Petty-dwarves

Origins

The Petty-dwarves were the descendants of Dwarves who in remote ages had been cast out from the great mansions of the East, either as outcasts of their houses or as members of families that had committed some offence against Dwarvish law. Driven west across Middle-earth, they came into Beleriand long before the Dwarves of Nogrod and Belegost crossed the Blue Mountains, and long before the Sindar had spread through the land. In exile they dwindled in stature and in craft, and grew furtive and secretive beyond even the normal habit of their race.

In Beleriand

The Petty-dwarves made their homes by delving into hills. They were the first to hollow the caves beside the Narog that became Nargothrond, which they called Nulukkizdîn, and they dwelt on the hill of Amon Rûdh, which they named Sharbhund; the house within it was Bar-en-Nibin-noeg. When the Sindar first met them they did not know what they were, and hunted them as they would hunt animals, so that the Petty-dwarves came to hate the Elves and to fear all strangers. Only when the Dwarves of the Blue Mountains arrived and the Elves learned what Dwarves were did the hunting stop, but by then the Petty-dwarves were few. The Elves called them Noegyth Nibin and left them alone; they did not attack, but they never forgot.

When Finrod came to the Narog and enlarged the caves into the great fortress of Nargothrond, the Petty-dwarves who had begun it were dispossessed. This was among the wrongs that Mîm most bitterly remembered.

Mîm and Túrin

By the time of Túrin only three Petty-dwarves remained alive: Mîm and his sons Khîm and Ibun. In F.A. 486 Túrin's outlaws captured Mîm, and one of Túrin's men killed Khîm with an arrow. As ransom for his life Mîm led the outlaws to his hidden house in Amon Rûdh, and there the band dwelt for two years, joined by Beleg. Mîm's hatred of Elves fastened on Beleg, and when he was captured by Orcs Mîm betrayed the outlaws' refuge in exchange for his life and Túrin's. The Orcs took Túrin captive, and Beleg was left bound; Mîm's attempt to kill Beleg failed, and the Dwarf fled. Ibun was lost in the Orcs' hands, and Mîm was alone.

The end

After the fall of Nargothrond Mîm went to the ruined halls and possessed the dragon's hoard, calling it the treasure of his fathers. There Húrin, freed from Angband, found him and slew him in vengeance for the betrayal of his son, and took from the hoard the Nauglamír. With Mîm the Petty-dwarves ended.

Character of the kindred

They were smaller than other Dwarves, of great skill in delving and in the finding of roots and the reading of the wild, but suspicious, spiteful and cunning. Mîm's speech mixed Khuzdul with a broken Sindarin. Their story is a small tragedy within the greater one of the Elder Days: a people wronged by the Elves before either knew the other, who repaid the wrong on the one Elf, Beleg, who had treated them with courtesy.

The Petty-dwarves were shorter and slighter than other Dwarves, stooped and furtive in movement, with the same hardiness against cold and the same long beards. Mîm is described as bent and old, with a long beard and a sack on his back, moving quickly and silently through rough country. They were reduced in stature as they were reduced in number, so that Elves at first took them for two-legged animals.

The Petty-dwarves retained the Dwarvish gifts of delving, of finding a way through stone, and of secret knowledge of the land; Mîm knew the roots that could feed a band through winter. They had lost the great crafts of the mansions and the wealth that went with them, and their treasures were the memory of the halls they had begun and the Elves had taken. They spoke Khuzdul among themselves and a halting Sindarin with strangers, gave their real names, unlike other Dwarves, and lived in hidden houses cut into hills. They laid a heavy value on the ransom of a life for a life, and on oaths given in exchange for safety.

Dwarves cast out of the eastern mansions, whether for crimes or as unwanted kindred, wandered west long before the histories of Beleriand began. Cut off from the seven houses they diminished in body, craft and number. Reaching Beleriand before the Elves, they delved the first halls of Nargothrond and Amon Rûdh. When the Elves came they were hunted as beasts, and by the time both peoples understood what the other was, the Petty-dwarves were near their end.

The kindred died out in the First Age. Khîm was shot by one of Túrin's outlaws in F.A. 486, Ibun vanished after his capture by Orcs in 489, and Mîm was slain by Húrin at Nargothrond in about 501. No Petty-dwarf survived into the Second Age.