Grimbeorn

Son of the skin-changer

Grimbeorn was the son of Beorn, the skin-changer of the Vales of Anduin, born after his father took a wife in the years following the Battle of Five Armies. He inherited the leadership of the Beornings, the people who had gathered around Beorn between the Misty Mountains and Mirkwood, and by 3018 he was called Grimbeorn the Old and ruled a large following of hardy Men.

Lord of the Beornings

What is known of him comes from Glóin, who told Frodo in Rivendell in October 3018 how the lands about the Lonely Mountain fared. Under Grimbeorn the Beornings held the High Pass over the mountains and the Ford of Carrock, so that the road from Eriador to Dale and Erebor was still passable in a time when Orcs and Wolves were once more multiplying. Without them, Glóin said, the way from Dale to Rivendell would have been closed. The Dwarves valued the Beornings but did not love them: Grimbeorn's people charged heavy tolls, and like Beorn they were no friends of Dwarves. Nothing further is recorded of Grimbeorn, and whether he shared his father's gift of changing shape is not stated, though it was said of the Beornings that some of them did.

Lord of the Beornings at the end of the Third Age; his death is not recorded.