Talk:Harad/Archive 1

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The Haradrim spoke the tongue of Haradiac and was quite unknown to the Men of the west. They were heard echoing these crys while entering the Battle of the Pelennor Fields during the War of the Ring. When the Dark Lord Sauron was finally defeated at the end of the Third Age, Harad formed an alliance with Gondor and they remained close allies for years to come. Little is known of Far Harad, yet we do know that the lands of Near Harad were allies to Gondor during the Fourth Age or the Age of the Dominion of Men. They were known for their dark skin and their immense strength that was said to rival a hill troll; yet we do not know if these accusations are true. Most Haradrim worshipped Sauron as a god and offered sacrifices to him at their temples; those that did not accept Sauron were killed. They were skilled warriors and successfully managed to raise and train a Mumakil, or an oliphaunt, to be beasts of war for them against the Gondorians during the Third Age. Mumakil usually stood ten stories tall, thus being greatly larger than their present-day elephantine relatives of Africa and Asia. Haradrim were transported throughout Sutherland and even to the bordors of Gondor. They were a gender based society and relied on the men for food, protection, and government. Some Haradrim were longed lived, sometimes rivaling the Numenorians and spanding to two-hundred years; though most barely reached one hundred. I now conclude with this final statement. The Haradrim were followers of the Dark Lord, yes, but they followed him out of fear not out of true loyalty.--69.134.95.4 00:58, 4 Jun 2004 (UTC)Sal Della Villa June 4, 2004

Most of the above is based on non-canon sources (MERP, probably...) Ausir 04:49, 4 Jun 2004 (UTC)

In the lands of Haradwaith there are many tribes constantly at war. Each tribe is adapted to where it lives, though some may be nomadic.

The tribes are mainly centered around certain realms of Haradwaith (see Harad). In the lands of Near Harad, Pelargir,and Harandor [sic?], the tribes are more normal, being nomadic or simply living in cities.

In Khand, the men are varied, though most are nomadic or bear the characteristics of their king.

In Umbar, the men are city-people, or more warlike, riding in the fleets of Dalamyr and are more accustomed to the seas.

The tribesmen of Far Harad are very different. In Kârna and Badharkân the men are made to live in the forests, though the men of Badharkân are housed in a great city-fortess, whereas the men of Kârna live in a ruined city. Also, more nomadic men of the mountains live in Hidâr and guards are placed along the Harad road.

Lastly, the men of the Nâfarat are all nomadic, living in encampments at Dhâran-sar, Abrakân, and Gadîrkarn, though the men of Dhâran-sar may roam the mountains.

This time it's from The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game. If only Tolkien wrote more about these guys, then we wouldn't have to invent... Uthanc 17:25, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

VfD result

The consensus at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tribelands of Haradwaith was declared "merge to Harad", but it was clear in the discussion that it should have been merged where appropriate - namely The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game - since most of the info wasn't from Tolkien. I removed the added text (in the main section) and put the original text here, but I was reverted, so to comply with the verdict I've removed the original info again except for the names, which I put in the right section. Uthanc 23:01, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Africa

I generally thought that the more well-kingdoms in Middle Earth corresponded with Europe and then Harad could be paralleled with Africa, however this is merely my interpretation. Is there any canonicial basis to this? LukeSurl ^{t c} 10:07, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

You are correct. JRR Tolkien clearly intended Harad to be more or less analogous with Africa, albeit an Africa from a far earlier period of human history, and with different geography, etc. The Haradrim were diverse, coming from different tribes and areas, but were also very clearly meant to be black. I have no doubt that Peter Jackson chose to ignore Tolkien's description and give the Haradrim a vaguely "Persian" or Arabian look because of the perceived racial connotations of portraying blacks as allied with Sauron, fighting the white armies of the West. Just as many on the left like to condemn Tolkien's work as racist, you can imagine the fallout from such a treatment in the films.

