Galadriel’s Entire Backstory Explained

galandrial is among the most powerful and mysterious characters in the lord of the rings and her long history stretches back to the earliest days of middle-earth itself from her blessed beginning serve final journey here is galadriel's entire backstory explained galadriel's life began back in the earliest recorded days of elven history when the elves first awake in middle-earth they're initially led by the god-like beings known as the valar who lived far across the sea in a westernly realm known as valiner the elves first come to valiner to help protect them from the dark lord morgoth a fallen vala who's hell bent on wiping out both the elves and pretty much the rest of creation too in fact one of the origin stories for the orcs suggests that morgoth caught some of these young elves before they migrated west torturing them half to death and slowly turning them into the first generation of works do you know how the orcs first came into being they were elves once over time many of the elves that aren't captured or killed make their way across middle earth until they arrive at their new home and it's here roughly three thousand years later that galadriel is born for the record that makes the lady of lorien over 8 000 years old when the events of the lord of the rings takes place in her youth galadriel maintains a stellar reputation in the heavenly kingdom she's born into royalty and is both an impressive lore loremaster and a gifted athlete according to tolkien's unfinished tales she's said to be the tallest of all the women of the eldar and is recorded to be around six foot four inches in height while her beauty is brought up on multiple occasions however it's her hair that is most frequently mentioned in the silmarillion it stated that her hair was lit with gold as though it had caught in a mesh the radiance of loralyn loreland as it happens was one of the two magic trees that lit valiner before the sun and moon were created in his book unfinished tales tolkien even suggests that galadriel's hair is like the light of both trees mixed together and that it inspires the great elven craftsman feyenoor to create the silmarils the titular jewels of the silmarillion the silmarils eventually attract the attention of morgoth who had previously destroyed the two trees and sets himself on stealing the jewels sparking a devastating war with the elves in the process galadriel's royal pedigree makes it difficult for the elven princess to avoid the limelight and eventually her lofty position drags her into one of the most infamous events in middle earth's early history when morgoth destroys the two trees and steals the silence it sparks a rebellion in veliner feeling betrayed by the valar guardians a large faction of elves decide to reject their protection in velanor opting to take things into their own hands instead by chasing the enemy back to middle earth where he's fled with their priceless gems one group of these elves seizes a fleet of ships by killing their elven guard and sail back across the sea to the western shores of middle-earth the larger host with galadriel in their midst doesn't participate in this battle but they're nonetheless unsettled by the coming of morgot and feel a powerful calling to return to the lands that they came from so they too decide to leave valiner with no ships left behind by feyenoord's elves however they're forced to travel northwards across a stretch of land known as the hell caraxe the hell caraca is where baliner and middle earth come closest together in the silmarillion tolkien describes the hal karaxia as a place filled with vast fogs and mists of deathly cold and the sea streams are filled with clashing hills of ice and the grinding of ice deep sunken needless to say many elves perish in the crossing but the survivors do eventually reach the shores of middle earth once galadriel arrives back in middle earth she spends the next several hundred years lying low by this point the first stage of middle earth has begun and the land is ravaged by war as the elves and their allies are slowly ground down by morgoth and his armies eventually after 500 years of conflict the valar themselves arrived to take on morgoth and cast the dark lord into the void of space notably during this time gladreal visits the elephant kingdom of doriath and it's here that she meets an elven prince named keleborn the two fall in love and eventually marry soon galadriel and kelliborn pack up and head further eastwards leaving all the politics behind in search of a peaceful existence deeper within the continent when the first age ends with the defeat of morgoth many of the exiled elves returned to baliner some of them however head further east where they find galadriel and kelleborn already settled down at this point middle earth has entered the second age still over six thousand years from the lord of the rings in the hobbit which take place at the end of the third age with the world changed immeasurably since the dark days of morgoth galatrial and caliburn begin to dabble with the idea of taking on legitimate political leadership just what happened next is kind of up in the air however partly because tolkien mentions contradictory details in each version of the story that he wrote what is known is that during this time galadriel and kelleborne lead two separate elven communities in northwestern middle earth roughly 750 years into the second age they move on and heads southeast into aragian an area ruled by a distant cousin of collaterals named kelebrimbor this is the same region where the fellowship of the ring is later tracked by birds and finds the doors of moria from there galadriel eventually makes a trip with her daughter calebrian through the dwarven mines and pays her first visit to the elms that live in lothlorien kelleborn who isn't all that fond of dwarves remains behind for the time being by this point a new foe has set himself up in middle earth morgoth's chief necromancer and second in command sauron you probably know what happens next in disguise sauron visits the elven kingdoms of middle-earth charming them with his knowledge and teaching them how to forge rings of power and in the darkness after keller brimbour forges the three elven rings one is given to gladreal