"Deep down here by the dark water
lived old Gollum, Our first impression of Gollum is hardly Hobbit-like. When we meet him Gollum seems a horrible little monster, preying on blind fish and goblins in the dark recesses of the earth, bent wholly on killing the respectable Bilbo Baggins. J.R.R. Tolkien says, "I don't know where he came from, nor who or what he was." The creature, he continues, is "a Gollum". From there on, however, THE Gollum becomes simply "Gollum". "...there lived by the banks of the Great River on the edge of Wilderland a clever-handed and quiet-footed little people. I guess they were of hobbit-kind: akin to the fathers of the fathers of the Stoors," Gandalf tells Bilbo's nephew and heir, Frodo Baggins, many years later. "There was among them a family of high repute," he continues. "The most inquisitive and curious-minded of that family was called Sméagol. He was interested in roots and beginnings; he dived into deep pools; he burrowed under trees and growing plants; he tunneled into green mounds; he ceased to look up at the hill-tops, or the leaves on trees, or the flowers opening in the air: his head and his eyes were downward." Sméagol the Stoor was a miserable creature in his own day: unwanted, unhappy, bitter, jealous. He turned away from the world and his own people long before he was cast out in earnest. Deep inside his heart became dark and loathsome long before his outward appearance became hideous and emaciated. He little resembled a hobbit in spirit. There were three tribal groups of hobbits: Harfoots, the most numerous; Fallohides, the most adventurous; and Stoors. Stoors were a river-folk, but they were also given more to commerce and travel. They were often associated with Dwarves and learned much from them. The Stoors were in some ways the hardiest and most frontier-like among hobbits, for it was long before they found a safe home. Hobbits dwelt in the Vales of Anduin for a long time. They probably settled there near the end of the Second Age, wanderers or refugees out of distant eastern lands in the days when Sauron's armies were conquering vast regions of eastern Middle- earth. The hobbits found friends and allies among the Edainic peoples of Rhovanion, the Free Men of the North, from whom later came the Beornings, the Men of Dale and Long Lake, and the Rohirrim. In those early years the hobbits sought out Men and lived close to them or in shared towns, much like Bree in the Third Age. Most of the hobbits -- the Harfoots and Fallohides -- must have dwelt far to the north, however, for the Edainic Men had been driven into the mountains and distant lands by Sauron during the great War of the Elves and Sauron. It would be many, many centuries before they became numerous enough to colonize the southern lands near Lothlórien. But as the Men multiplied and spread slowly southward throughout the first thousand years of the Third Age, they seem to have left the hobbits behind. Except for the Stoors. These hardy folk appear to have settled near the Gladden River originally, where they could be close to the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm, perhaps. They would have been relatively safe because of the power of Khazad-dûm and Lothlórien. Around the year 1000 of the Third Age Sauron again took shape, and finding that Mordor was fortified against his return he settled on the hill of Amon Lanc in southern Greenwood the Great. The hill had once been the heart of an Elvish kingdom, but the Elves had long since moved north and there was nothing in the forest to oppose Sauron. He built a great fortress on the hill, which in time came to be known as Dol Guldur (the Hill of Sorcery). And Sauron began colonizing the lands of southern Greenwood and the southern Vales of Anduin with his creatures: Orcs, Trolls, Werewolves, Wargs, and Men. Easterlings had long been troublesome to the great kingdom of Gondor, but now tribes came and settled in the Vales of Anduin and rumor of the dark power in the southern forest spread north. The Harfoots, perhaps remembering their ancient past or having heard the stories of the wars between the Elves and the ancient Dark Powers, fled over the Misty Mountains into Eriador, never to return. The Fallohides followed them a hundred years later, and at the same time the Stoors abandoned their homeland by the Gladden River and crossed the Redhorn Pass into the former Elvish land of Eregion. From there the Stoors passed northward to a land called the Angle between the rivers Mitheithel and Bruinen, or they passed west and south to the borders of Dunland. The Stoors of the Angle lived under the rule of the Dunadan kings of Rhudaur. The hobbits strengthened the realm of Rhudaur, but less than two hundred years later the evil kingdom of Angmar arose in the north and threatened Rhudaur. The hobbits fled their homes once again. The Stoors of the Angle were of two minds: some migrated south to join their kinsfolk in Dunland, but some decided to pass back over the Misty Mountains to the Vales of Anduin. The horror of Angmar must have seemed greater to them than the horror of Dol Guldur. And at least in the Vales of Anduin they had been close to two powerful and ancient kingdoms of the Elves and Dwarves. So for more than a thousand years the Stoors seem to have lived in relative peace. They were a small folk but hardy and unobtrusive. The