WEBVTT - From the Vault: Orcs in the Deep 0:00:05.720 --> 0:00:08.880 Hey, welcome to stuff to blow your mind. This is 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:12.520 Robert and this is gonna be a vault episode for you. 0:00:12.600 --> 0:00:17.319 This is one that we originally published nine two. I 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:20.400 believe this was for Hobbit Day. This is a discussion 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:24.520 of the Orcs of Middle Earth getting into where they 0:00:24.560 --> 0:00:27.640 come from in the dark corners of the human imagination. 0:00:28.440 --> 0:00:34.720 So I hope you enjoy. But of those unhappy ones 0:00:34.760 --> 0:00:37.760 who are ensnared by melk Or, little is known of 0:00:37.760 --> 0:00:41.360 a certainty, for who of the living has descended into 0:00:41.400 --> 0:00:44.599 the pits of a toumbno or has explored the darkness 0:00:44.680 --> 0:00:47.720 of the councils of melk Or. Yet this is held 0:00:47.760 --> 0:00:51.360 true by the wise of Eressia, that all those of 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:53.960 the KINDI who came into the hands of melk Or 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:58.360 aerotomno was broken, were put there in prison, and by 0:00:58.480 --> 0:01:02.720 slow arts of cruelty, were corrupted and enslaved. And thus 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:06.120 did Melcor breathe the hideous race of the Orcs in 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:09.280 envy and mockery of the elves of whom they were 0:01:09.319 --> 0:01:13.240 afterwards the bitterest foes, For the Orcs had life and 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.160 multiplied after the manner of the children of Iluvatar, and 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:19.920 nought that had life of its own, nor the semblance 0:01:19.959 --> 0:01:23.119 of life could ever milk or make since his rebellion 0:01:23.520 --> 0:01:27.200 in the ain Alundli before the beginning. So say the wise, 0:01:27.880 --> 0:01:30.720 and deep in their dark hearts, the Orcs loathed the 0:01:30.760 --> 0:01:34.440 master whom they served, in fear the maker only of 0:01:34.480 --> 0:01:42.920 their misery. Welcome to Stuff to Blow your mind production 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:51.920 of My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Stuff to blow 0:01:51.920 --> 0:01:55.040 your mind. My name is Robert Land and I'm Joe McCormick. 0:01:55.040 --> 0:01:57.120 And man, I had to read that opening part quite 0:01:57.120 --> 0:01:59.640 a few times. That, of course, is from The Silmarillion 0:01:59.720 --> 0:02:02.840 by R. R. Tolkien. Yeah, and of course we're talking 0:02:02.840 --> 0:02:08.400 about Tolkien because today's publication date is September two, which 0:02:08.440 --> 0:02:11.080 also happens to be the credited birth date of both 0:02:11.120 --> 0:02:14.760 Frodo and Bilbo Baggins, the Hobbits central to J. R. 0:02:14.880 --> 0:02:18.080 Tolkien Saga of Middle Earth. Uh. Thus this has become 0:02:18.120 --> 0:02:21.919 known as Hobbit Day, which falls during Tolkien Week, at 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.920 least as proposed by the American Tolkien Society in nine eight. 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:29.359 So this tradition is roughly a month older than I am. 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:32.960 That's funny. So it's a week long festival then, yeah, yeah, 0:02:33.000 --> 0:02:36.280 apparently a week long celebration of Middle Earth and all 0:02:36.320 --> 0:02:39.600 things Tolkien. I was not aware of it until just 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:42.680 like last month, and I realized that the publication day 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:44.600 lined up perfectly, and I'm like, oh, well, we've already 0:02:44.600 --> 0:02:47.880 done an episode on the One Ring. We did another 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:52.160 one on Hobbits and how their their biology works and 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:56.640 how they, you know, relate to multiple meals per day 0:02:56.760 --> 0:02:59.160 and to sunlight, and so I thought, we gotta come 0:02:59.200 --> 0:03:01.560 with something else that we can talk about on hobby 0:03:01.639 --> 0:03:05.160 Day itself. So you wanted to talk about orcs. I 0:03:05.160 --> 0:03:07.120 guess you've had Tolken on the brain all year, right, 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:09.200 Are you still you're still reading it with the family? 