Fëanor's Alliterative Verse

[Erucheb]

I wasn't able to view last night's discussion live, so I missed the discussion of the Alliterative Oath of Fëanor -- which is, indeed, pretty awesome. I wanted to bring up a couple of points that I think were missed in discussing this spontaneous poem.

First, it seems likely to me that Tolkien is here revising and expanding the Oath of Fëanor portion of his abandoned alliterative "Flight of the Noldoli from Valinor", which was published in the Lays of Beleriand. In particular, note the following correspondences:

• "Be he foe or friend, be he foul or clean, // brood of Morgoth or bright Vala" (lines 1-2, AA), "Be he friend or foe or foul offspring // of Morgoth Bauglir" (lines 132-133, FN)
• "neither law, nor love, nor league of swords" (line 5, AA), "shall no law nor love nor league of Gods" (line 135, FN)

Even apart from the Ælfwine connection, this could explain why Tolkien chose to do this text in alliterative verse; he had already done so once before, and perhaps liked the effect. (Though it could easily work the other way as well -- perhaps thinking of Ælfwine was what inspired the original alliterative Flight of the Noldoli.)

Second, a minor point about the poetry itself. As Professor Olsen noted, a typical feature of Anglo-Saxon verse is that the fourth stressed syllable does not take part in the alliteration. I find it fascinating, therefore, that Tolkien chooses to end this oath with the line, "and our vow remember, Manwë and Varda" -- a double, chiastic alliteration that fully embraces the final stress. Even if we say the alliteration on m is the primary alliteration, the choice to have a secondary alliteration on the final stress still violates the spirit, if perhaps not the rule, of Anglo-Saxon verse. It seems fitting that such a transgressive oath should end with such a transgressive line.

 

[MithLuin]

While it is true that Tolkien had already written the Oath of Fëanor in alliterative verse format, it is important to remember that he also had already written it as rhyming couplets for the Lay of Leithian - Celegorm recites it in Nargothrond.

Certainly, the alliterative version is better! And I did try to keep some alliteration in my Quenya translation of the Oath, but it's fair to say that I did not manage to keep that much alliteration or hit those beats with it. It's a little challenging to do something like that in a language you aren't really comfortable with!!