In a lot of classic adventure tales, specifically in the fantasy genre, there’s a pretty clear line between good and evil. There are the villains that are intent on corruption, or gaining power, or simply taking over the world, and then there are the heroes that fight to save humanity from them. Usually, the line between good guys and bad guys is pretty obvious, and more ambiguously coded characters aren’t as common (though they’ve been gaining popularity recently). It’s often easier for an audience to follow along if there are clear markers of who they’re supposed to root for or against.
The Lord of the Rings, for the most part, follows this structure. There are heroes and there are villains, and there’s not a lot of crossover between the two. Even certain races are subdivided into being either wholly good or bad, and there’s not much of a deviation from that, other than with humans, occasionally. For example, Orcs are evil, but Elves are good, and are really a shining beacon of “goodness” in Middle-earth. But was that always the case? Or were there someElves who fell outside of that definitionof hero?
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Are Elves Always Good In Lord Of The Rings?
While, for the most part, Elves are generally on the right side of history, there are still a few throughout Tolkien’s lore that exhibit less-than-ideal morals. So yes, Elves are capable of evil, in the same way that any other being would be. There are multiple cases of Elves performing evil or villainous acts, but a lot of them are in the First Age. The Elves that are aroundin the time of the Third Age(which is whenThe Lord of the RingsandThe Hobbittake place) are the wisest and strongest of their kind, which is likely why they’re able to avoid a lot of evil temptations, and why no evil Elves are seen duringLOTR.
So yes, while Elves can be capable of evil, it seems that for the most part, they choose not to be. Unlike beings like Orcs, who seem to have a certain amount of evil inherent within them, morality is a choice for Elvesthe same way it is for humansand for many other races in Middle-earth. While there were Elves who caused problems and could be labeled as villainous in Middle-earth’s past, by the timeThe Lord of the Ringscomes around, there aren’t really any evil Elven characters.
Are There Any Evil Elves In Middle Earth?
Of the Elves that arenot remembered well by history, Fëanor, along with his sons, is probably the one with the worst reputation. Fëanor used the essence of the Two Trees of Valinor (which are very important to the Elves) to create gems called the Silmarils, and he and his sons made it known that they would not give the Silmarils to anyone. In fact, anyone - good or evil - who tried to take them would become an enemy of Fëanor’s family, and they would essentially start a war against them to get the gems back.
The Valar tried to persuade Fëanor to give them the Silmarils to keep them away from Morgoth, but he refused. Morgoth then stole the Silmarils, and Fëanor and his sons pursued him to try and take them back, even going as far as to steal ships from the Teleri Elves, killing the ones that got in their way. When they arrived in Middle-earth, they burned the ships, which stranded those who had followed Fëanor’s half-brothers in Middle-earth. Beren and Lúthien had one of the Silmarils at one point, and Fëanor’s sons carried outtwo separate kinslayingsto try and get it back. In general, this whole family clearly landed on the side of immorality, if not outright evil.
There are also a number of other Elves who committed heinous acts. Eol tried to kill his own son, but ended up killing his wife whom he had basically entrapped into marrying him. Maeglin betrayed the Elves and sided with Morgoth, though Morgoth did torture him to get him to that point. Then there’s Celegorm, who plotted to assault Lúthien, and his goal was clearly described as “a design more dark than any that had yet come into his (Morgoth’s) heart since he fled from Valinor”. So, pretty bad. Unlike someone like Maeglin, he wasn’t driven down a dark path by external forces, rather he was making this choice and planning these evil intentions of his own accord. So yes, while there aren’t many, there are still a fewElves in Middle-earthwho did not fall on the side of the good guys.