This is a fairly good article, but I suspect some of the detail is lifted from various RPGs, etc. I have read almost everything JRR Tolkien or Christopher Tolkien has written, and I recall nothing about Numenorean "enslavement" of the Haradrim, etc. The Numenoreans dominated Middle-earth and made the tribes of Harad nearest to their settlements into tributary peoples-- acknowledging their political domination of these regions, but still free folk governing their own affairs. The description here goes quite a bit too far, and seems written to generate "sympathy" for the Haradrim as oppressed by Numenor. While that is true to some extent, it also ignored the descriptions of the Harad tribes as very war-like and aggressive folk apart from any grievance against the equally aggressive Numenoreans.

Tolkien's treatment of the Haradrim varies. He describes them as "cruel" in some sections-- fierce warriors like the Huns whose way of life was based on hardcore violence and subjegation of weaker peoples; and also as having come wholly under Sauron's sway, worshipping him, in effect, as a god, or worshipping Melkor perhaps at Sauron's bidding.

On the other hand, Sam's epiphany when he sees the Harad warrior dead points to a more nuanced picture-- ultimately, they were just men, neither inherently good or bad, with free will to choose their course in life, and the motivations of whom were probably many and varied.

Free will is very important in Tolkien's book, and I think the vignette with Sam was meant to show that the Haradrim were not like the orcs-- incapable of exercising free will, and in effect, an evil race-- but Men like any other group of Men, deserving of mercy or understanding when and if appropriate, and not irredeemable in any way.214.13.130.104 (talk) 08:43, 7 February 2010 (UTC)Vainamoinen

the Haradrim were not like the orcs-- incapable of exercising free will, and in effect, an evil race-- 214.13.130.104 (talk) 08:43, 7 February 2010 (UTC)Vainamoinen

Tolkien's orcs have free will.

During the in-fight at Cirith Ungol and the dispute at Fangorn, they clearly show they got free will, they're just dreadfully afraid of Sauron's power and thus obey him.

about the suppoused "african/black link" to the Harradrim: Most likely you've got this idea from the film adaption or some of it's games, were they resembles africans quite allot.

They're were more or less based on Ancient Carthage.

Interesting, in Return of the Kings, it says they wear copper/bronze armor with scarlet coloured tunics, not gold, atleast in the two versions ive read.

Tolkien's Ring is a very interesting book,,which explains were Tolkien probably found all inspiration from. --109.58.105.191 (talk) 03:00, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

The question of free will and moral agency is at the heart of Tolkien's work, and there's a debate among scholars as to whether the orcs are presented as evil-- moral agents exercising free will, and who choose to do evil, regardless of the reasons why; or are incapable of being evil in as much as their wills are dominated by Sauron (or Melkor), though obviously to a lesser extent than the Nazgul. Tolkien seems to suggest different answers to this question at different times. Scholars like Shippey would agree with the example mentioned in the comment above with the scene of Sam and the dead man from Harad suggesting an element of choice and agency never attributed to orcs. On the other hand, Tolkien specifically addressed this in a letter and suggested that the orcs were not necessarily beyond redemption, although no example existed of an orc achieving "salvation" in the way Boromir did (or that Gollum came close to).

Tolkien also discusses Middle-earth's geography in his letters and states that the Harad is roughly analogous to Africa; and I agree with the poster above, every description of the Haradrim suggests they were black/swarthy/dark-skinned, and intended to represent the likely inhabitants of an Africa-like region; although not a tribal Africa, but an imperial northern Africa of ancient times. Ptolomeic city-states, Carthage, Byzantium's African vassals, etc., were the likely rough analogs. BTW, you do know that Carthage was in Africa, right? 219.101.196.2 (talk) 02:15, 29 December 2012 (UTC)TexxasFinn

Portrayal in films

I think that the Haradrim are portrayed the way they are in the films to avoid racism.

Anonymous173.74.57.205 (talk) 02:25, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

"He wondered ... if he [the Southron] would not really rather have stayed there in peace"

The above quotation [TT 4:IV:269] throws some doubt on the article's generalizations that the Haradrim were "warlike" etc. Cheers 111.220.226.167 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 08:10, 15 August 2016 (UTC)

Merge Umbar here

Umbar is not an important city in Tolkien's legendarium. It is mentioned in Lord of the Rings, but there are no scenes there. Most information seems to come from Appendix A. The article on Umbar is mostly original research. I propose that Umbar be merged here.--Jack Upland (talk) 07:39, 28 December 2019 (UTC)

