Éowyn

Éowyn
Tolkien's legendarium character
Aliases	Dernhelm
Race	Men of Rohan
Book(s)	The Two Towers (1954) The Return of the King (1955)

Éowyn is a fictional character in Tolkien's legendarium who appears in his most famous work, The Lord of the Rings. She is a noblewoman of Rohan who is described as a shieldmaiden.

In The Two Towers, Éowyn, a daughter of the House of Eorl and the goddaughter of King Théoden of Rohan, is introduced in Meduseld, the king's hall at Edoras. She was the daughter of Théodwyn (Théoden's sister) and Éomund and the sister of Éomer. When she was only seven years old, her father was killed fighting orcs and her mother died of grief. Éowyn and Éomer were raised in her uncle's household as if they were his own children.

Tolkien writes that she longed to win renown in battle—especially since she was royal—but being female, her duties were reckoned to be at Edoras. When Théoden's mind was poisoned by his adviser Gríma Wormtongue, Éowyn was obliged to care for her uncle, and his deterioration pained her deeply. To make matters worse, she was constantly harassed by Gríma, who lusted after her. However, when Gandalf arrived, he freed Théoden from Wormtongue's influence.

Éowyn fell in love with Aragorn, but it soon became clear that he could not return her love although he did not mention his betrothal to Arwen, except by indirect allusion, and would not allow her to join him in going to war. As Aragorn pointed out, her duty was with her people; she had to shoulder the responsibility of ruling Rohan in Théoden's stead when the war-host of Rohan went to war, a duty he deemed no less valiant. Likening her situation to a "cage", Éowyn said she feared "[t]o stay behind bars, until use and old age accept them, and all chance of great deeds is gone beyond recall or desire."

In The Return of the King, she disguised herself as a man and under the alias of Dernhelm (from Old English dern meaning "secret, concealed"), and she traveled with the Riders of Rohan to the Battle of the Pelennor Fields outside the White City of Minas Tirith in Gondor, carrying with her Meriadoc Brandybuck, who had also been ordered to remain behind, on her horse Windfola.

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