"O Mavwin, my mother, soon will I come back to thee"--but he knew not that the doom of Melko lay between them."

The Book of Lost Tales Volume 2

Turambar and the Foaloke is one of the first versions of The Children of Hurin. There is evidence that he started working on it in 1919. It looks like he wrote in pencil, erased it, and then rewrote it in pen. In this story, Etlas tells the story at the urging of Lindo. At this point, Turin is just Turambar. Mavwin is Morwen and this is just a couple of the many changes that Tolkien made before he got to the final version. Name changes aren't the only aspects of the tale to change. In the final version, Morwen had sent Turin to Thingol to be fostered because she worried for his safety when Hurin never came home from the Battle of Unnumbered Tears. In this version, Mavwin sends Turambar away because she could not care for children on her own which suggests she knew she would soon be living in poverty. Turambar does have the same dark emotions as Turin had in the final version.

One thing we do know about Tolkien is that he was never content with his work. He was constantly reworking and rewriting it. Foaloke refers to Glorund who is a dragon. In the final version, we know Glorund to be Glaurung. In Quenya, foa=hoard, and loke=snake. Since Tolkien excelled in language and Norse mythology played a part in the creation of Middle-Earth, it is no coincidence that loke means snake. In Norse mythology, Loke or Loki is the trickster and also known as "he who brings the end of the world." Glaurung was the first fire-breathing dragon in Middle-Earth. He was bred by Morgoth himself. While he was not the biggest dragon of Middle-Earth he was fierce. He was able to use a dragon spell to affect those who looked into his eye.

This selection does leave questions that Tolkien probably worked through again and again. Glorund hoarded treasure in Nargothrond and we never know what actually happens to the hoard. It is so fascinating to see his process in creating this history.

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