Reply To: The Taproom

I don’t know what got me started on a yen for collecting Balrogs. Probably just the sheer variety, which i think is entirely justified in Tolkien’s universe.

Early ideas of the Moria Balrog made him more mannish, and “no more than man high” (HOME vol 7 pg 197) So there we have the little guys.

Then there is the description of “sudden host of Balrogs” (HOME vol 10, pg 75) so there we have license for many. On page 80 of the same book, there is mentioned “about three balrogs, no more than seven” which contrasts the earlier ideas of multitudes. However this concludes with Melkor having created “Many other monsters of divers shapes and kinds that long troubled the world.”

So sifting through all of that, I envision seven “greater” balrogs, including the chief baddy, Gothmog. These would be the larger Mithril and GW types. Than there could be a host of “lesser” balrogs, which I could easily envision being involved in the sack of Gondolin and other such tragedies. Good fun!