Beren

Lineage

Beren was born in F.A. 432 in Dorthonion, the only child of Barahir, younger son of Bregor, and of Emeldir, called the Man-hearted. Through his father he was of the House of Bëor, the first of the Edain to befriend the Elves, and the cousins with whom he grew up, Baragund and Belegund, were the fathers of Morwen and Rían. He was twenty-three when the Dagor Bragollach destroyed his people's homeland.

The outlaw of Dorthonion

When Emeldir led the women and children away over the mountains in F.A. 455, Beren stayed with his father and the twelve companions who held out in the highlands beside Tarn Aeluin. For five years they fought a hidden war against Morgoth's Orcs. In 460 Gorlim, broken by Sauron, betrayed the camp; Beren was away, and in a dream Gorlim's ghost warned him. He came back to find his father and companions dead and the Orcs gone with Barahir's severed hand. He buried Barahir beneath a cairn, followed the Orcs to their camp at the well of Rivil, killed their captain as he boasted of the deed, and took back the hand with the ring of Finrod still upon it.

For four years Beren lived alone in Dorthonion, waging his father's war by himself. He would not kill beasts or birds, and they became his friends and helpers; he became so feared that Morgoth's price on his head equalled that on the High King of the Noldor, and Sauron sent werewolves to hunt him. At last, when Dorthonion had become a place of horror, Beren left it, crossing the Ered Gorgoroth and the haunted valley of Nan Dungortheb, a journey no one else is recorded to have survived, and came down into Doriath through the Girdle of Melian, which had been made to keep all such strangers out.

Lúthien

In the forest of Neldoreth Beren saw Lúthien, daughter of Thingol and Melian, dancing in the moonlight, and the sight healed him of the grey years behind him. He called her Tinúviel, Nightingale, and for a season he watched her and she fled from him; then in the spring of 465 she came to him, and they loved each other. The minstrel Daeron, who also loved her, betrayed them to her father.

Thingol, who had never before let a mortal set foot in his realm, would have killed Beren but for the oath he had sworn to Lúthien not to. Instead he set a price that was meant to be a death sentence: he would give his daughter to the man who brought him a Silmaril from Morgoth's crown. Beren laughed, said that for so small a price a king might sell his daughter cheaply, and swore that when they met again his hand would hold a Silmaril.

Nargothrond and the Isle of Werewolves

Beren went to Nargothrond and showed Finrod the ring of Barahir. Finrod, remembering his oath to Beren's father, resolved to go with him, though Celegorm and Curufin, who lived in Nargothrond then, turned the people against the quest by reminding them of the Oath of Fëanor. Finrod gave up his crown to Orodreth and went out with only ten companions. Disguised as Orcs by Finrod's arts, they were caught on the borders of Sauron's domain and brought before him on Tol Sirion, now Tol-in-Gaurhoth. Finrod and Sauron contended in songs of power and Finrod was overthrown, and the twelve were thrown into a pit to be devoured one by one by a werewolf. When the wolf came for Beren, Finrod broke his chains and killed it with his hands and teeth, and died of his wounds.

Lúthien, escaping the treehouse where her father had confined her, was caught by Celegorm and Curufin and held in Nargothrond, until the hound Huan, who loved her, carried her away. Together they came to Tol-in-Gaurhoth. Huan killed the wolves Sauron sent, including Draugluin, and mastered Sauron himself in wolf-shape, and Lúthien forced him to yield the tower. Beren came out alive; Finrod was buried on the island's green hill.

Into Angband

Beren wished to go on alone, and twice tried to leave Lúthien behind. On the borders of Doriath Celegorm and Curufin, cast out of Nargothrond, rode upon them; Beren overthrew Curufin and took his horse and his knife Angrist, and as they fled Curufin shot at Lúthien and Beren took the arrow. Huan left his masters then for good. Healed by Lúthien, Beren slipped away northward, but she and Huan overtook him, and this time she would not be sent back. Clad in the pelt of Draugluin and the bat-skin of Thuringwethil, they walked through the desolation of Anfauglith to the gate of Angband.

There the great wolf Carcharoth barred the way, and Lúthien laid a sleep on him. In the deepest hall she danced and sang before Morgoth himself until the Dark Lord and all his court fell into a swoon and the iron crown rolled from his head. Beren cut one Silmaril free with Angrist. Greed took him to try for a second; the knife broke and a shard struck Morgoth's cheek, and they fled. At the gate Carcharoth woke. Beren held out the Silmaril to daunt him, and the wolf bit off his hand with the jewel in it and ran mad into the world. The Eagles of Thorondor, sent by Huan's message, carried the two of them south.

The Hunting of the Wolf

Beren came before Thingol's throne with his hand gone and named himself Camlost, Empty-handed, and then told the tale, and the king's heart changed. Carcharoth meanwhile, burning with the Silmaril inside him, broke through the Girdle of Melian into Doriath. Thingol, Beren, Huan, Mablung and Beleg hunted him. The wolf sprang at Thingol, Beren threw himself in the way and was torn open, and Huan killed Carcharoth and died of his own wounds. Mablung cut the Silmaril from the wolf's belly and laid it in Beren's hand, and Beren gave it to Thingol and died.

Return

Lúthien's spirit followed his to the Halls of Mandos, and there she sang before Mandos of the sorrow of the two kindreds, and he was moved as he had never been moved. Manwë gave her a choice, and she chose mortality so that she and Beren might return to Middle-earth together for a second life. They did not go back to Doriath. They lived on the green island of Tol Galen in the river Adurant in Ossiriand, among the Green-elves, and their son Dior was born there. That country was afterward called the Land of the Dead that Live.

The last deed

In F.A. 503 the Dwarves of Nogrod, who had murdered Thingol and sacked Menegroth, marched home with the Nauglamír and the Silmaril set in it. Beren, warned by the Green-elves, ambushed them at the ford of Sarn Athrad on the Gelion, and the Ents came out of the woods to help. Beren killed the Lord of Nogrod, took the necklace, and brought the Silmaril to Lúthien, who wore it in Tol Galen until the end of her second life. When Beren and Lúthien died, no one saw them go, and the Silmaril passed to Dior.

Legacy

Beren's marriage was the first union of the Elder and Younger Children, and its blood descended to Elwing, to Eärendil's sons Elrond and Elros, and so to the kings of Númenor and the line of Aragorn. The Silmaril he won became the star that Eärendil bore over the world. In the Third Age the tale was still sung at Rivendell and remembered at Weathertop, and Aragorn himself, who married Elrond's daughter, likened his own love to Beren's. Of all the Men of the First Age, Beren is the one whose deed the Elves ranked beside their own greatest.

Died first of Carcharoth's wounds in Doriath and was restored to a second mortal life with Lúthien; died a second time in Tol Galen some years after F.A. 503, and his spirit passed beyond the world.