Tolkien and the Old Wives

Here's to the old wives. They could keep a hospitable house, dispense herb-lore, and tell tales only a fool would disregard. They had a rapt audience in the Brothers Grimm, who recorded their knowledge of customs and of cautions, of Faërian folk and of country folk; tales so deep in the "cauldron of story" that no one knows the ancientry of their origins. Any diminishment of the old wives is highly suspect, in my opinion. Does it stem from the very bad myth that women are less worth listening to than men, or that a pastoral life is inferior to a citified one?

This little watercolor is my celebration of the fact that the old wives had a student and a cunning defender in J.R.R. Tolkien, whose academic peers were apt to dismiss folk tales and fireside yarns as embarrassments unworthy of their educated notice. I've come to believe that Tolkien quietly and magnificently rebuked them all in giving us Ioreth of the Houses of Healing, whose wisdom saves lives. It is reputed of her and her healing sisters that she remembers this verse:

When the black breath blows

and death's shadow grows

and all lights pass,

come athelas! come athelas!

Life to the dying

in the king's hand lying!

This rhyme is, of course, a signifier of Aragorn's true kingship, as proven out by his effective use of the herb which the "country-folk" call kingsfoil.

Ioreth's words are dismissed by the male herb-master as doggrel, but they hold a significant secret. Without the athelas herb, we would have lost Faramir and Éowyn, and Merry Brandybuck, and many others who fought so bravely against the Enemy's purposed domination. If, like me, you cannot do without these beloved folk, then it is a very good reminder never to discount Ioreth and the wisdom of old wives.