Swift birds of prey, smaller than Eagles, but just as sharp-eyed. Though the Eagles were the best known of Manwë's messengers, we're also told that there were hawks among the ranks of his servants, watching Middle-earth and bringing back news to their noble master on Taniquetil. Other forces also used them as servants, and far above the crebain that spied for Saruman in the War of the Ring, Aragorn reported that he had seen hawks hovering, watching the lands far below.
Notes
1 |
Hawks are mentioned commonly enough in Tolkien's work that we can be sure that they were familiar to peoples across Middle-earth. However, these references tend to be indirect or metaphorical, and hawks are only directly mentioned on a single occasion. As the Company of the Ring crossed the lands of Eregion in southeastern Eriador, Aragorn spoke of seeing many hawks high in the air.
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2 |
There are actually two separate groups of hawks, with Accipitrinae representing those native to Eurasia (which would correspond to Middle-earth in this context). Another disparate group of about fifty further species (Buteoninae) are found in the Americas, but these would not historically have been seen in Middle-earth.
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- Updated 4 February 2022
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