Bannock

Tolkien uses over 600 hyphenated words in The Hobbit. Most of them, like “tree-trunk”, are words that go together easily in English. Most of them use words from The Ten Thousand most common. Why hyphenate? I suggest that hyphenating words which don’t need hyphenation emphasizes that, as Tolkien would have it, we are reading a translation of the journal that Bilbo wrote. There isn’t quite an English word to convey the meaning, so two words bound together will have to do. Examining these words is another project in itself. I am leaving them out of this edition of the Concordance, this work I am doing through July, 2015.

19.048 and handed him the tobacco-jar.
14.017 Just now he was enjoying the sport of town-baiting
02.079 it was thick as a young tree-trunk

Update 2015.07.09: I put them in.

Spider

May 12, 2015October 28, 2015 lfsaldenbirch 10K, word

They appear in chapter 8 and immediately thereafter – and in the Chapter 3 description of Bilbo’s handwriting. The word comes from the Old English word meaning “to spin”.

03.041 and spidery.
08.041 All the time he was wondering whether there were spiders
08.042 and then he found spiders all right.
08.075 Then the great spider,
08.075 Then the spider jumped back,
08.075 The spider evidently was not used to things
08.075 as small spiders do to flies –
08.076 The spider lay dead beside him,
08.076 Somehow the killing of the giant spider,
08.080 That is why the spiders neither saw nor heard him coming.
08.081 that there were spiders huge
08.088 With that one of the fat spiders ran along a rope
08.089 To the fattest of these bundles the spider went –
08.089 and kicked the spider straight
08.089 and the enraged spider fell off the branch,
08.091 hissed the angry spider climbing back onto the branch.
08.092 the spider had reached Bombur,
08.092 The stone struck the spider plunk on the head,
08.093 and taking off the spider sitting
08.094 The idea came to him to lead the furious spiders
08.096 Old fat spider spinning
08.096 Old fat spider can’t see me!
08.098 no spider has ever liked being called Attercop,
08.098 Practically all the spiders
08.099 but several of the spiders had run now to different points
08.099 that at least was the spiders’ idea.
08.103 The spiders saw the sword,
08.104 if a spider had not luckily left a rope hanging down;
08.104 only to meet an old slow wicked fat-bodied spider
08.104 and before the spider knew what was happening it felt his sting
08.104 before the spiders were disgusted
08.108 when the spiders began to come back,
08.111 The spiders had caught them pretty easily the night before,
08.112 that some of the spiders had gathered
08.112 and slashed at the spiders
08.113 For he saw spiders swarming up all the neighbouring trees,
08.114 and hundreds of angry spiders were goggling at them all round
08.115 and again the spiders were beaten off,
08.115 Already the spiders were beginning
08.117 I shall draw the spiders off,
08.118 the spiders were drawing their circle ever closer.
08.119 That upset the spiders greatly.
08.119 they drove at the spiders on the left,
08.120 though many of the spiders were close behind.
08.120 and already some spiders were
08.121 and charged into the astonished spiders
08.123 The spiders swelled with rage,
08.123 the spiders suddenly gave it up,
08.124 which the spiders did not like.
08.130 their cries as the spiders caught them
08.144 The giant spiders were the only living things
09.001 The day after the battle with the spiders
09.008 to be trapped by spiders?
09.008 Are the spiders your tame beasts or your pets,
09.009 and rouse the spiders with your riot
09.015 from the spiders,

“spider, n.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, March 2015. Web. 11 May 2015.

Riddle

May 12, 2015October 25, 2015 lfsaldenbirch 10K, high, word

Bilbo’s riddles with Gollum sharpened his wit for riddling with Smaug. The Chapter 8 references to riddling are about recounting the story of “Riddles in the Dark”. Tom Shippey classifies riddles as one type of truth found in Old English poetry, “the basic rule of which is that all statements in them must be true, but also misleading”. I suggest you begin with his essay when you launch your own study of riddles and the many papers which have been published on the influence of Old English poetry on Tolkien’s work.

05.024 because he had not had time to think of a riddle.
05.052 but Bilbo asked another riddle as quick as ever he could,
05.054 It was not really the right time for this riddle,
05.062 but Gollum thought it was a riddle,
05.076 and after all that last question had not been a genuine riddle
05.098 Not a riddle, precious, no.’
05.022 It likes riddles,
05.022 Riddles were all he could think of.
05.029 and nearly bursting his brain to think of riddles
05.037 everyday sort of riddles
08.092 asking riddles
08.125 riddles and all,
12.056 beginning to be pleased with his riddling.
12.058 No dragon can resist the fascination of riddling talk
12.087 from his riddles added to the camps

Shippey, T. A. “Approaches to Truth in Old English Poetry”. University of Leeds Review 25. 1982. PDF of reprint.

