The medievalist and fantasy author J. R. R. Tolkien derived the characters, stories, places, and languages of Middle-earth from many sources. Among these are Norse mythology, which depicts a reckless
Ragnarök is one of the elements scholars have identified in The Lord of the Rings. Battle of the Doomed Gods by Friedrich Wilhelm Heine, 1882
"Great horns of the North wildly blowing": Tolkien's account of the arrival of the Riders of Rohan at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, seen here in Peter Jackson's film The Return of the King, has been read as exemplifying the "heroic Northern world".
First Age Elves such as Fëanor (left) and Fingolfin expressed Northern courage in different ways. Artwork by Tom Loback, 2007
Byrhtnoth, prideful loser of the 991 Battle of Maldon
The lives of the characters in J. R. R. Tolkien's world of Middle-earth appear variously to be driven by luck or by fate. This is arranged in such a way that the characters' free will is never comprom
Scholars have likened the Valar to Christian angels, intermediaries between the creator and the created world. Painting by Lorenzo Lippi, c. 1645