As unique as Smaug himself is the appearance of “calamity” in the work.
- 12.048 and Greatest of Calamities,’
high
Haste
Gollum says only one word outside of The Ten Thousand (contrast his mouth-and-throat noises and his sibilance), and that is “hasty”. I am amused to note that each person who hears it then says it to someone else, if only for a short run.
- 05.081 We can’t go up the tunnels so hasty. (Gollum to Bilbo)
- 16.033 Don’t be so hasty! (Bilbo to Bard)
- 17.029 Not so hasty! (Bard to Thorin)
“Haste” in all of its forms presents itself more and more frequently as the action of the book increases pace, culminating in seven occurrences in Chapter 17. It signifies the intensification of action, so I have tagged it “high’.
- 05.050 haste!’ said Gollum,
- 05.082 We can’t go up the tunnels so hasty.
- 05.118 and make haste.
- 05.118 Make haste!’
- 08.102 run hastily backwards
- 09.003 The king had ordered them to make haste.
- 09.061 in haste from the king’s great doors.
- 10.027 Now make haste
- 13.047 From here it hastens to the Gate.
- 14.042 he hastened now down the river to the Long Lake.
- 15.021 Bid him hasten!’
- 15.040 Come haste! Come haste! across the waste!
- 15.040 Come haste! Come haste! across the waste!
- 16.005 and snow is hastening behind them.
- 16.033 Don’t be so hasty!
- 17.028 but if you do not hasten,
- 17.029 Not so hasty!
- 17.031 and was now hastening to Dale.
- 17.033 We are hastening to our kinsmen
- 17.035 and they hastened back
- 17.044 and they hastened night after night through the mountains,
Abominate
Abominate, to hate intensely, was used most often in the mid-1600s and tapered off. Its derivatives “abomination” and “abominable” follow the same patterns, but have always been used with about ten times greater frequency.
- 06.008 into those abominable tunnels to look for him,
- 08.075 as it struggled to wind its abominable threads round
“Google Ngram Viewer.” Google Ngram Viewer. Web.
Manflesh
The Oxford English Dictionary has man-flesh (hyphenated so) as a word attested since the seventeenth century. Tolkien does not hyphenate it and only Tom the troll says it. More on hyphenated words hereafter. I merely observe my own little shudder to learn that the trolls have a word for this particular variety of meat.
- 02.045 “Never a blinking bit of manflesh
Update 2015.06.08: I’m adding the tag “high” to this word to be consistent with later use of the tag – indications of danger are adventurous and thereby earn this tag.
“man, n.1 (and int.).” OED Online. Oxford University Press, March 2015. Web. 9 May 2015.
Bless
Bless is a complicated word indeed – Bilbo, Thorin, Gollum, Balin, the narrator himself, and even Gandalf and Smaug use it as an interjection, blessing themselves in a folksy manner. Gandalf is being disingenuous with Beorn in 07.081 and putting off the dwarves in a teasing manner in 07.116. “Bless me” (or in Gollum’s case, “us”) sounds like a verbal habit of a slightly superstitious, perhaps parochial dialect.
But whence the superstition? What is blessing? In the more solemn sense of spiritual gift, the word is used three times. In chapter 12, Bilbo wordlessly blesses the luck of his ring and Balin lifts up the importance of knowing about Smaug’s bare patch. In chapter 18, Thranduil names Bilbo “elf-friend and blessed.” Although Tolkien had not planned Bilbo’s future trajectory as he wrote that, we certainly see this blessing play out in Bilbo’s story going forward.
What do we make of it? Two uses of bless. Do we chart them differently? I propose that when characters bless themselves, we think of it as a parochial saying and when characters bless others that it is a word of high register. Well, bless us and splash us.
- 01.017 Bless me, (Bilbo)
- 01.120 Bless me!’ said Thorin,
- 05.015 Bless us (Gollum)
- 06.014 Bless me, (narrator)
- 07.081 And, bless me! (Gandalf)
- 07.116 but bless me! (Gandalf)
- 08.127 Gollum! Well I’m blest! (Balin)
- 12.044 and blessed the luck of his ring. (Bilbo avoiding Smaug)
- 12.067 Bless me! (Smaug)
- 12.089 and a blessing yet to know of the bare patch (Balin)
- 18.008 Well I’m blessed!’ (Bilbo)
- 18.049 And I name you elf-friend and blessed. (Thranduil)
- 19.035 Bless me! (Bilbo)
Grim
It is possible that I got into this entire business because of my curiosity about the word “grim”. It’s an uncommon word. It’s a humble, one-syllable word. It evokes in me a sense of the color grey although I find only one close pairing of those words: 09.053 shadow grey and grim! I wondered who was described as grim, and had a vague sense that it was related in Tolkien’s usage to kingship. Here’s our little table of who and what are described as grim in The Hobbit.
- The Misty Mountains: 01.082 Far over the misty mountains grim
- Thror and Thrain: 01.124 They looked very grim but they said very little.
- Gandalf: 01.132 and grimly,
- Mirkwood: 08.078 The forest was grim
- Thranduil: 09.006 and though he looked grimly at them,
- Shadow: 09.053 Stoops in shadow grey and grim!
- The Lonely Mountain: 11.001
- Balin: 11.007
- Bilbo: 12.008
- Bard:
- 14.006 said another with a grim voice.
- 14.009 But the grim-voiced fellow ran hotfoot to the Master.
- 14.013 if it had not been for the grim-voiced man
- 14.018 grim-voiced
- 14.018 and grim-faced,
- 15.020 he is a grim man but true.
- 15.046 and grim of face,
- 15.049 and grimly spoken;
- 16.032 asked Bard grimly.
- Thorin:
- 15.059 So grim had Thorin become,
- 17.019 said Thorin grimly.
- Dain’s troops
- 16.005 Though they are a grim folk,
- 16.031 and has at least five hundred grim dwarves with him –
- 17.031 and their faces were grim.
- Some men of Beorn’s line: 18.051 and some were grim men
Not all the grim folk are kings, but all the kings are grim.
Online Etymology Dictionary tells us that it’s an Old English word meaning fierce and severe, adding the connotation of ‘gloomy’ in the 12th century. Its Proto-Indo-European root may be related to “thunder”, and I’ve certainly known more than one person of grim countenance to be described in stormy terms.
Harper, Douglas. “Grim”. Online Etymology Dictionary. Web.
words that you were saying 