Warg

Hyrrokin riding a wolf, on an image stone from the Hunnestad Monument, constructed in 985–1035 AD|left The Tolkien scholar Tom Shippey states that Tolkien's spelling "warg" is a cross of Old Norse vargr and Old English wearh. He notes that the words embody a shift in meaning from "wolf" to "outlaw": vargr carries both meanings, while wearh means "outcast" or "outlaw", but has lost the sense of "wolf". In Old Norse, vargr is derived from the Proto-Germanic root reconstructed as *wargaz, ultimately derived from the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root reconstructed as *werg̑ʰ- "destroy". Vargr (compare modern Swedish varg "wolf") arose as a non-taboo name for úlfr, the normal Old Norse term for "wolf". Shippey adds that there is an Old English verb, awyrgan, meaning both "to condemn [an outcast]" and "to strangle [an outcast to death]"; he writes that a possible further sense is "to worry [a sheep], to bite to death". He writes that In Norse mythology, wargs are the mythological wolves Fenrir, Sköll and Hati. Sköll and Hati are wolves, one going after the Sun, the other after the Moon. Wolves served as mounts for more or less dangerous humanoid creatures. For instance, ''Gunnr's horse was a kenning for "wolf" on the Rök runestone. In the Lay of Hyndla'', the eponymous seeress rides a wolf. The jötunn Hyrrokkin arrives at Baldr's funeral on a wolf. The medievalist and Tolkien scholar Marjorie Burns writes that Tolkien uses the fact that wolves were among the Norse god Odin's war beasts "in a particularly innovative way". Odin kept two wolves, Freki and Geri, their names both meaning "Greedy"; and in the final battle that destroys the world, Ragnarök, Odin is killed and eaten by the gigantic wolf Fenrir. Thus, Burns points out, wolves were both associates of Odin, and his mortal enemy. She argues that Tolkien made use of both relationships in The Lord of the Rings. In her view, both the Dark Lord Sauron and the evil Wizard Saruman embody "attributes of a negative Odin". for the enormous battering ram named Grond which destroys the main gate of Minas Tirith. On the other side, the benevolent Wizard Gandalf leads the fight against the wargs in The Hobbit, using his ability to create fire, and understands their language. In The Fellowship of the Ring, Gandalf again uses magic and fire to drive off a great wolf, "The Hound of Sauron", and his wolf-pack; Burns writes that the wolves' attempt "to devour Gandalf hints at Odin's fate", recalling the myth of Fenrir and Odin. ==J. R. R. Tolkien ==

In J. R. R. Tolkien's books about Middle-earth, wargs are a malevolent wolf-like race. They are usually in league with the Orcs whom they permit to ride on their backs into battle, sharing any spoils. In The Hobbit, they can speak: they plan their part in "a great goblin-raid" on the woodmen's villages. Tolkien's wargs influenced the ten-year-old Rayner Unwin to write a positive review of The Hobbit, with the words "Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who lived in his hobbit hole and never went for adventures, at last Gandalf the wizard and his dwarves persuaded him to go. He had a very ex[c]iting time fighting goblins and wargs." The review led his father, Stanley Unwin, to publish the book, still doubting its likely commercial success. mounts, as depicted in Peter Jackson's The Two Towers, battling the Riders of Rohan. The critic Gregory Hartley treats wargs as "personified animals", along with the sentient eagles, giant spiders, Smaug the dragon, ravens and thrushes. Tolkien writes about their actions using verbs like "[to] plan" and "[to] guard", implying in Hartley's view that the monstrous wargs are "more than mere beasts", but he denies that they "possess autonomous wills". T. A. Leederman calls Tolkien's wargs "a species of semi-intelligent but evil-aligned mount wolves ... on whom the orcs rode into battle". He notes that they may have been derived, in the fiction, from First Age werewolves like Carcharoth, with their own "proto-language". ==In Dungeons & Dragons ==

In the context of the tabletop game Dungeons & Dragons, "wargs" first appeared in Gary Gygax's Swords and Spells supplement (1976), but were renamed to "worgs" (along with balrogs to "balors," ents to "treants," and hobbits to "halflings") in response to a lawsuit from Tolkien's estate. In the first edition of the Monster Manual (1977), "dire wolf (worg)" appears under the entry for "wolf." In later editions, such as the 2014 edition, "worg" receives its own entry. ==Other authors and media ==

In George R. R. Martin's series of epic fantasy novels, A Song of Ice and Fire, and the series' television adaptation, Game of Thrones, Wargs are skinchangers who can enter the mind of animals (and in Bran Stark's case with Hodor, a person), see what they are seeing, and control their actions. In Wen Spencer's Tinker (Elfhome) series, wargs are large magically engineered wolves. Similar Tolkien-based creatures appear in some fantasy video games, including The Lord of the Rings Online, Age of Conan, and World of Warcraft, both as four-legged monsters, and as a race of anthropomorphic werewolves, the Worgen. ==See also ==