0:03:09.720 --> 0:03:12.560 No way, I haven't been reading it. We've been meaning 0:03:12.600 --> 0:03:15.400 to come back around to Fellowship of the Rings, but 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:18.480 instead we just we just got into Star Wars this year, 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:21.000 so that's where we are. But I couldn't. I couldn't 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:24.680 let the stars seemed to align on this particular episode. 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:26.520 So I thought, well, we've got to we gotta do something, 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:29.200 and I started looking around. I thought, well, maybe it's orcs. 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:32.320 Orcs are such a central part of the work and 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:37.640 something that has been highly influential on fantasy in general, like, 0:03:38.240 --> 0:03:42.280 generally speaking, fantasy games, fantasy books, fantasy movies, they're just 0:03:42.440 --> 0:03:46.080 lousy with orcs. You know. I was trying to think 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:49.520 when I first started, when I first became aware of orcs, 0:03:49.520 --> 0:03:52.200 and I think before I ever read any Tolken, I 0:03:52.280 --> 0:03:57.760 played the Warcraft games, which which have orcs in them, 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:01.680 which are essentially the palace guard that Jabba's Palace from 0:04:01.720 --> 0:04:05.960 Return of the Jedi. Yeah, they're green, and they've got tusks, 0:04:05.960 --> 0:04:09.440 and they've got kind of like a bulldog faces. Yeah, 0:04:09.520 --> 0:04:11.160 they have that. They look a lot like those Gamorian 0:04:11.200 --> 0:04:15.240 guards from from Jedi. Um. They also, of course, of course, 0:04:15.400 --> 0:04:19.080 um that whole gaming system I think has its roots 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:23.720 too and being inspired by the Warhammer games as well, 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:26.120 which yeah, which I'll touch based on that in a 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:28.480 little bit, because I think they're very important to the 0:04:28.680 --> 0:04:33.360 history of how we interpret orcs. UM. I think I've 0:04:33.440 --> 0:04:36.880 I have always pictured the Orcs of Middle Earth in 0:04:37.040 --> 0:04:41.000 less detail, like, you know, more abstract, brutish creatures in 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:43.360 the you know, in the rough semblance of human beings. 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:46.280 And part of that might be that I at a 0:04:46.400 --> 0:04:48.359 very early age I saw at least parts of the 0:04:48.400 --> 0:04:53.920 original UH animated version where all the animation is pretty 0:04:54.000 --> 0:04:56.880 much like that. It's kind of like abstract shapes and 0:04:57.279 --> 0:05:00.160 less detail, and the Orcs and other evil things things 0:05:00.200 --> 0:05:03.200 are often shown in kind of a silhouette. This is 0:05:03.240 --> 0:05:06.000 the ralph back she won with the does have rhotoscoping 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:10.080 in it. Rotoscoping animation. I believe that's the technique they used. Yeah, 0:05:10.160 --> 0:05:14.080 it was. It's it's interesting. It's a little bit different 0:05:14.160 --> 0:05:17.440 from the Rank and bass Uh animation that you saw 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:20.200 on The Hobbit and then saw on the Return of 0:05:20.200 --> 0:05:25.200 the King, which you know, basically finished what this film didn't. Oh, 0:05:25.240 --> 0:05:27.840 this is the one where Sauman is Santa Claus. They 0:05:27.880 --> 0:05:31.360 give him a red robe. It's been so long, I 0:05:31.360 --> 0:05:34.320 don't even I don't even remember that honestly, but but 0:05:34.440 --> 0:05:36.880 I I remember flashes of it. It had it had 0:05:36.880 --> 0:05:40.760 some sort of an impact on me. Um. I'd say that, 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:44.000 I think in hearing about Middle Earth and all um, 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:46.839 it probably also has a lot to do with like 0:05:46.880 --> 0:05:49.599 the two earliest stories that I remember my dad telling 0:05:49.640 --> 0:05:52.880 me were he would tell me about Beowulf and Grendel. 