• Merge Umbar is not enough of a place of setting to justify having an article on it.John Pack Lambert (talk) 13:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
• Support merger, but I'd go further. We need a small number of properly-cited articles using reliable secondary sources (i.e. not Tolkien) on the major themes. I suspect Harad (let alone Umbar) can only survive by virtue of the literary sources that discuss Tolkien's racism, i.e. the Haradrim are black and inclined to evil. The article might properly be entitled Racism in Tolkien's legendarium or some such, and it would be a very different article to the in-universe material that it is composed of today. I suggest we merge both Umbar and Harad to Man (Middle-earth). I'm having enough trouble citing that half-decently; Harad is almost purely cited to Tolkien, which isn't sustainable given the current pace of deletions. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:47, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, Chiswick Chap, what are you proposing to merge to?--Jack Upland (talk) 21:05, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

Ah, sorry, something went wrong with a copy operation. I don't think Harad is remotely defensible; one solution would be to redirect to Man (Middle-earth) where the Haradrim are cited as one of the "evil" races of Men. Another option might be to point to a list of places in Middle-earth but all there seems to be is Realms of Arda which doesn't seem suitable as it's a bare list with no descriptions. Of course it could be enhanced and cited. Chiswick Chap (talk) 23:34, 9 January 2020 (UTC)

I think that's more an argument for deletion.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:55, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Not really, no; there is good reason for both Umbar and Harad to point to Man (Middle-earth), where the Corsairs of Umbar and the Haradrim are discussed and cited. It is right and proper for readers looking for Umbar to land somewhere decent, which means a discussion as specific as possible and where the term is described and cited. What is not right is for readers to be ignored (term not covered at all) or ditched onto a general article that doesn't help them. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:08, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree readers shouldn't be ignored. Merging Umbar here would be OK. I'm not suggesting that Umbar be directed to a Wikipedia wasteland. That's pointless.--Jack Upland (talk) 10:22, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

The underlying issue is what shape the whole coverage of the JRRT legendarium should be in once the current spate of deletions has run to completion. It seems to me that there should be a few good solid articles on the main characters, the main races, the main countries or regions (The Shire, etc), and a few well-cited list articles (like Man (Middle-earth)) covering rather more of the characters, places, and events in the legendarium. Then there should be quite a large number of redirects pointing to all the items named in those articles. I suspect that will require some reorganisation of the articles and the templates, and possibly the creation of some list articles. It will also require much more disciplined use of reliable 3rd-party sources than the legendarium has seen up to now. Even major characters (like Bilbo Baggins) whose notability is not in question have absurdly in-universe articles at the moment, and they're absurdly poorly cited given the richness of the literature about them. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:52, 10 January 2020 (UTC)

Chiswick Chap, do you support a merger of Umbar to Harad for the time being?--Jack Upland (talk) 17:07, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

If we can only do things in stages and fix the heap of double-redirects later, then ok but it seems a silly way to sort things to me. Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:20, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Well, Chiswick Chap, it's up to you. You can formally propose the merge you want, and we can put my merge on hold. Otherwise I can do this merge. As there is no opposition.--Jack Upland (talk) 22:19, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

You do it your way, it'll happen anyway, I think. I already said ok. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:48, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

• Merge. Umbar is a city of Harad. Goustien (talk) 04:50, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
• Comment I think we should merge to Harad for now, but I do think Chiswick Chap has the right idea. With the scapping of the Dwarf, Orc, Elf and Hobbit lists upon us, there will probably need to be major reworking of articles on those. The artilce on Men needs major editing, and I am beginning to wonder if we should not make redirects to that article those on the various groups of men.John Pack Lambert (talk) 08:10, 12 January 2020 (UTC)
• Comment I also think racism is too loaded of a term to use here. It is also too easy to inject. I once thought the hill men of Ghan-buri-ghan were akin to the hill people of India. They may be in an odd way, but literary study suggests they relate to folk traditions about semi-wild people from Medieval Europe. In a like way if there is a hisotirc enemy that is connected by the Easterlings and Harradim, it is the Saracens, who by the US census definition as just as white as everyone in Europe. Even if they are phenotypically black US census counts say they are white. There may be a way to see read Tolkien's work so that Illuvatar is God and Sauron is Allah or Muhammad, I don't doubt we could find some source somewhere that has tried, but how truly reliable such a source would be is another question. The attempts to read racialized issues into the Hobbit and LotR always seem to fail because the main enemies are the golbins/orcs and smaug, the Easterlings and Harradim are very minor in the scope of the plot. Hugh Nibley wrote a piece once in which he explored the notions of Tolkien as presenting the age old war between industry and farming. A lot of workers are Geneva Steel factory in Vineyard, Utah rebelled at the fact that the work compared them to orcs. In the total scope an ecological reading of Tolkien is probably going to be easier to run than a racialized one.John Pack Lambert (talk) 08:17, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

