Is LOtr fully based on IRish folklore about the battle between the Tuatha de danan and the Fomorians? They even have Balor a giant eye that destroys everything it sees. The Tuatha de danan are the elves who battled the Fomorians who were like orcs. Balor is Sauron I guess and Cuchulain is not in this I guess.lol
shareMy understanding is that Tolkien avoided Irish influences, though I've seen the Tuatha de danann as possible influences for Robert E. Howard's Picts and in the comic strip Prince Valiant.
"Hell hath no fury like that of the uninvolved." - T. Isabella
But the similarities are close though.
shareIt is certainly worth noting that both Thranduil of the Woodland Realm and his kinsman Thingol Greycloak dwell in underground palaces.
"Hell hath no fury like that of the uninvolved." - T. Isabella
The more mythology I read the more inclined I am to agree with Jung, Jos. Campbell, et al. There are themes that run through all the stories humans have told through the ages. Tolkien acknowledged his debt to a few specific traditions but his main areas of interest seemed to be Germanic and Norse legends. He doesn't seem to have dealt with Celtic myth to any great extent.
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