Gil-galad
Gil-galad is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium, the last high king of the Noldor, one of the main divisions of Elves.
In the Last Alliance of Elves and Men, Gil-galad and Elendil laid siege to the Dark Lord Sauron's fortress of Barad-dûr, and fought him hand-to-hand for the One Ring.
According to The Silmarillion, he was born into the house of Finwë as a son of Fingon sometime in the First Age, and as a child, he was sent away during the Siege of Angband for safekeeping with Cirdan the shipwright in the Falas.
[T 3] After the War of Wrath and the end of the First Age, Gil-galad founded a realm in the coastal region of Lindon along the shores of Belegaer, the Great Sea.
[T 4] King Tar-Aldarion of Númenor presented Gil-galad with the gift of some seeds of the Mallorn tree; he in turn gave some to Galadriel, who grew them in the guarded land of Lothlórien.
At the end of the Second Age, Sauron reappeared with a newly formed army and made war against the kingdom of Gondor, near his old home of Mordor.
At the end of the siege, Sauron finally came forth and fought hand-to-hand against Gil-galad and Elendil on the slopes of Mount Doom, losing the One Ring but killing them both.
[5] Margaret Purdy, in Mythlore, writes that Gil-galad's shield, like all elvish heraldry personal not inherited, seems to incorporate his stars, though the field is blue not silver.
The family tree as presented follows Tolkien's late note The Shibboleth of Fëanor.¶ In the published Silmarillion, Orodreth is Finarfin's second son (and still Finduilas' father), and Gil-galad is Fingon's son.Gil-galad means "star of bright light" in Sindarin.
[T 19] Christopher Tolkien, editing the published version of The Silmarillion, made Gil-galad the son of Fingon, a decision he later regretted, saying he should have left the parentage obscure.
[T 2] Renee Vink, of the Dutch Tolkien Society, suggests that the only good reason for making him son of Fingon is the correspondence of the colours, blue and silver, of Gil-galad's heraldic device and Fingolfin's banner.
She notes that the publication of The Silmarillion, based on a limited "grasp of the material", created a "virtually unshakeable" tradition for this parentage.
[8] The scholar of literature Lawrence Krikorian, in Mallorn, writes that Elrond's account of his personal observation of being Gil-galad's herald in the Second Age, thousands of years earlier, helps to make the narrative function as history rather than allegory.
[10] Gil-galad is mentioned in the behind-the-scenes documentaries included with the Special Extended Edition DVD of The Fellowship of the Ring and is listed in the credits.
