She was the dark terror of Cirith Ungol.
A great spider who fed on elves, men, and orcs.
One of the great monsters of the third age and the mother of the spiders of Mirkwood.
Today on Nerd of the Rings, we cover the life of Shelob and the spiders of the Third Age.
In the Two Towers, Tolkien paints a vivid picture of Shelob’s appearance...
Shelob was born in the First Age, the offspring of the dark creature Ungoliant, who took the form of a great spider.
We’ll cover Ungoliant in her own video, but we should note that she was an incredibly
formidable force of her own - destroying the two trees and nearly killing Melkor were it
not for the help of his balrogs.
Sometime after this exodus to Middle-earth, Ungoliant spawns her offspring in a valley
near a mountain range in central Beleriand.
This mountain chain would be known as the Ered Gorgoroth the Mountains of Terror and
the valley as it is taken over by the offspring of Ungoliant is called Nan Dungortheb - the Valley of Dreadful Death.
Even the Noldor would not dare to cross this area, and with very few exceptions, every
other living thing would avoid it.
It’s in this area, where Beren would dare to travel as he flees Dorthonion, where Shelob
sends the early centuries of her life.
Sometime before the destruction of Beleriand, however, she would make her way to the east,
coming to the mountains where she would spend thousands of years and enter the larger story
of The Lord of the Rings...
During her time in the Mountains of Shadow, she would spawn more spiders, devouring her mates.
Shelob would feed off anything unfortunate enough to cross her path.
While this initially included elves and men, they would become more scarce in this region
as Sauron takes up residence in Mordor.
With men and elves not being as frequent an option, Shelob turns to orcs for nourishment.
Sauron was completely fine with this.
He gladly accepted the price of a few orcs here and there in return for having more security
around the passes into his lands.
In The Two Towers, it states: ...as for Sauron: he knew where she lurked.
It pleased him that she should dwell there hungry but unabated in malice, a more sure
watch upon that ancient path into his land than any other that his skill could have devised.
And Orcs, they were useful slaves, but he had them in plenty.
If now and again Shelob caught them to stay her appetite, she was welcome: he could spare them.
And sometimes as a man may cast a dainty to his cat (his cat he calls her, but she owns
him not) Sauron would send her prisoners that he had no better uses for: he would have them
driven to her hole, and report brought back to him of the play she made.
So they both lived, delighting in their own devices, and feared no assault, nor wrath,
nor any end of their wickedness.
Never yet had any fly escaped from Shelob's webs…
As for Shelob’s children, they would spread throughout the Ephel Duath and north into Mirkwood.
These spiders were smaller than Shelob, but still intelligent beyond normal beasts and
had a propensity for evil.
When Sauron returns later in the Third Age and takes up residence in Dol Guldur, this
return of evil makes Shelob’s descendants more bold and aggressive.
These were the very spiders that Bilbo and the dwarves encounter during the events of The Hobbit.
These spiders were apparently capable of speech, as Bilbo hears them talking about the dwarves
Returning to Shelob in the Mountains of Shadow, we see that she first meets Gollum in 3009
TA, as he is seeking the One Ring.
He becomes trapped by the great spider, but manages to convince her to let him leave,
promising to bring her more food.
Gollum would indeed return on March 11, 3019 as he accompanies Sam and Frodo on their journey to Mordor.
At this time, Gollum lives up to the nickname which the orcs of the Tower of Cirith Ungol
called him - Shelob’s Sneak.
He brings Sam and Frodo into her tunnels, planning to have her dispense with them so
that he can reclaim his precious.
While Shelob is driven back by the light of the Phial of Galadriel, she would attack again outside the tunnels.
While viewers will no doubt be familiar with the depiction of a stinger in Peter Jackson’s
films, Tolkien’s writing - including his letters - points to the phrase “sting”
being used instead to describe her bite.
This sting of Shelob would not kill her prey, but put them into a coma-like state, so that
their meat could stay fresh for consumption.
After rendering Frodo unconscious, Shelob attacks Sam.
However, arguably one of the most impressive feats of the Third Age, Sam defeats the giant spider.
As she strides atop him and prepares to crush the hobbit with her massive weight, Sam let’s
her impale herself on the sword Sting.
He then uses the Phial of Galadriel, and the spider flees.
As for Shelob’s ultimate fate after this brutal wound, Tolkien says...
...Shelob was gone; and whether she lay long in her lair, nursing her malice and her misery,
and in slow years of darkness healed herself from within, rebuilding her clustered eyes,
until with hunger like death she spun once more her dreadful snares in the glens of the
Mountains of Shadow, this tale does not tell.
As for her offspring, we know that at the end of the War of the Ring, Celeborn and Galadriel
destroy the fortress of Dol Guldur.
Meanwhile, Thranduil defeats Sauron’s forces in the north of the forest.
Cleansing their respective portions of Mirkwood, Celeborn and Thranduil meet in the middle
and rename Mirkwood Eryn Lasgalen - Wood of Greenleaves.
Leading us to believe that the spiders of Mirkwood were either wiped out or driven away.
Though we don’t know what ultimately became of Shelob - whether she died of her wounds
or lived to hunt her prey into the fourth age, one thing is for certain - she and her
family were among the most terrifying of all the creatures in Middle-earth.
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