As any Lord of the Rings fan knows, there are many different types of elves in Tolkien’s legendarium, from different parts of the world in all the different ages that have passed. These elves have different languages, different statuses different skills and cultures and laws. But of all these elves, it is almost entirely universal that they are pure beings, people of light and magic.
However, there are also certain elves throughout Tolkien’s stories that turned to crueler, less holy things, and these elves became known as dark elves. These elves are different from the Moriondor in history, who were twisted and tainted by the evil or Morgoth, as introduced by Adar in the recent Rings of Power series. The dark elves were elves who did terrible things of their own volition, and the most famous example is Eol.
Eol is what is known in Tolkien’s world as a Moriquendi, an elf who has never lived in the light of the Trees of Valinor. The Noldor, and the high elves like Galadriel and Elrond, are the Calaquendi, those who dwelled in the Undying Lands before Morgoth’s betrayal. Of all the Moriquendi, Eol was the elf who most valued the darkness, and he chose to dwell in the dark forest of Nan Emloth, where he could walk among the twilight stars. He preferred the world before the sun had risen, and became notorious among his kin for rejecting and admonishing the ways of the Noldor who chose to live in the light. But more than this, he became known as a dark elf because of the terrible deeds he committed.
In the earliest days of his isolation in the forest, he simply dwelled as a lone elf who preferred to live alone than in the company of others. There was no sin in this, despite him rejecting the Noldor, and he was free to live and do as he pleased. He took to conversing with the dwarves of the Blue Mountains, and began learning their trades and their craftsmanship, admiring their weapon-making. In fact, he was one of the earliest elves to have made contact with the dwarves, and may have been some of the inspiration behind the portrayal of Elrond and Durin’s friendship, symbolized by the Lindon tree of Khazad Dum in the Rings of Power.
His two most famous creations were the swords Anguiriel ad Anglachel, the latter of which became Turin’s sword in the fall of Gondolin, another tragic event in elven history. Turin was one of the ultimate warriors of Middle Earth, but also became one of the most devastating. But despite indirectly influencing one of the darkest periods of elven memory, it wasn’t his relationship with the dwarves or the creation of the doomed sword that sealed his fate in darkness, it was the treatment of his wife and son.
His wife, Aredhel, was the sister of the king of Gondolin, and was a fair and beautiful elf among the Noldor. One day she got separated from the walking party who accompanied her and found herself lost in Nan Emloth, where Eol saw her from afar. He greatly desired her, and so he played tricks with the light to lure her deeper into the woods, where she found herself at his front door.
It is a contentious and highly disputed topic among Tolkien fans, but it might be one of the only cases recorded in Tolkien’s works, especially among the elves, of rape or assault, as it is noted that he ‘took her to be his wife, against her will.’ She was not ‘wholly unwilling’, but she was forced to stay with him, and walk beside him beneath the stars in the darkness, as he forbade her to have any connection, or indeed even any mention of her kin the Noldor from that point onwards. This same tyrannical rule extended to their son Maeglin, especially when it came to questions around the battle for the Silmarils.
For more than 16 years they lived in the dark forest under his rule, until one evening when he was away with the dwarves they made their escape. They fled to the city of Gondolin, where her brother still reigned, and sought sanctuary there, but Eol soon discovered the treachery and headed to Gondolin himself, demanding that they be returned to him. He reached the city via a secret road and was therefore not permitted to leave, which meant that he would never again be able to walk in the darkness of his forest. He was to submit to Gondolin, or die in Gondolin. And so, he chose to die, but in a bitter rage, he attempted to take his son Maeglin with him. He threw a poisoned javelin at the boy, but it struck instead his wife Aredhel, and she died later of her wounds.
For this crime, Eol was sentenced to death and was thrown off a cliff. In the final moments as he fell, he cursed their son Maeglin, and all of Gondolin to be destroyed by its own folly, and in some ways, his curse came true, because the Fall of Gondolin came just a short while later. Never before had an elf been filled with such hatred and darkness for his own kind, and so he became the truest dark elf in all of Middle Earth.
