin's watch-post, it was Balin's admiration that first made the others take the burglar seriously. At the secret door, when Bilbo went down toward the dragon, Balin alone came part of the way into the tunnel with him. He fought in the Battle of Five Armies and survived it, and after Thorin's death he was among those who saw Bilbo on his way home.

The visit to the Shire

In 2949 Balin came to Bag End with Gandalf, the only one of the company recorded as visiting Bilbo afterward. He brought news of the North: Dáin King under the Mountain, Dale rebuilt under Bard, and the roads safe again. It was the last time the two friends met.

Lord of Moria

Balin never gave up the hope, shared by many of Durin's Folk, of returning to Khazad-dûm. In 2989, with Dáin's unwilling consent, he led a company from Erebor to the Dimrill Dale that included Óin, Ori, Flói, Frár, Lóni and Náli. They fought their way in at the East-gate, drove the Orcs from the First Hall, and Flói was killed there. Balin set up his seat in the Chamber of Mazarbul, the chamber of records off the Twenty-first Hall, and took the title Lord of Moria. For five years the colony worked the old mines, found mithril and other treasure, and gathered gold and gems.

Death

On November 10, 2994, Balin went alone to look into the Mirrormere in the Dimrill Dale, as Durin had done, and an Orc archer hidden behind a stone shot him. His people carried him in and buried him under a slab of white stone in the Chamber of Mazarbul, with an inscription in runes naming him Balin son of Fundin, Lord of Moria. Within days the Orcs came up the Silverlode and from the East-gate; the Dwarves held the Bridge and the Second Hall, then were driven back to the Chamber, where the last of them died beside the tomb. The Watcher in the Water took Óin at the West-gate, and Ori wrote the final lines of the colony's book before the end.

Legacy

In January 3019 the Fellowship of the Ring found the tomb by the light of Gandalf's staff. Gimli, Balin's kinsman, cast his hood over his face and stood in silence, and Gandalf read the Book of Mazarbul that told the story. Frodo, who had heard Bilbo speak of him often, grieved for his old friend's sake. Balin's attempt was the last Dwarvish effort to retake Moria in the Third Age, and its failure left Khazad-dûm to the Balrog until the days of Durin VII.

Shot by an Orc archer at Mirrormere on November 10, T.A. 2994, and buried in the Chamber of Mazarbul, where the Fellowship found his tomb twenty-five years later.