Long before the adventures of Frodo and the Fellowship, there were many mysterious figures and creatures in the universe of The Lord of the Rings that we could never see in the movies. One such being is Ungoliant, whose descendants nearly finished off Frodo.
Where does Ungoliant come from? The true origin of Ungoliant is unknown. Some Elves believed that Ungoliant was once an Ainur. The Ainur were created by Eru Ilúvatar before the beginning of the world.
It is believed that Melkor, an Ainur who later became a malevolent dark lord, corrupted Ungoliant. However, Ungoliant was not loyal to Melkor. She acted according to her insatiable urge to consume everything that could satisfy her own emptiness. For this purpose, she then also collaborated with Melkor.
An Insatiable Hunger
Ungoliant wants to satisfy her own emptiness. To satiate her insatiable hunger and flee from the Valar who were hunting her, Ungoliant went to Avathar, a place on the continent Aman, which is west of Middle-earth. There, the creature took the form of a gigantic spider. She consumed more and more light and spun dark webs in a mountain that served as her hideout.
However, it happened that Ungoliant had drained all the light and she began to hunger again. Later, she encountered Melkor once more, who was plotting his revenge against the Valar. He promised Ungoliant to do everything to satisfy her hunger if she helped him.
To this end, they together destroyed the two trees of Valinor, which produced the light of the world. Ungoliant masked the two with her dark webs. Ungoliant drained the trees and the source of Varda and extracted their light. Ungoliant grew, and even Melkor developed fear.
They then fled from Aman to Middle-earth, but Ungoliant realized that Melkor would probably not keep his promise, which is why she captured him. The situation escalated, and Ungoliant attempted to kill Melkor. In a moment of desperation, he screamed and thereby attracted his Balrogs.
The Escape of Ungoliant
Ungoliant could not withstand the Balrogs of Melkor. The Balrogs attacked Ungoliant and prevented her master Melkor from dying. She fled to a place that would later be known as Nan Dungortheb and shielded everything with her spider webs.
There, Ungoliant mated with other spider beings and gave birth to several descendants, making Nan Dungotheb a terrible place, full of creatures that only killed out of malice and hunger. Only two known individuals survived the place and managed to come out alive.
Her descendant Shelob is known from the films as the great spider who almost devoured Frodo in Cirith Ungol and was fought by Sam.
Not much is known about the end of Ungoliant, only that the creature left Nan Dungortheb. In some stories, it is speculated that Ungoliant devoured herself in her insatiable hunger.
The universe of The Lord of the Rings offers so much more than the many films show. An important character that has never been seen on the big screen is Tom Bombadil. Despite his jolly nature, this character is a powerful figure: A character in The Lord of the Rings is so powerful and could have changed everything, yet he is absent in the films