0:05:53.160 --> 0:05:55.520 So had this like really early idea of Grendel in 0:05:55.560 --> 0:05:58.440 my head, And then I remember him telling me about 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:01.000 the Battle of Hastings, So I have I think I 0:06:01.160 --> 0:06:04.320 ended up sort of cobbling together this this Middle Earth 0:06:04.480 --> 0:06:07.560 orc as being a combination of Norsemen or Viking and 0:06:07.600 --> 0:06:12.440 that figure of Grendel. M hmm. But that's just me personally, 0:06:12.760 --> 0:06:15.479 just based on like where I came into learning about 0:06:15.480 --> 0:06:19.160 Bahabbed and what I've been exposed to previously. Um and 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:22.080 as as we're going to discuss here, there's there's subsequently 0:06:22.120 --> 0:06:25.200 been so many different visions of orcs and what worcs are, 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:29.200 and we're still in the process, uh of of defining 0:06:29.279 --> 0:06:32.680 and redefining what an orc is. For some reason, I 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:35.880 remember thinking that the Orcs of the Peter Jackson movies 0:06:35.960 --> 0:06:39.800 have a very dickensiean villain kind of flare, Like they've 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:44.200 got this, you know, sinister Cockney accent that you hear. Yeah, 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:48.800 the Peter Jackson orcs are are are very important in 0:06:48.800 --> 0:06:52.920 our our modern perceptions of them, but even those are 0:06:52.720 --> 0:06:56.239 are suitably very There are a lot of different visions 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.000 of what an orc is in those films. They range 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:04.760 from like big like dark brutes to more goblin e forms. 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:07.160 There's like one general that shows up and I think 0:07:07.160 --> 0:07:10.120 Return of the King that has this very like elephant 0:07:10.160 --> 0:07:14.800 man um tumorous appearance, and then by the Hobbit films 0:07:14.840 --> 0:07:16.680 they seem to have refined it a little bit to 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:19.840 where you have either refined the work in general or 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:21.840 that or just they've decided to portray these sort of 0:07:21.840 --> 0:07:26.280 misty mountain orcs as being almost kind of nos ferratu 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:28.600 in like they kind of look like big beefy nos 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:30.280 Feratus in a way in a way that I think 0:07:30.360 --> 0:07:33.760 really works more the classic Max shrek nos ferat or 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:37.320 the klaus Kinski nos Ferra to the Max shredded nos Ferrati. 0:07:37.560 --> 0:07:39.440 That's that's what they are. Like. This is very just 0:07:39.640 --> 0:07:46.840 very beefy um juice to Max. Now we mentioned mentioned 0:07:46.960 --> 0:07:50.440 U Warhammer just a second ago. I've long been a 0:07:50.440 --> 0:07:54.520 fan of of Warhammer, and Warhammer forty thousand one is 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:57.040 like the Fantasy version. One is essentially like a sci 0:07:57.080 --> 0:07:59.400 fi version of the same universe, and it is evolved 0:07:59.440 --> 0:08:01.680 since then. And you have orcs in both of them, 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:05.840 and in both games orcs are depicted as green skinned, 0:08:06.160 --> 0:08:10.320 almost bold dog like in their cranial structure, and even 0:08:10.480 --> 0:08:12.880 more to the point, though these orcs are presented in 0:08:12.880 --> 0:08:16.080 a manner that I would I would dare describe as fun. 0:08:16.840 --> 0:08:21.040 Uh They If Orcs are often you know, serving to 0:08:21.040 --> 0:08:24.840 to represent a kind of dark savagery of humanity, I'd 0:08:24.880 --> 0:08:27.600 say that the the Orc Boys as they're sometimes called, 0:08:27.920 --> 0:08:31.440 this with a z uh run counter to that, embodying 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:33.680 the spirit that kind of celebrates a kind of goofy 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.640 primal rebellion, especially in in Warreham or forty thousand, the 0:08:37.679 --> 0:08:41.400 futuristic version, which is a very dark and nihilistic, you know, 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:44.160 grim dark kind of fictional setting. The Orcs are pretty 0:08:44.240 --> 0:08:47.640 much the only faction that actually resonate with any lightness 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:51.400 and whimsy. Like you see are the depictions of them 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:54.480 