The Line of Durin only mentions Kings because Tolkien made it that way. He also made it so that the Dwarves apparently don’t record the names of the ladies. I expect he probably did think that male primogeniture was the way to go as well.
I dislike this intensely. So I’m changing it. Because fanfiction. So yes, in Sansukh,
Dísith
is firstborn, so she’s first in line. Durin is not.
(before someone points out
Dís-the-elder, in Sansukh she abdicated her place in the succession in order to marry Vili – as a lowborn nobody of a miner, he really was at the bottom of the heap. It’s mentioned several times in the fic. That’s why she didn’t become Queen. Also, she bloody didn’t want it after what it had done to her family.)
Well, canonically we don’t actually know very much about this. What we have is briefly summarised here. There’s also the speculation that Durin would return to herald the final era of glory for the Dwarves, before they dwindled and disappeared to give way to the era of Men.
The Dwarves believe that the eldest of the seven original Dwarves, Durin, would be reincarnated seven times and reign as King. There have been six Kings called Durin thus far.
In Sansukh, the seventh just arrived!
We know that Durin VII is meant to be descended from Thorin III Stonehelm, which is shown in the family tree in the LOTR Appendices.
What we DON’T know: how the heck do they know it’s Durin??????
My solution: Durin’s eyes. They shine in certain light, like ithildin.
Some speculation and ideas, now: I don’t believe that this little baby is going to have ALL the memories of his earlier lives. I think that is a recipe for disaster and heartache, frankly. He’s still a child, who does child things.
Each incarnation is like a possibility: I’m of the nurture-over-nature school of thought here. Depending on the influences in a kid’s life they can grow and develop in a myriad of ways, and this one is no different.
Some memories will come later in his life, as he becomes ready for them (not his deaths, though. Mahal would never be so cruel). More important is how people help and prepare him to face his own legend – and whether they treat him like an actual child, who does child-things both good and bad!
His new parents are very well suited to help with this, actually. Thorin Stonehelm knows ALLLLL about following in the footsteps of giants and having to live up to an impossible legacy. And Bomfris would tell Eru himself to shove it where the sun shineth not! She’s not going to hold back from telling a naughty Durin to ‘go to your room!’ if needed.
So, there’s some headcanoning! I hope you like, Nonnie!
omg – Nonnie, I have no idea? Perhaps some Dwarves would absolutely swear by the practice, in order for their little pebble to have a luxurious head of hair later on in life? But others might be OUTRAGED – i don’t know, I can’t decide, but what a fascinating idea! Thank you so much for sharing it with me!
(I’ve answered this before, Nonnie. Try here, and here!)
And yes, as far as I’m concerned. To quote that last answer, “what Prof T says is: Dwarves fall in love once, and if it isn’t reciprocated they devote their lives to their crafts. What Prof T doesn’t say: Whether they fall in love with one person at a time. Fall in love once – okay, gotcha – but nothing says that love must be for one individual alone.”
I made myself sad with an idea – when Aule made the dwarfs, and Eru found out, he wanted to destroy them first, and the original dwarf prototypes huddled together in fear and pleading for mercy. What if dwarfs have an unconscious recolletction of that, deep in their bones and souls, and they are so stubborn in their ways and unbending because they have the utmost need to be just as mahal made them else he’ll be displeased and will want to throw them away again.
Summarised: yes, Dwarves can TOTALLY find romance in the Halls, but it takes a while because of the huge stagnancy/inertia of the Halls. They are a place of waiting, and of peace, basically. So things happen slowly, if at all.
(still, Bifur and Ori managed to discover love for each other after death, so heyyy it happens!)
Oh yeah, other clans could totally happen! ABSOLUTELY happen. I mean, I have a few inter-clan relationships going on already… Bomfris is a Broadbeam, Orla is a Blacklock, Bifur, Bombur AND Bofur are Broadbeams… Gloin is ½ Firebeard… etc!
I think mingling would depend on the Dwarves as individuals rather than as a unit. Some would like to keep only to those folks they know – or knew, rather. Some are gregarious and curious and interested in meeting new people and learning about them!
(Bombur would absolutely be one of these… he’s a rather reticent fellow by nature, but he must-must-must know about their food, what are their cuisines like? Can he try it? What ingredient is this? May he PLEASE watch you as you make it???)
A note on the whole ‘Ones’ thing: no soulmates in Sansukh, sorry. I dislike the whole ‘predestination’ thing… I like free will. I also believe that it isn’t one person alone that could be ‘made for you’… you could be happy with any number of different people, but you have to choose them, choose it, and work at it, every day. A personal bias thingy there.
