I never thought of that...

[iainjcoleman]

In all the years I've been reading Tolkien, in all my rereads of The Lord of the Rings, this point (that I saw on an anonymeme) never occurred to me:

The Rohirrim explicitly have no issue with female warriors. Eowyn calls herself a "shieldmaiden" like that's an actual thing, and while Theoden and Eomer and Aragorn are all eager to stuff her into a

Comments

[watervole]

How often do we explicitly get told the gender of a rider? (I'd expect the shieldmaidens to be a small minority, so would be rare among named characters)

There were shieldmaidens in the sagas - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shieldmaiden - so it's not at all surprising for Tolkien to use the concept.

If shieldmaidens were part of the normal way of doing things, you wouldn't necessarily expect characters to comment on their presence.

[philmophlegm]

Good point, and few of the Rohirrim warriors are even named. What named riders there are seem to be the senior officers. Of these, Theodred is Theoden's son, Eomer his nephew (or 'sister-son', if you prefer) and he doesn't seem to have many other living relatives apart from Eowyn. That leaves (off the top of my head) Erkenbrand, Elfhelm, Eothain, Gamling and Grimbold.

That _might_ suggest that while women frequently fight, they only command if (like Eowyn) they are royal.

[kalypso_v]

It could be that the women are trained to act as the Home Guard, defending their homes while the men ride out to war, which would fit in with Eowyn being charged "to govern the people until their lord's return". Although it's tempting to think that there are other women riders at Pelennor, that appears to be contradicted by the Rohirrim who speak to Imrahil:

And rising he looked then on Eowyn and was amazed. 'Surely, here is a woman?' he said. 'Have even the women of the Rohirrim come to war in our need?'
'Nay! One only,' they answered. 'The Lady Eowyn is she, sister of Eomer; and we knew naught of her riding until this hour, and greatly we rue it.'

[temeres]

They wore false beards and rode in the ranks as honorary men. Absolutely true, see the Making Of featurettes on the extended edition DVD.