or the way that the various collectors have painted them up, 0:08:54.600 --> 0:08:56.920 and they often have bright colors and kind of a fun, 0:08:57.040 --> 0:08:59.880 goofy quality to them. I ran across one I think 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:02.240 is like a current figure where it's like an Orc 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:04.400 captain and he has like a big pirate hat on 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:07.480 and a bunch of cool colorful iconography. They have this 0:09:07.559 --> 0:09:11.600 kind of slap dash technology to them. Uh, they're they're 0:09:11.600 --> 0:09:17.320 a little bit monstars in space jam. I haven't seen 0:09:17.360 --> 0:09:20.800 space Sham, but it's when the nerdy aliens get really 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:25.160 big and good at sports and then then become the monstars. Okay, 0:09:25.200 --> 0:09:28.839 well I'll take your word for it. Um. Yeah, I 0:09:29.200 --> 0:09:32.199 guess I'm imagining from your telling of it, like sort 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:37.559 of lighthearted monstrosity, kind of cartoonish monstrosity. Yes, Okay, space 0:09:37.640 --> 0:09:42.040 Jam never gets too bleak, you know they don't. Space 0:09:42.120 --> 0:09:45.360 Jam doesn't go full grim dark a grim dark space 0:09:45.440 --> 0:09:48.040 Jam reboot that would be that would be scot that'd 0:09:48.080 --> 0:09:53.720 be so good. Now, this embracing of Orc nature. You'll 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:56.960 find this elsewhere as well. Uh. Indungeons and Dragons, of course, 0:09:57.000 --> 0:09:59.600 one may play a half work or even full bloody 0:09:59.640 --> 0:10:01.800 to work, which allows room for that sort of thing, 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:04.160 and will come back to Dungeons and Dragons in a bit. 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:06.840 But one title, and this is one that our former 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:09.920 co host Christian Uh turned me onto. Uh. There's a 0:10:09.960 --> 0:10:13.319 comic artist by the name of James um stoke O 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:15.840 I believe that's S. T. O. K Oe, And he 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:19.439 has this comic series called Orc Stain, and it presents 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:22.680 a delightfully crude and whimsical vision of a world just 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:26.959 overrun with Orcs. The protagonist himself as an Orc warrior, 0:10:27.360 --> 0:10:30.880 and it has this kind of I would say, you know, 0:10:30.960 --> 0:10:36.800 the art that accompanies the British musical um Act Gorillas. 0:10:37.160 --> 0:10:39.760 It has kind of that Guerrillas Tank Girl kind of 0:10:39.880 --> 0:10:42.520 vibe to it. It has this very kind of punk 0:10:42.640 --> 0:10:46.080 rock aesthetic, which I've I've I've seen I've seen that 0:10:46.080 --> 0:10:49.320 with orcs elsewhere where. This is kind of convergence of 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:53.560 like punk art culture and the embracing of the orc. Yeah, 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:56.880 punk monsters, I think is actually a pretty good tradition. 0:10:56.920 --> 0:10:58.480 I don't know how it got started, but I think 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:01.840 of in the old uh the old teenage meeting Ninja turtles, 0:11:01.880 --> 0:11:04.800 comics like the Bebop and rock Steady. H you're a 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:09.559 punk monsters exactly. Yeah, good point. So what does all 0:11:09.559 --> 0:11:11.960 this mean? What are orcs and and why do they 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:14.360 resonate with us? So why do we continue to tell 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:17.880 stories about Orcs and involve works in our games and 0:11:17.920 --> 0:11:21.280 our fiction, etcetera. Um? Can can we discuss science in 0:11:21.280 --> 0:11:25.480 relation to orcs? And are there problematic aspects here as well? Uh? 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:28.040 So that's where we're gonna be talking about in this episode. 