All the stars in our souls

Gil Galad's chief councilors and source of headaches.

No such thing has ever been in question for Celegorm & Curufin, as princes who have always been backed by systemic power or only temporarily disadvantaged yet still construed as within the right in their framework of power; the Exile is a schism, Maedhros' abdication is unprecedented, Nargothrond is seized by rhetoric and populism, Doriath - as later Sirion - are assaulted by means of military power. And what examples has Fëanor given them? That subterfuge and infiltration are the tools of Morgoth (theft; disguise; lie) and the way that Fëanor himself had been wronged (infiltration of the family structure by Indis), not something a king or prince is liable or allowed to use. Fëanor himself utilises rhetoric and takes advantage of the legal framework, and if no other thing will avail, uses military power and force to achieve his objectives, and decries cowardice, where a line can be drawn to assume that direct, open conflict is thus assumed to be the morally correct path to attain what you want. Celegorm and Curufin, the two most likened to Fëanor, exemplify his lack of willingness to treat with anyone considered a traitor to the cause or compromise on their objectives perhaps best of all. To them, guile is both humiliating and morally suspect in this ideological framework; the sons of Fëanor in Beleriand utilise force, organise military operations, send intimidating letters and use political posturing, but nothing akin to guile even such as Fingon uses to rescue Maedhros from Thangorodrim. That brings me to the second reason: guile missions in the Silmarillion require a certain amount of faith and hope in things turning out the right way, and a certain amount of divine providence. Fingon would not have succeeded without prayer just as Lúthien would not have enjoyed the fruits of their success without convincing Mandos. But hope in divine favour is not something that people famously eschewing the authority of the Valar and undertaking a blasphemous oath not once, but twice, would champion; clinging to hope for aid from the same people considered to have betrayed the cause & good of the Eldar is not to be expected. In light of that, relying on goodwill clearly seems like a suicide mission, especially in the aftermath of the Dagor Bragollach which has revealed that all of the military might the Noldor have been amassing is still insufficient to move any closer to their goal. The only possible way forwards is more power, more resources, more bodies. There is no hope to talk of.

1. Finwë as Ambassador of Valinor

My headcanon is that before arriving in Valinor, Finwë had short hair and when his life became calmer, he began to grow his hair

2. Finwë and little Fëanor

CELEGORM THE FAIR

latest finished commission of Celegorm in full Fëanorians-in-Beleriand getup, and this is probably the most ‘illustration’ style commission I’ve done so far: I loved the brief specifying the style of the earrings and I have been wanting to do armour again since my Eönwë commission. I also enjoyed the challenge of balancing a slightly feral look with the militaristic attire, plus balancing a ‘silver’ Celegorm with steel armour and gold+red accents as per the commissioner’s headcanon!

I don't think he cared about the silmarils themselves at all. It was simply being a possession of his dead father and his oath that made him care.

I feel like it's an underrated bit of characterization that, of all metals, he loved COPPER.

Copper, while lovely, is soft and maleable and by it's nature will oxidize over time to become blue-green and so is doomed to change no matter what (time will change it's color, polish and care will wear it away a bit at a time until it's no more).

And Maedhros ended up doomed and changed irrevocably himself, like the copper he favored over the eternal and shining gold and silver everyone else loved.

I don't think there's any other character described as loving copper, or even favoring anything except gold and silver (and mithril which looks like silver) for metals, but especially not an elf.

There is no way any piece of jewelry worn by Maedhros could have truly survived in the state it was in when he wore it. It's all either altered in some fundamental way visually, or it's literally gone. Eroded by either time or the hands trying to battle back time to keep it pristine.

I feel like his love of copper is a foreshadow of both how he would change and be changed by the "oxidization" of Beleriand and also how he himself is capable of letting go of the silmarils because ALL of his favored jewelry is fated to be gone eventually, so he was always able to let go of material things, in perhaps a way no other elf could.

Headcanoning that he would ALWAYS have destroyed the silmarils after acquiring them.

The other sons of Feanor wanted to possess them again and end the silmaril conflict by returning them to the House of Feanor they belonged to, but Maedhros was quietly planning to have a true and final end to the conflict they bring by smashing the fucking things from the start.

Nerdanel and her red babies

Elrond wore a mantle of grey and had a star upon his forehead, and a silver harp was in his hand, and upon his finger was a ring of gold with a great blue stone, Vilya, the mightiest of the Three.

JRR Tolkien, Return of the King

This week marks my Tumblr-versary, by which I mean this time last year I created an account here for the sole purpose of archiving some further reading I’d collected for my first longfic. A temporary, academic blog of sorts. Clearly, that did not happen, and I spent the last year publicly shaking my ass at Elrond on the internet and being a pain in yours 🫶🏽

To commemorate my roots, I spent 8 hours on the Caledonian Sleeper train last night painstakingly initiating said Elrond, his dramatic eyebrows and politically motivated five o clock shadow into my graphics tablet era.

[brocade brushes] [commissions open fyi]