#tinuviel

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The next day at the hour of sunset Aragorn walked alone in the woods, and his heart was high within

The next day at the hour of sunset Aragorn walked alone in the woods, and his heart was high within him; and he sang, for he was full of hope and the world was fair. And suddenly even as he sang he saw a maiden walking on a greensward among the white stems of the birches; and he halted amazed, thinking that he had strayed into a dream, or else that he had received the gift of the Elf-minstrels, who can make the things of which they sing appear before the eyes of those that listen.

For Aragorn had been singing a part of the Lay of Lúthien which tells of the meeting of Lúthien and Beren in the forest of Neldoreth. And behold! there Lúthien walked before his eyes in Rivendell, clad in a mantle of silver and blue, fair as the twilight in Elven-home; her dark hair strayed in a sudden wind, and her brows were bound with gems like stars.

For a moment Aragorn gazed in silence, but fearing that she would pass away and never be seen again, he called to her crying, Tinúviel, Tinúviel! even as Beren had done in the Elder Days long ago.

Then the maiden turned to him and smiled, and she said: ‘Who are you? And why do you call me by that name?’

And he answered: 'Because I believed you to be indeed Lúthien Tinúviel, of whom I was singing. But if you are not she, then you walk in her likeness.’

'So many have said,’ she answered gravely. 'Yet her name is not mine. Though maybe my doom will be not unlike hers.’

–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Appendix A, “The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen”


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He sped towards the hillock green,the lissom limbs, the dancing sheen;he leapt upon the grassy hil

He sped towards the hillock green,
the lissom limbs, the dancing sheen;
he leapt upon the grassy hill
his arms with loveliness to fill:
his arms were empty, and she fled;
away, away her white feet sped.
But as she went he swiftly came
and called her with the tender name
of nightingales in elvish tongue,
that all the woods now sudden rung:
‘Tinúviel! Tinúviel!’
And clear his voice was as a bell;
'Tinúviel! Tinúviel!’
His voice such love and longing filled
one moment stood she, fear was stilled;
one moment only; like a flame
he leaped towards her as she stayed
and caught and kissed that elfin maid.

As love there woke in sweet surprise
the starlight trembled in her eyes.
A! Lúthien! A! Lúthien!
more fair than any child of Men;
O! loveliest maid of Elfinesse,
what madness does thee now possess!
A! lissom limbs and shadowy hair
and chaplet of white snowdrops there;
O! starry diadem and white 
pale hands beneath the pale moonlight!
She left his arms and slipped away
just at the breaking of the day.

–J.R.R. Tolkien, The History of Middle-earth III: The Lays of Beleriand, “The Lay of Leithian”, Canto III


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Lúthien sketches! I don’t think I’ve drawn her before, so here’s how she looked when Beren first saw her and also short-haired, on the way to murder a Maia.

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