Luhansk regional governor Serhiy Gaidai claimed on April 19 that Kreminna, a city in eastern Ukraine, was under the control of “orcs”. The word, used by Ukrainians to refer to Russian soldiers, has been in the news since the start of the war on February 24.
The phrase came from the work of the English writer JRR Tolkien (1892-1973), written between 1937 and 1949, and is borrowed from Anglo-Saxon. means “monster”.
The fantastical stories, especially in “The Lord of the Rings,” take place in imaginary time and space, but are inspired by real life and evoke the moments Tolkien lived through during the First World War.
According to Tolkien, a mythological Europe, the Third Age of Middle-earth, inhabited by humans and other races, including elves, dwarves, hobbits, and orcs.
Orcs are the most common villains in the author’s mythology, a race of obedient creatures created by Melkor, a fictional character in the saga. They are part of a previously existing but corrupted way of life.
These creatures, portrayed as unhappy creatures, are beings they serve only out of fear, hating everyone, including themselves and their masters.
Hence the comparison with the Russians made by the Ukrainians.
In “The Hobbit” Tolkien states that orcs are always hungry and therefore eat all kinds of meat, including men and horses.
In “The Lord of the Rings – The Two Towers” (film), the orcs who capture Merry and Pippin debate whether to eat the hobbits.
Unlike elves, who have an ancestral chain, orcs don’t usually do nice things – they can only create tools to injure and destroy their tormentors.
While they are not inherently evil, they are culturally and mentally prone to darkness and evil.
Orcs also appear in “The Hobbit,” a prequel to “Lord of the Rings,” and “Silmarillion,” one of the last books published after Tolkien’s death.
Origin and types of orcs
Orcs would be made of stone and slime and animated by spells from a character named Morgoth.
According to the author, there were three types of races:
- Orcs, fearful of the sun, living in caves, are organized into tribes and tend to attack humans.
- the larger and more powerful Uruk-hai;
- Half-Orcs, a beast that is considered abominable and mixed between humans and orcs, though less in number, are just as cunning and deadly as the others.
Physically, they were described as humanoid creatures that were ugly and generally smaller than humans.
Meanwhile, many of them resemble monkeys with their long arms and bent backs and legs. According to the author, they carry black and sour blood in their bodies as they descend from resurrected bodies.
Tolkien describes them in one of his letters:[…] Chunky, broad, straight noses, pale skin and slanted eyes (or they were) […]”.
In the film adaptations of “The Lord of the Rings,” Peter Jackson mentions the equivalent traits associated with common orcs.
Although Tolkien does not elaborate on the culture and customs of the orcs, they are known to heal wounds and have very effective armor, although inferior to those of elves and dwarves. Besides wielding poisoned arrows and knives, they could sing strange songs and construct torture machines.
Orcs did not have a language of their own, but hid words from several other languages.
However, each tribe developed different dialects among themselves and used the general language Westron if necessary. Some words come from the Black Tongue of Mordor, which was widely used with Sauron’s resurgence in the Third Age.
source: Noticias
