Beorning questions...

only the woodmen remained. With the dragons coming out of the north and the Balchoth holding the south, the northmen of the Vales of Anduin were hard pressed to find a safe place to live. They must have entered into a lengthy period of decline at this time, and it would not be until the 30th century when they would begin to recover their lost lands. The Orcs began colonizing the Misty Mountains in the late 25th century, and they were a significant menace until the War of the Dwarves and Orcs (2793-99). Somewhere in all these years and wars the Beornings must have branched off from the other northmen. It is conceivable they were descended from both the remaining Eotheod and woodmen who had drifted northward before the dragons began to trouble the lands. Beorn's horses and ponies are not just remarkable (assuming Bilbo's tale was only somewhat embellished for the sake of telling it), he bears a great love for them which foreshadows the Rohirrim's devotion to their horses. It is therefore conceivable that the Beornings maintained a tradition of horseback riding. Just as the Rohirrim lived in the Ered Nimrais and pastured their herds and flocks in the wide grasslands of Calenardhon, so, too, may the Beornings have dwelt in the mountains and pastured their horses in the lowlands. Hence, it follows that if Beorn wished to return to the mountains, he may have been driven from them by the Orcs, and his people in general may have been destroyed or driven forth by the Orcs. A past war with the Orcs would explain the fewness of the Beornings when Bilbo and Gandalf visited them, but the huge losses suffered by the Orcs of the Misty Mountains in the Battle of Five Armies would have given the men of the Vales of Anduin a well-needed respite. Beorn could therefore have recruited new followers from among the woodmen migrating northward to swell the numbers of his own people, and since Gloin told Frodo that the Beornings kept the High Pass open at the time of the War of the Ring, the Beornings appear to have become strong enough to have returned to the mountains. The Beornings' culture may thus resemble that of the Rohirrim but in some ways would be similar to that of the woodmen. For the woodmen, however, we have no direct evidence concernig their lifestyles and customs. But Tolkien did describe another

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