History Becomes Myth and Myth Preserves History

At first glance, the difference between history and myth seems obvious: history is true, and myth is fiction. When J. R. R. Tolkien claims that Middle-earth is real and that the events he writes really did happen in our world, many would call it ridiculous. However, our own “real” history, once one goes back a few centuries, can only be encountered in fragments, since it survives through retellings, interpretations, and the occasional piece of writing that shapes our understanding of that time. Stories like Beowulf show this clearly, a story about a hero killing a fictional monster can also be read as trauma literature, inspired by the slaughters that took place in mead halls between rival factions vying for influence and power. Such stories are therefore grounded in truth rather than pure fiction, and they reveal the culture of the civilization at that time. Rather than treating myth and history as opposites, it is better to say that myth is history that has receded into the distant past, while still preserving historical truths.

Tolkien uses this idea, that history turns into myth given enough time, into the way Middle-earth is presented as our own world in the distant past. In Letter 151 he writes:

“Middle-earth is just archaic English for ἡοἰκονμένη, the inhabited world of men. It lay then as it does. In fact just as it does, round and inescapable. That is partly the point. The new situation, established at the beginning of the Third Age, leads on eventually and inevitably to ordinary History.”

Middle-earth should be understood as a history so distant that it has become legendary, yet still remains relevant to the present. This is why Tolkien also states that “The essentials of that abiding place are all there (at any rate for inhabitants of N.W. Europe), so naturally it feels familiar, even if a little glorified by the enchantment of distance in time.” The values that shape North Western Europe are already present in the story and have carried through to the modern day, which is why the world feels familiar to those readers.

    This raises the question of why it matters that ancient history survives into the present at all. Even when shrouded in myth, the core values of a people and their civilization can endure in stories long after historical detail has been lost. Sam voices this idea on the stairs of Cirith Ungol, when he realizes that the old tales from ancient days are not simply stories, but that he and Frodo are living inside that same history.

“No, sir, of course not. Beren now, he never thought he was going to get that Silmaril from the Iron Crown in Thangorodrim, and yet he did, and that was a worse place and a blacker danger than ours. But that's a long tale, of course, and goes on past the happiness and into grief and beyond it... and the Silmaril went on and came to Earendil. And why, sir, I never thought of that before! We've got — you've got some of the light of it in that star-glass that the Lady gave you! Why, to think of it, we're in the same tale still! It's going on. Don't the great tales never end?” (The Two Towers)

While Aragorn’s father is killed by orcs when Aragorn is only two, Elrond becomes a father to him and teaches him about Númenor, connecting him back to those ancient days. The Fall of Númenor is already many thousands of years in the past, yet through ancestry Aragorn is able to draw on that heritage for identity, authority, and a connection to an ancient world he has never seen. However, the legacy of Númenor is not a golden one. At their height, the Númenóreans were corrupted and sailed against the Valar, which ultimately led to their destruction. This shows that one’s roots do not need to be morally pure in order to remain meaningful.

    The sense of decline throughout Tolkien’s work reflects a loss of origins, as people become increasingly cut off from their past. Gondor, while still a significant power, is only a shadow of what Númenor once was. The island was destroyed, and even those who were not corrupted were forced to flee to Middle-earth. Although the Dúnedain preserved their culture for many generations, they are still doomed to slowly fade away. This aligns with Tolkien’s concept of the “Long Defeat,” in which the persistence of evil and the march of time will always doom the world, except in fleeting moments of unlikely victory or Eucatastrophe. This decline, however, makes it all the more important for humans to stand by their morals and continue fighting against the rising tide, in order to prolong the battle. Accepting near-impossible odds and fighting all the same, the Dúnedain, in the form of the Grey Company, along with many of the other Free Peoples of Middle-earth, give their lives in hope of victory because of the millennia-long stories of who they are and what they hope to protect.

    If myth is fiction and therefore irrelevant, then maps of the world according to thirteenth-century Europe would also have to be considered false. They look nothing like modern geography, and they include places a modern reader would call fictional, such as the Tower of Babel and the Garden of Eden. Yet they were still true for the people who used them. By combining geography with story, such maps told people about their own history and culture rather than simply helping them navigate. They maintained a connection to the ancient past and strengthened cultural roots against the erosive forces of time. Tolkien works in much the same way in The Lord of the Rings. Through myth, ancestry, and memory, Tolkien shows that the past does not vanish, it survives in the values later generations carry forward.

-EN