I am happy to post this interview what is binary option with author Benita J. Prins, fellow lover of all things Tolkien and a great writer in her own right too! I read her fantasy, Sea of Crystal, Sea of Glass recently and recommend … Continue reading
When Thorin Oakenshield and his company arrive at Bilbo Baggins’s door, their names carry an atmosphere older than the adventure itself. Fili, Kili, Dori, Nori, Ori, Oin, Gloin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Balin, and Dwalin sound like a compact piece of northern legend. Their music is deliberate: Tolkien wanted his dwarves to belong to a remembered heroic world, even when they were eating Bilbo’s food and asking for coffee.
The source behind this naming pattern is primarily Norse mythology, especially the catalogue of dwarves in the Völuspá, a poem preserved in the Poetic Edda. Tolkien drew names from that medieval list, reshaped their spelling, and placed them inside a new history of Middle-earth. The result is more than an elegant literary reference. It connects The Hobbit with the traditions of Old Norse poetry, heroic exile, treasure, dragons, and the deep underground imagination that would become central to Tolkien’s legendarium.
The names also show how Tolkien transformed inherited material. He did not simply copy a mythological roster. He gave familiar Norse forms new personalities, relationships, genealogies, and emotional weight. A reader who recognizes the pattern can hear one layer of the book; a reader who does not can still enjoy the comic company. Both experiences are part of the design.
In the Völuspá, a prophetic poem describing the history and fate of the cosmos, the speaker recalls the creation of dwarves. The passage includes a long sequence of names, often called the Dvergatal, or “catalogue of dwarves.” This list is not a narrative about a single band of companions. It is a concentrated display of names associated with the subterranean, craftsman-like beings of Norse myth.
Several names in Tolkien’s company appear in recognizable forms. Dvalinn becomes Dwalin, Bifurr becomes Bifur, Báfurr becomes Bofur, Bomburr becomes Bombur, and Nori, Ori, and Óinn remain close to their Old Norse counterparts. Fíli and Kíli also come from the catalogue. Thorin’s name is related to Þorinn, while the name Gandalf derives from Gandálfr, another figure in the same mythological naming tradition.
The spelling changes matter because Tolkien was writing for an English-speaking audience. His forms preserve an old northern flavor without requiring readers to navigate every feature of Old Norse orthography. The names look strange enough to suggest a remote culture, yet they remain pronounceable and memorable within an English children’s fantasy novel.
The most striking transformation is structural. In the Völuspá, the names are arranged as part of a mythic enumeration. In The Hobbit, they become a social group with different ages, temperaments, and comic functions. Tolkien turns a list into a chorus of voices. The source gives him the sound of a dwarven people; the story gives each name a place in an unfolding adventure.
The company’s names frequently arrive in pairs or clusters. Fili and Kili are young and closely connected, while Dori, Nori, and Ori are brothers. Oin and Gloin are brothers as well. Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur form another related group. This arrangement gives the company a sense of inherited community rather than presenting twelve unrelated fantasy characters.
Even when the characters receive limited individual development, their names help the reader keep hold of the group. The repeated endings and related sounds suggest kinship. They also reinforce Tolkien’s interest in genealogies, family memory, and the survival of old peoples. The company is on a quest, but it feels like a fragment of a much larger culture.
Tolkien’s adaptations are not always exact one-to-one translations from Norse myth. Dwalin is close to Dvalinn, and the relationship between Balin and a specific Norse source is less direct than the connection between Dwalin and Dvalinn. Some names may have been selected for sound, rhythm, or resemblance to the pattern Tolkien had established, rather than because a particular mythological identity was being carried over.
Thorin is a significant example. The Old Norse name Þorinn can be associated with the verb “to dare” or “to venture,” while Thorin’s personality and royal position are shaped by Tolkien’s own narrative. His full epithet, Oakenshield, is not an Old Norse name borrowed from the Dvergatal. It belongs to Tolkien’s invented history and recalls the battlefield moment when Thorin uses an oak branch as a shield.
Gandalf is similarly transformed. In Norse tradition, Gandálfr is one name in a catalogue of dwarves, though the name’s meaning has been interpreted in connection with a magical or wand-bearing being. Tolkien gives Gandalf an entirely different role: a wandering wizard, a guide, and eventually a central power in the struggle against Sauron. The borrowed name retains an archaic resonance while acquiring a new identity.
