Elurín

Establishing dates for Elurín and his brother Eluréd is problematic: there are several sources, but none of these fully agree with the others. A date of birth of I 500 is given in The Tale of Years in volume XI of The History of Middle-earth, which also states that the brothers were twins. However, this was later amended, and in later sources the brothers are dated as being born three years apart, Eluréd in I 492 and Elurín in I 495.

The fall of Doriath, which led to the loss of Elurín and his brother, is variously dated as I 507, I 509 and I 511. The value of I 509 given above seems to be the latest intended by Tolkien (indeed it directly replaced I 511 in his notes) though this is hard to state with certainty.

To complicate matters even further, the brothers may not have died in the fall of Doriath. They were left to starve in the forest, but according to at least one tradition they were saved by wild creatures, and eventually found their way in secret back to Ossiriand, the land of their birth. The published Silmarillion is coy on the matter, saying only that no tale tells of their fate, so it is at least conceivable that they went on to live a long life among the Elves of Ossiriand.

Elurín's main line of descent was from the Sindarin Elves of Doriath. His father Dior, however, was Half-elven, being the son of the Elf Lúthien and the Man Beren. Lúthien in turn was the daughter of Elu Thingol and Melian the Maia, so to a small extent Elurín also carried the blood of the Maiar in his veins.

The Elu- in Elurín's name is a reference to his great-grandfather Elu Thingol, who had been King of Doriath and Lord of Beleriand. It was common for the male descendants of this line to bear names recalling Thingol, so Elurín's father Dior was surnamed Eluchíl, 'Thingol's Heir', and his brother Eluréd had a name that also meant 'heir of Thingol'. Elurín's own name incorporates rín, from a root meaning 'recall', 'remember', and is interpreted 'remembrance of Elu'.