April 14, 2002

Re: Who Was First?
Brett C.

To respond to your question Tomas, I was pretty stumped myself until I realised that the one who refers to Treebeard as 'the oldest of all living things.' is Gandalf. The clue here is that Gandalf himself is far older than Treebeard, having his origins in the time before creation as one of the Ainur, yet he still gives the title of eldest to Treebeard.

So I'm speculating that his reference to Trebeard is in relation to creatures naturally born of Middle Earth, such as Elves,Men, Ents etc. This would exclude beings of spirit such as himself and his fellow Ainur and Valar. This could mean Bombadil, 'Eldest and Fatherless', who walked under the stars, 'before the Dark Lord came from Outside.' falls into the same categroy as Gandalf, a being in the world but whose origins are seperate from it. But that's just my reasoning. Any other thoughts?