Edainic peoples who lived nearby seem to have been friendly with them, or perhaps chose not to trouble them. During these years a small remnant of a Northman kingdom on the far side of the forest (now called Mirkwood) settled in the Vales of Anduin near the Stoors. These were the fathers of the Éothéod, the Horse-folk, who eventually migrated to the far north. But the Éothéod remembered the Stoors, whom they called Hole-builders, and they took such memories with them when their Lord Eorl led them south to found the kingdom of Rohan. In the 25th century of the Third Age, not long before the birth of Eorl, Sméagol the Stoor and his cousin Déagol went on a boating expedition. It was Sméagol's birthday. Déagol dove into the water, perhaps hunting for fish, and he found a golden ring lying in the mud. Bringing it up he showed it to Sméagol, who demanded the ring as a gift. "I have given you a present already," Déagol replied. "I found this and I am going to keep it." But the desire for the ring consumed Sméagol, for it was the One Ring, Sauron's Master Ring, which long before Isildur had cut from Sauron's dead body and claimed for himself. In the end the Ring betrayed Isildur to his death in the waters of Anduin, and now it was awakened by the malice of Sauron and sought to return to its master. Sméagol murdered his cousin and took the Ring for himself. In time he learned that, while wearing the Ring, he could not be seen. He used the Ring for his own gain and soon became unpopular among his people. And he began to gurgle to himself, "gollum, gollum", and the Stoors called him Gollum. Eventually the Stoors cast Gollum out and he never saw his people again. He wandered through the lands, lonely and miserable, until he resolved to find his way into the mountains and discover their roots and their secrets. He thus disappeared from the world of light and lost himself in the darkness of the earth and took with him the One Ring. For more than five hundred years he dwelt in the darkness, preying on Orcs and fish. The Ring extended Gollum's life, but instead of granting him more vigor it slowly drained him and enslaved him. He was consumed by thought of the Ring, which he spoke to constantly and called his Precious. In his mind the Precious was his by right, not by murder. It had come to him. And yet it gave him no joy, and he had no comfort or consolation in his loneliness. When therefore Bilbo entered Gollum's dark and empty cave by accident, though Gollum's first thoughts were of murder and a fresh meal, his memory was stirred and he recalled things from his youth which once had delighted him. For a few moments Gollum enjoyed a game of riddles with Bilbo, until he mistook Bilbo's concern about what was in his pocket for a legitimate riddle. Under the rules of the game Gollum lost but he determined to have his way, and returning to his island in the middle of the lake he discovered the One Ring he had cherished so long was missing. Bilbo had found the Ring, and Gollum suddenly realized what was in his pocket. From that moment on Gollum was consumed by the need to recover the Ring. He pursued Bilbo but to no avail, for the hobbit discovered the power of the Ring by accident and so evaded the evil creature. And after Baggins departed Gollum gnawed at himself in the darkness, fearing the light but aching with the loss of his Precious. In time he wandered out into the open world and began seeking to recover his lost treasure. Many years would pass before Gollum again encountered the One Ring. He traveled through many lands, braving the terrors of Mirkwood and Mordor. At that time Sauron sent out a summons to all creatures of evil bent and purpose, for the Dark Lord had returned to his ancient domain and begun building Barad-dûr once again. And Gollum, until that time single-minded in his purpose of finding Baggins and the Precious, turned aside from his quest and answered that summons. He was drawn towards Mordor and eventually was found and caught on its borders, and he was taken before Sauron, who learned from him all that had befallen the Ring after Isildur's death. Released by Sauron for some undisclosed purpose, Gollum became a pawn in a deadly and fateful game between the powers of Middle-earth. He was soon captured by Aragorn, Chieftain of the Dunedain of the North, and taken to the Elves of Mirkwood. There he was questioned by Gandalf, who learned as much from him as Sauron had. But in time Gollum escaped the care of the Elves and he fled south and west, until he eventually entered Moria, the long-abandoned Dwarven city of Khazad-dûm. Unable to escape, Gollum remained there in misery and doubtless expecting to die (or perhaps hoping to die). Instead fortune seemed to smile upon him, for one day the western gates which he was too weak to operate by himself opened and admitted nine adventurers: the wizard Gandalf, Aragorn, and their companions, the Fellowship of the Ring. From that moment Gollum pursued the Ring relentlessly, drawn by its malice and great power. When the Fellowship was broken during an attack by Orcs Gollum followed Frodo Baggins and his servant Samwise across Anduin, and in the hills of Emyn Muil overtook them. But Frodo and Sam overpowered Gollum and made him prisoner, and they forged a dangerous partnership with him. Gollum's journey with Frodo nearly redeemed him. Under Frodo's gentle