but when sauron creates his master ring he's unable to use it to control the elves because he didn't physically have a hand in their creation realizing what has happened the elves take off their rings and decide to keep them hidden from the new dark lord when sauron forges the one ring and reveals his true identity to middle earth it begins the war of the elves and sauron which ends roughly 300 years after galadriel first arrived in lothlorien after the war wraps up she leaves lorien and heads back east to find kelleborn eventually the two meet again in rivendell and decide to wander middle-earth during this period they spend a good amount of time in rivendell itself as well as the area that eventually becomes western gondor a lot happens in middle earth over the next few thousand years to say the least but it doesn't seem like galadriel or caliborn have much impact on these events in fact it's not until the third age that everything changes for the couple in the 1981st year of this era long after sauron's defeat at the hands of the lost alliance the king of lothlorien dies caliborn and galadriel then return to the woodland kingdom where they officially become the lord and lady of the golotham tolkien goes to great pains on multiple occasions to point out that kelliborn and galadriel aren't the straight-up rulers of lorien but there's no doubt that at this point they're the top dogs in the golden wood after she takes up leadership of lothlorien with her husband galadriel spends the next few centuries using her knowledge and her ring to help the land blossom preparing it for the inevitable conflict she knows is coming then 2463 years into the third age galadriel calls the white council for the first time this was a group of wise leaders in middle earth that included among others saruman elrond and gandalf initially glad trail attempts to make gandalf the head of this council of the wise but the wizard turns down the honor and saruman ends up getting the nod instead by now the white wizard is already starting to turn away from the light and he intentionally steers the council in the wrong direction on more than one occasion nevertheless over the next five centuries the white council gets to work they identify the necromancer in murkwood as sauron keep tabs on his ever-growing power and eventually take action and drive him out of his fortress of dol guldur beware the necromancer he is not what he seems [Music] throughout all this drama galadriel remains intimately connected to the activities of the council frequently participating in its sessions and standing shoulder to shoulder with wizards and warriors alike as they rally together to take on the greatest threat to middle-earth since the fall of morgoth for tolkien movie fans this will all begin to seem like more familiar territory having being revealed to the world by the white council sauron retreats to mordor galadriel meanwhile prepares lorien for war she plays her first critical role in the war of the ring when she is visited by the fellowship of the ring after they escape from the mines of moria after she harbors the fellowship galadriel gives them a number of important gifts and sends them on their way she also welcomes a newly resurrected gandalf who's recovering from his epic mountaintop battle with the balrog galadriel plays a crucial role in helping gandalf to remember who he was bringing him up to speed and equipping him with the knowledge he needs for the rest of the war even after these two important events galadriel's role in the war continues in the books she sends a cryptic message to aragorn warning him that he must take the paths of the dead to help defeat sauron's forces in gondor in addition lothlorien is attacked by orcs three times during the war but galadriel her ring and her elven armies repel all three attacks after this galadriel and kelliborn lead their warriors into merkwood where they capture dol guldor and the lady of the wood uses her ring to utterly destroy its walls and cleanse the forest for good at the end of the war of the ring galadriel finally grows weary of the mortal lands of middle earth she attends arwen's wedding to aragorn and then a couple of years later decides to finally take a ship back to valiner joining elrond gandalf frodo and bilbo galadriel boards a ship and sails into the west kelleborn however is unwilling to leave quite yet and temporarily relocates to rivendell where elrond's two sons still live it's even said that mario doc brandy buck traveled to the fading elvish stronghold to speak with kelleborne and ask for his help in compiling the history of the wars of middle earth eventually though the longing for both the west and his wife went out and caliborne joins galadriel in their new home across the sea while recorded life ends on this bittersweet note there's one more part of her story that's worth mentioning gimli the dwarf is famous for his admiration of galadriel to the point he even asks for a strand of her hair to remember her by i asked her for one hair from her golden head [Music] she gave me three interestingly tolkien also says that galadriel manages to get permission from the valar for gimli to join her in retirement in valiner itself making him the only dwarf to ever set foot on the shores of the undying lands this benevolent act is a fitting final footnote for the illustrious story of the most famous woman in middle earth's entire history check out one of our newest videos right here plus even more looper videos about your favorite movies are coming soon subscribe to our youtube channel and hit the bell so you don't miss a single one you

Channel: Looper

Views: 348,982

Rating: 4.904418 out of 5

Keywords: looper, looper movies, lord of the rings, lotr, galadriel, galadriel lore, galadriel story, galadriel bio, lord of the rings elf, lord of the rings elves, elf, elves, eldar, tolkein, jrr tolkein, middle earth, lady of lorien, lady of galadhrim, lady of the wood, lady of light, elrond, glorfindel, celeborn, cirdan, legolas, arwen, haldir, figwit, the fellowship of the ring, the two towers, the return of the king, an unexpected journey, the desolation of smaug, the battle of the five armies

Id: PXUkrN_hIxA

Length: 11min 58sec (718 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 24 2020