Húrin

Lineage

Húrin was born in F.A. 441, the elder son of Galdor the Tall, lord of Dor-lómin, and Hareth of the House of Haleth. His grandfather was Hador Goldenhead, and his younger brother was Huor. Unlike most of his golden-haired kin Húrin was short, but he was so strong, quick and tireless that he was said to have inherited his mother's people's stature with his father's people's endurance. His name in the histories is Thalion, the Steadfast.

Gondolin

As boys Húrin and Huor were fostered for a time in Brethil with their mother's kin. In F.A. 458, when Húrin was seventeen, they went with the woodmen against an Orc-raid and were cut off from their company at the Crossings of Teiglin. A mist from the river Sirion, sent by Ulmo, hid them, and the Eagles of Thorondor carried them over the mountains to the hidden city of Gondolin. King Turgon took them in, remembering Ulmo's word that help would come to him from the house of Hador, and they stayed nearly a year. When they asked to go home, Turgon let them go, against the custom of the city, on their oath never to reveal where it lay. The Eagles set them down in Dor-lómin, and though many guessed, they never spoke of where they had been.

Lord of Dor-lómin

In F.A. 462 Galdor was killed defending Eithel Sirion, and Húrin, then twenty-one, took command and drove the attackers off. He became lord of Dor-lómin and the chief friend among Men of Fingon, the High King. The next year he married Morwen Eledhwen, daughter of Baragund of the House of Bëor, who had come to Dor-lómin as a refugee child. Their son Túrin was born in 464 and their daughter Urwen, called Lalaith, in 466. Lalaith died of a plague in 469, and Húrin's grief was answered by a hardness in Morwen that never afterward left her.

The Nirnaeth Arnoediad

When Maedhros gathered his great union against Morgoth, Húrin brought the whole strength of Dor-lómin to Fingon's host. On the morning of the battle in midsummer F.A. 472, Turgon came unlooked-for out of Gondolin with ten thousand, and Húrin and Huor greeted him with joy. But the eastern army under Maedhros was delayed by the treachery of the Easterlings, Fingon's host was drawn out onto Anfauglith, and the Balrogs and dragons came. Fingon was killed by Gothmog.

Húrin and Huor then held the Fen of Serech, the marsh where Rivil joined the Sirion, so that Turgon could retreat with his people to Gondolin. Huor urged Turgon to go, saying that from the two of them a new star would rise, and Turgon went. The Men of Dor-lómin died one by one around the brothers. Huor was killed by a poisoned arrow. At last Húrin stood alone, and he fought with an axe against the trolls of Gothmog's guard, shouting the name of the Day that would come with every stroke, until seventy lay dead and the axe withered in his hand. Then the Orcs seized him alive and buried him under their bodies, and Gothmog bound him and dragged him to Angband.

Before Morgoth

Morgoth wanted the location of Gondolin, and he offered Húrin freedom and honour for it. Húrin mocked him. Morgoth then set a curse on Húrin and all his kin, promising that wherever they went his hatred would follow them and his will would bend everything that happened to them toward evil. He set Húrin in a stone seat high on Thangorodrim, bound by his power, and told him to watch, and through Morgoth's own eyes and ears Húrin saw everything that befell his family for the next twenty-eight years: Morwen's long endurance and flight, Túrin's outlawry, the fall of Nargothrond, the meeting of brother and sister who did not know each other, and their deaths at Cabed-en-Aras. He never bent.

The release

In F.A. 500, when the curse had done its work, Morgoth released him, an old man, white-haired and leaning on a staff, but still unbroken in body. It was a last stroke of malice: Morgoth let it be known that Húrin was free, and the Elves suspected that he had been turned. Húrin went first to the mountains of Gondolin and stood in the Echoriath calling for Turgon, and by that he unwittingly showed Morgoth's spies where the hidden city must lie. Thorondor told Turgon, but the king would not receive him.

Húrin then went south to Brethil and stood at last by the grave of his children at Cabed-en-Aras. Morwen was there, dying, and they spoke once before she died in his arms; he buried her beside the stone that bore their son's name. From there he went to the ruins of Nargothrond, where the Petty-dwarf Mîm, who had betrayed Túrin, had taken the dragon's hoard for himself, and Húrin killed him. Of all the treasure he took only the Nauglamír, the necklace made by the Dwarves for Finrod, and he brought it to Thingol in Menegroth and threw it at his feet, reproaching him bitterly for how his children had been kept. Melian then made him understand that what he had seen from Thangorodrim had been shown him by Morgoth's malice, and his grief turned from bitterness to clear-sightedness. He left the necklace as a true gift and walked out of Doriath.

Death

The Silmarillion says only that Húrin passed out of the tale, and that it was said afterward that he threw himself into the western sea. He died around F.A. 502, the last of the Men who had stood at the Nirnaeth. The Nauglamír he brought to Thingol became, with the Silmaril set into it, the cause of Thingol's death and the sack of Doriath, so that Morgoth's curse worked on through Húrin even after he was freed.

Legacy

Húrin's stand at the Fen of Serech was reckoned the greatest deed of war ever done by Men in the First Age, and it saved Gondolin for another generation, so that Huor's son Tuor could reach the city and Eärendil could be born. His defiance of Morgoth face to face was matched by no other captive. Yet his story is the tragedy of the Elder Days: his steadfastness bought Turgon's escape at the price of everything he loved, and the tale of his children is the darkest in the legendarium.

Released by Morgoth in F.A. 500 after twenty-eight years on Thangorodrim; buried Morwen at Cabed-en-Aras, brought the Nauglamír to Thingol, and afterward, it is said, cast himself into the sea.