Nori explicitly tells us in the story that he and Dori are both aro-ace… well, actually, he specifies that Dori is aro-ace, and that he himself is definitely aro… perhaps not ace! But he ain’t telling. A Dwarf needs a few secrets, and Nori likes to keep folks guessing.
Fili’s storyline in this fic is not about romance, and I will not create one for him… his story arc is about stepping up to leadership in his own right.
(I hope you note that Nori was first calling Thorin ‘boss’… but now? Now he calls FILI ‘boss’. Also, Fili has developed a nearly pathological protective streak for Frodo a mile wide. He is becoming a leader and a protector in ways that have nothing to do with his bloodline and heritage. GO FILI, GO FILI, GOLDEN HEART MY SON, YOU LITTLE BEAUTY)
Frerin has the crush to end all crushes on both Eowyn AND Faramir. But also recall, he still has the body and emotional responses of a mid-teen. Poor boy has the intellect of a much, much older Dwarf, but it’s crammed into a tiny body with a truckload of hormones. I don’t think we will see him in actual, reciprocal romantic love in this state.
(but hey, we have good evidence that he is at the very least bisexual, and that he is hella poly.)
A long-term friend of mine had been lamenting that while there seems to be a lot of push to diversify elves and ‘get them out of the forest’ but everybody seems content to leave the dwarves in their mountains. In my campaign world I do have dwarves still in the mountains, but I have a particular reason.
Dwarves, as a fantasy or rpg race typically have the following traits:
Short, stocky or round with a low center of gravity
Facial hair and plenty of it, sometimes on females as well
The Axe. If there’s no axe, there will be a hammer
Smiths, craftsmen and great builders
Beer, mead, ale… it’s all good as long as it’s not wine
Underground. Not just a little hole, but deep underground.
That’s a phenotype you can pick up and move anywhere, provided you can grow something you can then ferment and make into booze. So let’s see how they might fit in different environments.
Desert. If you’re going to live in the desert you have to worry about water and maintaining your body temperature, as it can get both unreasonably hot and cold in the desert, often switching from one extreme to another from day to night. Lots of animals have figured out that the temperature is much more stable underground and burrow, and the trees that survive find the water table. There are two very good reasons to build your home underground, and from there you expand your home into a city with networks etc. You can ferment the cacti. Darkvision would be handy as you’re not going to come up in the day if you can avoid it. I imagine they’d build large ventilation columns, a bit like termite mounds, reaching above the dunes, the only evidence of the city below.
Sea edge. I’m thinking cliffs, harsh and windswept towering above the churning waters. The windchill can be lethal, and the saltwater of the ocean is all but undrinkable without specialized processing. (Maybe they have that technology, maybe salt is a major export. Everybody needs salt before refrigeration.) Not much lives on sea cliffs aside from some agile birds that nest there, far out of reach of predators. Building your fortress into the side of the sea cliffs is a very defensible position, and there’s a huge amount of energy to be potentially harnessed in the wind and waves. Branching out into ships is difficult from cliffs, it may be easier to use underwater channels, if such a clever dwarf could devise a vessel to travel entirely beneath the waves. The lower tunnels of an sea cliff fortress are prone to flooding, so these dwarves are likely to be better at balancing and swimming than their inland brethren.
Ice. Where do you expect to find a phenotype that has a reduced body surface area to volume ratio (approaching spherical), comfortable insulating body fat and extra hair? Somewhere very cold. You can dig down into solid ice, which will be relatively more comfortable out of the wind chill, but if you build up with the excavated ice it will likely end up with snow accumulating on at least one side, eventually looking like a hill. Fireballs obviously strongly discouraged, and layered furs prefered over open flame for heat to preserve structural integrity.
Old forest. Nobody ever said anything about getting the dwarves out of the forest. I don’t mean your standard, idyllic, meadow filled forest. I mean the dark, overgrown, ancient, creaking forest with trees so old, massive and twisted that you can’t be certain they don’t have faces. The sort of forest where you can barely see the sky, and the hairs stand up on the back of your neck for no clear reason, but you can’t help but trust your instinct that something, somewhere is patiently waiting to eat you. Here it’s probably much safer underground, where you can at least establish a defensible position. I imagine large halls, edged with the passive roots of the still living trees, and probably a significant mushroom proportion in the diet. Elves above may not even know they’re there.
Really they can make themselves at home anywhere you need a defensible position. Break some stereotypes, throw some dwarves around.
(But you cannot toss them)
…Desert dwarves fermenting cacti for booze. So you’re saying… dwarves with tequila? XD
Aw Yiss 