Celeborn

Origins and the question of his kindred

The published texts do not agree about where Celeborn was born. The Silmarillion makes him a Sinda of Doriath, a kinsman of Thingol, whom Galadriel met and married in the guarded realm. Unfinished Tales sets out the fuller Sindarin genealogy, in which he was the son of Galadhon and grandson of Elmo, the younger brother of Thingol, so that Nimloth who wedded Dior was his niece; but the same book preserves a late alternative in which he was Teleporno, a prince of the Teleri of Aman and kinsman of Olwë, who left Valinor together with Galadriel and so was never under the Doom of the Noldor. The Doriathrin account is the one The Silmarillion tells, and it is followed here.

Doriath and the Elder Days

Celeborn was tall, silver-haired, and reckoned wise even among the Sindar, and he held a place of honour in Menegroth. There he met Galadriel, who had come out of the West with the Noldor and was received as kin of the king, and there they were wed. He took no part in the wars of the sons of Fëanor, and the two of them were absent when Doriath was destroyed, first by the Dwarves of Nogrod and then by the Fëanorians. The ruin of his people's realms left him with a lasting distrust of Dwarves that he still carried, unsoftened, into the Third Age.

The Second Age

After the War of Wrath and the drowning of Beleriand, Celeborn and Galadriel dwelt for a time in Lindon under Gil-galad, and there their only child, Celebrían, was born. Unfinished Tales gives several accounts of their later wanderings that cannot all be true together. In the fullest of them they crossed the Blue Mountains into Eriador and ruled the Noldorin realm of Eregion by the West-gate of Moria, where the Elven-smiths grew great; Celeborn would have nothing to do with the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm, while Galadriel valued their friendship. When Celebrimbor and the smiths took the lordship of Eregion, Galadriel went east through the mountains to the woodland country that would become Lothlórien, and Celeborn remained behind. In the war that Sauron brought on Eriador in S.A. 1697 he led out what force Eregion could muster and broke the enemy's first assault before he was driven back; the land was ruined all the same, and Elrond gathered the survivors north to found Rivendell. Another tradition has them living long in the coastlands of Belfalas; all the accounts agree that they were never Sauron's subjects and never his dupes.

Lord of Lórien

By the middle of the Third Age Celeborn and Galadriel were settled in the Golden Wood among the Silvan folk, and when King Amroth was lost at sea in T.A. 1981 they took up the rule of Lórien openly, dwelling in Caras Galadhon in the greatest of the mallorn trees. Celeborn governed the Galadhrim as their lord, ordering the wardens of the northern fences and the defence of the Anduin marches, while Galadriel's power, drawn from Nenya, kept the wood unstained. When the Fellowship came out of Moria in February of T.A. 3019 he received them, questioned them closely about the loss of Gandalf, and spoke bitterly to Gimli about the folly of waking what slept in Khazad-dûm; rebuked by Galadriel, he took the words back, which no one who knew his history thought a small thing. He gave the Company boats, cords and counsel for the river-road, and set out for them the choice they would face at the Falls of Rauros.

The assault on Dol Guldur and East Lórien

While the war ran south, Dol Guldur sent three assaults across the Anduin against Lórien, and all three were beaten back. After the Ring was unmade on March 25, Celeborn led the host of the Galadhrim over the river, took the fortress, and Galadriel threw down its walls and laid bare its pits. He then met Thranduil in the midst of the forest, and the two kings named it anew, Eryn Lasgalen, the Wood of Greenleaves. Thranduil took the north, Celeborn took the whole south as far as the mountains and called it East Lórien, and the wide middle of the wood was given to the Beornings and the Woodmen.

Departure

Celeborn came to Minas Tirith for the wedding of Aragorn and Arwen, and afterwards parted from Galadriel in Eriador when she rode to the Grey Havens with the Ring-bearers in T.A. 3021. He did not sail with her. For a while he held East Lórien, but the Galadhrim went over the Sea or drifted away, and Caras Galadhon fell silent; after Arwen died on Cerin Amroth the wood was empty. Then Celeborn went at last to Rivendell, and dwelt there with his grandsons Elladan and Elrohir, the last lord in Middle-earth who had seen Menegroth and the light of the Two Trees reflected in his wife's hair. In the end he too sought a ship, and with him the living memory of the Elder Days passed out of the world.

Legacy

Celeborn is easy to underrate beside Galadriel, but he ruled a realm for a thousand years, led the only Elven army that took an enemy fortress in the War of the Ring, and was the last great lord of Doriath left in the world. His line ran through Celebrían into the kings of the Reunited Kingdom.

Remained in Middle-earth after Galadriel sailed, held East Lórien for a time, then dwelt in Rivendell with the sons of Elrond and passed over the Sea in the Fourth Age.