Have Dinosaurs Ever Existed in Arda?

Question

If the LotR universe is supposed to be an alternative history of Earth, then are dinosaurs known to exist in this version of history? How do they fit in?

Source for the alternative history part? I haven't heard that. IMO it very clearly isn't. — , Jun 08 '16 at 10:44
@RikerW it's common knowledge though? in-universe, LotR is supposed to be world history. The modern day is, what, the Sixth or Seventh Age? — thegreatjedi, Jun 08 '16 at 11:16
Re Tolkien-history being our history, there are some things in the letters that could be interpreted either way. As for dinosaurs, I don't think they were ever mentioned but you could hand-wave and say they happened during the Spring of Arda. — Spencer, Jun 08 '16 at 11:39
“If the LotR universe is supposed to be an alternative history of Earth” — myth != alternative history. Saint George is “supposed” to have slain a dragon at some point in England’s past, but that doesn’t make his story an alternative history of England either. I think it’s like Star Wars: “A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...” is intended to mean “Don’t worry about how this relates to real life”, but ironically makes people like us, its target audience, go “Wait, when and where exactly?!?” — Paul D. Waite, Jun 08 '16 at 12:25
@RikerW: as per @Turambar’s links, I found this answer a useful discussion of the “Middle-Earth is our earth” idea. — Paul D. Waite, Jun 08 '16 at 12:31
@Paul D. Waite Late to the party, but probably worth pointing out that Tolkien's works aren't myths. They're written in the style of myths, and they borrow narratives from mythology - but they lack their own tradition, as well as actual belief aspects necessary for fiction to be mythology. They're fictional works concerning a fictional Earth history, completed by one person with the full knowledge that the stories did not actual happen, and they are not intended to be believed. They can absolutely be described as "alternative history of Earth." — Misha R, Oct 04 '21 at 12:36
@Spencer, it makes me think the dinosaurs perished with the great Lamps of Arda. It seems consistent with them all dying at once. — Michael Foster, Oct 10 '23 at 13:15

score 14 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 08 '16 at 20:41

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Letter 211:

I did not intend the steed of the Witch-King to be what is now called a 'pterodactyl', and often is drawn (with rather less shadowy evidence than lies behind many monsters of the new and fascinating semi-scientific mythology of the 'Prehistoric'). But obviously it is pterodactylic and owes much to the new mythology, and its description even provides a sort of way in which it could be a last survivor of older geological eras.

answered Jun 08 '16 at 20:41

VictimOfCircumstance

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In my head-canon, the fell beasts are Quetzalcoatlus, or something similar. Related Worldbuilding question: Could a large bird be used as transportation? – Molag Bal Jun 08 '16 at 20:45
There were also other, unspecified monsters of the ancient world, bred by Morgoth. Some of them could have been dinosaurs. – Molag Bal Jun 08 '16 at 21:05
Is Tolkien saying he doesn't believe that Dinosaurs existed? – RedCaio Jun 08 '16 at 21:57
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@RedCaio perhaps, but also perhaps he's astute enough to separate the evidence we actually had from artistic impressions of Stegs and TRex fighting while a Pterosaur flies overhead and cavemen ride Brontosaurs. – OrangeDog Jun 09 '16 at 17:52
Funny how Tolkien seems to refer to "science" as "the new mythology"; I read and loved all Tolkien works since, well, forever, but sometimes his luddite views are a bit annoying – Sekhemty Sep 13 '17 at 10:11
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Could be, but it sounds as if it could equally be referring to how they "often are drawn", often based on incomplete skeletons and guesswork, and the public (mis-)understanding of dinosaurs based on that, partly right and partly not, that provides the raw material for science fiction from then on. Tolkien was a myth specialist and more interested in how myths evolve than how reptiles evolve. (Velociraptors were quite small and had feathers; but the Jurassic Park ones are probably here to stay now.) – A. B. Oct 04 '21 at 11:33
When was Letter 211 written? – Spencer Oct 04 '21 at 12:49

score 8 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 04 '21 at 07:53

In The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien suggests that the Nazgûl's mounts may have been "creatures of an older world".

The great shadow descended like a falling cloud. And behold! it was a winged creature: if bird, then greater than all other birds, and it was naked, and neither quill nor feather did it bear, and its vast pinions were as webs of hide between horned fingers; and it stank. A creature of an older world maybe it was, whose kind, fingering in forgotten mountains cold beneath the Moon, outstayed their day, and in hideous eyrie bred this last untimely brood, apt to evil. And the Dark Lord took it, and nursed it with fell meats, until it grew beyond the measure of all other things that fly; and he gave it to his servant to be his steed. Down, down it came, and then, folding its fingered webs, it gave a croaking cry, and settled upon the body of Snowmane, digging in its claws, stooping its long naked neck.
_{The Lord of the Rings - Book V, Chapter 6 - "The Battle of the Pelennor Fields"}

A few years later, in a letter to a reader, Tolkien referred to this passage, and said that while he did not intend for this creature to be a pterodactyl, he felt this passage did imply as such.

Yes and no. I did not intend the steed of the Witch-king to be what is now called a ‘pterodactyl’, and often is drawn (with rather less shadowy evidence than lies behind many monsters of the new and fascinating semi-scientific mythology of the ‘Prehistoric’). But obviously it is pterodactylic and owes much to the new mythology, and its description even provides a sort of way in which it could be a last survivor of older geological eras.
_{October 1958 Letter to Rhona Beare (Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien #282)}

This is not the only time that Tolkien makes allusion to extinct animals.

For all living things that are or have been in the Kingdom of Arda, save only the fell and evil creatures of Melkor, lived then in the land of Aman; and there also were many other creatures that have not been seen upon Middle-earth, and perhaps never now shall be, since the fashion of the world was changed.
_{The Silmarillion - Chapter 5 - "Of Eldamar and the Princes of the Eldalië"}

Have Dinosaurs Ever Existed in Arda?

2 Answers2