She is the Valie responsible for most of the light within the world itself. She is the Lady
of the Stars, most revered by the elves, and of all the valar, she is the most feared by Morgoth.
Today, on Nerd of the Rings, we cover Varda Elentári.
Even before the Music of the Ainur, in which Melkor sewed his discord, Varda saw Melkor’s
mind and despised him. And in turn, Melkor feared and hated Varda most of all the Valar. For she
was most associated with light, which Melkor himself was unable to control. In the First War
between Melkor and the Valar (VY 1), as Manwe fights Melkor for the control of Arda itself,
Varda descends to Arda to stand alongside her husband. Though Melkor prevailed for ages and
ruined many of Aule’s works in the process, the Vala Tulkas would descend in the Valian Year 1499,
and his mighty laughter causes Melkor to flee beyond the Walls of Night.
Thus, after over 14,000 of our own years, the Valar are left to complete the work
of forming Arda. In the Valian Year 1900, Aule constructs the two lamps,
and Varda fills them with light. They would light the world until the Valian Year 3450,
when Melkor throws down the lamps and brings mass destruction to the world.
As the Valar withdraw to the lands of Aman, Varda resides with Manwe in
Ilmarin upon the summit of Taniquetil - the highest peak in all the world.
With Manwe by her side, Varda hears all voices that cry from east to west,
from the hills and the valleys, and from the dark places that Melkor had made upon Earth.
With Valinor now lit by the light of the two trees, Varda keeps great wells beneath them
which catch the dew that falls from Laurelin and Telperion. Eventually,
the day would come when the Valar could feel the awakening of the elves was drawing near. Mandos,
the doomsman of the Valar fortells that the elves would see first the stars,
and that they would always look to Varda in reverence.
Then Varda... looked out from the height of Taniquetil, and beheld the darkness of
Middle-earth beneath the innumerable stars, faint and far. Then she began a great labour, greatest
of all the works of the Valar since their coming into Arda. She took the silver dews from the vats
of Telperion, and therewith she made new stars and brighter against the coming of the Firstborn;
wherefore she whose name out of the deeps of time and the labours of Eä was Tintallë, the Kindler,
was called after by the Elves Elentári, Queen of the Stars. Carnil and Luinil, Nénar and Lumbar,
Alcarinquë and Elemmírë she wrought in that time, and many other of the ancient stars
she gathered together and set as signs in the heavens of Arda: Wilwarin, Telumendil, Soronúmë,
and Anarríma; and Menelmacar with his shining belt, that forebodes the Last Battle that shall
be at the end of days. And high in the north as a challenge to Melkor she set the crown
of seven mighty stars to swing, Valacirca, the Sickle of the Valar and sign of doom.
These stars and constellations, new and brighter than any before, were made by Varda for the
elves - and the Valacirca as a challenge to Morgoth. While we don’t know for certain if they
are indeed the same, many have noticed that the Valacirca contains the same number of stars that
Durin the First sees above the Mirrormere, which are also described as a crown and lead him to
found Khazad-dum. While we are unsure of Durin’s constellation, we know instances where both
Baggins heroes would see the Sickle of the Valar. In 2941, while Bilbo Baggins is on the Quest of
Erebor, he sees the Valacirca twinkling in the northern sky above the entry of the River Running
to the Long Lake. Decades later, when Frodo is in Bree on Sept 29th, 3018, he looks out the window
of his room and sees the constellation bright above the shoulder of Bree-hill.
Varda would later hallow the Silmarils of Feanor. While the elven smith created them,
it was Varda would made them so that no creature of evil could handle them without
being burned. Later yet, when Melkor and Ungoliant destroy the two trees, the great
spider also drinks dry the wells of Varda, and the world is truly plunged into darkness.
Thus Varda sets to the work of bringing light once again to Arda. She takes the
last flower of Telperion and the last fruit of Laurelin and places them within the vessels
created by Aule. And she gives to these vessels such power that they outshone
the ancient stars. And these vessels, the sun and the moon, are placed in the sky.