0:11:28.040 --> 0:11:30.800 But the first step, I imagine is to discuss what 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:34.360 Tolkien says in Universe about the creation of the Orcs 0:11:34.520 --> 0:11:37.760 coming back to our cold opening, and then also discuss 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:41.800 where he even got the name orc itself. All right, well, 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:45.240 let's enlist in the Orc army, all right, Okay, So 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:48.160 in Tolken's writings, the Orcs are the most common evil 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:51.640 foot soldier. They're like the ubiquitous enemy um. In the 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:54.559 Hobbit we deal more with goblins, which are often understood 0:11:54.559 --> 0:11:57.280 to be either lesser Orcs or a particular species or 0:11:57.320 --> 0:12:01.040 subspecies of mountain orc. And Tolkien apparently rolled out a 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:05.640 few different contradictory origin stories for the Orc in his work. 0:12:05.720 --> 0:12:08.560 But according to the Token Encyclopedia, which is a book 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:11.679 I typically turn into for such matters, uh, they were 0:12:11.720 --> 0:12:14.720 twisted forms of life that Milk Corp spawned in the 0:12:14.760 --> 0:12:18.040 pits of Utum. No no, uh. They served as the 0:12:18.040 --> 0:12:20.480 bulk of his armies, and then after his defeat they 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:23.880 served as the bulk of Saron's armies as well. Now, 0:12:24.000 --> 0:12:27.640 was milk Or the same person as Saron in an 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:30.640 earlier incarnation? Or was milk Or the god that Saaran 0:12:30.880 --> 0:12:34.760 served my understanding, and this is a good point for 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:37.120 us to point out that neither of us are Tolkien 0:12:37.200 --> 0:12:41.400 scholars or or professed to be Tolkien experts pro it's 0:12:41.440 --> 0:12:43.720 you're you keep wanting to do these token episodes, and 0:12:43.720 --> 0:12:46.520 then we get the mail from people who are like, actually, 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:49.440 I know and I I and I love it. I invited. 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:52.400 I I definitely want to hear from from people more 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:56.400 knowledgeable in the in Tolkien scholarship than I am, or 0:12:56.520 --> 0:13:00.720 just in general, you know, or or scholarship if you will. Uh. Now, 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:05.240 my understanding is that melk Or was the original fallen 0:13:05.320 --> 0:13:10.440 god that rebelled against everything. Then he was defeated Saaron, 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:15.000 being like a fallen hephaestus type forge god had served 0:13:15.080 --> 0:13:18.400 milk Or. But with milk Or destroyed or you know, 0:13:18.400 --> 0:13:20.840 taken out of the picture permanently, now it's time for 0:13:20.920 --> 0:13:25.520 Saron to shine. Basically, Sawon was milk Or's VP. Okay, cool, 0:13:25.920 --> 0:13:28.480 Now now we we kicked off the episode here with 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:31.520 that cold reading about the creation of the Orcs in 0:13:31.559 --> 0:13:34.960 the in the Pits of Autumn. No, you know, the 0:13:35.000 --> 0:13:37.640 idea that they would have been created, you know, this 0:13:37.840 --> 0:13:41.800 sort of blasphemous process that takes place in a fallen 0:13:41.840 --> 0:13:45.079 god's dungeons, like it was a sort of a mockery 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:48.960 of life. Yeah, the idea that they captured els and 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:52.480 twisted them through torture into this new terrible form of life, 0:13:52.760 --> 0:13:55.680 and that the Orcs therefore were products of pain and hate. 0:13:55.880 --> 0:13:59.040 They lived only for pain and hate, and outwardly they 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:02.679 were quote and this is from the token Encyclopedia, bent, 0:14:02.920 --> 0:14:05.560 bow legged, and squat, so they were ape like in 0:14:05.600 --> 0:14:09.480 many respects, but cunning and cruel. Their skin looked as 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:12.720 if burned. In their eyes were quote crimson gashes like 0:14:12.840 --> 0:14:17.559 narrow slits and black iron grates behind which hot coals burn. Now, 0:14:17.559 --> 0:14:20.040 there are different varieties of orc, we're told in Middle Earth, 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:23.320 from the goblins of the Misty Mountains to standard orcs, 0:14:23.360 --> 0:14:25.800 and then later you get these taller, more sun resistant 0:14:26.440 --> 0:14:30.080 Urakai orcs that were made by Sauron much later. And 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:33.800 it sounds as if the idea is that Sawin ends 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:36.400 up combining orc stock with human stock to create a 0:14:36.440 --> 0:14:40.120 more human statured, day tolerant trooper. Yeah, and I think 0:14:40.120 --> 0:14:42.000 that ties into the idea that a lot of creatures 0:14:42.040 --> 0:14:44.040 in Middle Earth or in Tolken's world, like, if you're 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:46.920 a bad creature, you're often sort of confined to a 0:14:47.040 --> 0:14:50.360 nighttime existence. You can't go out in the sun trolls 0:14:50.360 --> 0:14:52.360 are this way, and the Hobbit trolls are turned to 0:14:52.480 --> 0:14:56.200 stone when Gandalf tricks come into staying up till till 0:14:56.240 --> 0:14:58.480 the sun comes out. And I guess the idea is 0:14:58.520 --> 0:15:01.360 also that maybe the Orcs or the goblins just don't 0:15:01.360 --> 0:15:05.920 really like sunlight. Yeah. Now, the Token Encyclopedia and other 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:10.680 sources as well, it has you'll find lengthy passages discussing 0:15:10.720 --> 0:15:12.720 the role of Orcs to the history of Middle Earth. 0:15:13.040 --> 0:15:17.680 Uh there's there's no shortage of of of information uh there. 0:15:18.120 --> 0:15:20.880 But basically, the idea is that throughout their history the 0:15:20.960 --> 0:15:23.760 numbers swell and shrink at times when dark lords rise 0:15:23.880 --> 0:15:27.240 up and then fall away. Um when they when dark 0:15:27.280 --> 0:15:29.880 lords come back to power, the Orcs are there to 0:15:29.920 --> 0:15:32.320 fill the ranks of the evil armies. But even when 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:34.400 they're defeated, they never completely go away. They kind of 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:38.000 shrink to the hidden corners of Middle Earth. Um. And 0:15:38.080 --> 0:15:41.320 even with the defeat of Sauron and Middle Earth's transformation 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:43.920 into a modern world, there's this idea that the Orcs 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:47.000 are out there somewhere. So that's the the in universe 0:15:47.040 --> 0:15:51.680 explanation or as cannon and origin stories can be cobbled together. 0:15:51.840 --> 0:15:53.520 But of course we know that J. R. Tolkien did 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:56.240 not create Middle Earth out of nothing. He forged it 0:15:56.280 --> 0:16:00.760 out of existing mythological, folkloric and historic motifs. And I 0:16:00.760 --> 0:16:04.600 would say, actually, maybe more than anything, out of linguistic motifs. 0:16:04.800 --> 0:16:08.160 You know that Tolken loved language, and you often get 0:16:08.200 --> 0:16:11.920 the sense that his story came out of having a 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:15.120 word for something, you know, like you'd find you'd find 0:16:15.120 --> 0:16:17.320 a word for something an old Norse. That's just a 0:16:17.400 --> 0:16:19.880 great word. And and it almost feels as if the 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:24.400 character springs from the sound of the name. Sorry that 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:27.560 that makes sense, I know, no, absolutely, I mean you 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:32.600 you really you can't discuss Tolkien creating anything without without 0:16:32.600 --> 0:16:35.520 bringing in language, like clearly, like that was his his 0:16:35.520 --> 0:16:39.520 his primary um scholarly interest, and everything else kind of 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:41.960 like springs out of that. And then thus that's where 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:44.880 a lot of these characters and species come from as well. Yeah, 0:16:45.200 --> 0:16:48.360 so it seems that Tolkien actually derived the term orc 0:16:48.520 --> 0:16:52.000 from a usage in Beowulf. Beowulf is, of course the 0:16:52.320 --> 0:16:55.680 great epic of Anglo Saxon. It's an epic poem from 0:16:55.720 --> 0:16:58.200 the early Middle Ages. We don't know exactly when it 0:16:58.280 --> 0:17:01.000 was composed, it was written in Old to English, which 0:17:01.040 --> 0:17:04.080 is the ancestor to modern English, but also which is 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:07.359 you know, it's so unlike modern English that you can't 0:17:07.400 --> 0:17:09.719 just read it, you know, it's basically like another language. 