Legolas

**Legolas** was a Sindarin elf who was part of the Fellowship of the Ring in the Third Age. As he was the son of the Elvenking Thranduil of Mirkwood, Legolas was Prince of the Woodland Realm (Mirkwood), a messenger, and a master bowman. With his keen eyesight, sensitive hearing, and excellent bowmanship, Legolas was a valuable resource to the other members of the Fellowship. He was well-known for becoming friends with the dwarf Gimli, despite their long-held differences.

It is not known whether Legolas was Thranduil's only son, or whether he was his heir. His age is unknown as well.

### Biography

Legolas was the son of Thranduil, the King of the Elves of Northern Mirkwood. His mother is unknown.

### *War of the Ring*

Legolas came to the Council of Elrond in Rivendell, the great meeting held by the Elf lord Elrond, as a messenger from his father to discuss the escape of Gollum. When the council was choosing the "Nine Walkers" to pit against the "Nine Riders," Legolas volunteered to represent the elves, and to become one of the members of the Fellowship that would set out to destroy the One Ring.

During their journey, Legolas would stay at the rear due to his keen eyes. On Caradhras, Legolas was able to run nimbly over the snow, leaving behind little imprint, whereas his companions struggled to plow through it. When Gandalf gave his counsel, Legolas voted against passing through Moria. In the morning, the Fellowship was waylaid by wargs and Legolas fought for their defense. After the battle, he picked up his arrows, save one which was damaged.

Gimli quarreled with him in Moria (which was not unexpected considering the ancient quarrel between Elves and Dwarves) - Legolas' father Thranduilhad once imprisoned Gimli's father, Glóin.

He and Gimli became friends, however, when Gimli greeted the Elven queen, Galadriel, with gentle words. Before the Fellowship departed from Lorien, Legolas was given a new Galadhrim longbow. While the Fellowship was travelling over the River Anduin, he used his new bow to shoot down a nearby Nazgûl with one masterful shot in the dark.

Legolas and Aragorn sang a song of lament for the fall of Boromir. He led the rest of the Fellowship through Rohanwhen Merry and Pippin had been taken by the Uruk-hai. During that week, he acquired a grey horse named Arod, on which he and Gimli would often ride together.

In Fangorn Forest, Legolas, Aragorn, and Gimli were reunited with Gandalf, now called Gandalf the White. Upon their meeting, Gandalf delivered the messages of Galadriel to them.

In the Battle of the Hornburg, Legolas and Gimli engaged in an Orc-slaying contest that Gimli won (the score being 42 to 43, respectively), though Legolas was not jealous, stating, "You have passed my score by one but I do not grudge you the game, so glad am I to see you on your legs."

In Rohan, he and Gimli followed Aragorn and Elladan and Elrohir to the Paths of the Dead. His horse, Arod, refused to enter the paths, and Legolas calmed him. Their company rode on, with Elladan on the last, but Legolas turned back and saw the Dead following the Grey Company.

Legolas fought in the Battle of the Pelennor Fields with Gimli and the sons of Elrond. After the battle, he and Gimli entered Minas Tirith; Legolas sang an elven-song as he walked, and suggested that the place needed more gardens. They met Prince Imrahil and went to the Houses of Healing, at which the cries of the gulls at Pelargir and sang a song about his sea-longing.

### After the War

After the destruction of the One Ring and of Sauron, Legolas stayed for the coronation of Aragorn II Elessar and his marriage to Arwen. Later, he and Gimli traveled together to Helm's Deep, visiting the Glittering Caves, and then later traveled through Fangorn Forest. Eventually, Legolas came to Ithilien with some of his people, with his father's leave, to live out his remaining time in Middle-earth helping to restore the woodlands that had been war-torn. After Aragorn's death, Legolas made a ship in Ithilien, and left Middle-earth to go over the sea. His strong friendship with Gimli prompted Legolas to invite him to go to the Undying Lands; making him the first and only Dwarf to do so.

## Character

Although he lived among them and in their culture, Legolas was not fully of the Silvan Elves. As a son of the Elven-king Thranduil, who had originally come from Doriath, Legolas was at least part Sindarin Elf, as his mother's identity is completely unknown. This is complicated by the fact that a small minority of Sindarin Elves ruled the predominantly Silvan Woodland Realm of Northern Mirkwood, a minority to which Legolas belonged. The Sindarin minority in that realm, who should have been nobler and wiser than the Silvan Elves can be seen as having "gone native" at the end of the First Age: after Morgoth was defeated and all of the grand Elf-kingdoms of Beleriand were destroyed, they can be seen as going back to "a simpler time" in their culture.

Like all elves, Legolas has a great respect and appreciation for nature. While in Fangorn Forest he longed to return once more in order to explore its wonders more thoroughly. He is kind, and cares greatly for his friends, even Gimli the Dwarf, though it was a rarity for Elves and Dwarves to express a liking for one another because of their feud. Due to his age however, he sometimes seems rather patronizing toward the mortals around him.

## Age

Tolkien does not specifically give Legolas' age but many have used what details Tolkien does give to hazard a guess. There are no known dates concerning Legolas before TA 3018. It's safe to say that Legolas was most likely born after Oropher, his grandfather, moved his people across the Misty Mountains, since in the book he referred to the Ñoldor elvesas a "strange race". That would mean he's at most 5000 years old which places his birth date in the latter part of the Second Age, at the earliest. Legolas is never mentioned in any account of the Last Alliance of Elves and Men, so most assume he was born in the Third Age, after Isildur took the Ring of Power.

Legolas has never been to Lórien before he travels there with the Fellowship. Therefore, we can assume that he was not with his grandfather's people when they left Lórien for Northern Mirkwood. Before the Shadow of Dol Guldur fell on Mirkwood in TA 1000, Legolas' people spent time amongst their Lórien neighbors. But when the Shadow fell, they "retreated before it as it spread ever northward, until at last Thranduil established his realm in the north-east of the forest and delved there a fortress and great halls underground." So it seems likely that Legolas' birth-date was after TA 1000, when the Kingdom of Northern Mirkwood was created. This would make him younger than any other elf character in the series, including Arwen. In the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Legolas refers to his travelling companions many times as "children". Yet when he arrived at Fangorn, he claimed to feel young compared to the forest, saying, "It is old, very old. So old that I almost I feel young again, as I have not felt since I journeyed with you children."

## Weapons

Legolas famously used an Elven bow, as well as a long, white knife. He would prefer to pierce his enemies from afar, but his dagger was sometimes used for close combat. In Lothlorien, he was given a long-bow of the Galadhrim, which was longer and stouter than those of the fashion of Mirkwood.

## *The Hobbit*

*If Tolkien’s projected rewriting of our story in 1960 had proceeded as far as the Mirkwood chapters, we might have been able to discover whether he intended to bring Legolas into Mr. Baggins’ story (after all, in the light of later knowledge we can say he would almost certainly have been present at the Battle of Five Armies); there is no sign of it in the admittedly sketchy notes that survive. But even this would hardly have resolved the question of what was in Tolkien’s mind almost thirty years earlier when he wrote The Hobbit, since by that later date he was committed to the decision that Thingol and the Elven-king were two different characters.*