Initially, Varda aims to keep both the sun and moon in the sky together at all times,
but the Valar Irmo and Este tell her she will deprive the world of night,
the stars, and a period for rest and sleep. Thus, Varda alters the course of the Sun so
that it will spend time hidden, allowing her greatest work to be seen once more.
After the War of Wrath at the end of the first age, it is Varda who places Elrond’s father,
Earendil the mariner, into the sky as a star.
Even into the Third Age, the elves would revere Varda above all other valar.
Gildor and his company of elves sing a hymn to her when the hobbits meet them in the forest.
Snow-white! Snow-white! O Lady clear! O Queen beyond the Western Seas!
O light to us that wander here Amid the world of woven trees!
Gilthoniel! O Elbereth! Clear are thy eyes and bright thy breath!
Snow-white! Snow-white! We sing to thee In a far land beyond the sea.
O Stars that in the Sunless Year With shining hand by her were sown,
In windy fields now bright and clear We see your silver blossom blown!
O Elbereth! Gilthoniel! We still remember, we who dwell
In this far land beneath the trees, Thy starlight on the Western Seas.
In Rivendell, they have a poem dedicated to the Queen of the Stars:
A Elbereth Gilthoniel silivren penna míriel
o menel aglar elenath! Na-chaered palan-díriel
o galadhremmin ennorath,
Fanuilos, le linnathon nef aear, sí nef aearon!
O Elbereth Starkindler (white) glittering slants down
sparkling like jewels from [the] firmament
[the] glory [of] the star-host! To-remote distance far-having gazed
from [the] tree-tangled middle-lands, Fanuilos, to thee I will chant
on this side of ocean, here on this side of the Great Ocean]
Not only is the name of Elbereth revered, but it also one of power. Her name Varda
means Exalted or Lofty. Her titles of Elentari and Elbereth simply translate to queen. While
Gilthoniel means “Star-kindler”. As we’ve seen in previous songs, the elves also
refer to her as “snow-white” or “everwhite” the translation of the elven word Fanuilos.
One instance where her name is invoked, is when the Nazgul attack on Weathertop,
Frodo yells O Elbereth Gilthoniel before striking at the feet of the ringwraiths. Later,
Aragorn would tell him that Frodo’s strike did nothing more than cut the
Nazgul’s garments - More deadly to him was the name of Elbereth.’
And when Frodo, upon Glorfindel’s horse Asfaloth stands in defiance of the nazgul at the river
Bruinen, he cries “By Elbereth and Luthien the fair, you shall have neither the Ring nor me!”
But perhaps the most moving and powerful invocation of Varda’s name would come much
later in The Return of the King, when Samwise Gamgee faces overwhelming odds.
Even as Sam himself crouched..., seeing his death in [Shelob's] eyes,
a thought came to him, as if some remote voice had spoken,
and he fumbled in his breast with his left hand, and found what he sought:
cold and hard and solid it seemed to his touch in a phantom world of horror, the Phial of Galadriel.
'Galadriel!' he said faintly, and then he heard voices far off but clear:
the crying of the Elves as they walked under the stars in the beloved shadows of the Shire,
and the music of the Elves as it came through his sleep in the Hall of Fire in the house of Elrond.
Gilthoniel A Elbereth!
And then his tongue was loosed and his voice cried in a language which he did not know:
A Elbereth Gilthoniel o menel palan-diriel,
le nallon sí di'nguruthos! A tiro nin, Fanuilos!
And with that he staggered to his feet and was Samwise the hobbit, Hamfast's son, again.
Varda is remembered as one who rejoiced in the light. Too beautiful for words,
her face radiates with the light of Iluvatar. The elves,
and in some cases hobbits, would call upon her in their hours of deepest darkness,
and as we have seen, the Queen of the Stars would both hear, and answer their prayers.
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