0:17:09.720 --> 0:17:13.280 You need you need a glossary or translation basically to 0:17:13.359 --> 0:17:17.639 understand it. Uh And so the term specifically that appears 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:21.840 in Beowulf is or caneus or caneus. It is a 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:26.200 creature that's mentioned during the introduction of the monster Grendel, 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:29.680 you know, the real first big bad that that Beowulf 0:17:29.720 --> 0:17:33.359 has to fight. Beowulf arrives at at roth Car's mead hall, 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:36.600 and the mead hall is being terrorized by attacks from 0:17:36.600 --> 0:17:39.520 this monster Grendel. And so I'm going to read from 0:17:39.520 --> 0:17:42.560 the J. Leslie Hall translation of Beowulf in the part 0:17:42.640 --> 0:17:46.639 that mentions orcs uh so or the word or canaos 0:17:46.720 --> 0:17:51.520 at least Hall translates for that bitter murder, the killing 0:17:51.560 --> 0:17:55.879 of Abele all ruling father, the kindred of Cain crushed 0:17:55.920 --> 0:17:59.439 with his vengeance in the feud he rejoiced, not but 0:17:59.560 --> 0:18:03.320 far A drove him from kindred and kind that crime 0:18:03.400 --> 0:18:09.120 to atone for meter of justice. Thence Ill favored creatures 0:18:09.160 --> 0:18:14.080 elves and giants monsters of ocean came into being, and 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:17.720 the giants that long time grappled with God, he gave 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:21.840 them requital. Now in the Hall translation here there are 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:25.040 a couple of different words. They get translated as giants. 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:29.040 One is the old English gigantists, and the other is 0:18:29.240 --> 0:18:31.400 a yoton s, which I think is where we also 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:35.280 get the word yoton like the Norse mythology giant a 0:18:35.320 --> 0:18:37.760 couple of different kinds of monsters. So in the line 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:42.240 that mentions orkans, it's a yotanus and ilfa giants and 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:45.600 elves and or can a s which I think here 0:18:45.680 --> 0:18:50.240 is translated as monsters of ocean, but other translations have 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:54.120 have chosen different terms for it, sometimes calling it a 0:18:54.119 --> 0:18:57.560 a demon or a goblin or something like that. Uh. 0:18:57.640 --> 0:19:00.800 There's also an interesting translation note in the j. Leslie 0:19:00.840 --> 0:19:04.840 Hall version of Beowulf, which notes that when Grendel himself 0:19:04.960 --> 0:19:08.919 is introduced, the word used to describe him could be 0:19:08.960 --> 0:19:12.840 translated as demon and often is or could be translated 0:19:12.920 --> 0:19:18.600 as stranger. Uh. Literary and linguistic conflation of the unfamiliar 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:22.120 person with the monster of hell, and j. Leslie Hall 0:19:22.160 --> 0:19:26.440 actually chooses stranger in in this translation, making for an 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:30.200 interesting set of lines. A foe in the hall building, 0:19:30.440 --> 0:19:35.359 this horrible stranger was Grindel, entitled the march Stepper, famous 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:38.280 who dwelt in the moor, fins, the marsh and the 0:19:38.359 --> 0:19:42.480 fastness that. So, if you think of Grendel as a stranger, 0:19:42.560 --> 0:19:46.560 this gets into some interesting territory about what monstrosity means, 0:19:46.600 --> 0:19:50.080 and that a lot of times are our mythical monsters 0:19:50.160 --> 0:19:55.560 are sort of ways of mentally metabolizing concepts of people 0:19:55.600 --> 0:19:59.120 who are unfamiliar or who you worry might be threatening 0:19:59.200 --> 0:20:03.400 to you somehow. Yeah. Absolutely, But then also just from 0:20:03.400 --> 0:20:05.199 a surely like in that on the other hand, like 0:20:05.240 --> 0:20:08.080 just from an imaginative perspective, like I hear that, and 0:20:08.119 --> 0:20:11.159 I just love the idea of Grendel as this, as 0:20:11.280 --> 0:20:14.320 as the stranger, as this, you know, this being that 0:20:14.520 --> 0:20:18.280 is um that is almost from another world, you know, 0:20:18.359 --> 0:20:21.680 because in many many respects he is well and much 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:24.000 