Felaróf
| Felaróf | |
|---|---|
| Horse | |
 | |
| "Felarof and Leod" by Catherine Chmiel | |
| Information | |
| Other names | Mansbane |
| Location | Lands of the Éothéod |
| Affiliation | Léod; later Eorl |
| Death | T.A. 2545 The Wold, alongside Eorl |
| Family | |
| Children | Ancestor of the Mearas |
| Physical Description | |
| Race | Horse |
| Gender | Male |
| Hair color | White |
| Gallery | Images of Felaróf |
Felaróf was the famous steed of Eorl the Young, the first King of Rohan, and to whom all of the Mearas, mighty horses of Rohan, were descendants.
History[edit | edit source]
According to later tradition among the Rohirrim, the ancestors of the Mearas were brought from the West by Béma.[1] Therefore, Felaróf might be a descendant of those horses according to said tradition.
Léod was a tamer of horses among the Éothéod, who captured this wild white horse while it was still a foal. In T.A. 2501[note 1] he tried to tame it himself, but when he attempted to mount it, it threw him and escaped. So Léod died, leaving a sixteen-year-old son, Eorl. Eorl hunted the white horse, found it, called it "Mansbane" and demanded that it give up its freedom in payment for the death of his father. The horse agreed, and took the name that Eorl gave it: Felaróf.
It was on Felaróf that Eorl rode to the aid of Gondor and earned a famous victory, one that would lead Steward Cirion to grant them the wide empty land of Calenardhon, which would come to be called Rohan. For more than thirty years afterwards, Felaróf had the freedom of those wide grasslands, but a new invasion of Easterlings saw Eorl ride to battle once again. In The Wold, the far northern reach of Rohan, Eorl and Felaróf met their ends, and were laid together in a mound raised outside the gate of Edoras.
Felaróf was a very remarkable horse indeed. It is even recorded that he could understand the speech of Men. He gave rise in turn to a race of wonderful horses, the Mearas, who according to tradition could only be ridden by the Lord of the Mark, Eorl's descendants. It was from this line that Gandalf's horse Shadowfax came, making him a descendant of Felaróf himself.[1]
Etymology[edit | edit source]
Felaróf is a poetic word in Old English: "very valiant, very strong".[2]
Genealogy[edit | edit source]
| Possibly Nahar | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| FELARÓF | |||||||||||||||||||||||
| Shadowfax | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Portrayal in adaptations[edit | edit source]
2020: The Lord of the Rings Online:
- Felaróf appears briefly in the flashback narrating the history of the Eotheod.
Notes
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, Appendix A, "The House of Eorl"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Unfinished Tales, "Cirion and Eorl and the Friendship of Gondor and Rohan", note 28
