ThE BluE WiZaRDs

In the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, the Blue Wizards (or the Ithryn Luin in Sindarin) are two mysterious Maiar of the Vala Oromë sent to the East who are commonly called Alatar and Pallando. They are only hinted at in The Lord of the Rings, where Saruman states that there are five Wizards. However, other writings of Tolkien have more to say. In a writing found in Unfinished Tales of 1954 (p. 393), Tolkien writes:


Manwë summoned the Valar for a council [ Maybe he had asked Eru for counsel ] at which it was resolved to send out three emissaries to Middle-Earth and he asked who would go. They would have to lose might and clothe themselves in flesh to win the trust of Elves and Men but this would also imperil them, diminish their wisdom and knowledge and bring upon them fear, the care and weariness of the flesh. Only two came forward; Curumo [ Saruman ] and Alatar. Curumo was chosen by Aulë among "his" Maiar and Alatar was send by Oromë. Manwë asked where Olórin [ Gandalf ] was and Olórin just returned from a journey and coming to the meeting asked what he wanted from him and Manwë told that he wished him to go as the third to Middle-Earth. Olórin answered that he meant himself to weak for such a task and that he feared Sauron. Then Manwë said that that was all the more reason why he should go and he commanded him to go as the third. There Varda broke in and said "Not as the third". and Curumo remembered that. The tale ends with the statement that Curumo was obliged to take Aiwendil [ Radagast ] with him to please Yavanna, Aulë`s wife and that Alatar took Pallando as a friend.


In a 1958 letter, Tolkien explains that the two wizards went into the East, and likely failed their mission, possibly falling into the same trap of greed and power-lust that would consume Curumo. However, all of this changes in a text written in the last year or two of Tolkien's life (published in The Peoples of Middle-earth) of 1968. They are said to have arrived not in the Third Age, but in the Second, around the year 1600, the time of the Forging of the One Ring. Their mission though is still to the east, to weaken the forces of Sauron. And it is here said that the Wizards far from failed; rather, they had a pivotal role in the victories of the West at the end of both the Second and the Third Ages. At the same time, Tolkien considered the possibility that Glorfindel arrived back in Middle-earth along with the Blue Wizards. On this later, more positive interpretation, the Blue Wizards may have been as successful as Olórin, just located in a different theatre beyond the borders of the map in The Lord of the Rings.[1]



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