Queer

May 12, 2015October 25, 2015 lfsaldenbirch 10K, funny, word

Tolkien uses the first definition of “queer” – strange, odd, peculiar, eccentric – and mostly in the first half of the book. Eccentricities are funny, of course.

01.005 got something a bit queer
01.023 and with the spike on his staff scratched a queer sign
01.093 Gets funny queer fits,
06.024 He gave Bilbo a queer look from under his bushy eyebrows,
06.086 He used to turn queer if he looked over the edge
06.088 He was feeling very queer indeed
07.092 in a queer language
07.116 They must have looked very queer from outside,
07.126 queer,
08.003 There were queer noises too,
11.028 He had a queer feeling that he was waiting for something.
16.018 if it is that queer little creature that is said to be their servant.’

“queer, adj.1.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, March 2015. Web. 11 May 2015.

Pony

May 11, 2015June 1, 2016 lfsaldenbirch 10K, food, low, word

Ponies are mentioned 73 times in our book. Thorin & Co. lost their original ponies in the goblin cave, had the loan of ponies for some of Chapter 7 from Beorn, they received ponies in Laketown only to have most of them eaten by Smaug. Finally, Bilbo has a pony on which to ride home and which will carry his treasure. Being by definition only of a certain height or less, I shall declare them “low”.

Richard Blackwelder wrote an essay on the horses of The Lord of the Rings, including a mini chapter on the ponies of The Hobbit.

“Pony” has the food tag because both goblins and Smaug like to eat them!

02.022 They were on ponies,
02.022 and each pony was slung about
02.022 There was a very small pony,
02.026 on laden ponies;
02.029 the pony was tired
02.035 Then one of the ponies took fright at nothing
02.039 leading their ponies
02.047 or even pony,
02.117 Then they brought up their ponies,
03.001 leading their ponies,
03.008 but a pony that walked there
03.010 Bilbo’s pony began to stumble over roots
03.012 or bumped his nose on the pony’s neck.
03.014 Your ponies need shoeing!
03.017 Your ponies are straying!
03.019 “Just look! Bilbo the hobbit on a pony,
03.026 leading their ponies,
03.026 as narrow as a pony could well walk on;
03.026 each leading his pony by the bridle.
03.034 the ponies as well,
04.005 and their ponies were standing with their heads down
04.009 and ponies
04.012 and their ponies along.
04.012 There was just room to get the ponies through with a squeeze,
04.013 At one end there was room for the ponies;
04.013 and that was the last time that they used the ponies,
04.015 in time to see the last of the ponies’ tails disappearing into it.
04.023 The ponies were already there huddled
04.024 of those excellent little ponies,
04.024 and ponies
04.042 No ponies,
06.001 cloak, food, pony, his buttons
06.036 and ask the goblins nicely to let you have your pony back
07.012 and no ponies to ride;
07.067 and our troop of ponies –
07.068 Troop of ponies?
07.069 there were more than six ponies,
07.092 in trotted four beautiful white ponies
07.093 The other ponies came
07.093 Beside them a pony pushed two low-seated benches
07.126 He would provide ponies for each of them,
07.127 and my ponies.
07.130 if they had still had their ponies,
07.131 and Wargs run swifter than ponies.
07.135 Now you must send back these excellent ponies
07.136 but to keep an eye on the ponies too.
07.143 and unpack the ponies.
07.145 Then at last they said good-bye to their ponies
09.060 a round-bellied pony that was always thinking of rolling on the grass.
10.045 and ponies had been sent round by circuitous paths
11.001 and the ponies for their own use that had been sent to meet them.
11.001 They packed what they could on the ponies
11.003 each leading another pony heavily laden beside him;
11.013 and there was some grass for their ponies.
11.016 to guard the ponies
11.028 some were exercising the ponies down below,
12.025 and all our ponies too,
12.029 The ponies screamed with terror,
12.032 He guessed from the ponies,
12.032 from the valley where the ponies had been standing;
12.033 Their ponies were lost or killed,
12.060 Let me tell you I ate six ponies last night
12.060 Maybe Barrel was your pony’s name;
12.062 that I can eat a dwarf-ridden pony
12.078 Ponies take some catching,
12.087 and the ponies.
15.027 they heard that three of their ponies had escaped
15.027 to find the ponies
15.028 The ponies they had brought
18.037 such as one strong pony could carry.
19.001 their ponies were tired,
19.024 where the pony had fallen
19.027 and slung them on the ponies,

Blackwelder, Richard E. The Horses of Tolkien’s Middle Earth. Personal correspondence. July 8, 1980. Photocopy.

words that you were saying

An adventure through the words of The Hobbit

Author: lfsaldenbirch

Bannock

Bake

Bacon

Ale

Acorn

Hyphenated words

Spider

Riddle

Queer

Pony