Peregrin Took

Lineage

Peregrin was born in T.A. 2990 (S.R. 1390), the youngest child and only son of Paladin Took and Eglantine Banks, after three sisters, Pearl, Pimpernel and Pervinca. His father was a farmer at Whitwell near Tuckborough until in 3015 he unexpectedly became Thain, and Pippin grew up as the heir of the Fallohide house of the Great Smials. He was a cousin of Frodo through the Old Took and of Merry through his aunt Esmeralda, and the two younger hobbits were rarely apart. When he left the Shire he was twenty-eight, five years short of his coming of age, and it showed.

The youngest of the Fellowship

Pippin was one of Merry's conspirators, and walked out of Hobbiton with Frodo and Sam on 23 September 3018 chiefly, he said, for the fun of it. He nearly betrayed Frodo's name in the Prancing Pony by starting to tell the story of Bilbo's party; he was sent to bed at Rivendell when the Council met; and Elrond would have kept him out of the Fellowship altogether had Gandalf not argued for friendship over wisdom. In Moria his curiosity dropped a stone down a well and woke the deep, earning him Gandalf's angriest rebuke. Yet he was already learning. When the Uruk-hai carried him off with Merry from Parth Galen, it was Pippin who worked his hands free, ran a few yards out of the column, and dropped the brooch of his Elven cloak on the grass as a sign for Aragorn; Aragorn found it and understood.

Fangorn and the palantír

Freed with Merry in the confusion of the Rohirrim's attack, Pippin spent the following days with Treebeard in Fangorn, drank the Ent-draught, and watched the Ents break Isengard. On the ride from Isengard, however, he made the great mistake of his life. Wormtongue had hurled a crystal globe from the tower of Orthanc, and Pippin had picked it up. That night, unable to resist, he stole it from the sleeping Gandalf and looked into it. It was a palantír, and Sauron was at the other end. Pippin was questioned, saw the Dark Lord's laughter, and was released only because the Enemy assumed he was the Halfling with the Ring and wished him brought to Barad-dûr in person. The shock nearly killed him. But his blunder told Gandalf what Sauron did not yet know and drew the Eye away from the true bearer. Gandalf took the stone, took Pippin up before him on Shadowfax, and rode for Minas Tirith.

Guard of the Citadel

They reached the city at dawn on 9 March 3019. Brought before Denethor, who had just learned of Boromir's death, Pippin, moved by pride and pity, offered the Steward his sword in payment of his debt, and was taken into the Guard of the Citadel in the black and silver livery of the Tower. The city called him the Prince of the Halflings. He befriended Beregond of the Guard and his son Bergil, waited on Denethor through the siege, and watched the Steward's mind give way. When Denethor carried the wounded Faramir to the House of the Stewards to burn him alive, Pippin refused the order to stand aside, sent Beregond to hold the door, ran through the burning city, and found Gandalf. Faramir was saved; Denethor was not. Pippin then discovered Merry wandering lost in the streets and carried him to the Houses of Healing.

The Black Gate

Pippin marched with the army of the West to the Morannon as a soldier of Gondor. In the battle before the Black Gate on 25 March he saw Beregond go down before a hill-troll, drove his sword up into the creature's belly, and was buried under its falling body. His last thought was that the tale had ended badly. Gimli found his hairy foot sticking out from beneath the troll and dug him out. He recovered in Ithilien with the other hobbits, and rode home a knight of Gondor.

The Scouring and the Thainship

Back in the Shire, wearing the livery of the Tower, Pippin rode to Tuckborough on the night before Bywater and brought a hundred Tooks to the battle on 3 November 3019. He was the tallest hobbit in the Shire, and the young were much impressed. In S.R. 1427 he married Diamond of Long Cleeve, a North-took descended from the Bullroarer, and their son Faramir was born in 1430. When Paladin died in 1434 Pippin became Thain, and the same year was made a Counsellor of the North-kingdom. He built up at the Great Smials the collection of Gondorian books and records from which the Thain's Book, the Shire's authoritative copy of the Red Book, was later made. His son married Goldilocks, Sam's daughter. In 1484, at ninety-four, he laid down the Thainship and rode south with Merry for the last time, dying in Gondor and resting in Rath Dínen, and at the end beside the king he had served.

Died in Gondor after S.R. 1484 and was laid in Rath Dínen with Merry, and later beside King Elessar.