| Name In The Hobbit | Related Old Norse Form | Role Or Association In Tolkien |
|---|---|---|
| Dwalin | Dvalinn | An elder member of Thorin’s company |
| Bifur | Bifurr | One of the three companions grouped with Bofur and Bombur |
| Bofur | Báfurr | A cheerful, practical member of the company |
| Bombur | Bomburr | The heavy, sleepy, comic figure of the expedition |
| Nori | Nori | Brother of Dori and Ori |
| Ori | Ori | A younger dwarf associated with writing and records |
| Oin | Óinn | Brother of Gloin and a capable traveler |
| Gloin | Related to Glói | Father of Gimli in The Lord of the Rings |
| Fili and Kili | Fíli and Kíli | Thorin’s nephews and heirs within the company |
| Thorin | Þorinn | Exiled king and claimant to Erebor |
| Gandalf | Gandálfr | Wizard and instigator of the quest |
| Durin | Durinn | An ancestral name central to dwarf history |
Durin does not belong to the company that first enters Bag End, yet his name is essential to understanding Tolkien’s use of Norse material. In the Völuspá, Durin is among the named dwarves. In Tolkien’s mythology, Durin is the first and greatest of the Longbeards, remembered as Durin the Deathless. His line establishes the historical depth behind Thorin’s claim to the Lonely Mountain.
This is where Norse influence becomes part of Tolkien’s invented past rather than a surface decoration. Tolkien borrows the sound of Durin’s name, then builds around it a system of reincarnation, royal descent, lost kingdoms, and ancestral memory. The dwarf kingdom of Khazad-dûm, the halls of Erebor, and the people of Durin all become connected through a history that stretches beyond the events of The Hobbit.
Thorin’s name therefore works on several levels. It identifies a character, evokes the Norse catalogue, and participates in the grandeur of a royal house. His title “Oakenshield” adds a different kind of heroic language: a personal epithet earned through action. Tolkien combines the inherited name with a newly made surname, allowing Thorin to feel both ancient and specifically his own.
The influence of Old Norse literature extends beyond the names. The Hobbit includes themes that belong comfortably beside northern heroic tradition: a lost inheritance, a guarded hoard, a dragon, a dangerous journey, a proud king, and the moral peril of gold. Tolkien’s dwarves are not identical to the dwarves of the Eddas, but they inhabit a related imaginative landscape of mines, metalwork, treasure, and old grievances.
Their songs intensify that connection. “Far over the misty mountains cold” sounds like a ballad from a vanished northern world. Its mountains, halls, swords, and ancestral homeland make the quest feel like the recovery of a broken saga. Tolkien’s verse often acts as cultural memory within the story. The dwarves sing because their history has survived in words, and the reader hears that history before fully understanding it.
At the same time, Tolkien complicates the heroic image with humor. The dwarves are dignified heirs to Erebor, but they are also hungry guests who create chaos in Bilbo’s home. Bombur’s physical comedy, the company’s appetite, and their quarrels keep the mythic register from becoming solemn all the time. This mixture is one of Tolkien’s most effective techniques: ancient legend and domestic comedy occupy the same scene.
A name in Tolkien often functions like a small signpost. It can indicate linguistic ancestry, family membership, historical status, or a connection to a story outside the immediate action. The dwarven names in The Hobbit point backward toward Norse myth while also pointing forward toward The Lord of the Rings, where Gimli becomes the most fully developed representative of dwarf culture.
Gloin’s appearance in both books makes this continuity especially clear. In The Hobbit, he is one member of a crowded company. In The Lord of the Rings, he is Gimli’s father and a participant in the Council of Elrond. The name that once seemed like part of a comic list becomes part of a multigenerational narrative. Tolkien’s naming choices help make Middle-earth feel inhabited before and after any single adventure.
The names can also be read alongside Tolkien’s invented languages. Dwarves traditionally keep their own language, Khuzdul, private from outsiders, while many of the names used in the narrative are forms understandable to other peoples. That distinction contributes to the sense that the company is being presented through an external historical record. What readers see is a translated or adapted surface, not the whole of dwarven identity.
The most rewarding approach is to hear the names before trying to explain them. Their repeated sounds, old-fashioned shapes, and clusters of related syllables create an impression of a people with roots deeper than the page. Research then reveals the Norse pattern, but the imaginative effect comes first.
Tolkien’s achievement lies in making scholarship serve storytelling. A reader does not need to know Völuspá to feel that Dwalin, Balin, Fili, Kili, and Thorin belong to an older order of things. Knowing the source enriches that feeling without replacing it. The names remain alive because they have been given bodies, voices, flaws, loyalties, and a road through Middle-earth.
Return to The Hobbit with the Norse catalogue in mind, and the opening chapters become a meeting point between medieval myth and modern fantasy. The dwarves at Bilbo’s table are Tolkien’s inventions, yet their names arrive carrying echoes from a much older northern song. Follow those echoes through the novel, the wider legendarium, and the writers Tolkien influenced.
An essay I wrote about the desire of Tolkien and the TCBS to be a light to their darkening world. A century later, he still provides light. Thank you, Professor and God trade binary option bless! Art by Justin Gerard … Continue reading