like the Orc that we were just talking about, Grendel 0:20:24.119 --> 0:20:27.400 here has given an unholy origin story. Right. They say 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:30.040 that he has descended from Kine, who in the biblical 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:33.159 story murdered his brother Abel Caine was you know, the 0:20:33.200 --> 0:20:36.840 third human to exist and Abel was the fourth and Caine, 0:20:36.840 --> 0:20:40.600 I guess, got jealous of Able having having good offerings 0:20:40.640 --> 0:20:42.600 to God that God was very pleased with, and so 0:20:42.800 --> 0:20:46.360 Kane murdered him. And then God comes to Caine saying, hey, 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:49.040 where's your brother? And Kane says, am I my brother's keeper. 0:20:49.119 --> 0:20:52.080 So God curses Kane and sends him off wandering in 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:55.159 the wilderness to the land of not and Kane's offspring 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:58.960 apparently become the monster Grendel. So it's like there there's 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:02.439 a sort of there's a generational curse that has passed 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:06.360 down for that original crime. Now, in a nineteenth century 0:21:06.359 --> 0:21:10.560 glossary of Anglo Saxon terms, the scholar Thomas Wright notes 0:21:10.600 --> 0:21:16.840 that orc means possibly hell, devil, or specter or goblin uh, 0:21:16.880 --> 0:21:20.040 and he notes that it is phonetically similar to Orcus, 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:23.120 which was a Roman god of the underworld I think 0:21:23.240 --> 0:21:29.840 somewhat regularly conflated with Satan during times of Christian syncretism. Yeah. Yeah, 0:21:29.960 --> 0:21:32.800 Orcus of course has come up on the podcast before. 0:21:32.840 --> 0:21:36.200 And this also brings to mind that that line from 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:40.639 William Blake that of course is um is adapted and 0:21:40.680 --> 0:21:44.000 switched around a little bit most more probably more famously 0:21:44.080 --> 0:21:47.320 to most listeners in Blade Runner. But that line fiery, 0:21:47.359 --> 0:21:51.399 the angels rose as they rose deep thunder rolled around 0:21:51.400 --> 0:21:55.200 their shores, indignant, burning with the fires of Orc. Oh yeah, 0:21:55.240 --> 0:21:57.400 that's come up before. I know you like that one, 0:21:57.440 --> 0:21:59.320 and that's great. I mean, Blake is always great, but 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:03.120 Orc there is different. Work is not so much a monster. 0:22:03.160 --> 0:22:05.320 There is kind of like I don't recall exactly some 0:22:05.440 --> 0:22:08.200 kind of character. Yeah. Yeah, you you're dealing with the 0:22:08.560 --> 0:22:13.000 Blake um um cinematic universe there as opposed to any 0:22:13.000 --> 0:22:16.520 of these others. UM. I should add add one thing. 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:19.880 It's it's interesting that we don't have to really discuss 0:22:19.920 --> 0:22:23.600 what a goblin is in any of this UM. There's 0:22:23.640 --> 0:22:28.520 something about the goblin in particular that I think you'll 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:32.600 find just about everywhere. Like we've discussed um various Chinese 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:37.680 folklore's and mythologies before that involve something that is translated 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:41.240 as a goblin. And it does seem to suggest that 0:22:41.280 --> 0:22:44.960 there is just sort of an intrinsic goblin nous to 0:22:45.240 --> 0:22:49.320 the human imagination, Like there is a space preserved for 0:22:49.440 --> 0:22:51.919 the goblin that we we don't even really need to 0:22:51.960 --> 0:22:54.720 even expand on too much. Well, yeah, I mean, I 0:22:54.800 --> 0:22:57.520 think it's just there's a general fear of something that 0:22:57.720 --> 0:23:01.399 is evil that is roughly shaped like a human and 0:23:01.440 --> 0:23:04.960 has human capabilities in a way, but cannot be reasoned 0:23:04.960 --> 0:23:09.480 with and has no and has no like mercy or morality, 0:23:09.520 --> 0:23:12.240 and is just sort of like meanness and cruelty and 0:23:12.400 --> 0:23:16.040 human form or right human form. Yeah, or even kind 0:23:16.040 --> 0:23:17.960 of uh, I guess sometimes with the Goblin, I get 0:23:17.960 --> 0:23:22.200 a sense of like the diminutive nature of the goblin'sgested 0:23:22.359 --> 0:23:26.240