Bag End

[6] The protagonists of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, lived at Bag End, a luxurious smial or Hobbit-burrow, dug into The Hill on the north side of the town of Hobbiton in the Shire's Westfarthing.

[15][16] The scholar of literature and film Steven Woodward and the architectural historian Kostis Kourelis suggest that Tolkien may have based his Hobbit-holes on Iceland's turf houses, such as those at Keldur.

[18] The Tolkien scholar Michael Livingston comments that from this it is easy "to recall the man-like, elf-friend, hole-dwelling hobbit Mr. Baggins of Bag-End, hired by the not-too-dissimilar dwarves to commit thievery".

Its position at the top of The Hill "demonstrates a physical and social elevation above other hole-owners",[2] since as Tolkien wrote in the Prologue to The Lord of the Rings, "suitable sites for these large and ramifying tunnels...were not everywhere to be found".

Such things could indicate, Brooke writes, that Bag End's owner is "indulgent, overly-luxurious, too comfortable, a tad vain even",[2] though against this, the hanging-space for many hats and coats suggests that welcoming guests is important to him.

Brooke quotes Morris's remark that "the working man cannot afford to live in anything that an architect could design; moderate-sized rabbit-warrens [are] for rich middle-class men",[19] stating that with its mention of rabbit warrens, this "aptly suits Bag End".

[2] The cartographer Karen Wynn Fonstad created a plan of Bag End, showing her vision of its comfortable layout with many cellars and pantries, complete with multiple fireplaces and chimneys, based on the clues given by Tolkien in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

[4] The journalist Matthew Dennison compares Lobelia Sackville-Baggins's desire to move into Bag End to the similarly-named aristocrat Vita Sackville-West's passionate attachment to her family home, Knole House, which she was unable to inherit.

[21] The historian Joseph Loconte wrote that Tolkien had set up a contrast between Frodo's light and serene Bag End and the corrupted wizard Saruman's dark and industrially destructive Isengard.

[26][27] Honegger points out a quite different contrast, between Bag End as depicted in Tolkien's drawing The Hall at Bag End, "the homely yet narrowly limited space of a hobbit-hole with the similarly neat and defined landscape of the Shire in the background," with his The Forest of Lothlórien in Spring, which shows "no particular place, but an airy glade in a forest filled with sunlight, evoking a feeling of sheltered openness.

The same applies, Honegger argues, to time: where Bag End and the Shire are anachronistically in the present, the Old Forest, Rivendell, and Lothlórien represent journeys back into the past.

[3] Bag End receives strange visitors – Gandalf and the Dwarves, making it seem a "queer place", in the character Ted Sandyman's words, "and its folk are queerer".

[28][29] David LaFontaine writes in The Gay and Lesbian Review Worldwide that Bilbo is a "confirmed bachelor" who is never "linked romantically" with any woman, and who lives alone in the "luxurious, lovely environment", Bag End, "illustrating the hobbit's artistic sensibility".

[30] The 1969 parody novel Bored of the Rings, written by the National Lampoon founders Henry Beard and Douglas Kenney, mocks Frodo's homecoming from his dangerous quest to Bag End with the words "he walked directly to his cozy fire and slumped in the chair.

Bag End, Hobbiton, the comfortable underground dwelling of Bilbo and later Frodo Baggins , constructed for Peter Jackson 's The Lord of the Rings film series .
Tolkien's painting The Hill: Hobbiton-across-the-Water , watercolour , 1938 [ 1 ] showing its ideal position near the top of the Hill at Hobbiton, with less-favoured Hobbit-holes lower down. [ 2 ]
The Hall at Bag-End, Residence of B. Baggins Esquire : Tolkien's drawing of Bilbo Baggins in the front hall of Bag End, showing it as a sizeable room with 20th century fittings including a clock and a barometer .
Jackson's version of the Hill at Hobbiton on the Water. The image may be compared with Tolkien's watercolour painting The Hill: Hobbiton-across-the-Water (above).
Turf-covered houses at Keldur , Iceland
A cosy interior: the Swedish artist Carl Larsson portrayed his Arts and Crafts-inspired home in 1901 in this painting. Johanna Brooke suggests that Bag End could have been in such a style. [ 2 ]
The cartographer Karen Wynn Fonstad 's plan of Bag End, showing her vision of its comfortable layout with many cellars and pantries, and multiple fireplaces and chimneys. [ 20 ]
Lobelia Sackville-Baggins's desire to acquire ‘Bag End’, Bilbo's home, has been compared to Vita Sackville-West 's frustrated desire to inherit her family home, Knole House (pictured). [ 23 ]
Contrast with Bag End: Matěj Čadil's artist's impression of Lothlórien , "an airy glade in a forest filled with sunlight, evoking a feeling of sheltered openness." [ 3 ]