care and wisdom Gollum came to think of himself as an individual again, and he remembered being Sméagol and what it was like to live and to love another creature. But Frodo's servant Sam was a foil to Gollum's redemption. At the crucial moment when Sam could have made an overture to Gollum, and so help win him back to light and hope if even only for a short time, Sam rejected the harder path and shut Gollum out. In return Gollum hardened his heart against Frodo and Sam and betrayed them. Yet there was a great doom associated with the Ring and all who desired it. Slavishly following the Ring wherever Frodo carried it, Gollum could not turn back and seek safer lands. He walked into the very heart of Mordor and tried again to recover the Ring. Now he was weaker than ever, and Frodo had grown great in spirit. But the Ring, too, had increased in power as it came closer to the master it had long sought and to the place where it had been made. "Begone!" cried a voice from the Ring. "And trouble me no more! If you touch me ever again, you shall be cast yourself into the Fire of Doom." It was to the Fire of Doom, the Sammath Naur, where millennia before Sauron had made the Ring, that Frodo was intent on taking it. There he hoped to cast it into the Fire and so destroy it and the foundation of Sauron's strength, for Sauron had let the greater part of his power enter the Ring. Gollum by now understood Frodo's intention, and desperate to prevent the destruction of his Precious he overcame Sam upon the slope of Mount Doom and followed Frodo into the chamber. There he attacked Frodo once again, and in the brief struggle bit the Ring from Frodo's hand. Victorious and jubilant, Gollum leaped high and danced in ecstasy, but he failed to take into account how close he stood to the edge of the chasm, and stepping wildly he lost his balance on the very edge, tottered, and fell in. With him went the Ring, and when they fell into the fire the power of Sauron was destroyed and his mighty evil realm brought down. Sauron himself was so weakened by the loss of his power that when his body was destroyed in the ruin of his fortress his dark spirit rose above the wreckage and faded into impotence. The story of Gollum's relationship with Frodo is long and moving. "For myself," Tolkien wrote to his son Christopher, "I was probably most moved by Sam's disquisition on the seamless web of story, and by the scene when Frodo goes to sleep on his breast, and the tragedy of Gollum who at that moment came within a hair of repentance - but for one rough word from Sam." The tale of Gollum's relationship with the Ring is tragic and pathetic, yet Tolkien notes that the Ring was not the cause of Gollum's evil nature: "The domination of the Ring was much too strong for the mean soul of Sméagol. But he would have never had to endure it if he had not become a mean sort of thief before it crossed his path. Need it ever have crossed his path? Need anything dangerous ever cross any of our paths? A kind of answer can be found in trying to imagine Gollum overcoming temptation. The story would have been quite different! By temporizing, not fixing the still not wholly corrupt Sméagol-will towards good in the debate in the slag hole, he weakened himself for the final chance when dawning love of Frodo was too easily withered by the jealousy of Sam before Shelob's lair. After that he was lost." The tragedy is dual in nature: Gollum is redeemable because there is something left in him which can be redeemed, and yet Sam fails to perceive or appreciate that. "For me perhaps the most tragic moment in the Tale comes in II 323 ff. when Sam fails to note the complete change in Gollum's tone and aspect," Tolkien wrote to a fan. "His repentance is blighted and all Frodo's pity is (in a sense) wasted. Shelob's lair became inevitable. "This is due of course to the 'logic of the story'. Sam could hardly have acted differently. (He did reach the point of pity at last (III 221-222) but for the good of Gollum too late.) If he had, what could then have happened? The course of the entry into Mordor and the struggle to reach Mount Doom would have been different, and so would the ending. The interest would have shifted to Gollum, I think, and the battle that would have gone on between his repentance and his new love on one side and the Ring. Though the love would have been strengthened daily it could not have wrested the mastery from the Ring. I think that in some queer twisted and pitiable way Gollum would have tried (not maybe with conscious design) to satisfy both. Certainly at some point not long before the end he would have stolen the Ring or taken it by violence (as he does in the actual Tale). But 'possession' satisfied, I think he would then have sacrificed himself for Frodo's sake and have voluntarily cast himself into the fiery abyss." Such is the way of tragedy, however, that the redemption of Gollum never occurred. Sam's hardened heart though later softened led him to speak the one word which destroyed all the change Frodo had effected in Gollum. Frodo lost all delight in Middle-earth because of the One Ring, but through his sacrifice Middle-earth was saved and Frodo himself eventually found peace in the Uttermost West. Gollum, however, made the greatest sacrifice of all: he lost his soul. Sources:
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