@Johnpacklambert, Chiswick Chap, Jack Upland, and Goustien: I don't want it to seem like I'm undercutting the merge discussion here, but I have listed this article at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Umbar (2nd nomination). I see nothing in here really to merge: we've got a plot summary, some adaptations in culture, and an unsourced publishing history section. I can find nothing substantial in secondary sources. Also, reading the first deletion discussion for Umbar (from 2005) made me realize just how far Wikipedia guidelines have come. Hog Farm (talk) 19:31, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Well, the AfD must cause this merger to be closed, we can't have two conflicting processes running. I'll remove the tags now. Chiswick Chap (talk) 22:46, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

"Barangils" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Barangils. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 May 3#Barangils until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Hog Farm (talk) 23:30, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Haradrim, Tolkien, and Race

In response to another editor's concern, I've rewritten the intro to the section on race. The key facts are these: Tolkien has repeatedly been accused of racism by making the bad guys look ugly and slanty-eyed (Orcs) or dark-skinned (Haradrim). (Jackson dressed the Haradrim as Saracens, but chose white-skinned actors...) Tolkien scholars have replied, and it is certainly a reply, that there is proof in Tolkien's letters that he was strongly anti-racist in his attitudes both in peacetime and in war, for example vigorously opposing demonisation of the Nazis, whom he also demonstrably disliked: he said they were human like everybody else, i.e. evil was carried inside everyone, and everyone had to oppose it in themselves. Indeed that can be said to be the core message of The Lord of the Rings, as Fleming Rutledge powerfully argues. I hope this is enough to show that the section needs to begin with a statement about racism, and to follow that with some kind of rebuttal. In British English, which is what all Tolkien articles are written in, "but" is a perfectly neutral connective introducing a caveat, concern, side-issue or (sometimes) a wholesale rebuttal. I can understand that in other varieties of English, the connective has other meanings, but that is no grounds for any sort of edit-warring. Anyway, I've rewritten the intro as I said, without the TLW. Hope this is clear for everybody: there is ample supporting evidence available. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:19, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Mumakil

Hopefully volunteers can gather a proper image of the "Mumakil" (elephant variant).

More about Harad can be subjected to a massive artistic project. 137.59.221.36 (talk) 19:38, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Harad

The color red and the preference for the "Mumakil", the Saracen and Corsair like peoples, the "Xebec" fleets.

Lead the visual art to the people's of the "Indus River Valley", and the people that led the "Islamic invasions of the Indian subcontinent". 137.59.221.36 (talk) 19:43, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Um, I assume you know that Wikipedia depends completely on the scholarly sources (policy: WP:RS) that it uses? We can't just set out to lead readers to things that we think might possibly be related (policy: WP:OR), that doesn't work here. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:46, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Heroic Romance

While I'm aware that Tolkien personally preferred that Lord of the Rings be categorized as a heroic romance, I was under the impression that it is Wikipedia's policy to make these judgments based off of secondary sources and common perception. Wouldn't 'High-fantasy Epic' be more accurate? Or something similar to what is on The Lord of the Rings? Hesitant to just make the change myself based off of GA status and lack of in depth knowledge on the topic. Chaddude (talk) 03:05, 24 February 2022 (UTC)Chaddude14

Well, any such brief label, other than 'book', will be hopelessly inadequate, but since 'high fantasy' has become commonly accepted, let's go with that. All the best, Chiswick Chap (talk) 04:19, 24 February 2022 (UTC)